For your story to have any focus and drive, your characters need to want something. Under the right circumstances, you might even want them to be obsessed. But that can be harder to write. In an article for Writer’s Digest, Caitlin Barasch shares her advice on how to write a character driven by an obsession.
“Is there an object, person, experience, or state of mind your character will stop at nothing to achieve or attain?” Barasch writers. “If so, you may discover an unexpected plot and a basic narrative arc.” Her advice includes:
- Make sure your protagonist acts on her obsession. “Get out of their head and launch them into society: How does their behavior become altered by obsession?” Barasch says. “Characters who make decisions, who act, are usually the most exciting to read about.” Let them defy convention and take risks as they pursue what they want.
- Give your hero more than one obsession. “Obsessions are often inevitable, mysterious, messy; when we dig a little deeper, and try to understand the source of our fixations, we might discover what revelations lie just beneath the surface,” Barasch writes. “What obsessions would your protagonist choose to confess to, and what obsession would they resolve to keep secret at all costs?”
- Give them consequences. “Obsessions can be destructive—intense, all-consuming, sometimes misguided,” Barasch notes. “So it seems inevitable that an obsession might wreak havoc as a result. What does this character stand to lose?”
