Into the Night

This is the most fun part (short of the actual writing) of the whole development of a book… determining whether a character will be good or evil, based on their morals vs. the morals of their people. I don’t determine whether a character is a hero or a villain for a reason, here… As far as I’m concerned, whether a character is hero or villain depends on their actions in correspondence to each other. But I firmly believe a hero can be (or at least do) evil, and a villain can be (or at least do) good. That’s determined by social mores.

Now, this particular area isn’t quite as much fun in contemporary fiction, because we’re all aware of what we consider to be morally repugnant. But what about the future, or another world, or even another dimension? They won’t necessarily have the same moral structure as we do today (after all, even just a hundred years ago, the idea of living together without being married was socially unacceptable in most Western society, but we don’t bat an eye at it today).

So, let’s take our sample series, and determine the morals of our society vs. the morals of our heroes and villains… *GRIN* This should be fun for all of you…

Martian society: Murder is a crime. However, murder of a Psi whose powers pose a threat to the safety and welfare of a normal human is not punished as strictly as the murder of a normal human.

Jack Peterson & Kathrin Cross (from ILLEGAL PURSUIT): Murder is murder. Jack’s a former Homicide detective, who sees no distinction in the violent loss of life, between Psi and non-Psi. Kathrin’s on a personal crusade to see the man who murdered her sister (a powerful Psi) locked up forever. Both are Psi, so naturally, this would colour their outlook on the law.

Josef Travinski (also ILLEGAL PURSUIT): He knows murder is a crime, but he believes Psis are dangerous animals which need to be exterminated for the safety of human society. While he is, in fact, the villain of this story, his views would not necessarily be considered wrong or morally repugnant by Martian society (even though WE recoil in horror at the idea). Ergo, by the morals of his time and location, he isn’t necessarily “evil.”

By the same token, to use another book’s characters as examples (still in the same series) as well, apply the same Martian society rule to this character, and try to see if you can guess if he’s considered good, or evil (not hero or villain, though)…

Xander Mylonas: He has dangerous Psi abilities to possess and drain the life energy from any lifeform, which he must do to sustain his own life, thanks to the radioactive parasites in his blood. He has confined himself to killing only criminals or those whose death is imminent for medical reasons. However, many of these people are non-Psi. By Martian standards, is he good, or evil?

As you can see, the determination of good and evil plays a very big part in character development (at least, for me) because it helps to tell me if this character is going to be honoured or hunted by his/her society, if he/she is going to get in trouble with whatever law (if, indeed, one exists… I have a series with a planet in it where no law exists, and you should see some of THOSE characters!) governs the land, and if he/she will ultimately end up justly rewarded (or punished) for his/her actions. This sets the first big action that will move us into the actual plot of an individual story…

Next, we get out of the realm of general world building, and into the arena of putting it all together, to craft the plot… Stay tuned!

Well, now that we’ve covered Setting and Time, and we’ve hit on the first step of character creation (ie, racial creation), let’s break things down a little further, and get to the bare bones of character creation….

Character Creation, Phase I — What’s in a name?

Most authors know that a name either works, or doesn’t work, for a character. We all know that Slartibartfast, for example, while being absolutely wonderful for tongue-in-cheek humourous SF like Douglas Adams, would be less than successful as our love interest in a SF Romace. But what makes SF/Fantasy names truly unique to the character (and story) at hand?

The answer is surprisingly simple… It comes from all of the prior steps to this one. What do I mean by this? Well, let’s take a look at my sample series, Section Psi, and see…

The series is set on Mars, so you might expect something exotic after hearing that. But, remember, these are Terran colonists. Whenever you transplant a people long distances away from their comfort zone or home territory, instead of going weird and abnormal, they cling to the most traditional, tried-and-true things they can find. So, naturally, people transplanted from Earth to Mars would cling to the most normal thing they could — namely, well, names. At least for a few generations. Which means that new transplants (Like Jack Peterson’s parents) would naturally cling to normalcy when naming their children (hence, the very normal names he and his sisters were given), whereas the descendants of the First Families, who have been on Mars several generations, would try to break away from their Terran roots and establish new identities, hence the ever-more-odd formations and unusual names given to their children. This, of course, causes an immediate, noticable societal disparity, and adds yet another level of depth to the story (and, btw, the social climate information discussed here relates directly back to research…For a good racial development, you’re going to find it easier to create if you do a little psychology and sociology research, first. I’ve had so many years in it that it comes second nature to me, so I don’t stop to think about that).

Next up, we discuss the difference between personal and racial morals… What makes a character good or evil…

Well, we’ve covered the boring beginning, establishing our Setting, doing locationary research, and plotting our history and timeline… Now we get to the fun part…Race and Character Creation!

Step 6: What makes a Race?

Race creation trips a lot of authors up, especially if they just make it all up as they go along. Characters are less 3D and more unbelievable without detailed information on their races… And I’m not talking skin colour, here… I’m talking what makes each group of people similiar to each other. Because, before you can know what makes each individual unique, you must first have a norm t0 compare them against…

In SF/ Fantasy, an author has the unique ability to create some, or all, of their people from scratch. But, for my sample series, we start with the basic racial concepts of humanity. We breathe air, require a certain amount of gravity to move around without strange things happening, eat food for fuel, and so on and so forth. However, we further break this down by what, for the most part, we CAN’T do… Most people can’t read your mind. Most people don’t start fires with just a thought, or walk through walls, or separate themselves psychically from their bodies, or transplant their consciousness into a computer… you get the idea…

So, now that we’ve established our planet as Mars, and we’ve set the scene with our timeline and a series of strange disasters, what’s next? Why, a change to the basic human prototype, which creates an all new racial evolution, and therefore another race. Psis.

There are a series of questions you should always ask yourself when creating a new race (these are the basics that should be asked… You can expand these as far as you wish). I’ll pose each question, and then provide an answer using my sample series, so you can see what I mean…

First, establish your race’s name (if it has, or indeed needs, one). In this case, we’ll be working with Psis.

1: What is this race’s origin? (free-evolved, colonist-begun, etc)
Sample Answer: Originally colonists from Earth, but altered by the effects of the Martian Fever and other environmental causes on Mars.

2: What are this race’s physical characteristics? (A skin colour, dominant eye-colour, etc)
Sample answer: Human normal. They have the same physical appearance as typical human beings. (Some examples of specific racial physical characteristics that could be used here include Frank Herbert’s Fremen, who had blue eyes, or Tolkein’s Hobbits, who are all very short in stature)

3: What makes these people different from any other races in the series/book?
Sample Answer: They have psychic/paranormal abilities which manifest in the physical world. (If you’re creating races from scratch, you’ll want to make sure you have some very distinct differences, because this can add to tension between characters from different races.)

4: What makes these people similar to other races in the series/book?
My answer here would be obvious, as they’re all human. But, even in the case of very different races, it helps to have at least one facet (social, political, physical, etc) in common between characters. In the hero/heroine situation, it gives them common ground. In a hero/villain situation… Ever hear of Kissing Cousin Syndrome? Where two people are very much alike, animosity often breeds. Very useful for tension.

5: What is the social structure of the race?
Sample Answer: Though Psis are human, they are considered social outcasts from that society, feared by most, and forbidden to travel/reside on Earth. Because of this, they have developed their own social hierarchy, which breaks down by how old the Psi is (not the individual, but how far back in the family tree the particular ability can be traced), how powerful the individual is, how stable the person is, connections both inside and outside Psi society, the type of Psi and how useful it is, how they acquired the Psi, etc… An example of this would be my heroine from the upcoming second book in the series. Calli is the descendant of one of Mars’ First Families (automatically elevating her position in both the Psi and non-Psi societies of Mars), and her Lexus ability can be traced back several generations through her father’s family, further elevating her standing among the Psis (modern comparison: Think JFK Jr… He was a celebrity without having to do much to earn it, based solely on his family history and connections). Furthering her standing even more is the fact that her ability is powerful, and rare even among Psis. And it’s a very useful skill, to boot, and she’s had it since birth.

6: What is this race’s religious/ moral code?
Sample Answer: Psis don’t have a religion outside of the normal human choices. However, their moral codes break down by type of ability. This is a complicated answer, in this case, and would take far longer than I have here. But this question should be complex, and should be applied to all races you create, no matter if they’re human-norm or not. This answer will make up the backbone of what your character stands for.