Characters are Useful to a Story Right?

Still behind! Who else is?

I'm also very behind on PiBoIdMo, but I believe I've met a breakthrough in my story and as I'm figuring out characters for Lil' Red, I'm also learning more about the characters in my PB manuscripts. Characters are the main focus for PB and Middle Grade manuscripts as the reader MUST connect with the characters to enjoy or even pay attention to what the plot is or whatever the moral is for the story. As a reader I have to connect with the characters or else even I won't pay attention to the plot, unless of course the author's writing is so fascinating that I forget about characters (usually doesn't happen.)

Speaking of characters, every character has a basic archetype. According to Carol Jung, who created the archetype concept and was amongst the other early 1900's psychologists who dug into the human psyche with dream interpretations, everyone has a handful of basic archetypes that they've fallen into. Same goes with characters in a story. However, not everyone is a cookie cutout of stereotype, even Jung didn't think this way as he says within his writings that the archetypal list is a never-ending list of personalty possibilities. This little article got me thinking of the archetypes of my characters, specifically the idea that it's not what the character does, but why the character does what they do.