Characters need to act and move, walk, and chew gum! Watch all those around you; how do they move? Collect those tiny ways in your notebook. I like to keep lists. A page for each person I conjure up.

For example, Robbie Whitman in my imaginary fourth grade classroom, wore glasses. He would reach his thin hand up, smooth his hair back and poke the bridge of his glasses higher up on his nose. Madilyn Wermer crossed her legs one way and then another, and when the teacher was talking, she’d tap her toe on the edge of the metal desk, and then she’d pop up and walk the whole way around the room to sharpen her pencil. Why? Another ingredient, motivation—the why. She couldn’t sit still and she wanted to look at Robbie, because of course, I was pretty sure she had a crush on him!
Writers turn their whole world into a living movie theater, just chock full of action!

But, what I’ve mentioned so far are little actions. There are bigger, more substantial actions too. I like to play the ‘What IF’ game once I’ve got a sense of a character and a whiff of a problem. So..what if Madilyn sat back down in her seat, and Robbie got up to go to the pencil sharpener? And what if, at that exact moment, Madilyn crossed her legs just like she always did, and Robbie tripped and fell in the aisle right next to her? Embarrassment is a great problem…where will that story go from there.

I love to pack lots of problems into the life of my main character, but not to the point of torturing my reader! In my novel, Ivy Leigh Conquers a Small Universe, Rachel bullies her way up the aisle to Ivy Leigh’s seat. She kneels on the vinyl seat covering, leans over and breathes the words ‘Poison Ivy’ into Ivy’s ear. Ugly actions and sometimes ugly words, despite how much I hate to hear them, make for good story. And hopefully that makes the reader want to take action on behalf of Ivy too! But I also make sure the reader trusts me and trusts that Ivy will pull through. That part is super important too.

So, think about those two components and keep on nesting in that Writer’s Notebook of yours. Be a spy! Watch and wait! Then, best of all, capture your observations on the page! Soon we’ll be talking about Dialogue and Description, but let those first two, the character and the problem, simmer in your brain and back on to the page. Dream about it, collect pieces for it, and write it all…every bit of it down!

Check out Opal’s problems in BECAUSE OF WINN DIXIE, she’s got a boatload of them! And the thing I love most is how Kate DiCamillo puts them out there, right on the first page! Remember the scene in the grocery store? We see Winn Dixie barreling through the grocery store, the manager chasing after him, the shouting and screaming and then Opal claiming and naming him right there on the spot! And that is just where the problem begins!