I'm going to rant about other similar yet different heroines here a little bit, that make me drop other stories, but not this one. I give you the description: beautiful young traumatized and shy woman or girl, who's not aware of her positive sides at all. You can now imagine dozens, probably blonde, main characters. I'm not here to cry about repetition, I'm in the villainess genre for goodness sake, but what makes some work and some not. Even a broken down heroine needs agency. Here, Lia's goal is to save her loved ones. Rubrika's is to make herself appealing enough to survive. Being a shy shut-in who accidentally stumbles into meeting the love interest and is dragged along is not an agency. Literally anytime the plot is, that a mc is forced into a situation, that they just passively go along with while complaining on the inside, that's just the end of any interesting characterization.
A main character, that breaks down repeatedly, fails often in her efforts to get better and doesn't communicate her needs well is a hundred times more interesting than a character that just stands there, as plot happens to her.
I'm going to rant about other similar yet different heroines here a little bit, that make me drop other stories, but not this one. I give you the description: beautiful young traumatized and shy woman or girl, who's not aware of her positive sides at all. You can now imagine dozens, probably blonde, main characters. I'm not here to cry about repetition, I'm in the villainess genre for goodness sake, but what makes some work and some not.
Even a broken down heroine needs agency. Here, Lia's goal is to save her loved ones. Rubrika's is to make herself appealing enough to survive. Being a shy shut-in who accidentally stumbles into meeting the love interest and is dragged along is not an agency. Literally anytime the plot is, that a mc is forced into a situation, that they just passively go along with while complaining on the inside, that's just the end of any interesting characterization.
A main character, that breaks down repeatedly, fails often in her efforts to get better and doesn't communicate her needs well is a hundred times more interesting than a character that just stands there, as plot happens to her.