I had a discussion with a fellow writer the other day about making characters more likeable.

In romance, the lead characters are sexy. Most by looks, a few by charisma. But the majority are just down right gorgeous. Hunky. Drool worthy.

Now I don’t know about most of you out there, but in real life, things don’t always work that way. Very few of my girl friends are size two’s with a sultry voice and a gorgeous body. And while the men in their lives are their alpha-male heroes, they’re not all romance cover models. (Shhh… don’t tell them I said that, though.)

So what can we do to stop the “pffft, like anyone would ever be like that?” reaction to our gorgeous heroes and heroines?

Character flaws.

Countless literary educators teach about making your characters human. There’s a lot of prep work into character development, and everyone has their own way of doing it. But almost all the educators will tell you the easiest thing to do is to start with someone you know. Find a person in your life who has one or more of the characteristics you want in your character, and use them as a launching pad. By doing this, you give your character a start in life.

What’s your quirk?

I knew a man who couldn’t stop snapping his fingers whenever he got the start of an idea. He would be halfway through his sentence, stop, snap his fingers half a dozen times, then wiggle his index finger frantically before blurting out his new idea. It was annoying as hell. But a really cool thing to add to a character you want to project as annoying.

Is your character a mom with a young boy? Guaranteed she has Hot Wheels cars in her purse, crayons and a coloring book in the glove box, and knows the name of every monster truck. Is the man a wanna-be handyman? Always offering to fix something but has no idea how to actually use a level or straight-edge? Or is he a car fanatic? Never able to point out a vehicle without telling everyone the make, model, year, engine size, horsepower, history, and odd fact about the paint color on models made in the 70’s? Is your heroine such a bad cook she can screw up a glass of water?

There are so many things you can use to make your characters more likeable. By using character flaws and personality quirks the reader can associate with, you will bring them up off the page and right into our hearts.