4 Tips To Write About Family in Fiction

I love a good family story. That is the reason my first two novels, Indivisible and Brighter Than the Sun, have a strong focus on parental and sibling relationships. I like to think of families as complex, imperfect units that can provide such rich material—if you know how to effectively utilize them to elevate your story.

(Daniel Aleman: On Books That Break Your Heart Before Mending It)

Here are some tips I’ve found helpful on how to write about family in fiction:

Real-life families are diverse and complex, and they may be composed of different members, which is something you can and should explore in your writing. Who are your protagonist’s closest relatives? Are these people present in their life? How does your character feel about each of them? The answers to these questions may lead you to uncover important details about your protagonist, especially since people tend to be shaped by the dynamics they’ve experienced at home, and family composition could influence your main character’s personality, worldview, and way of doing things.

Think of it this way: A youngest sibling may have different perspectives than a first-born or an only child. A kid who grew up in a single-parent household may have a different vantage point than someone who grew up in a two-parent household. Or someone who comes from a tight-knit family could have different priorities than someone who isn’t too close with their relatives. You might not need to include all these details in the narrative, but they will help inform your character’s motivations, objectives, and decisions.

In order to create three-dimensional, realistic families, it’s important to consider how one person’s decisions impact everyone else. Keep in mind that, for your protagonist, this is a two-way street: They are likely to be affected by what others in the family do, but their own decisions will also elicit reactions from family members. Being aware of this as you craft your story will provide rich territory for you to explore familial bonds and conflict.

For better or for worse, relatives can have a way of eliciting strong emotions in an individual. Dig deep into what your main character feels toward each person in their family, and don’t be afraid to explore conflicting or contradictory emotions. A character could hold deep resentment toward a family member, while also feeling love for them.

Or we could sense that someone in the family disapproves of certain decisions our main character has made, while also feeling proud of who they have become. It’s these contradictions that lead to complex, life-like characters. After all, families are imperfect, and people can have a multitude of different feelings at once.

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Some or all of your main character’s relatives may not feature heavily in your novel, and that is okay. Rather than shoving these characters to the side, think about how their absence could elevate the story. For example, if you’re writing for children or young adults, you might feel as though the protagonist’s parents pose an obstacle to the plot, since they may prevent the main character from leaning into adventure.

You might choose to turn these characters into busy parents who are so preoccupied with other things that they’re unaware of what their child has been up to. In this scenario, you could ask yourself how this relationship makes the protagonist feel, and in what ways it leads them to feel even more inclined to pursue adventure.

It may also be possible to explore physical distance—if your character lives in a different city than the rest of the family, in what ways does the distance impact them? Or, separately, if your main character is estranged from a relative, how has this shifted their outlook on life? Whatever your reason for choosing not to feature a family member in the story, exploring the impact of their absence could help you understand your main character better and bring depth to their worldview.

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