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Developing A Character Readers Will Root For?

Zak9

Scribe
I love developing the worlds my characters live in, and I have an easy time developing the antagonists and side characters. The only thing I have a tough time with characteristically is the main character. Convenient, huh?

I always battle myself over what his or her main traits should be. Should they be quiet and reserved like many are? Why are so few protagonists lively and excited? Opinions? Methods for how you develop your main character?

PS this is for the main character in my POV
 
I think most people are at least somewhat sympathetic if you get deep enough into their motivations. Give them a problem, then show how that problem affects them and how they deal with it.
 

Jamber

Sage
Agree with Feo Takahari: give them a struggle to begin with, as well as some trait we can admire (even if it's tiny), and you'll have us mostly hooked.
 
A part of it is balancing a positive trait with a flaw. Simply building a character around "courage" or "ingenuity" or whatever, even with detailed background and motivations, can come across as a bit idealistic. But if you show he's brave but also paranoid about the longtime enemy he's had to fight, and the story centers on whether that enemy can be trusted, readers see he has to manage his own nature and grow, and that's irresistable.
 

Ireth

Myth Weaver
A part of it is balancing a positive trait with a flaw. Simply building a character around "courage" or "ingenuity" or whatever, even with detailed background and motivations, can come across as a bit idealistic. But if you show he's brave but also paranoid about the longtime enemy he's had to fight, and the story centers on whether that enemy can be trusted, readers see he has to manage his own nature and grow, and that's irresistable.

Seconded. ^^ Cadell, the MC of my newest project, is not a very likeable character at first -- he's selfish and hedonistic, hurts an innocent man for something that wasn't even his fault (and the guy in question was trying to FIX the thing that went wrong, he just failed at it), yet he's also incredibly loyal to those who have his loyalty, mainly his Queen and his lover. As the story goes on, he learns to be less selfish, and slower to misjudge people (though the latter kinda backfires on him a little).
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
I also tend to start with events and setting. I have a huge goblin invasion and a city sacked, and I have a little girl caught in all this who eventually gets away to safety. I didn't try to build any more character than that. I certainly did not think in terms of strengths and weaknesses, but development sort of happened as I wrote her.

To make it easier and more streamlined, I had her be an orphan. I wanted her to be around ten to twelve because that's a special age with a very particular kind of courage and clarity of vision. That meant she had to be living on the streets, which meant she had to be clever and quick.

As I threw specific scenes in her way and helped her get through them, she exhibited other traits. I'm not one who believes these just emerge. They're pure tricks I pull out to get her unstuck, whether it's a hot temper or light fingers or the ability to run fast. She hasn't needed any magic yet, but she does have a big dog (Roman war dog, in fact). Once I gave her the dog, a whole other set of traits came forward.

I don't believe for an instant that I could have planned all this up front. The only way I know of to have come up with them was to have started writing. It's a bit like playing jazz. I might decide key and tempo up front, but how we get from bar 25 to bar 26 just plain can't be planned; it has to be played. To continue the metaphor, if we're in a recording studio, then maybe we have multiple takes and start mixing and editing, and that's all re-writing.

There is a danger in this, and I've been there. It's called writing yourself into a corner. Sometimes everything fits and everything flows, right up until it doesn't. And then you can't go forward because of the character and events you've created. Then you either throw it all out, or you're faced with major surgery. It can really be disheartening. I've done it more than once.

If I could plan it all in advance, I surely would!
 
But you think your "pants-seat writing" built a good character because you kept an eye on how much trouble she was in and what traits might help her (or sometimes hurt her, I'm sure) in it, and then what those implied. A good point; it's hard to go far wrong with "person in trouble, coping" as a focus.
 
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Nebuchadnezzar

Troubadour
I'm afraid I don't know how to develop a character readers will root for, because I don't know (yet) if readers root for my characters. I've written fanfic, but there it's pretty much guaranteed the readers will pull for your character(s) so long as you don't take them too far from canon.

That said, what I try to do in my original writing is write characters that I would root for; that means good-hearted characters with flaws. And by that I mean real flaws -- not so-called flaws like "I have incredible powers like a super-hero but I lack the self-confidence to realize how truly awesome I really am." Or: "I'm incredibly attractive but the person I really love doesn't realize it and I need to convince him/her" (in a movie this usually is achieved by the character taking their glasses off).

I try to write MCs who have, IMO, real flaws. In my WIP, one character, the White Lady, is a super-human warrior, effectively immortal, and 150 years old or so with many years to go. However, emotionally she is only ever 20 years old (because of a theory I have about age and what it really means to be old), and this creates significant problems for her relationships with the normal humans she knows and loves. Although I love her dearly and she's one of my favorite characters, there's an aspect of her that is (I don't know a better word) pathetic.

The MC of the book that I'm drafting to follow my WIP is a loser. He's handsome, charming, occasionally an action-oriented individual. But deep down he's a quitter and as a result of that he's a failure. Perhaps I'm channeling Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas when I write him.

Somehow I find these kind of characters, who in my mind have real problems, more appealing than, I don't know, super-heroes whose big flaw is that their parents never loved them. YMMV.
 
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Zak9

Scribe
Sorry for taking so long to reply!

Thanks for the advice everyone, especially skip.knox, I think the character will be developed as I write.
 
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