There are many aspects and elements of a great novel. One of them is plot – nothing is more thrilling than a tightly woven story, filled with ups, downs, turns and red herrings finished with a magnificent payoff. But a great plot will feel empty if the characters are intangible, two dimensional and unfeeling. The one thing that makes the characters of a novel tangible for the readers is the characters’ emotions. The more the characters and the protagonist feel emotions, the more real they are for the readers. You can write a great story, but no reader will care about it unless they feel what the characters are feeling. And below, there are several ways which can help you create characters that brim with emotions.

1. Understandable characters

The first step towards believable characters is creating characters the readers can relate to. This doesn’t mean that every character needs a certain set of character traits. What they need instead is a lot more subtle: dreams, aspirations and desires. Quite often, book characters, and protagonists especially, find themselves in situations they never wanted to be. There are various reasons why – it might be a call of duty, a family obligation or maybe a friend in need will call upon the protagonist. The readers will understand the characters and the protagonist better if they know who the character was before the story, why the story needed to happen, and how the events of the story change the protagonist’s life.

2. Show the emotions

Showing the emotions is a no brainer – it is always better to describe the emotion and the physical effect it has on the protagonist, rather than simply state what the protagonist is feeling. Consider the background of your protagonist – what makes him afraid, and what makes him happy and pleased? How will he react, talk and move when he’s afraid, and how will he move when he is happy or content? Answering these questions will give you two aspects of your protagonist – his emotional triggers and his reactions, thus creating a deeper effect than simply stating what emotion overcomes the protagonist at a given moment.

3. Use conflict and important scenes

There is an unwritten rule that says every scene needs to have a purpose in a novel. Every small scene needs to move the plot forward. The emotional arc of the protagonist in the novel is a subtle line that runs parallel with the overall plot – and the best way to incorporate this is to make every scene vitally important for the protagonist. This doesn’t mean that the protagonist needs to be afraid for his or her life in every scene. But the scenes where the protagonist isn’t in danger should be focused on the protagonist as a person. Every scene needs conflict, and conflict that inflicts emotional responses in the protagonist is what makes the scene important.

4. Verbal and physical reactions

In the scenes where the emotions of the protagonist start boiling is a scene worth reading. This means that the characters shouldn’t boil inside and put on a poker face, or hide behind a mask – unless the story and the situation requires it (in turn, hiding emotions from the characters the protagonist is speaking to creates tension both within the protagonist and the reader – which is an emotion in itself). In other situations, protagonists wear their hearts on their sleeves and react, both verbally and maybe even physically and violently towards the other characters or objects that have triggered a powerful emotion. Remember, a trigger can be simply an object that brings back a memory, a setting which reminds the protagonist of an event that has happened but left a deep mark on him, and it can be a person who goads the protagonist on purpose.

5. Magic words

We’ve covered the characters, the situations and we have reached the most important element of giving protagonists emotions: the wording. Never be afraid to use powerful words to increase the emotion of a scene. Harsh words can convey a sharp emotion, while softer words will convey a gentler emotion easily. Use a sharp, austere writing style to describe negative emotions, and a style that is mellow and even a bit flowery to describe a positive emotional state of the protagonist. Otherwise, even a sad scene where a character dies will be flat and emotionless for the readers.

Image credit: Pixabay

Georgina Roy wants to live in a world filled with magic. As an art student, she’s moonlighting as a writer and is content to fill notebooks and sketchbooks with magical creatures and amazing new worlds. When she is not at school, or scribbling away in a notebook, you can usually find her curled up, reading a good urban fantasy novel, or writing on her laptop, trying to create her own.