Now What Do You Want?

Getting more specific about what drives your characters

What does your character want? Most writers strive to answer this question before they get too deep in a project. It's generally considered essential. But have you ever felt you only had a vague answer, something like Happiness? Love? A home? A few twists on the question can make it more useful by forcing it into more specific territory.  

• Try to identify the one object or physical item the character most wants. Is it related to the one emotion they would like to experience (or be shed of)?

• Ask yourself if there's a difference between what the character really wants and what they say they want. Or what they think they want.

• Then go to the one-third point in the text (if you're not finished, just estimate where it would be) and ask whether what the character wants has changed.

• At two thirds, ask again. Have new desires arisen in place of or addition to the original one?

• Finally, at the end, contemplate whether the character ended up with what they wanted. If not, what do they have instead?