Main characters are my muses, the spark that drives my desire to write a story. One reason I have such difficult time starting a new story is I don’t know my main character well enough to feel that necessary passion for them, yet. It’s a catch-22, because you can’t feel passion for them until you start writing, and write long enough to find something in them that sparks your passion, but if you can’t write until you feel passion, well…. That’s why I have to find other ways to motivate myself to write until that passion can take over. In the case of my old novel, my early writing was simply a way to distract myself from my doctoral dissertation. That story started out as a big, fluffy soap opera with no particular plot or lead character. And then, gradually, one of the characters emerged as someone who could carry my interest in the story herself.
Different case with my fan fiction epic. I developed a passion for the character while watching a television show–an unanalyzable fascination and emotional investment that demanded I continue to tell his story when there was no more television show to tell it.
The issue with my new story is that I don’t have a muse yet to motivate me. So I rely instead on the obligation to do these weekly updates and to send them to my writing coach, whom I am paying, to be a substitute motivation. And of course, there’s also that deep down hope that I will reach a place where I am writing with passion, and the belief that I can get there if I keep pounding at it long enough.
But so far, I am un-aMused. I have all these characters, and none yet is emerging as the character that sustains my interest in the story. I suppose that, so far, none of them is emotionally screwed-up enough to be interesting. Not that I think that’s the definition of “interesting.” It’s just, looking at my own track record, that’s the sort of character that gets under my skin–infinitely vulnerable, emotionally volatile, angry, and with major parental issues. Don’t ask me why. Those are not words that describe me, just what I’m drawn to. Which…okay, let’s just skip past the psychoanalysis of yours truly.
Author Nancy E. Shaffer 
good luck with trying to find something in these characters that gets your muse going. what draw you to the idea of this story in the first place?
I just wanted to write a story. I dug around for something to write about and came up with about five different ideas that were common to stories I am drawn to, so at present, I’m writing all of them at the same time, assuming they are part of the same story, or will be one day, or some will fall by the wayside as less interesting.
ah, yes i can see how that might make it more complicated to find the character that sparks you
It would help if I didn’t have two other writing projects (editing old stories) taking up writing time. If this were my only story, I think I’d work a bit harder at finding that muse.
oh i know this one so very well
Well, there is light at the end of the tunnel for both those other projects.
that’s good
This is all very alien to me, since I don’t lack inspiration. I lack the will to take stories out of my head where they are perfect and transmit them to paper, where I will instantly hate them and realize how much they suck.
No, that actually describes a variation of why this happens pretty darned well.