Welcome to the community, Milly! Your writing is marvellously intuitive and I'm sure you'll be a great new asset to our team, especially in helping budding writers grow.

Author: @Milly_Liber

All novels can essentially be categorised into one of two types: character driven novels and plot driven novels. Character driven novels are stories lead by the actions of your characters, while plot driven novels are stories lead by outside elements in your novel.

Naturally, you will either start out more focused on your characters or on the plot. Both of these are okay, but stories need both strong characters and an interesting plot, which is why it is important to remind yourself to give some of your attention to whichever of the two you have been neglecting.

In Pt 1, I will focus my attention towards character driven novels and plot driven novels in Pt 2. So, with all that said, it is time to look at the elements of character driven novels.

N.B. some of these elements are in plot driven novels too, but for different reasons.

1. The main cast: this includes your MC (main character) and anyone else who is show to be consistently in the story, but more importantly affects your MC.

2. Supporting cast: this is any other character in the story, big or small, that wasn't important enough to be included in the main cast.

3. Backstories: regardless of whether or not it is relevant to the plot, all of your characters should have a backstory. This doesn't necessarily have to be a part of the story, but it should give a basic explanation as to why a certain character is who they are and where they are at the beginning of the story; your past experiences turned you into the person you are today, which brings us onto the next point.

4. Reason: everything must have a purpose behind it! I cannot stress this enough. As their backstories shape them, so too do the actions of your characters shape the story. This is why the backstories are so important.

5. And finally, Relationships: your characters are the stars of your book. They need to interact with everyone else. If you are struggling with this, take inspiration from your own life. So, now you have all the elements of your character driven novel, but what if your novel isn't character driven? Well then all you need to do is reassess all of your characters (even if you have a big cast. If they are important enough to have a name, then you need to take a look at them) and decide which ones are needed and which ones are there for no good reason. Take out the useless ones and use the elements above to make your characters actually worth caring about. So that's it for character driven novels, right?

Wrong. All writers are different and you need to decide how much control you give your characters. This will take a while, but it'll be worth it. In Pt 2, I'll discus plot driven novels. Take care and happy writing.