The process of character construction, a reflection

When I create a character for use in my own work, merely starting the process begins a lot of asking of questions. Probably the first and foremost question when writing any story is “how important is this character going to be to the story?”. In the cases of characters like Linula and Ruby Amelda, the answer is exceedingly obvious. They are the entire basis for the story, and in one case, the story is going to be seen almost entirely through her eyes. The first of the stories in which Linula and Ruby appear is in part a meditation on the fact that the things that make us different (one is from an abusive, self-righteous asshole family, the other a loving successful commercialist family) are just as important, if not more so, than the things that make us the same. So constructing these two characters is a painstaking process in which many questions have to be asked and answered.