Minor Characters, Briefly
In typical stories, those set in this world or on other worlds, your main characters will likely meet many side characters along the journey we call “plot.” Learning how to introduce a character briefly so that the reader can get a sense of them quickly, using details that are both memorable and necessary is a skill. This is a particularly important writing skill in genre fiction because plot involves moving new characters in and out of scenes.
With your main characters, you’ll be able to describe them leisurely if you choose. Just promise to never ever let them stand in front of a mirror and think about how they look in their head. But for characters that come in and out, describe them succinctly. Use this opportunity to focus on the most notable characteristic. Hint: It’s rarely the color of someone’s eyes.
My two simple rules for describing minor characters:
Keep it short
Make it memorable
In your book, words are valuable real estate. If a character is not a big part of your story, don’t spend a paragraph describing them.
Dorothy Sayers—the classic mystery author who created the iconic gentleman detective of the Roaring Twenties, Lord Peter Wimsey—had a wonderful gift for quick characterization. Here’s her description of a judge in her classic novel “Strong Poison”:
“The judge was an old man; so old, he seemed to have outlived time and change and death. His parrot-face and parrot voice were dry, like his old, heavily-veined hands.”
Perfection. I’m absolutely green over “parrot-face and parrot voice.”
Here is a character in full flesh. By narrowing the description to a couple of characteristics, Sayers draws the reader's focus and doesn’t waste our time describing a minor character. And by being a little weird, and using utterly unique metaphors, the description is deeply memorable. From here on, I can see him in my mind’s eye as he lectures the accused and monologues at the jury.
Quick character sketches is one of your writing muscles. And the best place to exercise these muscles is away from your computer and out in the world. Go to a bar. Ride a train. Visit a mall, if those are still a thing where you live. Watch people. What do you notice first? Try to come up with a dozen quick sketches in an hour. Some will be better than others. Save the best ones for minor characters in your stories.
Because I am a millennial, I put these into the Notes app on my phone. I find it’s a bit more discreet than scribbling in a Moleskine, hiding behind columns like Henry Higgins, but you do you.
Hudson River Park
Youthful teal sunglasses obscured his sunken eyes, but they couldn’t hide his pale mastiff jowls.
His head was shaved down to the bare khaki canvas.
Swirling gray and black ink peeked beneath each wrists, hinting at the sleeves she never took off.
He wore a plain baseball cap, no logos, chocolate brown, and so stiff and tall that his whole head resembled the cut bit of a cigar.
The man breathed heavily through his mouth, baring his top row of teeth fully, while hiding the bottom row behind his lower lip.
Wind flowing over the river swirled and tugged at her blonde bob and she ducked down against the gale as if boarding a helicopter.
He was three grown men in one. His cane touched down so gently after each step, that it was no more than a prop.
Chelsea, on the street
The line stretched around the block, and the last man’s head swiveled and twitched, hoping someone else would commandeer the end from him.
Though well over thirty, her outfit had all the hurried adjustments of a boarding school uniform trying to pass for street clothes.
She fully extended a bare arm to hail a taxi, inadvertently topping the gesture with a fist of resistance.
Art Bar, West Village
Two pairs of seated knees almost touched below the bar, but above the rim they leaned away from each other coyly.
The tall man stretched back against the flimsy plexiglass divider like a cat enjoying a rub.
All the elements of a smile were there, but negated by an unfriendly stare.
None of these are amazing. If there are a few I’d actually use I’d wittle them down here or there. But that’s the thing about exercise—you can just keep doing reps until you’re utterly exhausted.
