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Out of curiosity

Gurkhal

Auror
I'm just wondering, how important is it to keep the character gallery slim and functional and the plots straight?

I know that for example Robert Jordan bloated his series with endless subplots and characters, and which is the reason to why I love him despite me feeling there's to much magic in that series, and so how off putting is it with writing character focused "slice of life" kind of stories as opposed to stories where everything has a purpose and things are not as messy as in stories that tries to reflect real life more?

I know I can and probably should write what I want. But I am a bit curious about what people think of this. Are there anyone else but me out there who appreciate the messy plotlines and vast set of characters, not all of them feeling particuarly relevant at all times?
 
in absolutely everyone's life, there are hundreds of contacts and machines moving to make it possible. the average person knows 600 people. that's a lot of characters. Fortunately, we can group them into main characters, side characters, and background characters. In harry potter, there are several main characters. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dumbledore, and Voldemort. for side characters, you have harry's parents, Malfoy, Hagrid, the teachers, the Weasly family, and many more. for background characters, you have all the people in Hogwarts, Hogsmead, and characters that only appear in one or two scenes.

It's hard to plot out all of those characters. however, the more side and background characters you have, the more you build a believable world.
J. K. Rowling put 40 people into harry's grade. I hardly have 10 characters so far in my book. One of these made millions, the other, you will probably never hear of.

As for plot lines, you can't have the readers knowing the whole book from the description on the back, but you also don't want them to be too confused to read the book. The more you read books, the better you will be at making plot lines. After a while, you can spot a good plot from a bad one.
 

Red Star

Scribe
My personal preference is to look at a story as one large machine with countless working parts. The machine's purpose is to develop characters, themes and messages. If there are parts of the machine that are unecessary to the greater whole, cut them out. That being said, I love Wheel of Time.
 

Lynea

Sage
It probably depends on the genre/nature of the story. I understand that "slice of life" is typically full of characters that potentially have their own arcs. If that's what you're going for, then I would say have fun with it. I can relate to you in that I keep throwing characters into my story. As a writer, I really want to lock in their subplots even when it has little to do with my main plotline. I do it just for me, really, before going back and taking out what's not necessary. I, too, am trying to get better with keeping the plot clean without having too much going on.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
Dive in head first! My last novel had five characters, pretty much from start to finish. My first novel, though, has many characters and I went into it being sure of only two. The whole process of writing was in part a kind of on-going audition for characters. They would come in and out.

My current project is similar. This time it was only one character I was sure of at the start. Others shadow-lurked during development until they either stepped forward or dissolved. Or transformed into someone else. And some came riding up over the horizon and made themselves indispensible, no matter how many times I tried to spense them.

That's all on the author side. On the reader side, I'm instatiable. Give me characters who are memorable, whether they are there for the whole arc or just walk on to steal a scene. I want to feel there was a reason why the author put that character in; if the author cares about the character, then I will. A classic example is Tom Bombadil, who in no way advances the plot yet is memorable. Goldberry even more so. I don't care if they can be cut without damage to the story. I *like* them and I like the chapter. There's a reason why people squawked when they were cut from the movies.

So, go ahead, put them in, coach, and write them the very best you can.
 
My last novel was a whodunnit with three characters - two detectives and a butler.

It was fairly short.

I'll get my coat...
 
Emmersive and very complicated is fine, but to do so concisely, without unintentional confusion while keeping some pacing, is key. It also depends on the type/genre of narrative... if it follows multiple characters through many, many seemingly conspicuous or unrelated threads, and an author can masterfully weave or unravel said threads together to keep an idea (plot) together, I'm very likely to enjoy the read. Get it too tangled and confusing, and it might not pay off or be worthwhile.

But, to be fair, I'm also in the mood for an "unreliable narrator", messy viewpoint type story every once in a while.
 
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