Writing Tip #1 & My Writing Journey Update

Hey there! This is just a fun little update about writing, and my writing journey. Maybe you've noticed that I've been posting more often :)
I am LOVING writing more often. I've finished several short stories and poems lately, as well as getting a lot accomplished in re-writing my books.
I've also been participating in YWW - Young Writer's Workshop. It's hosted by Brett Harris and Jaquelle Crowe, both of which got published while in their teens. It's fantastic! I'm loving all that I'm learning. I found a couple of tips that help me write, and so I thought I might do a little series on them. :) I'm still debating on whether I should solely write my devos on this blog, or add to it to become my own personal blog.
Anyways...
 

Writing Tip #1

Develop Your Characters

Obviously, this is a fiction writing tip. :) I've found that developing my characters not only makes it more exciting, it makes it easier and more accurate to write them.
It annoys me to no end when people just add in a ton of characters and never really develop any of them. It turns me off.
In short stories, you don't necessarily need a timeline of their entire life (though I tend to write one anyways!), but in books it's a lot easier to write when you know their story, their life, their dreams, and their sorrows. Developing characters helps the reader to be able to really understand them. For example, in a short story I'm writing (which I still haven't named... hehe), Adrianna (the protagonist) lives in a very quiet home. 
Most people around her don't understand why the family hardly ever socializes, hardly speaks, and never participates in anything. They live simply, and hardly ever wear new clothing.
But behind it all, Adrianna really lives in a loving home - even though her mother never shows it. Her father died when she was only eight, four years before the story begins. He died while saving another family during a storm on the ocean. He was the lighthouse keeper, and a jovial, handsome young man with life to look forward to with his family of two daughters (at the time) and a beautiful wife.
When he died, his wife struggled with the fact that their baby was born too early because of her stress over his death. The baby was born only a few days after his death and nearly died, which caused her even more sorrow. Yet she never grieved, holding it all on the inside, which caused her to clamp shut against the world. She never grieved for the sake of her three daughters, because she had to be strong for them. She had to help the family survive on the meager salary she earned as she took her husband's place as the lighthouse keeper. She had no family to turn to, because they had all disowned her after she fell in love with a sailor of all people rather than someone of the same high social standards and married him against the family's wishes. She shut off the world, and kept to herself.
Adrianna doesn't understand completely, and even though she is a young lady, she has no friends but the ocean. Her father had always told her that the ocean was her friend, if she respected its strength. So it is no surprise when she disappears, only to find her...
 
Alright, that's where my example ends. How's that? :) When I'm writing from the POV of one of the characters, I tend to act out their situation - most of the time in my head, thank goodness! Arissa, one of the characters I write the part for in To Find the Royal Truth (a series that I'm writing with my best friend, and one that I doll-itized a teaser trailer type thing for - you can read it here) is one of the characters I like to imagine her part as. That way, I can accurately write what I think I would say if I was in her position... it's rather fun, if not eccentric. :D
 
I hope this helps, if you're a writer! I love writing, and I love meeting other writers!
~ Light4theLord
 

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Introducing... Charis Rae!

I'm so honored to be a part of Charis Rae's blog launch (a.k.a. Grace from The Girl Upstairs), and here it is!