How Many Characters Are Too Many?

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helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com
www.kmweiland.com
Historical and speculative novelist K.M. Weiland offers tips and essays about the writing life to help other writers understand the ins and outs of the craft and the psychology behind the inspiration.
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This week's question is from @bluenetmarketing:
"How many characters are too many?
"I am writing the first book in a Sci Fi series, where minor characters become major characters in later books. Book One, Chapter One, introduces predominantly the two main characters (hero & heroine) as leaders of a mixed gender team of ten, and three minor characters get a brief mention. Chapter two brings in three more characters and slowly throughout the book, more characters become known.
"I have been told that this far too many characters in the first three chapters which would confuse readers. I would appreciate hearing your opinion on this issue."
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Writing Screenplays That Sell by Michael Hauge: www.amazon.com/Writing-Screen...
The Secrets of Story by Matt Bird: www.amazon.com/Secrets-Story-...
How Many Characters Should You Include in Your Story?: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
How to Take Advantage of Your 4 Most Important Characters: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
The 10 Rules of Writing Large Casts of Characters: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
9 Positive Character Arcs in the Enneagram: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
9 Negative Character Arcs in the Enneagram: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
6 Tips for Introducing Characters: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
The Characteristic Moment: www.helpingwritersbecomeautho...
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Опубликовано:

25 июл 2024

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Комментарии : 29

@MrNoplotproductions Год назад

you are the most generous writer i have met(on youtube), thank you for caring about others like me. . respect to the max!!happiness

@Maidaseu Год назад

Here's me with 9 POVs in my novel 😅

@TheZetaKai Год назад

There's nothing wrong with that number, so long as each one is serving a unique purpose in the narrative, with their own agendas, perspectives, and characteristics. Otherwise, you will need to make cuts &/or combinations in order to have a more focused story with deeper, more complex characters.

@anastatiacaraballo.poet24 Год назад

I am so happy to have found your channel😍

@UC241 Год назад

Creating heartwarming characters and an exciting adventure in an immersive environment will tend to keep more readers than cliffhangers.

@mageprometheus Год назад

Thank you. I will try and restrain myself. Love and light.

@andyclark3530 Год назад

Well said. The other thing I might add, about how many characters to have in the first couple of chapters, is that it depends on chapter size, particularly the number of scenes in a chapter. I think that it’s ok to introduce 2 or 3 per scene, but that’s a gut reaction and something you’d have to pare down.

@scruffypupper Год назад

How ironic. A few days ago I posted a review of a (kindle) romance novel I'd just read. I really liked the premise and the two main romantic characters, but the story quickly turned into a mind-boggling quagmire of characters--I counted 45!--with half of them constantly present. I began to feel the author was packing characters as a way of introducing them as part of a hometown series. I checked her book listings and that's exactly what she did as all the secondary characters (family) had their own books. It was overwhelming. I noted that if all those extraneous characters and their scenes which did little to nothing toward moving the story forward were removed, what was left? Mostly the love (sex) scenes between the couple the story was supposed to be about. At close to the halfway mark I had to start skimming to try and finish it. The author is a good writer with a fresh voice, but I suspect she didn't know how to develop a true relationship between the main romantic couple so filled up major gaps with other people.

@sivabalamanigandansivbaals6634 Год назад

Lovely KM❤

@lexingtRick Год назад

It was good too see ya, and see that you appear well and health. Just over ten years ago I was beginning to write and I sought RU-vid and there you was K.M. Weiland. Thanks for being there.

@suziegiggles8589 Год назад

Got your email, thanks! Watching now. I am also working on sci-fi, and have several characters. I know what I am doing, but was curious to what you got to say about it! OK, just listened, interesting. I have read a lot of your stuff. I like the writing style of "the novelization" of movies. Movies have several characters. I guess it just depends on your talent to introduce and separate sub plots of characters. Stories would be very short or very long boring without many characters. Look at all the examples of many characters.... like the Hobbit, Star Wars, etc. Thanks for the video, I learned a lot.

@TheZetaKai Год назад

Another approach to making a large cast of unique characters is to look at the Meyers-Briggs diagram for personality types. Even if you disagree with the psychological validity of those 16 archetypes, they are useful for creating characters that have distinct voices which each have their own purposes, points of view, and reactions to stimuli. This system is not as focused as the Enneagram, but it is more varied and nuanced, which may be beneficial for very large casts.

@kentjensen4504 Год назад

D&D reference from Katy! Nerd alert! 😅 Great video, as always.

@CM-hp5nk Год назад

I'd be interested to hear how you would introduce characters when the protagonist lives among them and already knows all of them except one?

@sumannayek7271 11 месяцев назад

Very helpful ma'am🎉

@AEmiliusLives Год назад

Speaking of characters, I've been meaning to ask you for your opinion (or perhaps technique) on this: character naming. I always thought everything can be our means of expression, and character names could and should mean something. A friend of mine oposes this completely and picks random names off the phonebook. He thinks naming a character something relevant or specific is as bad as giving them Snow White dwarfs' names (Sleepy, Bashful, etc). Of course that's an extreme example and I wouldn't go that far, but I think it's important to give characters a meaningful name, even if only I know the meaning. Otherwise it's a wasted opportunity for expression, I feel like leaving something like that to chance isn't something a creative person would want.

@tambikhai3601 Год назад

I have news for your friend - names already have meanings. Let's say you pick "James" out of the phone book - what are the various meanings for that name? What will your readers think of when they see that name? James Earl Jones? James Cameron? LeBron James? The Biblical meaning "supplanter" or "replacer"? King James? That guy down the street who parks his car in the yard? James Bond? The name will have connotations that can work for or against your story. It's absolutely an opportunity for expression, and I'm a firm believer in spending time developing the names of your main characters. It makes a big difference in their voice, how they're perceived by the other characters, as well as the first impressions of the reader. Does the name fit the character's personality? Did their parents give them a name that's "too big" for them, or "too small"? If your character is named James, your reader might not connect "supplanter" or "replacer" as a meaning, but what if that's his character flaw? You've planted a subconscious seed in their mind, and given yourself a reminder as you write who this character is.

@TheZetaKai Год назад

I'm reminded of the scene in Pulp Fiction between Butch and Esmarelda, where Bruce Willis asserts that "our names don't mean anything"; how wrong he is.

@mariocoulombe6285 Год назад

The two most important things are credibility and reader immersion. Will the names of your characters make the reader believe they're real? Will the reader "forget" that this is a fictional story? Will they become completely immersed in the characters and the story, or will they constantly see the puppeteer behind the puppet?

@prenevost53 Год назад

Thanks for this. My characters all come out of action to move the story forward as needed. BTW, you look so pretty in video!

@TheZetaKai Год назад

I'm PRETTY sure that she doesn't appreciate her teachings being reduced to "you're PRETTY".

@PsiCorps85 10 месяцев назад

I tried to use MBTI/socionics for my first book... making 16 characters, and I think it didn't turn out as well as I meant. Current book, Murder Upon Mercury, has an ENFP protagonist, and ESTJ villain. Other characters are an INTP, ISFJ, ISFP, and a few others that aren't prevalent being ESFJ and ISTJ.

@sylviaauclair5112 Год назад

This was interesting. My WIP has one main protagonist but 15 other characters that are part of her extended family, plus a few outsiders that are involved briefly. Some are more important than others at any given moment and most are fairly well developed. But as it is a post-apocalyptic story, many do die off. I hope I have developed them sufficiently as needed, and while many are introduced fairly early in chapters one and two, they become more developed as needed for the plot and to show their individual importance to my MC which then helps her growth into the person she needs to be.

@joanwarren9907 Год назад

Thank you for this thoughtful, practical clip. I have a similar situation, in which I'm running two timelines. Each protagonist has their own family members, most of whom are minor and undeveloped. I'm considering not naming many of them--just referring to them as brothers or sisters, but then it becomes almost unnatural to not think of them by name in deep POV. It also seems unnatural to not have brothers and sisters. So far, what I've done is only name a few of them. This is literary fiction that can also fit historical and women's fiction. Any extra suggestions or comments in this situation? Thanks again.

@TheZetaKai Год назад

What are these siblings doing within the story to advance the plot? What are they each doing to support your story's themes? To enhance the mood? To affect the main characters? Do they do anything for the story, other than to flesh out the world, because statistically many people have siblings? If the answer is "Nothing", then the solution is clear. A great artistic work is not improved by what can be added, but by what must be removed.

@dmandrewsauthor Год назад

The Wheel of Time has a huge number of characters - more than any other book series as far as I know - and yet somehow it worked ;) Loved it!

@normythijs2385 Год назад

On the other side of this question, when would it generally be too late to introduce a relevant side character? I have one that currently is introduced a while after the midpoint, and it seems like an afterthought: "Oh, yeah, I forgot they were supposed to be a part of this! Surprise! Here they are!" If they are actually important, they should fit in earlier, and if their introduction can wait so long, then they probably aren't as relevant as first thought and can be cut, right?

@stgr6669 8 месяцев назад

How about promoting side to main characters within the book? I have a protagonist team of six persons, and who will be going into the final fight isn't pointed out until the climax. And there is an antagonist team looking similar at the beginning, but the real evil guys here get killed early, leaving us wondering what the others have in mind. Meanwhle someone else turns out to be the true villain of the story.