Writing The Fear Thesaurus taught us so much about the psychology of fear and how that translates for our characters. The difference between minor and deep fears, the role fear plays character arc, how we can build it into a story’s turning points to shore up the structure…there’s so much to know about this important emotion.
But don’t be afraid ;). If you haven’t yet picked up a copy of this book, we’ve compiled our free resources on the topic here in one spot for easy reference. Enjoy!
Posts, Podcasts, & PDFs
How Fear Shrinks Your Character’s World Over Time
Use Universal Fears to Build Reader Empathy
Fear of Change: A Sample Entry from The Fear Thesaurus
How Fear Plays Into Character Arc, Part 1 (Backstory)
How Fear Plays into Character Arc, Part 2 (Current Story)
The Fear and Human Needs Connection
Understanding Fear’s Intensity Levels
Fears Vs. Phobias: What Writers Need to Know
Is Fear Weakening Your Story? 5 Mistakes to Check
How to Amplify Tension in a Fear-Driven Scene
How Genre Influences Fear’s Role in a Story
How Fear Differs for Antagonists and Protagonists
Using Turning Points to Build a Fear Arc
Fear as a Vital Storytelling Element (Podcast)
We’ve also uploaded some of the appendix tools from the book to our Free Tools page. There, you can find a Fear Survival Response Sheet to help you discover your character’s fight, flight, freeze, or fawn tendency and two Turning Point Maps you can use to build fear into your character’s change or failure arc.
Lastly, for the ultimate resource on this topic that also explores 80 common fears, check out our book, The Fear Thesaurus: A Writer’s Guide to What Holds Characters Back.
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 Conflict that Has Maximum Impact
How to Write about Character Occupations
How to Show (Not Tell) Character Emotions
How to Create Phenomenal First Pages
How to Write about a Character’s Emotional Wounds
How to Write about Your Character’s Pain
How to Choose & Employ Your Character’s Talents and Skills
How to Use Amplifiers to Stress Characters & Elevate Emotion
