Thread: Too many characters?

So I was wondering, is there anything as a story with too many "main" characters?

The story I am currently writing has 12 major characters {because that was how I planned the book to be} who are needed to wrap up the whole story.

So I was wondering, would it be better to centre on certain characters; leaving some of the others shadowed. Revealing a lot about some of the characters, and only some things about the other characters?

Or should I go through everyone's life to explain how they got to where they are? Wouldnt that be necessary?

Well, there are really no absolutes in fiction. It's your own story, so you have the right to do what you want with it. I don't think there's anything wrong with 12 main characters, but it would be easier for you if you had one protagonist and one antagonist. You can throw the literary hodgepodge aside, but it basically just means that out of your main characters, have a MAIN hero and a MAIN villain.

Aha, I suppose you are right. + Thanks a lot.

Could see some problems with that, but maybe not. I think I know what I am going to do now. Have one main character- and show how much she is affected by the other "main characters" throughout the story... while having references from their sides of the story, too.

I don't think you should delve into the lives of every character in great detail in your story. If the information is relevant then yes, by all means, let the reader know. As long as the characters are bringing something to the story as a whole include them.

I have several characters in one of my stories who are important - while I have introduced them all and given a tiny bit of background to the reader, I won't force them into the story unless they are needed.

I think you can have as many main characters as you want for your story as long as you can rationally justify for it.

One of my favorite novels of all time is James Clavell's Shogun, which has one main character but a cast of at least 15 primary characters. One of the amazing things about the book is that while the author does very little (if anything) along the lines of physical description or backstory, each character almost immediately creates a little corner in your mind.

That's what you have to do if you want that many characters. You can never have a point where the reader thinks to themselves, 'who's this guy again'? This is difficult, but very possible. I don't know the tricks to doing this; someone else will have to handle that. But if you can pull it off, it can be very satisfying. You simply can't weave that big a story with two or three main characters.

Of course Clavell did this in about 1200 pages.

I suppose that is something.
However, to be able to do that effectively you need somewhat easy names to remember, no? Like James or Ellen. Something my characters dont really have {they are names after angels... long story}. Do you think that would be something the reader should adjust themselves to, or that the writer need to justify themselves by limiting the amount of appearances each character has? Or, maybe increase the amount of appearances?

*sigh* Im really lost at what to do, because even though I remember all the names, they are really unusual =/

One thing that Clavell does very well in this is establishing a heiarchy of characters. This is easy with the subject matter, which is samurai. You're introduced to character A who appears to be the boss, then character B comes along and blows character A out of the water. Character B has a feud with character C, who has a love interest with character A, and things are going badly until character D, the big real boss, shows up. Character D has an archenemy (E) who has his own lackeys (F and G, the equivelant of B and C) and then there's always X, the love interest of the Main Character and wife of character H.

Etc. Etc. The point is that doing it like this connects them in your head. It's hard to remember ten completely seperate characters, but if they all fit in with one another through a certain chain of events or relationships, it becomes much easier. Remembering character G alone is hard; remembering G because he's B's husband is much easier.

Hope that makes sense.

I think that made sence to me, and I am able to see your point. Because, in using that tactic, you wouldnt necessarily NEED to remember every name, but when reminded of their relationship towards one another you know who it is, no?

Very clever. It's sort of like that with mine aswell, but I havent found all the inter-relationships {except for the main one...} between all the characters yet...

Yeah, I always worry that I'm using too many characters. I think it helps me to introduce them gradually so that I allow myself the space to explore them enough to introduce their relationships and hint at their arc, but without removing from the overall flow.

If the introduction of a new character breaks the overall story then for me, it doesn't work.

What I also think can sometimes work, is referencing a character by name before actually introducing them. In my current project there's Old Frank, and despite not appearing until chapter Eight, he's been implemented into the relationships of the others. These are just a few ways that work for me to utilise lots of characters!

Because of the diversity of our writing and the diversity of our authors, the number of main characters in a story can be just as diverse, but on a rough average, popular stories do not contain that many main characters. It's not easy on the reader to have to remember too many main characters.


There are exceptions, lengthy stories, like War and Peace, where readers expect to be challenged (otherwise, they wouldn't pick up the book in the first place), but if you intend to devour a book in one sitting, then three or four main characters are quite enough.

I think you can have too many, because then you can't build them up so well, having to focus on numerous instead of just a few. Or even if you could your book would be so long, people would just take one look at it and walk away.

For me, I don't think there is much to worry about.

But I do think someone perhaps steps into dangerous territory when they start jumping halfway across the world to introduce new characters and give them their own point of view that lasts for only a paragraph (I exaggerate).

I haven't read the books (nothing past Eye of the World at least) but I've read Jordan did this in the later books introducing too many characters and the story basically went no-where?

In other words, that's why I caution against that.

I wrote a 5k story a month ago with about eight or so characters. Things made sense to me, but people in the class I took seemed confused by it, particularly when I referred to the parents by their first names.

I went through it and changed some names to "X's mom" and "Y's dad" and so forth afterward, but it still seemed unnecessary to me.

I think you can have as many characters as you wish as long as you let the reader know who the most important ones are. I remember reading a girl's story where new characters seemed to appear with each page, and she went head hopping without visible transitions. Now that was confusing, and a pain to read.

Many war movies jump around between 'several' main characters and the reader becomes attached to each of them...all depends on how well written a story is. I guess.

Too many characters is when, like Stephenie Meyer, you throw in a bunch of 30 or so characters in one chapter and expect us to remember their names, even when none of them hold any significance to the story. 30, or even 60 major characters spread across a novel, explored to various depths and interacting alongside events in the story, is not too much.