Talents and skills can serve many purposes in a story by revealing truths about the character, making them more likable or relatable for readers, and contributing to story arc by helping the character achieve their goals. As such, they can do a lot of good things for our stories and characters—if they’re chosen well.
This is why Angela and I created the Talent and Skill Thesaurus at Writers Helping Writers. We wanted authors to have a resource that could help them explore special abilities they might want or need in their story. With over 60 entries, it’s a great jumping-off point for figuring out what your character might be good at.
It may not seem like it, but there’s a lot to think about when you’re making this decision for a character. So we’ve compiled a list of posts to help you learn about identifying talents and skills for your character and incorporating them into a story.
Helpful Posts
4 Reasons Your Hero Needs a Talent
7 Ways a Talent or Skill Will Enhance Your Story
Using Talents and Skills to Characterize
Choose a Unique (but Fitting) Talent for Your Character
Individualize Your Character with a Talent or Skill
How a Skill Can Liven Up a Quiet Protagonist
How to Use Hobbies to Flesh Out a Character
Add a Talent to Make a Character More Likable
Other Mother Lode Posts
If you found this collection of resources helpful, you might be interested in some of our other compilation posts.
How to Write about Character Occupations
How to Show (Not Tell) Character Emotions
How to Create Phenomenal First Pages
How to Write Conflict that Has Maximum Impact
How to Write about Your Character’s Pain
How to Write about a Character’s Emotional Wounds
How to Use Amplifiers to Stress Characters & Elevate Emotion
Becca Puglisi is an international speaker, writing coach, and bestselling author of The Emotion Thesaurus and its sequels. Her books are available in five languages, are sourced by US universities, and are used by novelists, screenwriters, editors, and psychologists around the world. She is passionate about learning and sharing her knowledge with others through her Writers Helping Writers blog and via One Stop For Writers—a powerhouse online library created to help writers elevate their storytelling.