20. Picture them
How
many characters are there in your novel? You probably started off with
a small cast of central figures. Maybe just one.
If you are lucky you will have mental images of their appearance and
– perhaps – mannerisms or patterns of speech.
But then they begin to breed more and more people:
- the security guard that your heroine always sees at the same time each day as she leaves her office
- the postal worker who delivers the fateful letter
- the neighbour's children
- the blacksmith, the job's-worth from the council, the half-seen mugger, the half-glimpsed hit-and-run driver …
All these people to keep in your head, to imagine
and flesh out with their own lives and motivations … it can be
a struggle to say the least.
If you have difficulty picturing this expanding cast of characters, try this trick. Look through exhibition catalogues and photographic coffee-table books and choose faces that can fit your minor characters. Scan them or photocopy them and pin them up beside your desk or slip them between the pages of your notebook. When ideas for those characters come to you, jot them down alongside or – better still – on the pictures.
Picture them.
