“I forgot they weren’t real people.”

It was probably the nicest thing a reader ever said to me at a convention nearly a decade ago. You see, Reader, they’d read the first two books in my Marked Ones Trilogy and were eagerly awaiting the release of the 3rd.

And that’s the real magic of storytelling isn’t it, Reader? To create characters that feel so real that you could bump into them on the street, or meet up with them for coffee? Or have them swoop in and rescue you during a political coup.

Real flesh and blood people with lives and dreams and hardships and loss who we conjured from nothing more than words on paper.

We’ve all been there though, right? Been so wrapped up in the narrative of a movie or show that we genuinely forgot—even for a moment—that the people on screen weren’t real.

Got so attached to the Tributes that we could feel our heartbeat in our skin every time we turned a page.

Were so attached to that dangerous game of the Iron Throne that it became the most-watched show in the world.

Felt like we were in those green tracksuits playing Red Light/Green Light along with them.

They felt like real places. They felt like real people. And the storytellers made us forget they weren’t.

So how do you do it, Reader? Make those things and places and people who feel so real? By using the things that are.

Here Are 5 Ways You Can Use What You Know to Make Your Stories Feel Real:

1) Your Expertise:

Did you go to university or college to be trained for a particular profession such as a doctor or computer programmer? Maybe you work in a particular field? Such a criminal law or fashion. All of those hours of study can benefit your fiction no matter if you studied botany or dentistry.

I use my art training in my fiction, but I also use all the other classes that were required for my degree from history to astronomy. Another author friend of mine, Susan Kaye Quinn, was a legit rocket scientist for NASA who went on to write SciFi when she retired. You can bet she uses everything she learned in her career to inform her writing.

2) Your hobbies

Maybe you like to rock climb or maybe you just like to collect rocks. Either way, what you like to do in your downtime can offer up some interesting plot bits for your fiction. Whether that’s red herrings found in the murder victim’s flat or main hobbies of the protag themselves. Use whatever fascinates you, because I can guarantee you it will fascinate someone else.

I have spent nearly my entire life on stage or in some sort of collaborative performing activity. From musical theater and dance to historical reenactment and role-playing, I’ve been in it all and I use that acquired knowledge in my stories.

3) Your Cultural Heritage

All of us—whether we like to think so or not—have a cultural heritage. Some are just more overt than others.

The place and the people you come from influences the way you see the world and you can use that to show a point of view in a story. Or you can use it to make something entirely new in a place that never was.

4) A Place You Know Well

You can choose to set your stories in real places you know as well as the back of your hand. Or you can instead take places that you know and transplant them into places that never existed at all. And by that, I mean the story worlds you create.

Bayside Academy and The Embassy in The Marked Ones don’t exist, but the buildings do. Corbeauvale in Predestined is based on a real town in Oregon an hour or so from my husband’s family.

Steal from the best

I’m not the only one to do this to be sure. Miyazaki is a master of this technique. And Disney and Pixar storytellers are as well. In fact, the Pixar movie Luca is set in the fictional seaside town of Portorosso, Italy, but is based on the picturesque village of Riomaggiore.

5) Your Raw Experiences

Have you ever broken a bone? Do you have a lethal allergy? A crippling phobia? Ever experienced a devastating loss or grave injustice? Do you remember how it felt?

Did it make it hard to breathe? To eat? To sleep? Did it feel as though you’d lost the ability to speak? Or did you suddenly find your voice? You don’t have to give your characters the exact same injury, loss, or obstacle as you, the key is in transplanting your raw emotions into them.

It’s true that I gave Patrick my severe debilitating phobia of needles. But I took these same visceral feelings and gave them to another character with agoraphobia.

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I hope these examples give you plenty of ideas for using what you know to make the characters and places within your stories feel more real.

Well until next time, Reader, this is your friendly neighborhood storytelling Kat wishing you a wonderfully creative week.

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Your cohort in storytelling,

Kat Vancil

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PS 👉 Do you have a topic you’d like me to cover for one of these emails? Just hit reply and let me know.

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