I’m a big believer in planning. That’s why I went through a thorough outline for the book I’m writing, and why I outline most writing I do (from how-to articles and blog posts to press releases and white papers).

You would think that character sheets, notes, outlines, etc. and then the novel outline itself would be more than enough to get a good feel for your characters–to get into their heads.

What I’m finding fascinating in the drafting process is realizing that I don’t really know my characters at all–or least not as well as I thought I did.

For example, the current book is a mystery. To oversimplify, it revolves around the protagonist trying to find her sister’s killer when the police run out of leads. In the first scene alone I realized something about my heroine–she wasn’t as emotionally distraught at the funeral as I thought she would be. In fact she was rather subdued.

While writing, I discovered that she and her sister didn’t have a great relationship for the last few months of her life (even though that’s not how I outlined it). It gave her actions and emotions a new complexity–she not only has to mourn her sister’s death, but process those more complicated emotions like a lack of closure over their past troubles. It’s also keeping her general temperment a bit more on edge; a bit less predictable to those close to her.

I have no doubt I’ll learn much more about all of my characters throughout the drafting and editing processes, and I’m really looking forward to it!

When you write how much do you know about your characters up front, and how much do you let them run away with the story, exposing bits of themselves to you along the way?