Why Characters Feel Flat

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You know your main character inside and out, you know their backstory, their childhood, their fears, their quirks, and maybe even how they take their coffee. And yet somehow, when they hit the page, whether that's in your outline or your first draft, they still feel kind of flat. So maybe you do what most writers do and you add more. More backstory, more personality, and more detail. Or maybe you just focus on making them more likable. But either way, none of it really solves the problem. Well, in this episode, I'm going to show you why that happens, and I'm gonna help you figure out which specific piece of character development is actually missing. Also that you can strengthen the character you already have instead of piling on more details or scrapping your draft. Welcome to the Fiction Writing Made Easy Podcast. My name is Savannah Gilbo, and I'm here to help you write a story that works. I want to prove to you that writing a novel doesn't have to be overwhelming. So each week I'll bring you a brand new episode with simple, actionable, and step-by-step strategies that you can implement in your writing right away. So, whether you're brand new to writing or more of a seasoned author looking to improve your craft, this podcast is for you. So pick up a pen and let's get started. So today we're talking about what to do when your protagonist feels flat on the page, even if you feel like you know them really well. And this is such a common problem because most writers assume that flatness means they need more character information, more backstory, more quirks, more personality, or even more likability. But in my experience, that's usually not the real issue. The problem is usually that one of the key pieces that helps the character function inside your story is either missing, vague, or underdeveloped. So in this episode, I'm going to walk you through five common mistakes that make a character feel flat, and for each one, I'm going to show you what to look for and what to strengthen. So let's dive right in, starting with mistake number one.

Make The Goal Concrete

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Mistake number one is that the protagonist's goal is too vague to write from. Now, most writers know their protagonist needs a goal, and they've usually already given them one. The problem happens when that goal stays abstract. So maybe your protagonist wants to be happy or wants to be loved or wants to find themselves. All of those can feel like goals, right? Because technically they are things that a person might want. But again, the problem is they're too general to generate a story from. Because if you think about it, any one of those goals could belong to almost any character in almost any book, right? So let's take the first one as an example. She wants to be happy. Now that might capture the feeling that your protagonist is chasing, but it can't tell you what she would actually do next in order to be happy. And that's where the writing starts to get tricky. Because if you don't know what being happy looks like for this specific character, then you can't know what steps they would take to get there. Which means that every scene you outline or write essentially becomes a guessing game. Your outline's gonna start to feel fuzzy, your first draft will start to wander, and when you sit down to outline or write the next scene, you're not sure what's supposed to happen. If you can relate to that, I just want you to know it's super normal. And that is the problem with having a vague story goal. It might capture the feeling your protagonist is chasing, but it can't tell you what they would actually do next or what steps they would take to get to that feeling. So the fix here isn't necessarily to give your character a bigger goal. It's to get more specific about what they want and why. So, for example, let's take our character that wants to be happy and let's call her Sally. So Sally wants to be happy is a vague goal. It doesn't tell you what she's going to do to achieve happiness or what even happiness looks like for her. Now, let's take something like Sally wants to win the regional bake-off in September. That automatically gives you some sense of the next steps or the first steps that she could take to accomplish that goal. And it's even stronger when that goal is anchored in a really specific why. So, for example, maybe Sally wants to win the regional bake-off in September because it's the one thing her late mother never got to do. Now we know what being happy looks like for Sally specifically. And it's not just a general feeling anymore. It's a concrete goal that she can pursue and it has a personal reason behind it that readers can understand. That's the difference between an abstract desire and a workable story goal. Alright, so to say this in a different way, a concrete specific goal gives your book its spine. And the motivation behind that goal is what helps readers connect with your character and care about them. Once your protagonist's goal is clear, then your scenes become easier to shape because each one can move your protagonist visibly closer to or further from something that you and the reader can both picture and track. Alright, so if you think that this might be what's causing your character to fall flat, then I want you to ask yourself, can I name my protagonist's story goal in one concrete sentence? And is that goal specific enough that I can picture the actual steps they would take to get it? If not, that's okay because now you know exactly what to work on next. But if you were able to say yes to both of those questions, then you can safely move on to mistake number two and we'll see if that is what's causing your character to fall flat. So to recap, mistake number one is that your protagonist's story goal might be too vague to write from. Now, moving on to mistake number two.

Turn Big Stakes Personal

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Mistake number two is that the stakes in your story might be big, but they don't yet feel personal to your protagonist. So if the story goal is what your protagonist is chasing, then the stakes are what they stand to lose if they fail. And when a character falls flat on the page, a lack of personal stakes is often the reason. Now, here's an important distinction I want to make. Stakes aren't automatically compelling just because something big or serious could happen. They become compelling when readers understand what that outcome would cost your specific protagonist. And this is where I see a lot of writers get stuck. They put something big on the page, so something like a breakup, a death, a public failure, a lost opportunity, a threat to someone's safety, or anything big like that. And they assume that the reader is automatically going to feel the weight of it just because it's big. But here's the thing a lot of writers are missing. Something big can happen right there on the page, fully spelled out, and still not feel personal to your protagonist. So what I mean by this is let's say that your character loses their job. On its own, that might be a major life event for your protagonist. But just because it's a major life event, that doesn't necessarily make it a personal stake that really impacted them. Because in theory, maybe your character didn't really like their job and they were just waiting for an excuse to be let go, right? Or maybe it was truly devastating. So again, the event on its own might be something big in your character's timeline, but that doesn't necessarily mean it affected them in a significant way. Now the stakes of this can become personal if readers understand what losing that job cost that specific character. So for example, the future they'd quietly built their whole life around, or maybe their job was the one stable thing in their life when everything else around them has been changing for years and years, or maybe their job provided them the proof that the path they chose for their life was the right one. Right? So same event, two completely different weights. And the difference isn't the size of what's at stake or what's at risk. So to say this in another way, a story can put enormous things on the line and still feel flat, while a quieter story about maybe being passed over for a promotion can grip readers completely, because what makes the stakes of your story land isn't how big the things at risk are. It's how personal those things are to your protagonist or what those things mean to your protagonist. And so again, without that personal meaning, even the biggest event can feel like just a fact on the page. Readers might very well understand what's happening, but they won't fully understand why it matters to this specific character. And that's when a protagonist can start to feel flat. Not because nothing is happening, but because we can't feel the pressure those events are putting on them specifically. Now, you'll usually feel this mistake show up in your scenes. Usually I see writers who are trying to make the stakes hit harder and harder. So from scene to scene, they're raising the danger, piling on the consequences, and spelling out every little thing that could go wrong. And somehow their scenes still come out feeling oddly flat, like nothing is really pressing on or affecting the protagonist. And if you're in the situation now, then that is the tell that this mistake is probably affecting you. And so the fix here is to figure out what your protagonist personally can't bear to lose. And then make sure that the personal cost is what's creating the pressure in your scenes, not just the event itself happening, but what that event means for your protagonist. Ask yourself this question: if my protagonist fails to accomplish their story goal, what do they personally lose? And is that personal cost what's driving the scenes in front of me? Again, if not, that's okay. Now you know what to work on next. But if you were able to answer yes to that question, then this might not be the specific mistake that's making your protagonist flat. And maybe mistake number three is. So let's go there

Add Inner Conflict Friction

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next. Mistake number three is that your protagonist might have external obstacles, but no active inner obstacle. And this is the mistake I see most often in drafts that are almost working. So the protagonist's story goal is set up, maybe the stakes are really clear and personal, maybe the plot is moving, and as the external obstacles keep coming at your protagonist, they just keep dealing with them. But still, for some reason, they feel strangely flat or thin. Now, almost always this happens because every obstacle the protagonist faces is on the outside. So the antagonist, the locked door, the rival in a specific scene, the ticking clock, a deadline that won't move, and things like that. Yes, those external obstacles matter. They are part of the visible machinery of your plot, but on their own, they only create pressure around the protagonist. They don't automatically create pressure inside the protagonist. And that is equally important. Now, luckily, this is where your protagonist's inner obstacle comes in. If you're not familiar with this term, an inner obstacle is essentially just some kind of wound, fear, misbelief, or protective pattern that quietly works against what your protagonist wants. And it's not something that just sits in their backstory, it's something that's going to get activated by the events of the story and change how they respond scene to scene. Now, here's how to spot if this is the mistake plaguing your draft. I want you to look for how easy your protagonist is moving through the story. If something happens and they respond really cleanly and easily, so let's say they assess the situation, they make the reasonable choice and they move on, then they might not have an active inner obstacle yet. I say that because in this scenario, they are essentially frictionless. In other words, there is nothing inside them complicating their journey, influencing their next steps, getting in the way of their scene-by-sene decisions, or forcing them to wrestle with what's happening. And when there's no internal friction like this, your scenes are going to start to feel like things you're kind of just arranging around a person rather than someone whose story you're following. That's why a protagonist can feel thin even when there's plenty happening around them. The plot might be creating problems for them, but nothing inside of that character is being pressed, challenged, or exposed. And one of the things that makes a protagonist feel really compelling and interesting to readers is when they get to watch them move through the story carrying something unresolved. Readers want to see what's going to happen when a character has a belief they can't quite let go of, or a fear that shapes the way they move through the world, or some kind of wound from their childhood that they're protecting, you know, things like that. And the moments that readers lean in the hardest are the ones where that inner obstacle gets touched and the protagonist feels exposed. Maybe their guard slips, their armor cracks, and maybe they even react more strongly than the situation seems to call for. That kind of vulnerability is really magnetic because it lets us see who your character is underneath the strategy that they've been using to survive. Alright, so the fix here, if you recognize this mistake in your draft, is to develop your protagonist's inner obstacle. So again, that's just something internal that pushes against their story goal. And then let that internal obstacle show up in their scene by scene decisions. Because remember, an inner obstacle is something that can make your protagonist hesitate when they should act, push forward when they should stop, misread something important, avoid the truth, or choose the familiar pattern even when it costs them. And that friction between what they want and what's working against them from the inside is what gives each of your scenes its emotional charge. All right, so I just want you to ask yourself what wound, fear, or belief is working against your protagonist from the inside? And can I point to specific scenes where it affects and impacts the choices they make? Again, if your answer is no, that's okay. This just gives you something to work on next. But if you're feeling pretty good about your protagonist's inner obstacle, then maybe this isn't the one that's plaguing your draft. Maybe it's mistake number four. And

Give Your Protagonist Agency

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mistake number four is that the plot just seems to happen to your protagonist instead of because of them. And this mistake is a little harder to spot because on the surface of your story, your protagonist might seem active enough. Things are happening, scenes are moving, problems are showing up. But then when you look closer, almost everything in the story seems to happen to your protagonist rather than because of your protagonist. So something forces the issue: a person, an event, a shift in circumstances, whatever it is, and your protagonist responds. Or just as often, they wait, defer, or avoid the decision and just let things happen around them. Either way, your protagonist is rarely the one choosing and driving the plot forward. Instead, they're simply being moved through the plot and letting things happen to them. Now, this is an easy mistake to fall into from either direction. When your plot is really big or busy, the protagonist can kind of just get swept along by events. So they're swept along and they're just kind of responding to the last thing that happened, but they're rarely initiating the next thing. And when your story is quieter, the opposite can happen just as easily. With no strong external plot pushing your character forward, they can easily drift from scene to scene, waiting to see what happens. And both scenarios create the same problem. A character who only reacts or whose inaction never meaningfully affects the story is a character readers can only watch from a distance. Now, to be clear, this doesn't mean that your protagonist has to always be bold, decisive, or constantly taking action. Avoiding a decision can still be a choice. Staying silent can still be a choice, and walking away can still be a choice. Now, we probably don't want to do that in every scene, but those kind of decisions still count. What matters most is that your protagonist is choosing to do something, and that choice changes what happens next. And this is part of what makes a protagonist feel compelling in any story. It's when the reader gets to watch them decide what to do next. We get to see them make a move toward what they want, away from what scares them, or straight into the thing they've been avoiding, and then live with the consequences that that choice sets off. Alright, so if this mistake resonates and you feel like you might have made this in your draft, then the fix is to just let your protagonist's choices drive the story forward. And these choices are going to land hardest or be the most impactful when your protagonist has to also battle their inner obstacle that we just talked about in mistake number three. Because a character who acts in spite of the fear, wound, or belief that's working against them is far more gripping than one who acts when nothing is pushing back. Again, that resistance is what makes their actions, their choices, their behaviors mean something, and that meaning is what affects your reader. Okay, so just ask yourself, is my protagonist making choices that drive the story forward and affect what happens next? Or are they simply just reacting to what's happening around them and letting others decide? Now again, if you've made this mistake, that's okay, you know what to work on next. But if you're feeling pretty confident that your protagonist has agency and they're making choices that move your story forward, then maybe mistake number five is the culprit that's making your protagonist feel flat.

Write Through A Distinct Lens

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And mistake number five happens when a protagonist simply observes the story instead of filtering it for the reader. So let me explain what I mean by this. As humans in real life, we are never neutral observers. What I mean by that is that we are all partial. Our history, our fears, our desires, and our assumptions color what we notice, what we ignore, what and who we trust, what and who we question, and what or who we reach for in any given moment. And I want you to think about that this way. Two people can walk in the same room and see two different rooms because they're filtering that moment and that room through two different lenses. They're each bringing their own history, their fears, desires, assumptions, etc. and et cetera, to that moment and to those rooms. So they're partial and your protagonist needs to be partial in that same exact way. Because when they aren't, then readers feel it. And this is often what's happening when a protagonist has a fully fleshed out backstory, but still feels really generic or flat on the page. What I really mean by that is that they're just kind of reacting to events the way that any random person might on the surface, instead of only the way that that person would underneath the surface. So they're not interpreting the story through any kind of specific lens, and they're more just kind of like relaying events as things happened. And this is why they might feel flat on the page, right? Because they're more like a camera that is pointed at your plot, relating things to the reader, than a person who feels real experiencing these events as they unfold. Now, here's how to spot this mistake in your draft. I want you to look at any scene and notice what your protagonist notices first when they enter a scene or when they receive bad news, meet someone new, or walk into a room where something important is about to happen. A protagonist without a distinct worldview tends to notice the obvious things that anyone might notice or that a camera might notice. But a protagonist with a distinct worldview notices what their history, their fear, their desire, or their internal obstacle makes them notice. Things like the nearest exit, the half-empty bottle of alcohol, the wedding ring left on the kitchen sink, the locked door that shouldn't be locked, the person who won't make eye contact, or even the small details that confirm what they already believe about themselves or the world. And if the details on the page are the obvious ones that a camera might catch, then your protagonist's worldview probably isn't doing its work on the page just yet. Alright, so if you feel like this mistake might be the culprit or what might be behind why your character is reading flat, first I want you to make sure that you have developed the specific lens that makes your protagonist partial. So, like what is their worldview, what's their history, what are their preferences, fears, desires, things like that. And then let that lens shape how they move, show up, and react to things in the story. You might have heard the term interiority before. If not, I will link to an episode all about interiority in the show notes. But interiority is exactly what we're talking about here. So this is the work of putting that interiority or your character's inner life on the page. We don't want to give the readers a neutral account of what is happening. Instead, we want to give them this specific character's account that is shaped by who they are and what they've been through. All right, so that is the fix. And a question I want you to ask yourself here is I want you to look at your key scenes and say, across my key scenes, does my protagonist's specific history change what they notice, assume, and do? Or could any other character move through those same moments in basically the same way? And again, if this question makes you realize there's still more work to do on your protagonist, well, at least now you know where to start. And if you do feel like your character's worldview is already really strong on the page, then hopefully you were able to identify one of the other mistakes that might be behind why your character feels a little bit

Recap And Next Steps

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flat. Now, speaking of those other mistakes, I just want to quickly run through what they were in case you're taking notes. So mistake number one was that your protagonist's goal might be too vague to write from. Mistake number two was that the stakes might be big in your story, but maybe they don't feel personal to your protagonist just yet. Mistake number three is that your protagonist might have a lot of external obstacles, but maybe they don't have an internal obstacle that's getting in the way of their goals. Mistake number four is that you might have a plot that happens to your protagonist instead of because of them. And lastly, mistake number five is that your protagonist might be more of a neutral observer of the story instead of someone who is filtering it through their unique worldview. Alright, so hopefully as we went through those five mistakes, you were able to identify which one might be causing your character to feel a little flat. And it's completely okay if you recognize your story or your protagonist in more than one of those mistakes. That definitely happens because all of these pieces work together and relate to each other. So again, if you feel like you recognized more than one of these, that is totally okay and it's fixable. But here's what I really want you to take away from this episode. When a character feels flat, it's probably not a sign that you lack talent or that you chose the wrong idea or that you need to invent another 10 pages of backstory. More often than not, it just means that one of these key character development pieces isn't fully developed yet. And that matters because these are the pieces that help your protagonist carry the story. They give your character something to want, something to lose, something to wrestle with, meaningful choices to make, and a specific lens through which they see the world. When even one of these pieces is vague or underdeveloped, then everything else gets harder. Your outline starts to feel flimsy, the middle of your story gets really muddy, your scenes start to wander, and your draft can only go so far because the story is resting on character work that isn't quite strong enough yet. But once you can name the specific piece that's missing, you're no longer guessing what's wrong. You know exactly what to work on next and exactly what to strengthen. And if you would like my help doing that work, developing your protagonist and the story around them so they can sustain a full draft, that is exactly what we do in my Notes to Novel course. Notes to Novel is my step-by-step program that helps you turn your idea into a story that works before you write hundreds of pages that don't quite come together. Enrollment isn't currently open, but if you want to get on the wait list, head to the link in the show notes and I'll let you know the next time doors

Notes To Novel Invitation

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open. Alright, so that's all I have for you in today's episode. As always, thank you so much for tuning in. I hope your writing is going well, and I will talk to you next week.