# Advice needed!



## angeeeel (Jul 9, 2018)

In a story I'm writing my main character meets 7 main supporting characters in the beginning which means a lot of character description. I really don't want to overdo it (the character descriptions) but i also don't want to space out him (the main character) meeting the other characters because it will mess up the flow of how i want the book to be. Does this make any sense? Any advice is lovely!


----------



## Ralph Rotten (Jul 9, 2018)

I would not be crazy about the idea of introducing 7 or eight people at once. They would turn into a mosh pit of names and descriptions, a little like the beginning of War & Peace.
It could be done, but tricky.  Better to bring them in 1 or two at a time.

If I am bringing a new person into a scenario where I have already introduced the other characters, I find it is best to start a new scene with the new character, take a paragraph or two to introduce them as they are doing something peripheral to the story, then proceed with the story.  

Here would be how I start a scene where I am introducing a new person (actually 2). Keep in mind that this is peripheral to the main story--there is a whole 'nother storyline already going on when the new scene starts with Randy. It allows the story to shift gears from fast to slow, or serious to funny, while introducing a new character. A page after this Randy intersects with the main storyline...but by then you know all about Randy, Zinny and Bingo.  
*Note: None of those names could ever be mistaken for one another.*


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 9, 2018)

How would *you* handle meeting seven people, all at once? Would you get their names right away? I wouldn't. Would you note their physical features? I would notice only really obvious things. Same with personality traits.

What I'm saying is the main character can note obvious, striking things and get to know the rest over time. And the reader will go along for the ride. Just anchor the MC in the reader's mind before the rest come into play.

A first person narrative might be best for this situation.


----------



## Deleted member 61744 (Jul 9, 2018)

You could begin by describing what the characters are like together as a group. Are they a similar group, or do they look more like a patchwork of individuals? Maybe they give off a friendly aura or have a more sinister feel to them. Then you could pick up on any striking anomalies in the group. Maybe they all smile at the main character and welcome them warmly, save for two people who are huddled together and occasionally give disapproving scowls at the others. From there it might be easier to drip further details in.

I'd find it unusual if everyone greeted the main character in the same way. If the seven people already know each other and the main character is the only new person, two of three people might be more active in engaging with the main character whilst the others may just hang back and observe for a while. Focus on those few people and save the bulk of character description of the others for later.


----------



## MatthewSteele (Jul 10, 2018)

Jack of all trades said:


> How would *you* handle meeting seven people, all at once? Would you get their names right away? I wouldn't. Would you note their physical features? I would notice only really obvious things. Same with personality traits.
> 
> What I'm saying is the main character can note obvious, striking things and get to know the rest over time. And the reader will go along for the ride. Just anchor the MC in the reader's mind before the rest come into play.
> 
> A first person narrative might be best for this situation.



This is how I would approach it. Start with basic information, stuff you would just notice right off the bat. (Usually not a lot, maybe brief physical description.) Then as the characters start to have opportunity to interact and show more about themselves maybe start to have the MC take notice of more prominent or unique characteristics about that character. The reader will start to distinguish between the characters as more in-depth information is given with each interaction.


----------



## Ralph Rotten (Jul 10, 2018)

You should walk down into that valley...

Take your time and introduce the characters properly.
Brief little descriptions and blurbs are no substitute for good character development. 
If these 7 people are to play a critical role in the story, then introduce them properly.
If you rush it then you will just be dumping a mosh-pit on the reader.


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 11, 2018)

Ralph Rotten said:


> You should walk down into that valley...
> 
> Take your time and introduce the characters properly.
> Brief little descriptions and blurbs are no substitute for good character development.
> ...



Are you aware that you already replied to this thread?


----------



## Aschendale (Jul 11, 2018)

Unless it's jury duty or the start of boot camp or something, I think it's likely that some of the seven would already know each other, and could be introduced as semi-sets. 



> "Hi, my name's Darryl, and this is my brother Darryl, and my other brother Darryl." Well, at least I wouldn't have trouble with those names.





> "Hey, I'm Jen, and this is my boyfriend Bob." Bob stuck out his hand, but didn't say anything. "He's kinda shy," Jen said.


By doing that, you could focus on just a few of them in sharp-ish detail, and fill in the rest as things progressed.


----------



## luckyscars (Jul 11, 2018)

angeeeel said:


> In a story I'm writing my main character meets 7 main supporting characters in the beginning which means a lot of character description. I really don't want to overdo it (the character descriptions) but i also don't want to space out him (the main character) meeting the other characters because it will mess up the flow of how i want the book to be. Does this make any sense? Any advice is lovely!



A protagonist and seven main supporting characters is definitely too many for anything other than a novel, and probably too many for most novels too. 

If you are having doubts about things like this probably the best thing you should do is look at other stories. Besides true epics - War & Peace, Lord Of The Rings, etc - very few successful book have that many major characters if we are talking characters who are integral to the story, memorable, possessing strong individual identities and featuring more or less throughout the plot.

Leave aside the creative toil and consider solely the matter of word count and mathematics. Every important character needs development to be remembered - especially in a story. For sake of argument lets say you spend about 5,000 words on each throughout the entirety of the manuscript just illustrating individual quirks, appearances, private thoughts, delivering background and backstory, etc. In other words, we are talking everything that isn't to do with the central plot but purely there to reveal character and 'meat'. That is 40,000 words, or about half a standard novel with zero action. That also relegates your main character to 5,000 words. Chances are you are going to want to spend more time on your main character's development so let's call it an even 50k.

Given you have seven major supporting characters plus one main character I am going to assume this is probably quite a complex plot with various inter-personal conflicts to be fought and resolved and so on. I am also going to assume it contains a relatively vibrant setting which you will probably need to flesh out as well. Let's add an even 10,000 words for setting each scene, describing whatever towns/villages/cities/brothels these characters are in. 60k total. You have now used 60,000 words without any plot. 

So now we have our eight major supporting characters. Are there any antagonists too? How about minor characters or love interests or sub plots? The antagonist is probably going to need at least some revealing too. 5k minimum just on explaining their place in the story. Up to 65k. Let's assume at least 1 romantic subplot whether it involves the supporting cast or not - this is going to necessitate some dialogue. And yes, dialogue! Eight characters likely equals a good deal of conversation. Let's budget about 15,000 words just on that throughout the book which with this many characters is probably conservative.

So you can see that this hypothetical would be eighty thousand words without a central plot which, when you add your actual "Bill got in the car and turned the key" sort of thing is going to run to quite a long manuscript. Is it doable? Certainly it is doable, but it is difficult. There is a reason the Seven Dwarfs were all given names that reflected their projected personality and still most people cannot name all seven of them without a struggle. Confusion is a huge turn-off for most readers and having a large cast appear at once is difficult to execute. Don't give your reader an excuse to stop. Keep it as simple as your story will allow.


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 11, 2018)

luckyscars said:


> A protagonist and seven main supporting characters is definitely too many for anything other than a novel, and probably too many for most novels too.
> 
> If you are having doubts about things like this probably the best thing you should do is look at other stories. Besides true epics - War & Peace, Lord Of The Rings, etc - very few successful book have that many major characters if we are talking characters who are integral to the story, memorable, possessing strong individual identities and featuring more or less throughout the plot.
> 
> ...




Let's test this with a successful book.

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's / Sorcerer's Stone.

Besides Harry, there's a whole bunch of memorable characters. Here's a few : 
Ron Weasley
Hermione
Fred and George Weasley
Professors McGonagall, Snape and Dumbledore
Hagrid
Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia and Dudley 

Then there's a few notable, but more minor, characters : 
Oliver Wood 
Percy Weasley
Neville Longbottom
Draco Malfoy
Crabbe and Goyle
Lee Jordan
Professors Sprout and Flitwick
Madame Hooch
Filch
Peeves
Professor Quirrell
The ghosts : Nearly Headless Nick, Bloody Baron and the Fat Frier
The Fat Lady painting

There's still other lessor characters like the three chasers, Dean Thomas, Seamus Finnigan, the goblins at Gringotts and the three headed dog. 

And there was plenty of story to boot!


----------



## Darkkin (Jul 11, 2018)

Just like with starting a new job or at a new school.  A rush of brief impressions and introductions.  Move on to the next, if the character is important, the impressions and name are reenforced by the character's thought and memories when the character is encountered again.  But giving the secondaries an active role in the context, akin to Rowling's 'pale boy',  Draco Malfoy, is key.  The character interaction cues the reader in, includes them in the process. The secondary characters then begin to develop along side the MC providing a foil and context.   When someone is saying this is Pete, this is Larry...What are we going to notice about Pete and Larry when they are merely names, not tangible characters.


----------



## luckyscars (Jul 12, 2018)

Jack of all trades said:


> Let's test this with a successful book.
> 
> Harry Potter and the Philosopher's / Sorcerer's Stone.
> 
> ...



Memorable, sure, but I would push back on some of those being described as main supporting characters.  I would say with the protagonist being Harry there are really two MAJOR supporting characters (which I would loosely define as characters who are not the protagonist yet feature prominently through more or less all of the narrative) and those would be Ron and Hermione. 

One could perhaps make a case for Hagrid and Dumbledore, but not Fred and George Weasley. Snape and the Uncle/Aunt/Dudley are for most of the narrative minor antagonistic characters. Or put it this way: None of the actors for any of those parts would likely be considered for "Best Supporting Role" in the film adaptions regardless of performance because their roles were just not significant in the way Ron and Hermoine were.

Appreciate you might have a differing perspective on this. Actually in most really good books, like Harry Potter is, the importance of characters tends to fluctuate according to the twists and turns of the story meaning it is somewhat redundant. The OP can decide their own definition and ensuing route based on the above. I merely offer a single view and an example of how the more characters that are used tends to increase complexity, and therefore word count, and therefore the work required in writing a good book that others will read.


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 12, 2018)

luckyscars said:


> Memorable, sure, but I would push back on some of those being described as main supporting characters.  I woul
> d say with the protagonist being Harry there are really two MAJOR supporting characters (which I would loosely define as characters who are not the protagonist yet feature prominently through more or less all of the narrative) and those would be Ron and Hermione.
> 
> One could perhaps make a case for Hagrid and Dumbledore, but not Fred and George Weasley. Snape and the Uncle/Aunt/Dudley are for most of the narrative minor antagonistic characters. Or put it this way: None of the actors for any of those parts would likely be considered for "Best Supporting Role" in the film adaptions regardless of performance because their roles were just not significant in the way Ron and Hermoine were.
> ...



Just because more characters tends to increase the complexity of the story is not a very good reason to deliberately limit the number of characters.

And just because eight characters are introduced in the first chapter does not mean all eight would or should get equal attention and use. The Dursleys were introduced and used in the first two chapters, then existed only in the occasional reference.


----------



## Moonbeast32 (Jul 12, 2018)

never tried it out myself, but books like The Hobbit come to mind. have you tried looking at how they handle it?

basically just give a brief description of each characters physical appearance in quick succession. Afterwards, you might have all of them participate in a group discussion/argument. each time one character chimes in, there ought to be a brief recall of the physical description earlier, followed by an example of character-defining dialogue


----------



## luckyscars (Jul 13, 2018)

Jack of all trades said:


> Just because more characters tends to increase the complexity of the story is not a very good reason to deliberately limit the number of characters.
> 
> And just because eight characters are introduced in the first chapter does not mean all eight would or should get equal attention and use. The Dursleys were introduced and used in the first two chapters, then existed only in the occasional reference.




I do not think anything was said to the effect of deliberately limiting anything. The idea is to review what tends to work in the majority of cases for the majority of people to cast unashamed generalizations about what tends to be an easier path, on the understanding that most people prefer not to make the process more difficult. 

If the story must have seven major characters introduced from the outset to work then fine, however if that was the case I would assume this post would not exist as the question would be pointless.

I already acknowledged in my last post that the importance of characters in well-crafted stories fluctuates so no need to revisit that. Only to say that in order for a character to be major, a word that was specifically used, I do believe they must be developed and featured prominently through sizable portions of narrative. The Dursleys do not fit that description, in my view, and neither do Fred and George Weasley. The poster specifically identified seven MAJOR supporting characters as being their intent and those usually cost significant word count to execute fully.


----------



## angeeeel (Jul 13, 2018)

Aschendale said:


> Unless it's jury duty or the start of boot camp or something, I think it's likely that some of the seven would already know each other, and could be introduced as semi-sets.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I'm glad you made mention of this because all 7 characters do know each other! I was going to make one character kid of introduce them so its nice to see someone have the same thought as me :3


----------



## angeeeel (Jul 13, 2018)

First person narrative isn't my strongest suit but I may write the book in the narrative I'm currently writing in (if i can recall correctly its third person limited?) and first person and see which one works better!


----------



## Snelbrouler (Jul 14, 2018)

Instead of having the characters being introduced all at once, try to have the main character get to know each individual better as the story progresses?
For example, if the protagonist is being introduced to a large group of people, then he/she would naturally gravitate towards one or two people with similar personality traits. Once he/she has become friends with those characters (allowing the reader to be familiar with them as well), then the other characters that aren't close to the protagonist can slowly be fleshed out. The protagonist's close friends could then introduce their other friends to the protagonist, or a situation would arise that requires the strengths and abilities of the main character to be combined with those of the other characters. Then the protagonist, along with the reader, could learn the traits of the other characters, such as what their personalities are like and what they're capable of.

Honestly I'd have a headache introducing more than two new characters at once, and the only book I've read that does introduce a ton of new characters is Catch 22_.
_Hope this helped, and good luck!


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 14, 2018)

luckyscars said:


> I do not think anything was said to the effect of deliberately limiting anything.



If a recommendation to limit the supporting characters to two or maybe three was NOT the point of post # 9, then what was your point?


(My apologies to the OP for this side track. I'll drop it after this. I'm glad you have a solution you like!)


----------



## luckyscars (Jul 14, 2018)

Jack of all trades said:


> If a recommendation to limit the supporting characters to two or maybe three was NOT the point of post # 9, then what was your point?
> 
> 
> (My apologies to the OP for this side track. I'll drop it after this. I'm glad you have a solution you like!)



Key word is deliberately. The priority is finding what fits for the story. This is of course not a question for anybody other than the writer, as has been repeatedly underscored in the thread. I merely offered what I think and illustrated my reasoning.


----------



## Jack of all trades (Jul 14, 2018)

luckyscars said:


> Key word is deliberately. The priority is finding what fits for the story. This is of course not a question for anybody other than the writer, as has been repeatedly underscored in the thread. I merely offered what I think and illustrated my reasoning.



So, let me get this straight. You were recommending that the author limit the number of supporting characters, but not deliberately. Then how? Haphazardly? Accidentally? How does one knowingly limit something without it being deliberate?


----------



## Ralph Rotten (Jul 14, 2018)

I would not limit the characters, they just need to be introduced & developed properly, but 8 is not an impossible number at all (worked in Hateful Eight).
As Luckyscars indicated, it would make it a 60-80k word book minimum...which really isn't all that much.  I have sneezed bigger than that.
The trick with a book like this (with 8 major characters) is just to take your time and be as verbose and wordy as you damned well please. Segue whenever you feel the need, but build them [the characters] well.
Don't get in a rush to tell the story.
Trim the excess fat later, doubleback every 100 pages to ensure your characters are tight.


----------



## luckyscars (Jul 14, 2018)

Jack of all trades said:


> So, let me get this straight. You were recommending that the author limit the number of supporting characters, but not deliberately. Then how? Haphazardly? Accidentally? How does one knowingly limit something without it being deliberate?



I was not recommending anything. I do not make recommendations without knowing the work. Like everybody else, I was pointing out my own feelings and explaining them in a general fashion.

If the story needs seven major characters, or seventeen, or seventy, or seven hundred, that is up to its author's judgment. There are great books featuring a 50+ characters and there are appalling books featuring one. There is however a high degree of correlation between the number of characters and the time and creative energy required to write them well. More characters tends to mean a more complex plot and therefore a greater tendency for plot holes. It also tends to mean less character development, a kind of descent into avatars.

I want to draw your attention back to the fact I am generalizing - - just like you are. However, unless you would like to say that needless complexity is somehow worth striving for I am not sure what the confusion is. Most beginner writers would find a simple story with fewer characters easier to write and, perhaps most crucially, finish. In much the same way that polar explorers tended to travel to the south pole in as straight a line as possible I think it is important that a writer always chooses the most direct route to the destination that does not compromise the impact of the work. You may disagree.


----------

