5 Reasons Main Characters Are the Hardest to Write

I’ve read so many books lately where it seemed like the author had a great idea, detailed world-building, interesting side characters, and a decent plot—yet still, the book fell flat. I’ve been pondering why this happens, and I believe it’s because the main character is not compelling enough to lead the story.

It’s easy to criticize an author for failing to write a compelling main character. On the surface, it seems like this character should be the easiest one to write, doesn’t it? The main character should be the most interesting—the one the author loves the most. Right?

Well, in my experience, main characters are the absolute hardest characters to write. Give me a villain, a best friend, or a love interest any day. But main characters are hard!

As I draft my latest fantasy novel, I still find myself struggling with the main characters. Whenever I get stuck in my writing or lose momentum, it’s usually because there’s a gap in the main character’s design that I need to solve before I can move forward. It means I don’t really understand my character yet, and I need to get to know them better. This is easier said than done, especially because I have the power to make my characters whoever I want them to be. So, somehow I have to figure out who they really are, amidst all the options.

Why are main characters so hard to write?1. Flawed but not too flawed.

Your main character has to have flaws, otherwise the story is boring. But you have to be careful to balance those flaws with other merits, otherwise you run the risk of them being really unlikeable. Of course, no character will be universally loved by readers (that’s good, it means they’re realistic!) but you have to make them a compelling mix of good and bad, and create some tension between those two sides.

2. They are the reader’s tour guide

Your main character is essentially the story’s tour guide. They lead the reader through the book and show them all the sights. The reader experiences everything through the filter of the main character’s mind. They have to have opinions, emotions, and backstory, but somehow also be enough of a blank slate to experience everything for the first time on behalf of the reader. It’s like how Doctor Who always has a human companion who travels with them, so the human can be our eyes and ears in time and space. They can ask all the questions we need answered. They can react to things for the first time, so we know how to react. I think this is part of why YA books are so popular, because younger protagonists can be more of a blank slate and they have an easier time leading the readers on their journey of growth and discovery.

3. Understanding their motivations

We’ve all read characters who do infuriating things, things that make us want to shake some sense into them. But the best characters are the ones who can do infuriating things, and somehow it’s still understandable. We know why the character behaved the way they did. That’s evidence that the author has laid the foundation really well. It comes down to what a character needs and wants, and how they react when things interfere with their plans. Not everybody reacts the same way to certain situations. So unless we want readers to be frustrated saying “that’s not believable” or “nobody would do that”, we need to know why and how our characters react, and we need to lay it out clearly for the readers.  This is true of supporting characters as well, but main characters are the ones with the most “screen time”, the ones whose motivations will be questioned the most.

4. Living inside their mind

You have to live inside your main character’s mind for the entire book (or most of the book). This means you have to know every little detail about them. Everything from how they feel about themselves and the other characters, all the way to how they’d react in any situation ever.

It’s an intense depth of knowledge. You even have to know what the character doesn’t know, what they’re in denial about, what they need. It’s just a lot. And frankly, I think it’s hard to prepare all this information ahead of time. I’ve tried to do excruciatingly detailed character plans, but then, as I write, I discover my plan is wrong or flawed and I have to update it. I guess that’s the equivalent of “gaining life experience”, for these fictional characters.

5. Their perspective on everything and everyone  

Along with living inside the main character’s mind, readers also see everything and every other character filtered through the main character’s perspective. They only get partial information from the other characters, and they have to decide how to react based on how the main character reacts. The main character is a really useful tool for enabling the other characters’ development. They can show/tell us that the villain is terrifying, or the love interest is attractive. But we don’t have another character’s perspective on our main character, so the author has to work twice as hard to bring them to life. And if they don’t succeed, it filters back through all the other characters. If our main character’s perspective isn’t clear, we miss out on strong cues for everything and everyone else in the story.

Conclusion

Main characters may be the most difficult characters to write, but I think we can all agree that the effort is worthwhile. When you read a book that has a truly compelling main character, it transforms the entire reading experience. The characters become your friends—people you look forward to seeing on the pages.

For myself, I think I will always have something to learn about writing compelling main characters. But at the end of the day, my goal is to write people who feel real. I think the best way to do that, is to treat them like they are real and try to get to know them like I would anyone else in my life.

What do you think is the hardest thing about writing main characters? Are there other strategies to try to write compelling main characters? Let me know in the comments!