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Description:
Have you committed this literary sin? Having too large of a cast, or introducing too many characters at the same time, can lose readers and make them forget important details. This, our second installment of the Literary Sins Series, addresses the problems of a large cast and offers solutions for how to fix them.
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You are listening to The Novel Writing Podcast, Episode 156
I'm your host, Colleen Mitchell. Grab a cup, cozy up, and let's get to writing!
Today's Episode: Literary Sins Series
Today’s episode is the next in our Literary Sins series, all about those things authors do (or don’t do) that drive readers nuts, and how to avoid them (or not).
This literary sin is about having too many characters, both in total and introduced at one time.
Too Many Characters: The Problem
It’s not necessarily a bad thing to have a large cast of characters, but you WILL lose readers if you don’t take the proper time and care with introducing them.
Books with large casts are becoming more the norm, especially in fantasy and in series books regardless of genre, but just because it’s becoming more popular doesn’t mean you HAVE to have a large cast.
An Example of Overwhelm
I once read a fantasy book that introduced almost the entire cast in the space of one scene that took place at a long dining table, sort of like the house tables in Harry Potter. I couldn’t keep the characters straight, didn’t remember their names or any of their unique qualities or magical abilities, and never connected with any of them enough to care about what happened to them later on.
That book could’ve probably cut down on those characters by half or introduced them all in different settings that made them more memorable.
A Personal Example
In my first book, there’s a scene where my main characters walk down into Camelot and meet three secondary characters just outside the front gate. Early versions of this scene had all three secondary characters being introduced at the same time, which Halie pointed out was not memorable, even with just three characters!
She had a good point, too. So during edits, we changed it so that each character is introduced one at a time, in memorable ways (still just outside the Camelot gate!), so that the reader connected with them and could remember things about them. I did the same thing with introducing future characters, too.
What If You Need a Large Cast?
Doing this for a large cast can be time-consuming and difficult, which is in itself a case for a smaller cast. But what do you do if your story necessitates a large cast?
Question the Necessity. First, really question if you do, in fact, need a large cast. Get clear on the role of each character and why they are necessary to the plot. If you take them out or combine them with another character, what do you lose, if anything?
I combined two characters from my first drafts of book 1 into a single character. This was Renault Le Fay, who actually became one of my favorite characters because he got the qualities of both previous characters AND it made him a much more dynamic, interesting character than either of his predecessors on their own.
When you have multiple characters fulfilling the same or similar roles in the story, you will probably need to axe one or combine them.
Slowly Introduce Characters. If you do really need a large cast (and the number of characters in a large cast will change depending on your genre), figure out how to introduce them all slowly and in such a way that the reader won’t forget that character.
If a reader forgets a character, it’s a sign that the character is not super important, and raises the question again of whether that character is really necessary.
Side Characters and Names
If you have side characters who are basically extras in a scene, mentioned once and then never again, you can still make them memorable if you want, but you don’t need to build a huge backstory for them all.
There’s a really brief scene in my first book with two named characters who are never seen again, but their presence in that particular scene was extremely important for the overall plot.
A related no-no to this literary sin is having too many characters with similar-sounding names or names that start with the same letter.
I fully admit that I’m guilty of this sin because I have way too many names in my books that start with A, and I accidentally introduced a new character in book 3 that also has an A-name, but I cannot actually change it. The name itself is important to the story.
How Game of Thrones Solved It
A good example of this problem is actually the Game of Thrones books. There’s a character named Osha (O-S-H-A), who is a wildling from the north, and Asha (A-S-H-A), who is basically a warrior princess of the Iron Islands.
Those names are only distinguished by the leading vowel, and when you say the names out loud, they are incredibly similar depending on how you pronounce them.
The TV show solved this problem by renaming the warrior princess Asha to Yara.
Problems for the Author
Large casts can cause problems not just with memorability for the reader, but also for the author. Did you forget about a character or characters introduced early on who seemed like they were going to play important roles, but then never came up again?
It’s the same problem with introducing a lot of creatures or other things that you want the reader to know. If you introduce them all at the same time or in close succession, or they’re not easily distinguished from one another, the reader will get lost.
Fixing the Problem
A lot of these problems are solved through critique, self-edits, professional edits, and alpha/beta readers. You don’t necessarily have to stress about avoiding a large cast or info dumping in the first draft.
Just be aware that if you have a bunch of characters, you might have to sacrifice some of them in service of the story so that you don’t lose the reader.
Take the Challenge
If you’re struggling with figuring out how to get rid of this literary sin in your writing, one of the first steps is to give your characters unique voices. You can practice this skill with our five-day Character Development challenge, which you can find at tallyink.com.
Final Thoughts
That’s it for today’s episode! Thanks for joining me, and remember, the first draft is supposed to be garbage.
Show Notes
Dive into the first episode of the Novel Writing Podcast with your host Colleen and her sometimes-guest Halie Fewkes Damewood! Here, we give you the gist of who we are, what we do, and what you can expect from this podcast.
What to do next…
Halie & Colleen are both authors! Find their books below:
Secrets of the Tally, by Halie Fewkes Damewood
The Chronicles of Talahm, by Colleen Mitchell
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