Lost Boys, by OSC. Any writer who hasn't read it needs to. First off, just because it's a good read, but also as a study in effective characterization. I would say this is the quintessential "character" book. The entire book rests almost 100% on characterization. I absolutely loved the book and found it very gripping. It was a book I had trouble putting down. Here's the wierd thing I noticed about it, though. NOTHING HAPPENED. I would say 90% of the book is just a bunch a random, unconnected events in the life of this family. You don't even find out what the main plot is until the very end when the twist is introduced. So how could such a rambling book be so gripping?

Because of the characters. I really cared about the characters, and wanted everything to turn out okay for this family. The conflicts were mostly pretty minor, actually. The husband has a crappy job with a crappy, unethical boss. The teacher is picking on the son. The home teaching companion is crazy. That Glass guy seems like he might be a child-molester. A dozen other subplot threads. Nothing big, nothing that even feels really important, except that you love the characters so much that it's important that they solve these problems and go on with their lives, happy and content.

But you never notice the characterization happening. There are no, "Sit down, reader, and let me tell you about this character," sessions. You just get to know them like you get to know people in real life, by watching them act, react, and interact.

I think that's a big part of effective characterization. I guess it's part of the rationale behind "show, don't tell." In real life, there is nobody narrating everything, telling you things like, "Pablo is a shy, laid-back kind of guy. He doesn't like conflict, and he feels that his sense of humor will help him avoid it," so why say things like that in a story? In real life, we just learn what kind of person we think Pablo is by watching him and interpreting what we see him do and hear him say. It makes sense that the same method would be the most effective way to let the reader get to know characters in a story.

Another advantage to this is that it lets the reader filter a character's actions through his own perceptions, just like he would in real life. Our observations aren't objective. Two people can observe the same action and interpret it into two different opinions of the person. When we let the readers of our stories get to know characters the same way, instead of just telling them what the character traits are, it feels more real. It feels more like a real person, because they got to know them like they get to know real people.

I have always thought OSC does a great job of characterization. It is one of his strong points.

You said that nothing happened in the story yet you kept reading. You've made a real discovery, and it's the discovery between "movement" and "dramatic action." By "movement," I mean physical movement--moving from place to place and even intense movement of chase scenes and battles. By "dramatic action" I mean that which infuses drama into the story, namely, the process of the unknown becoming known, discovery by the hero and his subsequent decision based on his discovery, and the action that follows.

Consider: a wife drinking coffee from a mug is "movement," but if she happens to find lipstick on her cup that isn't her shade, that's "dramatic action." The unknown (the lipstick) has become known; a discovery has been made. We are held captive, waiting for her decision to either act or not to act. Not having read LOST BOYS, but reading your comments on it, I would suspect that the story is held together by a lot of "dramatic action" as opposed to a lot of "movement."

You're also correct in that effective characterization is not telling the reader about the characters, but showing the reader the characters through their appearance, actions, speech, and thoughts. One of the most dramatic tools writers have is putting conflict between these four methods. You show us that the character looks like a hobo, but then you show us that he enjoys reading French literature in French. The character has suddenly become alive. What happens if by his thoughts we see that he is very much an optimist, but he speaks as a pessimist. Obviously his thoughts are more true than his speech, so why does he want to come across as a pessimist? If he read French literature in French, he's probably well educated, so why does he dress like a hobo? These are questions that can be answered in a variety of ways, but the point is that by putting these four methods in contradiction with one another you've suddenly created a rather complex character. What you do with that will make or break the story.

If LOST BOYS affected you that much, you should go back and study what Card did to make his characters come alive for you. Study the story's dramatic action (not the movement). Look at how he reveals his characters through appearance, action, speech, and thoughts.

And on a personal note, for me the quintessential character writer is Charles Dickens.

Hobo + education x French = Pessimism

PS -- I also should have included Honore de Balzac (19th century) to the original list.

It's nice to know you like Hemingway. I was thinking about posting 13 of his lines in the newly opened discussion area. After Flannery O'Connor, I think he's the greatest short-story writer of the 20th century.