I don't think, that I was the first one to make up this idea. It is just a compilation of many advices from various manuals. There is even a special book which I used by the way - What Would Your Character Do?: Personality Quizzes for Analyzing Your Characters by Eric Maisel.
From the very beginning, it is necessary to define, whether you will interrogate only your main hero or more than one of them (as I did). Then you must imagine a person, who will conduct this interview - it can be your alter ego or entirely other person, whose task is to force your heroes to tell their story by their own words and from their own point of view.
It must be their voices, so you can test all over again those emotions, which they would show on the pages. You should imagine, that story, which took place in your book, remained in the past and now those who survived (alas, but with Interview method you cannot include those heroes, that are dead in the end of the book, though it is always possible to arrange a spiritual session) should remember all that has happened with them. It allows you not only to describe emotions of heroes at reminiscence of alarming, sad, joyful and other events, which you still has to describe in the book - it enables you to learn the true nature of minor characters. The person, who leads interview, can and even must give to the heroes tricky questions, because these question will ask your readers later, but you would not have the opportunity to answer them directly And after such discussion you will know accurately how to avoid as many questions as you can.
Here is a part of interview with the main hero of "Path of dream":
“...- Greg, it will be easier, if you will tell all from the very beginning.
- From what? - beautiful eyebrow raised a little.
His eyes are small, but deep. Usually people find attractive some green-eyed beauties or blue-eyed handsome boys. Gregory Lewell is far from being called handsome, but his eyes are remarkable. Bright.
- We came to an agreement, - I behave affectedly, opening my notebook. - You begin first, then I give you questions.
- Well, in last Tuesday..
- Greg, - I stop him. - From the very beginning.
Lewell doesn't want to, it's obvious. It's much easier to begin with murder, and even better is to begin with Alex Dain, who decided to show some tyrany and chose him. But I prevent this cowardy attempt. From the beginning means from the beginning, instead of from final or, at the best, from middle of story.
- I must begin with my school then? Tell you about porrige and evil dog?
- Perhaps, - I shrug, knowing, that he bluffs.
Because nobody is interested to tell me about porridge....“
Do you see? It would seem a little text, but we already know much about our hero. He doesn't want to begin his story, that he likes to argue and we even learned something of his appearance and his manner to behave. And this is only the very beginningof interview, with no word yet about the story itself.
Definitely, the main minus of Interview method deficiency is the fact, that the amount of written multiplies. I, as a matter of fact, wrote two first rough draft instead of one and the whole amount of written signs almost reached 1 million (!!). But you cannot imagine, how easy it was for me to write actually my draft after this Interviews. For those who really wants to learn his heroes and is ready to spend extra time and force, Interview method will really turn out a huge help.
By the way, during Interview it's possible and it's necessary to ask questions not only about the plot of your book. You must try to define beforehand the circle of extra questions and - if you want - prepare the most common answers. It is recommended to take advantage of any book on psychology with simple questionnaire. Your task is to know as much about your hero as you possibly can.
Only after that we can conduct our reader to the surprising world of the story inside our book.
