...why fear a flaw? Seems I may be too attached to introduce negatives now.
I'll not wax poetic about what the word "negative" constitutes, except to say that the tribal consciousness needs to back off and have some tea. Whatever the case, my protagonist is fleshed out on a character sheet (this is the same protagonist I was considering for the chopping block) and, reading the details, I continue to yawn.
I used to find the notion of his "vanilla" nature to be something that would evolve over the course of the book, but now I view this as a cop-out. It seems to be just me running from the hard work of designing these people fully before putting fingers to keyboard. I need to know who they are and why they are prior to setting off on the story.
My first section of chapter one exists because I can see that new character clearly, or at least more clearly than the others. I get a sense of who he would be in a crisis. My heroine, I am closer to her completion as well. Maybe she'll take over the main spot, if my protagonist doesn't get off his vanilla ass and get some persona. Not that there's anything against a female protagonist: far from it. It's just that I, like most men honest with themselves, know nothing about the complexities of feminine worldview. So I default to my grunt-grunt-ooga-ooga, which is far easier to interpret on the page.
I jest, of course. I don't know how the protagonist situation will play out. I'm open to letting the book write itself, and on occasion I just add a note or two. I do know that a boring man needs to become a little more interesting before even I will pay attention to him.
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