Behind the Scenes: Character Backstories

So I know that I have often wondered what kind of life a book character led before the story I am reading began, and based upon my experiences chatting with some of my writer friends, there are often very interesting details in a character's backstory that are never told in the main story.

While I understand that the backstory details writers choose to leave out are often ones that don't seem to matter to the storyline itself, I think they can still be important to how a reader relates to a character and how that reader interprets the story.

In this post, I have selected two of my favorite characters to let you get a behind-the-scenes glimpse of. I will show you their families and explain how these family members have impacted their lives and hopefully, this will help you to look closer at some of the characters in your head.

Whether these characters are in your head because you read about them, or because you yourself are an aspiring writer, perhaps this will show you how important developing a character's background can be.

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Characters:

Amy Mae Weston and Family: Born in 1924, in the fictional town of Riverton, Ohio, Amy is sixteen years old when Facing the Clouds takes place. She is a bit of a perfectionist, has a hot temper and is quick to speak before she thinks, but has a good soul at heart and only needs a few hard lessons to bring it out.

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Amy's father, Otto Weston, was born in Germany and immigrated to America as a young man. There in America, Otto met Amy's mother and they were married soon afterwards. They had one child, their daughter Amy, and Otto would often take his young daughter down to the railyard with him to watch the trains. It was he who taught Amy how to speak German, to be willing to try new things, and to never let anyone clip her wings.

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Amy's mother, Sarah Joy Weston, is a sweet woman with a even temper and a cheerful attitude. She likes being polite and is very good at choosing friends who will stick by her side in hard times.

Determined to keep her daughter from becoming a complete tomboy, Sarah taught Amy about Jesus and the Bible, about how to keep a home, and how to be gentle, bravely accepting her husband's loss and taking Amy further under her one wing.

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When Amy lost her father, she lost part of her heart, and this loss, combined with her best friend having to answer the draft call and natural teenage emotions, would be what combine to make her run headlong into one of the greatest conflicts in history.

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Brooke Taylor Johnson and Family: Born in 1927, in a little country farmhouse nestled in the heart of Tennessee, Brooke is twenty-three-years-old when her stories begin, and she is the oldest of three siblings born to Joshua and Hannah Taylor.

Brooke works alongside her husband, Greg Johnson, as a full-time police officer in the fictional city of Madison Town, located near Nashville, Tennessee.

When her father was asked to describe her, he said she was, 'a serious-yet-spirited woman with a stubborn streak, a .45-caliber police firearm, and a Yorkie named Buster. Be kind to her? She'll be your friend for life. Break the law? You've got one chance to explain why. Hurt her family? Run.'

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Brooke's younger brother, twenty-one-year old Shad, is a quiet young man who prefers to remain "invisible" to the world when he can.

Partially due to a semi-secret job with the FBI, Shad has a hard time trusting anyone outside of his family and like Brooke, is fiercely protective of his family. He has a crush upon one of Brooke's co-workers and for this reason, often comes to "help Brooke" at the MTPD.

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Brooke's younger sister, twenty-year-old Marie, is the black sheep of the Taylor family and is pursuing a life of crime under the alias "Foxy".

Marie was married once, but requested a divorce and has returned to using her maiden name. She has a son, Riley, who does not know anything about his mom's double-life and spends most of his time safe at his father's house. Riley is the one thing that Marie shows any love for, and though she won't admit it, she would die before let any harm come to him.

She doesn't dare go near her family for fear of both Brooke and Shad, who would feel obligated to do their jobs and arrest her; though of the two, she hates only Brooke, for Brooke was Marie's mentor when she was growing up, and because Brooke only joined the police force after Marie turned to crime, Marie feels betrayed.

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When Marie turned to a life of crime, it broke Brooke's heart and hardened her resolve to join the police force and do her best to keep anyone else from taking the broken path to destruction like her sister. Losing Marie's trust taught Brooke how dear friends and family are, and made her into the serious and kind-hearted woman she is today.

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So! I hope that gave you some food for thought, and perhaps has inspired you to dive into the backstories of some characters you know or have created. Maybe you'll learn something about one of them that will spark your imagination and finally allow you to share that tale which you've had bubbling inside for who-knows-how-long.

Brooke Johnson