46 Best Character Development Writing Exercises

Take your main character and describe the best day he/she has ever had. This is a prompt that will generate questions like, "Why did the character think that was their best day?"

Describe each day of the week as if it were a person. Give each one personality traits, a job, and a goal. Write a short story about them.

Who are the three most unlikely people your protagonist would have dinner with? Why? Write the scene.

Memorable characters are ones that mirror real people: their feelings, experiences, needs, and goals. Challenge yourself to get real with your character by first getting real with yourself. Grab a notebook and answer the following questions as they pertain to you:

• What emotion do you struggle with because you feel it so deeply?
• What type of situation makes you feel vulnerable or inadequate?
• What past mistake causes you the most regret?
• What core moral belief is so ingrained that you live it every day?

These questions require a deep look within and put us in touch with our authentic selves. This is what readers come to the page for, so answer these again, this time as your protagonist. When you finish, think about how you can incorporate some of these vulnerable moments into your story to show readers the deeper side of your character.

Choose a random occupation, a random personality trait, and the trait's opposite. Now, outline a train of events that explains how a person of your chosen occupation changes from having the random trait to having its opposite. Let's take, for example: "martial arts teacher," "shy," and "confident." What would make a shy martial arts teacher change into a confident one?Care for a double challenge? Try plotting the opposite path, too: a confident martial arts teacher turns into a shy person. What would cause that? Experiment with unusual occupations and traits to challenge yourself. Find a collection of traits for download at the end of this article.

Set a timer and start free-writing from one of your character's perspectives. Try to really get inside their head - what do they want, what ticks them off, what do they feel passionate about? Are they writing in a diary, telling a story to a friend, or dictating a formal letter?

Describe the same character twice. Once as the hero of a story and once as the antagonist.

There's a saying: "Everyone is the hero of his or her own story." For a 10-minute writing exercise, enter your book from another character's eyes. Think about how differently that character would experience your plot and capture that in a short story.

Transplant your character into an entirely new location. It could be a new country, city, or continent. How do they react to the new surroundings?

Your protagonist has just made it into a New York Times headline. What does the headline say? Write down the reaction of your protagonist to hearing the news that day.