Fringe Fiction Unlimited discussion

This sort of popped into my head. When you read a book do you care about how many characters there are? Do you care if there's too few or too many? I feel at times I do care because too many makes it hard to follow and I don't mind if there's too few but then again a book may get rather dull with only a few characters.

What are your thoughts?

I prefer fewer over too many unless the author does a good job at making them easy to identify and remember.

I was just hit on this by my editor in the prologue of my sequel so Im interested to know what people think. They were in a group situation and she said I had too many characters. It's a sequel so all the characters were in the first book quite a bit, but she said having them all there was too much. I'm curious what people think as well!

The story's easier to follow the fewer characters you have although how many you need depends on the story. More important than the number of characters in the story is how many you use for point of view. Definitely keep that number down to as few as possible.

I would think more important than the number would be the relevance of the characters. A murder mystery, for example, will need some "red herring" characters and they'll need plausible connections to the deceased or other tie-ins. That's what can be difficult...keeping everyone's relation to everyone else straight.

It definitely matters. Too many characters generally means less narrative for each one. You run the risk of your readers not having enough information to care about anyone, never mind your protagonist.

and to echo Ericka's comment above, too many people and your readers might need to make a diagram of who is connected to whom. Reading should not feel like work.

Very true. I remember reading a book where a new character was introduced almost every chapter and by the time I got to chapter 20 I just couldn't deal anymore.

IMHO, the number of characters is driven by the needs of the narrative.

The POV character for any scene is selected on who has the strongest voice for the scene aligned with who has the strongest story arc for the chapter.

Once that is determined I let the chips fall where they will for the number of characters.

This has always been on my mind. I know some authors that excel and are known for ensemble casts in their stories. And then there are others where the cast gets too big, too bogged down, etc.
I guess the one thing would depend on the narrative? Are they kill fodder, red herring, or will they just end up being useless names that could be done away with.
The one thing that bugs me is when there's a whole bunch of characters, but they're all so bland it's hard to remember who is who and why they're their.
To me it all depends on how their handled and for what purpose they all serve.

Depends on what the story needs.

Fewer characters means more focus but may mean they need to do an implausible number of things. Also, may create claustrophobic worlds.

For my current book I'm working on I have seven characters. 2 main characters, 3 sub important characters and two less important characters. I feel it's a good amount as any more may confuse the reader or draw away their interest.

I think it's like the Goldilocks tale--the porridge mix of characters has to be just right to make the reader's lips smack and eat it all up.

Mary wrote: "Depends on what the story needs.

Fewer characters means more focus but may mean they need to do an implausible number of things. Also, may create claustrophobic worlds."

Not necessarily. For instance, readers may follow five characters, which might mean that these five will be well fleshed, but that doesn't mean there cannot be other characters that don't need to be as developed. I mean the MC might talk to a bus driver for a chapter. We may not need to know much about the character, so in my mind, it doesn't count as one and yet, he's still there.

Fewer characters does mean that there cannot be other characters. Because if you add more characters, you don't have fewer.

That not all characters are equally developed is another matter.

Seen that way...I know some movies are made around a handful of characters and for me, they rarely deliver. Of course, there are exceptions but for instance, five characters ONLY would make the story kind of like inside a house, a spaceship, or something very remote.

Mary wrote: "Fewer characters does mean that there cannot be other characters. Because if you add more characters, you don't have fewer.

That not all characters are equally developed is another matter."

That was so confusing but I get what you mean lol

As with a lot of questions about writing, the short answer is, "it depends". In this case, the variable rests in how complex the story is. The more complex the plot, the more characters the story will need to have to bring said plot to fruition.

As I see it, an important point with "how many characters is too many" is that every character must 'have a job to do' - as in, they must perform some action or series of actions which advances the main plot in a crucial way. If a character doesn't do anything to advance the plot (they could be cut out and the story would proceed anyway) they are mere window dressing.

A good example of this phenomenon is the "love interest" female character present in most action films from the 80s/90s. In most of those films, the LI doesn't need to be there - and let's be real here, most of the time she's only in the movie so she can take off her shirt at some point. Otherwise, she serves no purpose.

Yet another good rule of thumb IMO; the more "screen time" a character has, the more important they need to be to the resolution of the plot. Characters who keep showing up on the page/screen yet serve no purpose beyond comic relief or sex appeal have a tendency to annoy consumers, because they do nothing beyond waste time that could be spent, you know, on the story the viewer/reader sat down to enjoy.

In the end, I'd say the right number of characters is "the number your story needs to work out the way you want it to, but no more than that". I don't know if that's helpful or not, but its the rule I go with when I sit down to write.

Well said Eric.

Eric wrote: "they must perform some action or series of actions which advances the main plot in a crucial way."

And sufficiently well to justify the amount of time they spend on stage.