Getting my timeline and characters in order

The people of Family Secrets and their adventures were in my head for many years before I ever began to write about them. That’s why I simply started on the first chapter without any preparation whatsoever. I knew exactly what was going to happen, after all! I hit a brick wall on page 5. Two characters could never have been around to witness a certain event because one of them was living in another country at that time.

All my attempts at getting it right failed. It just didn’t add up. End of story - literally.

Back to the drawing board

I built a timeline in Excel. Who was born when, what happened to the characters and families over the years and where did they match and differ? I finally created a clear structure for the story, and as I did that, I found that there were several other elements that were not correct. It took me several days to get the timeline in order and started again.

It took me a little longer to hit the second wall: my characters began to act up. Without understanding where it all came from, I watched them react very differently to situations than I had planned. It was ridiculous: it felt as if I was no longer in charge of my own story. Instead of having a conversation, they argued; instead of crying, they were rolling on the floor laughing. Huh?

It stood out like a sore tooth. I had not made character descriptions in any way, shape or form, and they were reacting in ways that were all over the place. Quite naive, of course, but hey, this is my first real novel and I’m still learning, the hard way.

Character Template

One of my colleagues found a character template for me online. An endless form that helped me record a huge amount of information about each and every character, from hair colour and scars to upbringing, education, likes and disliked, wishes and secrets. It was great! I had to start all over again but now I could fact-check whenever I needed to. The family members only act out of character when they have good reason to do so.