Have you ever wondered how authors come up with their characters? Today, Beth Overmyer, author of the recently released The Goblets Immortal, is here to talk about what she calls a “character casserole” and how it leads to characters that leap off the page!

Character Casserole

by Beth Overmyer

“This is a work of fiction,” reads the usual disclaimer on the copyright page of a novel. All the people who populate that book you’re about to crack open are works of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to real life? Coincidence. But how do authors create realistic characters from nothing? My personal answer: I make a character casserole.

A casserole, to those unfamiliar, is made from a hodgepodge of ingredients found in different places. Put together, they form a delicious one-dish meal. So while I don’t base a character on a person, I take elements of different people’s essences, exaggerate (or under-exaggerate), add a dash of imagination, and stir things up. To be honest, I don’t need to draw from multiple people’s quirks and traits to develop a living, breathing character on the page. I only need one person. Namely, me.

Every person you meet is multifaceted. You can be strong and soft, joyful and sad. I can’t be the only one who thinks that no one acts 100% the same with every person they know or meet. Different people and circumstances bring out different traits in us. I’m a bit shy but put me around a group of shy people who need to accomplish something, and I take the leadership role. Give me zero hours of sleep and several doses of caffeine, and I can be the most outgoing, hysterical person you’ve ever met.

So when it comes time to create, I look at myself during different times of my life and draw from multiple traits.

For example, in Circus in a Shot Glass, I created a woman who’s been through some tough times and suffers from alcoholism. I’ve never been an alcoholic, but I’ve had some tough times. So combining a bit of research and myself, I came up with a woman who drinks “shots” of pink stomach medicine straight from the bottle and is out-of-it a lot of the time. She also shares my love of 1950s fashion and falls for the type of guy I would fall for.

Also, in my book In a Pickle, the main character is a ten-year-old boy who thinks he needs to be tough. I’ve never been a ten-year-old boy, but I know what it’s like to feel the need to be tough and what it’s like to be young. So I gave the main character the “tough-guy” trait, along with some naïveté, which I’ve had in spades at various points in my life.

Then there’s Aidan Ingledark in The Goblets Immortal. We hate small talk, say we don’t trust easily while actually giving people the benefit of the doubt, and have a bit of a temper. Again, like the other characters, Aidan is in no way me. He’s a bit of imagination, a few exaggerated traits of mine, and empathy.

And I think the last word is key when writing any character: empathy, which is “the ability to identify and understand somebody else’s feelings or difficulties.”¹ So make your character casserole. Draw from the essences of others and yourself without basing your characters on anyone. The result will hopefully be a real, breathing person on the page.

¹Encarta Dictionary: English (North America)

About the Book

The Goblets Immortal
by Beth Overmyer
Published on February 20, 2020 by Flame Tree Press
ISBN: 9781787584396
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 288
Genres: Adult, Fantasy

In a land where magic's feared, a rare magical kind exists: the Blest, products of the Goblets Immortal. Aidan's a Blest on the run, forced to return home. He made his family vanish decades ago, but believes there s a way to bring them back.

Whispers of a new fear take shape in Meraude, a mage who hates all magic-kind. When she appears in Aidan s dreams offering a bargain for the return of his family, Aidan s desires wars with self-preservation.

Is it wise for Aidan to seek the Goblets Immortal for Meraude's unknown purposes? Friend and foe blur the magical lines, and Aidan must discern who will shake his hand or slit his throat.

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About Austine

I'm a 20-something research proposal developer with a background in the life sciences and education. Reviewer of books since 2011, amateur photographer by day, and aspiring author by night. I believe animals (and books) are better than people.