Character Descriptions

[dr_mabeuse]

Matriarch gives some good advice. This is really a bitch of a project, and I really don't know if it can be tackled head on.

Thinking of the most beautiful women I know, it's not so much their physical appearance as it is something in their carriage and attitude. Physical beauty won't make up for the mannerisms of a stevedore, but grace and attitude will more than compensate for a lack of physical perfection. A pretty woman is by no means the same as an attractive woman, and I think that's important to keep in mine.

ithout doubt, the one thing that makes a woman most beautiful is desire in her eyes. It doesn't have to be slavering and drooling, but just that look that says she's giving you her attention, that she sees something in you that's invaluable. I knew one girl who had that ability. She could make anyone she was looking at feel like he was the center of the universe, and men always flocked around her.

So much depends on the eyes, and it's not how they look to the world, but how they look at the world.

I think you could do worse than to say she had a girl's face and a woman's eyes. That would work for me, anyhow.

 

[impressive]

From Thunder Follows Lighting :

A crowded room, maybe a pub or bar, a thronged shopping mall or even once a milling queue of football supporters going into a match. All the people busily engaged, shopping, drinking, talking, walking, and going about their ordinary business. Then heads turn. Conversation stutters to a halt. Drinks stop halfway to lips. Strides are broken and people stare. Only for the barest fraction of a second. But it's there. It's noticeable. Something moving through the crowd. Something that demands attention and almost instantly dismisses it. That something is Storm.

I've loved this passage from the first time I read it.

 

[CharleyH]

Okay, this takes place in the future and it's in a fantastical universe (pink hair), but aside from that...
Okay, I'm basically trying to capture the essence of beauty in this descripton of a character (the "helen" of this world in my story) and I'm stuck. It seems like it's missing something. Anyway, it's essential to my story that the reader BELIEVE that this is the most beautiful woman ever.

I have not read anyone else's posts yet, but I'm certain I am not alone in saying that the only way a reader will believe she is the most beautiful woman is ... if you do. Much luck.

 

[CharleyH]

If it's a fantastic universe why do you need modern, western realism?

I think Whoopie is hot.

You know? I have always wondered such things of Sci-fi, why ... and its a different thread, but why Sci-fi erotic writers rely on conventions of the past instead of moving into something self-defined as they create that "new world". Interesting POV, although I know Mat has a certain point, as well.

 

[DemonOuterverse]

I think everybody had pretty much summed it up. "Less is more."

To give her a more "perfect" feel, I'd personally off her presence, the way she makes people around her feel and not her looks. Almost like she has an ethereal presence.

Personally, since I am a fan of anime I tend to like the description with the pink hair better in a sci-fi/fantasy story (most of the characters I write...not on lit, btw...all have oddball color hair or eyes). Describing every minute detail is more appropriate for a character profile.

I guess I'm reiterating what everyone else has already said.