InsaneJournal

physical appearance
I have about 25 pages of writing about the 7 characters who will feature in the WWI werewolf book, yet I realized last night I don't know what all of them look like yet. I loosely assigned hair color early on, to make sure everyone wasn't the same--5 dark-haired, 1 blond, 1 a redhead. I know the Frenchman is unusually tall, and last night I gave him a prominent nose and a small moustache (to prevent myself from having to picture him with handlebars). The blond is a hawkish, beautiful type suitable as material for an instant crush. The redhead is probably slender and unprepossessing, as a contrast to what he actually is inside. Crispin gets to have curly dark hair, as he's sort of Tom Jones-ish in general aspect.

That leaves 3 women, all brunette of various shades. They are very, very different characters, and I will probably represent that, at least a bit, in their body types. I just have to decide what those types are. Last night, I was going back and forth, back and forth. I have to decide soon for the nurse, for she's about to be naked and her appearance will be relevant. She's a middle-aged spinster; would she be bony and flatchested, like a maiden aunt in a novel? Or is that too stereotypical? The soldier passes as a boy, so that leaves out extravagant curves for her, but is she stocky or slender? Stocky might work better, as if she's too tiny, she'll seem more like a girl. The spy, I think, will be conventionally beautiful, which will contrast with her disarrayed hair and clothing and general hint of wildness; perhaps she's very curvy, or is that too stereotypical for the wild, adventurous woman?

Naturally, I cannot write solely by trying to subvert stereotype. What I do with the character will ultimately be what the reader remembers. But, oh, the waffling when I'm in the early stages of a project!