Broken Characters, Broken Lives

 

   What is it about books that attract people? Why do we sit down for an hour, two hours, maybe more, of our day staring at little squiggles of ink on trees? What is so entertaining?

   As humans, we live in this weird, broken, thing called life. We can't control what happens, we can't predict what will happen next, and sometime that scares us. Upsets us, and even depresses us. We feel that we have no control over anything in our life. We are just broken people living a broken life.

   I've been down the road of depression. I know that it's no fun. For the longest time, I felt lost, and broken. I would lose myself in a world where people were hurt, but things always came out alright for them. The characters would be broken just like I was, but they seemed to do okay in the end.

   We read to know that we are not alone in this world, even though the characters we read about are fake. We need some kind of little reassurance that they went through it and survived, maybe we can too. Although, while we should look more to God in those situations, we tend to look more to what people are always talking about. What they rage is now days. The books.

   As a writer, we have a lot of power in this time. We are the ones who will write these broken characters with their broken lives. We have the power to quite possibly influence someone-else's life through the words that we write.

   I love to write broken characters. It's something I have a passion for because it's something I went through. I want to show other people how I got through it, and how God was always there for me.

   What do I mean by broken characters?

   Imagine this: A fifteen year old boy lives with his parents. His father is a drunk and abusive, and his mother was a drug addict. He lives in fear of saying the wrong thing, not reacting quickly enough to something one of them says, and tries desperately to stay out of their way when they are mad. He grows up with fear rooted in his brain and his heart. He flinches anytime someone raises a hand, thinking of his father who often his him.

   A seventeen year old girl lives on the run, afraid to live in any foster home, afraid to get a new family, for fear of them leaving her as her first family did. She's afraid to get close to people because the people she loves always end up leaving her. She is afraid of making connections because she doesn't want her heart to be broken again. She doesn't want her life ripped to shreds again.

   'Broken'  comes in many different forms.

   Using your characters fear and their backstory can bring about a (beautifully) broken character.

   Why do you say beautifully, Victoria? Because breaking your characters is when you get to bring in God's healing for them. You get to begin the beautiful part of any life story. Being mended with His love and grace is the best thing you could ever do for your character. Besides, how can you mend something that hasn't been broken?

   By giving your character's broken lives, you enrich the story with things that real people today go through, and they connect to your character on a deeper level. They find themselves on a journey and want to see it through to the end. And, who knows? Maybe the healing for your character will inspire some healing for your reader.

   If you feel that you yourself are broken, don't ever give up hope. We have to broken to be mended by God's love.

Keep writing!