It's been about two years since I've last tried to write a novel. I got halfway through it and then realized I no longer had an interest in the plot. My lack of interested caused the story to get all jumbled and messy, and I ended up just tossing it. Ever since, I haven't had any solid ideas. And it's driving me a little crazy. I began reading up on how to get past writers block and many people gave the advice of figuring out what your character's motives/desires are. I'm just seeing now that I honestly have no clue how to answer that. I don't know what my characters are afraid of, what they want, or what their goal is. I've had this group of characters for a very long time and sometimes I feel like it's time to scrap them and create new ones. But whenever I try, my new characters just seem like different versions of my original ones. I guess I'm just stuck. I don't know if I should revamp my original characters, make new ones, if I make new ones, how can I assure they're different, etc. I just feel like if I can get past this character blockage, my writers block will slowly go away as well. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thank you so much!
If I were you, at this point I would write scenes. "Hey, it would be fun to see what Joe does if Meg spills red wine all over his collectible mostly-white rug." "Hey, it would be interesting to see what happens if Janet calls Fred in a panic after finding that her apartment's been robbed. They're exes; would he still feel protective? Let's see." And so on and so on.
For me, the motives and desires of my characters come from the plot first. What's the conflict and the eventual endgame? Once I have that, from there I try to create characters with personality types and backgrounds that fit the situation I've created, which more turns out to be figuring out why they have the motivations and desires that they do. I don't think I could create characters without the context of the story they're going to be inhabiting.
I have two pieces of advice for you. The first is to flesh your character out is to play a game my Creative Writing teacher called "They're the kind of person..." Take your character and just write out like 10 sentances starting like this and you'll find interesting information. Examples: He's the kind of person that smokes his cigarettes until he tastes the filter. He's the kind of person that wears headphones with no music playing. He's the kind of person that wears vintage clothes. You'll soon start figuring out why they do these things and why they are who they are. My second piece of advice is take the character and write a new story. The MC in my current book is Jak Zephirose. He is scoundrel with a computerized spellbook and a magical gun. In an unfinished WIP before that he was a superhero with telekinetic powers, and in an unfinished WIP before that he was a Psychic from a psychic academy. His love interested in the first two iterations was Terralilly who was meek and slowly learned magic throughout the story. In the third book, she is essentially still the same Terralilly but she is now a black lesbian who is not the MC's romantic foil and her powers have evolved from healing to necromancy. Each time I started a new story with the old characters they just sort of developed on their own. Their personalities are very much the same in each iteration, but their traits change. In essence, my advice is learn more about your characters and start a new story that you want to tell, and drop your favorite characters into it (as long as they haven't been published already).
How many characters are you looking at? I think too many characters can make it really hard to structure a book... I've written about thirty novels and I still can't really manage to have more than two MCs! (at least, not written to a standard I'm pleased with). I agree with the other advice offered, but I might also recommend scaling back what you're doing. Have one clear MC and leave the rest as supporting players. Then instead of having to find a plot that satisfies all of their needs and ambitions, you just have to focus on one person's goals. Might help?
I am definitely going to use that "They're the kind of person who ..." exercise. What a simple, but effective, way to explore characters! Love it!
Try discussing it with someone. I send all my writing to my mum, and we have some really insightful conversations. Try thinking about their past and what effects this might have had. For example, one of my characters is a time traveller who has moved around a lot in her childhood and therefore hasn't really had any friends. This contributes to her desire to stay in the past, with the friends she has made there.
I always think of character and story as one. The story belongs to the character(s). The character(s) belong to the story. If you've got some characters in mind, nothing wrong with reusing them. They will surely change and morph into somewhat new characters as the story continues. Also, I hate to say it, but I'm not sure you can call it writers block after two years. By then I think it's just not writing. But I hope you can get back into it, and maybe thinking of character and story as one will help. Good luck.
Here's an idea--and this forum is ideal for it--step away from the story you're toiling over and take on an exercise, like writing a narrative poem, or find a few short story prompts and try to hone your skill. And, as always, read, read, read. And don't just read books in your favorite genre. Step outside of your comfort zone and sample something off the wall (no pun intended). Add all these ingredients together, and they're likely to create a remedy for your writer's block.
There's also a crazy sounding one I read about and used for my current WIP. I was amazed at how well it worked. Get really relaxed, as one would for meditating, and in your head, "Ask" the character a question. "Who are you?" "What do you want?" "What are you afraid of?" "What do you cherish?" or whatever other question you have that isn't a yes/no question. You can also say something like, "Tell me about yourself." It's bizarre. When I did it, I got a lot of useful information.
Characters DRIVE plot. If your story isn't driven by your characters, you don't know them well enough yet. Ask yourself the following questions about the characters: What 'type' are they? (this can be the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or any archetype scale really.) What is their biggest fear? What is the line they won't cross? What's their value system: (nothing is more important than...list three) What's their goal? What do they need to learn? What drives them at their core? What's the single biggest defining moment in their life and how did it make them the person they are today? (be as detailed as possible on this in your notes.) Once you get to know them better in a 'what's my motivation' type of thing, then you'll know exactly how your plot should play out.
Character block can never happen to me. Do you know why? I will always create characters that fit the mold of my novel because I am blessed with creativity. Now what makes the character work is the background you create for him/her. My main characters are a couple who met in college and have been together since that fateful day in college in October of 2020. She is a Scottish, geologist, he is a Scottish meteorologist, she lost her family at the age of 15, he still has his parents and brother and sisters alive, he is the third of four children. He is a hurricane specialist asked to join the National Hurricane Center out of college, then as the series goes further, he becomes the director of the National Hurricane Center, he loves his job, but does he love his wife more? As I ask myself questions of what I would do in the character's shoes, I then see what the character would do and do differently. I think I would be driven by my love for my wife to be with her and our newborn child, but is Jack Irving driven by other means?
@VioletMason18 You say: I'm curious. How did these characters come about? Did you have a story in mind for them when you thought them up? Or were they just people whom you found interesting to create, but they had no story? What was the impulse that made them come into being, inside your head?