When you invent a main character, it’s usually a challenge to give that character worthy problems to work on. If the stakes are too low, reader sympathy will be hard to come by.
Writing Tip for Today: Here are a few ways to “bully” your Main Character in order to make your novel more compelling:

• Take Away Main Character’s Choices. If your MC “decides” to do something in your story, it may indicate the pressure is not sufficient to make readers care. The fewer choices the MC has, the more urgency the story takes on. And urgency usually leads to higher stakes, more tension and conflict that is complicated. Push your character into the flames! Don’t give her the easy way out! Keep the character cornered so that some sort of extraordinary action is required.
• Make Main Characters Dance. The enemy of gripping fiction is inaction.If your character does little except think about the problem yet never acts, readers are likely to feel dissatisfied. How would you feel if Superman said he was too tired to vanquish the bad guys and rescue you? Or his cape was at the dry cleaners? In stories when we present a problem, readers imply that we promise to show them the solution. Doing nothing is boring. So is too much sitting and thinking or talking but not doing. Make your MC DO SOMETHING!
• Make Main Characters Solve Problems. When it comes to solving problems, sometimes it’s easier to call in the cavalry or Mom and Dad or law enforcement. But readers want this Main Character to do the heavy lifting. Even though in real life we can’t all be heroes, in stories the Main Character must solve the major problems.If your MC is a juvenile, it’s still important to give the MC the “key” to the problem. Ever wonder why, in kids’ movies, the adults often are strangely absent? The reason is that readers need the MC to solve the problem. We just have to bully our Main Characters (or our softer natures) and dangle the MC over the fire.