Final Thoughts on Reader Identification

A few final pointers. First, defer a physical description of the character until
you’ve established that reader identification connection. Once that’s set, the
reader will buy almost any combination of hair and eye color and such.

Second, write toward your secrets. Don’t write away from them. You may not
use your secrets in your final version, or you may change the details
sufficiently so that they’re not recognizable. That’s fine. That’s what you
should do. It’s the emotional resonance and content you’re after and
sometimes the only way to capture that is to write into fear.

Here’s a weird truth: what you may think is so odd or aberrant or completely
bizarre and alien in yourself, so strange that to reveal it would result in your
being completely ostracized by polite society – that’s what people will
identify with most. Not in the sense that it’s happened to them, too. But
something about our deepest issue evokes empathy in almost everyone, and
empathy is a good thing in terms of reader identification.

Finally, one warning. Don’t confused creating likable characters with reader
identification.

For more techniques, check out FIRST PAGES at BAMwriters.com