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WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®

WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®

Helping writers become bestselling authors

Character Type and Trope Thesaurus

What do reluctant heroes, femme fatales, nerds, snobs, and rebels have in common? They’re all character types that are frequently found in many kinds of stories.

The upside of these tropes is that they’re familiar to readers, who will recognize them and immediately know the role they’re meant to play. The downside? They’ve been used so many times that they can easily become clichéd and predictable. But with The Character Type and Trope Thesaurus, they no longer have to be.

Use this resource to familiarize yourself with the commonalities for a certain kind of character while also exploring ways to elevate them and make them memorable, more interesting, and perfectly suited for the story you want to tell.

Recommended Reading:
What is a Character Type and Trope Thesaurus?
What’s the Difference between Archetypes and Tropes?

Type and Trope Entries (Samples)

ARCHETYPES
Caregiver
Creator
Explorer
Hero
Innocent
Jester
Magician
Orphan
Rebel
Ruler
Sage
Lover

TROPES
Adrenaline Junkie
Antihero
Bad Boy
Bad Influence
Benefactor
Bossy Britches
Chosen One
Christ Figure
Cowboy
Dark Lord or Lady

Doomsday Prepper
Father Figure
Free Spirit
Funster
Grotesque
Hopeless Romantic
Hotshot
Jock
Lady of Adventure
Loner
Mad Scientist
Mafia Don
Matriarch
Newcomer
Nice Guy/Girl
Pessimist
Phony Politician
Psychopath
Queen Bee
Reluctant Hero
Snob
Starving Artist
Storyteller
Wallflower

Ready to change the writing game? 

There are more tropes to explore, which is why an updated and expanded version of this collection can be found at One Stop For Writers. The Character Type and Trope Thesaurus is part of the largest Show-Don’t-Tell THESAURUS Database available anywhere.

Writing is hard, but the right tools make all the difference. Writers all over the world have discovered how One Stop for Writers resources can help them write stronger fiction faster. Stop by and see what we’re about by activating a free trial.

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NO AI TRAINING: Any use of this content to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The legal copyright holder, Writers Helping Writers®, reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models. WRITERS HELPING WRITERS® · Copyright © 2025 · WEBSITE DESIGN BY LAUGH EAT LEARN

 

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