Author Katherine Lato (aka KatherineWriting) led participants through her preparatory workshop Characters are story. This informative workshop delved into many aspects of characters: how to make them feel real to the reader, how to keep them interesting, how best to work them into scenes, how to handle their back story, etc.
There were plenty of exercises to let participants experiment with techniques Katherine introduced. 
Katherine, who actually enjoys editing (and who will be leading an editing Path for the Journey in 2014), shared many tips that she has learned over the years, including gems like this: real character flaws aren’t solved by the end of the book (people are imperfect). I also liked her advice to include reasons for rules that the author wants to be put in place. E.g., if your characters don’t swear profusely in the book where others in that profession might use a lot of profanity, mention a reason why, such as the influence of a matriarch grandmother who forbids the use of foul language.
The audience applauded Katherine at the end of the presentation and several individuals came up afterwards to thank Katherine and ask follow-up questions. Katherine has made all of her presentation material, with extensive annotations available in many formats; and notes from this session are also available.
Katherine was ably assisted in her presentation by her husband Barry Glicklich (FinbarrMcG).
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