Have you heard of Huckelberry Finn? He’s been an unforgettable character since 1884. Memorable characters are what make stories great. They feel like real people, making the reader care about what happens to them.

You can have an engaging plot, cool stuff that happens, and tons of conflict, but if you don’t have a great character the readers can care about, your story is lacking. Love them or hate them, readers want to care about your characters.

Make Your Characters Jump Off the Page

For the characters to pull the reader into the story, they need to feel like real people. Your characters need to be three-dimensional with a personality, a past, a family, secrets, a job, friends, and hopes and dreams. A good way to do this is to answer these four basic questions:

• Who are they?
• What do they want?
• What’s standing in the way?
• What’s the worst…