Jade Lee recently finished a fabulous week at AskAnAuthorAll. She spoke on “Writing Sensuality”, and advised us to use an imagery set for our characters throughout the book. A good starting point would be one of the four basic elemants – air, fire, water, earth. Other examples she gave were a volcano and a skittish bird.
I’ll sum up her talk by saying you can use these images as a shortcut to jump into the character’s mind (especially if you’ve had a few days away from the book). And you can use the images throughout your book to describe them. For example, if you choose the bird image, you can say she’s flightly and she flaps about. She flies away when there’s danger. She has a chirpy voice, and she likes to sit on rooftops – or in beauty parlors – and talk to her neighbors.
This probably wouldn’t be your heroine. 
Jade’s posts were WOW! revelations to me. I was working on character sketches for my wip, and realized I needed a new character. With the help of my CPs, I created one, and when I was setting up his character, I realized he’s the earth element. He works with the land, so it fits him perfectly. He’s deeply rooted. What makes this so perfect is that I used astrological signs for my other characters (something I normally don’t do). The romance interest for my earth character is a Pisces – the fish sign. So I’m giving her the water elements – and doesn’t earth need water?
Another character in my book wants freedom. I’m comparing her to a bird. Not the skittish bird I talked about earlier. Not an eagle, either. She’s a goose. She wants to fly high and far.
What about you? What would you compare your characters to? And if they’re love interests, a hero/heroine, what would you choose that would work off each other? Anyone using a cat and a dog? 
(If you haven’t read Jade Lee’s AAAA posts, I found her articles on Imagery here and here.)
Because my current WIP is a fantasy, it is easy for me to say my heroine is wind, my hero is a bear
. For my last book, even now, if you put a gun to my head I couldn’t tell you what imagery they are. So perhaps for me it only works in fantasy 
.
Oh, and for my two CPs who have read or are reading my current WIP, I give you full permission to LYAO at the above comment, because it isn’t just that my heroine and my hero are the wind and a bear in an imagery sense, they really ARE the wind and a bear, LOLOL.
Michelle, the bear is a no brainer for your hero, lol. The wind imagery is perfect for your heroine.
I wrote my blog on Monday and put it in drafts. Yesterday I wrote the first scene in the pov of the water protagonist. Sad to say, the water imagery didn’t fit her. Shrug. It’s a nice concept though. And I did have her think of the guy in an earthy way.
Michelle, I did LOL when I read your comment.
The imagery is really working in your book, so maybe there’s something to using it. I’ll see what happens with my goose protagonist and my earth love interest. I get the feeling the earthy love interest might work, but not so sure about the other one.
Hey, Edie, unique concept. I haven’t mapped my characters this way specifically, but they always have an elemental characteristic. Basically, I know how they “feel.” So, I use this concept, but not on a conscious level. LOL. Clear as mud, eh?
And that pic rocks! We’ve always had beagles, and once a beagle/bassett mix. Don’t ask, hubby let the girls pick one out from the local shelter when they were young. Verra strange looking doggie.
LaDonna, it’s clear as mud to me – and, hey, mud is an earth image.
I love beagle/bassett mixes. If it had been up to me, we would have gotten a bassett hound (or a beagle/bassett mix, lol). They’re so cute.
Those articles did make interesting reading, Edie. I’ve never imagined my characters using elements and I really cannot say if it would work with me. Next book I’ll give it a shot. Even if it doesn’t work, it will be interesting experiment.
Hard to describe your characters in DOTS, Michelle. I would say that Elizabeth was a tree since she was so rooted in her convictions and her loyalties. Jack? Not so sure. He was at a crossroads of his life and his convictions were shaky.
Liz, it’s been so long since I read yours, it would be hard for me to say what element it is for Rhiannon (sp?). Maybe something earthy.
Elizabeth came from the sea (or ocean, lol), but you’re right about her character. Not sure about Jack either.
Jack was originally a farmer, and he goes back to that, so maybe he’s earth. She’s a combination of a bird and the nuturing rains, maybe. But really the imagery I used throughout had nothing to do with the characters so much as the story itself. Lightning in particular. Maybe the imagery thing works best in a romance?
Michelle, maybe it varies with the story – and the storyteller.
I’ll let you know how it works for me.
I heard Jade talk at Celebrate Romance in March and she hit on much the same thing. It made sense–the hero in my March release is a mustang stallion, wild and free. My heroine a thoroughbred, refined and well-bred. I saw him as black and her white. But I never thought of this beforehand, just after the fact.
I don’t know as I could utilize this tool in the initial writing, because I’d be tempted to play author intrusion, and it would also require indepth plotting.
Jan, those are great images! I think you’re right about not using this in the initial writing, at least for me. I discover too much about my characters as I write to put them in a box – or an element. It’s nice to keep the images in the back of my mind, though. If it will work, my subconscious should pick up on it even if my conscious mind doesn’t. I have great faith in my subconscious mind.
Edie,
I found this idea really intruiging too. But I have no clue how my characters would fit into this.
And I think, for me at least, both you and Jan are right. The characters wouldn’t come off right if I tried to force them to fit a particular direction. But maybe during revisions, if they are already leaning toward a pattern– you could sort of help them lean that way a bit harder. lol
Theresa, that’s a good idea to do it during revisions, when you know which pattern they lean toward. I’m a loooong way from that point now, but I’ll keep it in mind. Thanks!
As you know, Edie, my characters come alive as I’m writing the story, not in the preplanning or whatever term is popular now.
The thing that would worry me about hanging any specific tag on a character early on is that it would stunt that character’s development, not enhance it. But then I’m not a plotter. 
Exactly, Theresa. Using the technique in the revision phase could deepen the characters and smooth out any inconsistencies.
Jan, I do skimpy character sheets – and then I forget about them, lol. I only look back for facts about the character – like age, height, relatives’ names, et., because I forget those too. So revision would be the better time for me to use something like this. By then you’d know what would fit the character. Like your stallion and thoroughbred.
Hey, Edie, do you think this technique is similar to the shadowbox thingies that Crusie and others use? As I’m thinking back to when I wrote ORC, I had a litho that was my nana’s of a black stallion and a white mare. That picture had been a favorite of mine since I was a child. Now I’m wondering how deeply that burrowed into my subconscious. *twilight zone music here*
Jan, that litho sounds so cool. I bet that did burrow into your subconscious. I have a collage that I made in my office, and one of the images is three little girls with their arms around each other. It represents me and my two sisters. I love this image. Now you have me wondering if it affected my Boobs story.
It just might, Edie. You have three women who bond in BOOBS, right?
Jan, I do. I have four women protagonists in my current book, but that’s because I noticed in other books about with mulit-female protagonists, the number is usually four. Since these are bestselling writers, I wonder if maybe they know something I didn’t.
I’ve never noticed that before, Edie. Me, I usually do things in threes and always have.
Jan, I didn’t notice before either. I always thought three was the magic number, lol. Debbie Macomber’s Thursdays at Eight and Patricia Gaffney’s The Saving Graces have four heroines. Lorna Landvik’s Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons has five protagonists. I like it. With my four protags, I should never run out of plot.