Not Everyone Stays Interesting

Creating a new character is like meeting a new person. They have a personality, beliefs on all sorts of subjects, and a number of backstories. There is so much to discover about them that it seems like an endless well of information.

Unfortunately, no matter how deep the well my be, it is not endless. If you spend enough time learning about a person, you will learn everything about them. You will have heard all their stories and learned what they think about the things they care about.

Then what? What do you do when you know all about a person?

In real life, the answer is to look to the future. If somebody is cool, you probably want to hang out with them and do stuff together.

In fiction, the answer is to challenge their beliefs through dramatic narrative (or simply revel in their personality through comedic narrative).

In both of those cases, we're assuming that these people remain interesting to us. Sometimes when we learn more about somebody, we find out that they are not so intriguing or inspiring or charming or attractive. Sometimes we find out that a character was quirky, but had no substance behind it. Other times, we find out that they simply are not so complex as we thought, or that they are not so similar as they first appeared to be.

There are a lot of reasons that one can grow tired of a character. More often than not, though, it's overexposure. As an author, learn how to tell just enough to keep people interested and wanting to learn more, but not so much as to spoil the intrigue. And also know when a character is tapped out. If they have nothing more to say or do, let them go. Start a new project or focus on a new character to keep things fresh.