How do you make a Lead character in fiction interesting to readers? Create a character who has problems, and who will DO something to try to solve the problem.
A victim character— one with a problem who can or will do nothing to try to solve it, who has to wait for rescue by someone else, isn’t strong enough to be the Lead in a work of fiction.
Imagine a character who is beaten by her husband, who does not leave her husband, or report the abuse, or do ANYTHING to try to help herself. She just waits until another character rescues her. We don’t become very interested in her, because she can’t take action. It’s her rescuer who might have a story worth telling.
Think of the Harry Potter books. Harry was an orphaned wizard boy with a powerful enemy. But he didn’t just wait around for Wizarding adults to solve his problem for him. He did things– not always the right things, but he took action. And most readers wanted to see him succeed.
In ‘Gone With The Wind’ young Scarlett O’Hara really wanted to marry Ashley. She didn’t just sit around wishing for Ashley, either. She did things— like declaring her love for Ashley and asking him to elope with her– on the day Ashley’s engagement to Melanie was announced.
I think most of us who read that book figured out that Scarlett should not have picked Ashley as a love interest. She made a wrong choice. But she sure knew how to take action to solve her problems, and that’s why her story could keep us interested.
So, when starting a story, don’t think of how to make your Lead character more like a popular person in real life– handsome, rich, athletic, whatever you think of as popular. Your character needs to be someone with a problem, who is able to take action to try to solve the problem.
Your plot make take your character on several failed attempts to solve the problem, or may be a quest to get the things needed to solve the problem. The character’s initial problem may be revealed as part of a bigger problem.
But the important thing is that your character must be able to take action, and the problem must be seen as one that is difficult but not impossible to solve.
In this way, your story can be something that will catch the interest of a reader, can be a journey that a reader will want to take.
My Antimatter Life 