Do you ever wonder about your favorite character, how they got to be who they were, what forces shaped them?
Did you ever wonder what Han Solo was like when he was eighteen? Ever wonder what V.I. Warshawski's first marriage was like? Did you ever wonder what "Dirty" Harry Callahan was like, fresh from the academy?
Apart from writing a ton of fan-fiction (Which we won't, because we'd rather write stuff we can sell, right? Right? Oh, who am I kidding.) or the creator deciding to write an origin story, all we can do is wonder.
But we can answer those questions for the characters we create. Writing an origin story can be a way to talk to our subconscious (or Muse). Some authors do this whenever they start a new novel or introduce a new character.
Did you ever wonder what Han Solo was like when he was eighteen? Ever wonder what V.I. Warshawski's first marriage was like? Did you ever wonder what "Dirty" Harry Callahan was like, fresh from the academy?
Apart from writing a ton of fan-fiction (Which we won't, because we'd rather write stuff we can sell, right? Right? Oh, who am I kidding.) or the creator deciding to write an origin story, all we can do is wonder.
But we can answer those questions for the characters we create. Writing an origin story can be a way to talk to our subconscious (or Muse). Some authors do this whenever they start a new novel or introduce a new character.
A while back, I wrote an origin story for my character, Smooth Charles from Smooth Running. I don't know if it will work as a stand alone short story or not (that's what my critique group is going to help me figure out) but it was interesting seeing what my brain came up with for his backstory.
As a writing exercise, why not try it? Pick one of your characters, ideally one of your iconic, mysterious people and write a story from before they became the bad-ass, confident hero they grew into.
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