“If your character could be replaced by a cardboard cutout with ‘PROTAGONIST’ written on it and nobody would notice, we have work to do. Characters need wounds, wants, and contradictions. Cardboard doesn’t.”
— L.A. Walton, The Book Maven
I’m going to be lovingly blunt: if your characters are flat, your plot doesn’t matter. You could have the most intricate, twist-filled, brilliantly structured plot in literary history, and if the characters moving through it are one-dimensional, readers will not care. Characters are the emotional engine. Flat characters = no emotional fuel = a story that stalls.
The Character Dimension Test
| Question | If You Can’t Answer, Your Character Is Flat |
| What do they WANT more than anything? | External goal drives the plot forward. |
| What do they NEED that they don’t know yet? | Internal need drives the character arc. |
| What is their deepest WOUND? | The wound from their past that shapes their present behavior. |
| What is their biggest CONTRADICTION? | The tension within them that makes them feel real. |
| What would they NEVER do—and what would make them do it? | This is where character-defining moments live. |
| How do they CHANGE from beginning to end? | No change = no arc = flat character. |
The Character Renovation Plan
- Write a scene that will never appear in the book. A scene from their childhood, their worst day, their happiest moment. Know them beyond the plot.
- Give them opinions. About food, music, politics, other characters. Opinions create dimension.
- Let them make mistakes. Perfect characters are boring. Flawed characters are beloved.
- Give them a physical habit. A tic, a gesture, a way of occupying space. Bodies create character too.
- Let them surprise you. If YOU know exactly what they’ll do in every situation, so will the reader. Let them act against type when the stakes demand it.
Your Move, Creative
Take your protagonist and answer all six questions from the table above. If any answer is vague, that’s your assignment: deepen that dimension until your character feels like someone you could sit next to on a bus.
Stop letting your stories stay stuck.
