In this, Episode 3 of the Writing for Children podcast, we discuss

Creating Characters for Children’s Magazines.

 

One thing children are not very forgiving of is a shallow, or poorly thought out character.

Characters who vacillate between being too babyish and too adult are common in the

manuscripts of new writers. So are generic characters with no real personality. Writing a

character, especially a protagonist, is a bit like taking on an acting role. You must truly know

the character in order to flesh it out completely.

 

Listen to learn more!

 

The tips in the show notes which you can download at writingforchildren.com/003 include:

 

Know What a Magazine Wants - Highlights Foundation wisdom

 

Naming Your Character -  Character naming is important and author Susan Uhlig has some resources to help.

 

What's Your Character Thinking?

Have trouble knowing how to handle a character's thoughts in your story––here’s help.

 

Our listener question of the week is from Kimberley Moran, who asks,

 

“How do you know when you’ve hit the right audience age range? Do you need to have kids in that age group or just read a lot of books targeted to that age?

 

The Institute of Children’s Literature faculty answers!

 

You can ask your question at speakpipe.com/wfc.