The Psychology Workbook for Writers: Tools for Creating Realistic Characters and Conflict in Fiction

I read this book the day I got it—it was easy to pick up and read through. The book is only about 80 pages but it is insightful and helpful. I’ll be using the questions at the end of each chapter to help me write and develop my characters. Although it’s short, the concepts in the book are valuable to think about when writing a book. I’ll be referring to it and using as a reference.

Started reading it and already getting insights. Great assistance for character building sheets

Interesting. Definitely gave me things to think about for my characters. I like framing these things in terms of psychological theories. I also appreciate that these theories can be used together or individually.

This excellent book has taken my writing to a new level! I have three dimensional flesh-and-blood characters now. Gone is the vague people that all basically acts the same, with only their names and appearance making it possible to tell them apart. The psychology is explained in a clear fashion that even the layman can understand. A set of questions at the end of each chapter guides you in creating your character with the information described in the chapter. There is also a very enlightening worksheet guiding you in using the information in the global story with character interaction for each chapter. I recommend this book to anyone that's been baffled by characterization. This book will also be a great addition to any well-established author's must-read-craft-books.

The book was helpful. I made me understand a ton of things I’ve seen in life, tv shows, and movies that I didn’t know could affect real life outcomes and literary conflicts. It’s not a self-help book but it did change my perception of how I should start seeing the world and it also will continue to guide me through my book writing. This book has about ten to fifteen pages of worksheets that will help with character development and creating conflicts to make for a more interesting story.

The examples and explanations of different psychological traits is good. While I know the book was written for fiction writers who don’t have training psychology, just when the author starts getting to the interesting part of the trait, he stops. The questions following may or may not help a writer develop a character. The book is only 80 pages long. I think it will be helpful in my writing but not as much as I hoped.

My goal is to write characters for comics but in all types of storytelling it's important to have characters that seem real. This book helps with questions I never even thought of about my character and their decision-making which can lead to a more relatable and emotional experience for the reader.

This insight was helpful to build my character profile model for my wip. I've looked at templates, and various profile models, but they've all felt superficial or superfluous. This, in conjuction with save the cat writes a novel, I've developed my own model that I feel gets at a deeper level of my characters without spending hours building a model that restricts my character from revealing themselves to me as I write. To each their own, but finding my character's favorite color or football team seemed a waste of my time. If you're interested in constructing a deeper character, I'd suggest this book and save the cat writes a novel. Together, they saved me time and I feel more confident in who my characters are.

Esta guía, elaborada por Darian Smith, es una herramienta muy útil para todo escritor o escritora que desee crear personajes realistas. A pesar de ser un libro bastante breve (apenas 80 páginas de contenido real), se divide en distintas secciones en las cuales Darian explica conceptos psicológicos que determinan la personalidad a largo plazo, y cómo incorporar estas ideas en nuestros propios personajes y a través de la trama, sirviéndose también de ejemplos del mundo cinematográfico para mostrar aplicaciones reales. Lo recomiendo a cualquier escritor, ya que te aporta una perspectiva muy interesante y, sea cual sea el género con el que trabajes, te permite ver otros posibles conflictos que van más allá del argumento y se adentran en el espectro psicológico y emocional. Darian ha hecho un gran trabajo escogiendo los términos y teorías que pueden resultar interesantes en la creación de dichos conflictos, y es muy directo y claro en sus explicaciones. Volvería a comprarlo e intuyo que lo utilizaré a menudo como herramienta.

a most informative little book. I have always had positive comments from my readers about the depth and realism of even my secondary characters, and now I know that I am doing the right things for the right reasons, and with more tools at my disposal to improve my work. An instinctive understanding of people is all very well, but a little bit of aid from this excellent little book is welcome, short enough to read easily in an afternoon and detailed enough to dip back into, so I can add to the depths of my characters. Some people have said they would like more, but personally I thought it said what there was to say, and then stopped, which is my definition of a good book of instructions. I don't care who thought of which psychological theory, I don't want case studies; a brief literary example is plenty.

This book offers a great starting point for writers aiming to benefit from several decades of research in psychology in a laguage that is friendly to fiction writers that know nothing about it. However condensed, the book offers lots of insights that can really be applied to a story to make it better while offering sources for further reading in case the reader wishes to dig deeper. For that, I would go as far as to say that this is an indispensable read for writers in formation.

Lots of good information to go back to

I carry this book along whenever I am writing, wherever I am writing. The reason is that is simplifies the way characters can be written. The insights are fun and revealing. Great reference book for a writer.