Breathing Life into Your Characters [Hardcover]

Rachel Ballon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 21, 2003 | ISBN-10: 1582971811 | ISBN-13: 978-1582971810 | Edition: 1

Psychotherapist Rachel Ballon teaches the reader how to use the principles of psychology to understand their characters better. Through a mix of instruction, examples, and writing and visualization exercises, readers learn how to tap into their own stories and emotions to create realistic, complex characters.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Dr. Rachel Ballon is a practicing psychotherapist who specializes in working with writers and other creatives. She is also a script and book doctor, referred to as "Doc Hollywood" by the Los Angeles Times. She lives in Los Angeles, California.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Writers Digest Books; 1 edition (October 21, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582971811
• ISBN-13: 978-1582971810
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,017,466 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Psychology of Characters and Characterization, March 26, 2004

By 

H. Grove "Errant Dreams Reviews" (Maryland, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Breathing Life into Your Characters (Hardcover)

"Breathing Life into Your Characters" uses the discipline of psychology to help you endow your characters with realistic depth and dimension. There's a ton of useful information in here: Archetypes, inner and outer goals, personal transformations, self-esteem, private and public selves, desperation, dysfunctional families, mental disorders, and much more. The material is accessible to a layman, but still useful to someone who already has an interest in psychology.

The exercises push you to delve into aspects of your own memories, emotions, and personality that you might not be comfortable with; the author believes that you can't create realistic characters that feel the wide range of human emotions if you don't even know what those emotions feel like yourself. But this isn't an approach that everyone is going to want to take, and some people may have good reasons for avoiding it. Just be aware of this aspect of "Breathing Life into Your Characters", and be sure that you're willing to go there if you decide to buy this book--the exercises are a serious part of the material, not a glued-on after-thought.

I do have a few minor problems with this book:

1. In the first half of the book there's a LOT of repetition of concepts--it gets old pretty fast.

2. Ms. Ballon stresses the value of exploring memories and releasing our emotions, with few if any caveats about this process. I think this is a little careless. There are circumstances under which exploring traumatic memories without the supervision of a trained therapist can do more harm than good, and I think she should have mentioned this--particularly since she herself is a psychotherapist.

3. For everyone who sees an issue one way, you're bound to find someone who sees it a different way. This is particularly true when talking about what constitutes a good story. Thus, the various phrases like "in any good story" and "in all good writing" that litter parts of this book seriously pushed my Pet Peeve Button--even when I agreed with them.

For all my complaints about the presentation issues, they're just that--presentation issues. They're annoyances that plenty of readers won't share. When it comes down to it, this is a very useful book that is almost certain to benefit your fiction-writing as much as it did mine. And so, while the annoyed part of me is tempted to give this book three stars, the more objective part of me impels me to give it four. It produced impressive results, and that's the true test of a writing book.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Authenticity Builds Character, January 16, 2004

By 

John Ballon "JB" (Hollywood, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Breathing Life into Your Characters (Hardcover)

There are countless writing books in and out of print, but few of genuine worth. This one is invaluable. If you are a writer of fiction who wants to move your audience with authentic and believable characters, this book offers some unexpected gems on how to get there. Dr. Ballon draws upon her experience as both a writing teacher and psychotherapist to put forth interesting ways of thinking about your characters. This book provides tools for penetrating the psyche of your characters to make them more motivated, complex, and believable. If more writers were to take Dr. Ballon's advice, there'd be less snickering in theaters at the endless parade of hollow characters and empty dialogue that plagues Hollywood today.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great character guidebook, July 19, 2006

By 

Pamela Jaye Smith (Hollywood, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Breathing Life into Your Characters (Hardcover)

As a mythologist who works with archetypes, I highly recommend Dr. Rachel Ballon's book, "Breathing Life Into Your Characters".

Dr. Ballon's book offers a professional's insight into what makes characters tick. For the writer, director, or actor, this is invaluable information to help shape your story characters.

I have attended seminars at the American Film Institute, UCLA, StoryCon, the Writers Store, and many other venues where Rachel leads people through exercises in understanding characters. I have listened afterwards to their comments. "Amazing, I didn't know I had that in me." "I was afraid at first, but it really opened up a wellspring of emotion." "The free-flow helped me free my ideas." "There was something my character was hiding and I couldn't get past it. Dr. Ballon's exercise helped me dig deeper and find the real motivation." These are the sorts of comments her work elicits.

The layout of the book makes it easy to locate certain character types and flaws and then goes into clear detail about how to use these flaws to create believable story characters.

Buy this book, read it through for a better understanding of human psychology, then come back to it again and again to fine-tune your characters.