This might sound like a question with an obvious answer, but how sure are you that you’ve got the right protagonist? Some of you might say: doh, of course, I’ve got the right protagonist and I know this because they’re the main character in the story. Even if you’re dead sure, let’s pause and ask two important questions. Is your protagonist the character with the most interesting story to tell? Are they the character that undergoes the biggest change throughout the course of the story? If they’re not, then another character is likely stealing the show.
These things happen. When you write, you might notice that your attention is being pulled away to another character, a minor one perhaps, who’s starting to grow and develop in ways you haven’t foreseen. When you watch a story on the screen, you might find yourself wanting to find out more about that other character. This certainly happened when I was watching the Belgian crime series, ‘Undercover’, on Netflix. As excellent as Tom Waes was as Bob Lemmens, the main good guy in the story, what I really wanted was to know more about Ferry Bouman, played by the equally brilliant Frank Lammers. Bob’s noble cause was to bust the local drug kingpin, but as it happened that drug kingpin was an incredibly interesting, flawed and multilayered character that totally stole the show. Sure enough, the producers picked up on this and Ferry Bouman got his own spin-off series and movies.
What does this mean for authors? First, that it’s good to double-check who is driving your story. You can start by checking whose actions are moving the plot forward. If you discover that your hero is mostly reacting to other people’s actions, you’ll need to rewind and revise your story. Second, you’ll want to answer a few basic questions:
- Does your protagonist have a goal?
- Are they the character with the most at stake?
- Are they actively trying, and perhaps failing, to reach their goal?
- Are they the one calling the shots?
If you can’t answer these three questions with ‘yes’, then you might have a false protagonist. This means that your protagonist is being moved around from scene to scene because of other people’s goals and actions. They’re going along for the ride, but they’re not in the driving seat. They might have an admirable mission but they’re not the one risking it all. As noble as your protagonist might be, they won’t win readers’ hearts unless they’re the ones on the front line fighting their own battles.
The bottom line is that if you remove your lead character from the story, the story has to crumble. If it doesn’t, then something is wrong.
This was exactly what happened with one of my works in progress. Initially, my protagonist was a young woman with a big change ahead. As I wrote, though, I realised that one of the side characters was driving the story. She wasn’t very likeable, nor was she meant to be in the centre of the story, yet she made things happen. Also, she had the most at stake and would undergo the biggest transformation. Once I’d accepted this, most of my plot issues vanished. What is more, the story was much more interesting when told from the old lady’s perspective.
So, what to do if this happens to you? To begin with, acknowledge it, take a deep breath and zoom out. Sketch out what your story would look like if you changed the lead character. Then, revise your story on paper and make sure you cover the basics. Make sure you know where you’re heading before you start writing. Once you’ve got the right lead character, the story will be much easier to write.
