How do I keep my character from becoming a mary sue?

[Battousai-nii]

The trick is to develop the character to the point where they become a seperate entity. When I create a character, the first thing I think about is what I want him/her to do and why. It sounds like what you are writing is basically a teen-angst story transplanted into a fantasy world. My advice would be to develop each character mentally, exploring their motivations and ideals. Give the character distinct personality traits and habits, and flaws.

A primary problem I see in Mary Sue stories is a lack of explanation for the motivations of the other characters. You say everyone acts like they like her, but more interesting would be if one character is actually sorry for her, another envious, another in love/lust, and another really hates her and is just pretending. Add layers details to your characters to make them seem real and avoid generalization.

Another thing is theme. Does the story have a point? Does it communicate something unique about growing up or moving to a new place, or some other important lesson? Because the worst Mary Sues ( and lots of other really really bad writing) is pointless. That may sound like I'm telling you be preachy, but really the theme is the thing that gives the writer a reason to care what happens. It also helps a lot in charting the course when you are writing.

Best of luck!

[Queeny]

I'm not even going to read the 1st post cos the title is asking the question.
It's obvious you know what a Mary Sue is... so WHY DON'T YOU DO THE OPPOSITE!!! scream

sweatdrop well the other option is to sit in a park and see what people look like and how they act, but don't go to the posh areas go to places where common people hang out.

[Queeny]

Lady Muckaduck

I have a character, Katya, a half elf half human, who I use a lot in my work, I'm planning on having her as the main character of my novel I'm working on, but my main problem is this...

The story involves her being sent to earth for her own protection, all half caste children are being slaughtered. She was going to be brought back at the age of 12 but a miscalculation (the years on the planet are longer) means she's actually 17 and the person she is betrothed to is only a year older than her. She has to deal with an entirely new world, not being allowed to wear pants (all skirts all the time) and finding out her father isnt dead like they all assumed, but hiding because he's a chicken. And an assassin has been hired to kill the royal family, the prince of which is her betrothed...(her mother was a duchess but ran away with an elf, but the queen remained friends and organised the betrothal - yes cliched but its necessary)

I like my plot, it needs some work, but I like it, my problem is the fact that all the main characters like Katya without any problems, despite the fact she is terrified of them and for a most part wants to get away from them. I don't want to have them hating her, but they are making my character a mary sue, how can I make her normal without changing the plot too much?

Can anybody suggest something, preferably without being too insulting.

Okay as you can see I've read the 1st post (Cos I didn't wanna be too horrid) but if she is royalty then there is not much you can do to not make her be a mary sue. The only faults she can have is that she's too perfect and needs to dumb down a bit.

Think about it. Cultures and customs will make her weird. From one planet to the next. At the age of 17 she'd have to hang with punks or stupid teens - you know fall to their level.