Waterville Public Library

Jane Eyre. Jason Bourne. Sula. Boo Radley. Holden Caulfield. All indelible characters, bursting with life, lingering long after their books conclude. Who are the characters that stay with you? What can you learn from them? And how can you make the people in your own prose as memorable? Whether you’re writing fiction or nonfiction, a novel or a memoir (or something in between), good books need vivid people. 

Professor Sarah Braunstein of Colby College will lead a discussion about creating powerful characters in muscular prose. This session is designed for writers of any experience level who want to improve their character-developing skills, who want to get to know their characters better—or to meet them for the first time. A discussion of character will be followed by a few writing prompts.  

Please bring the name of one of your favorite characters (from any book) and perhaps a short excerpt in which they are described.  

This session is appropriate for anyone 18 and older. Participants should bring something to write on and with: laptop, iPad, pad of paper, etc. 

Free and open to the public. Seats are limited; registration is required. Register at: https://creatingvividcharacters.eventbrite.com 

Sarah Braunstein is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Colby College. Her stories and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, Ploughshares, Agni, The Sun, The Harvard Review, and in other places. Her first novel, The Sweet Relief of Missing Children (W.W. Norton), won the 2012 Maine Book Award and was a finalist for the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize from the Center for Fiction. She holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and an MSW from Smith College School for Social Work.