How to Populate Your Story With the Right Cast

by Stephanie Morrill

Stephanie writes young adult contemporary novels and is the creator of GoTeenWriters.com. Her novels include The Reinvention of Skylar Hoyt series (Revell) and the Ellie Sweet books (Birch House Press). You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and check out samples of her work on her author website including the free novella, Throwing Stones.

(This post is part of the Writing A Novel From Beginning to End series. You can find other posts from this series on the Looking For Something Specific? tab.)

Ever read a book where the main character had lots of spunk and voice, but it felt like he or she was operating in a world of cardboard cut outs? I have, and I know my first drafts almost always read that way.

Your main character is certainly the most important one to figure out, and in the early stages of planning, she's usually the only character I've taken the time to unravel. But at some point—ideally the beginning, but for me it sadly tends to be during the second draft—it's wise to tune into the rest of the cast and make sure they're earning their spot. A good place to start is to ask:

What value does the character add?

Often characters arise organically as I'm working on a new story. This is great, except that it often leaves me with characters who matter for a chapter or two, but then just hang around on the fringe for the rest of the book.

I try to only have as many characters as I need for a story. The reader can only remember so much, plus it's annoying to waste time with characters who don't impact the story. This doesn't mean I automatically cut all my organic characters, but rather that at some point in the process, I clarify their purpose.

How many characters does a story need? It completely depends on the story. George R.R. Martin books require quite a few, which is typical in the epic fantasy genre. If your story scope is narrow, however, you won't need as many. 

So how do you figure out if a character is necessary to a story? You imagine what the story would be if you were to cut them.

In my first draft of Me, Just Different, I gave my super popular main character, Skylar, seven friends. To me this felt very real. The popular girls at my school always had big groups of friends. 

But early feedback indicated that there were too many friends to keep track of. Upon examination, I realized I could cut two of them because they rarely impacted scenes or did anything other than hang out on the sidelines of conversations.

Then an agent read a later draft, and her response was still, "I can't keep track of all these friends. We need to cut one or two." So I cut more.

The result is that Skylar has three close friends, and not a single person has ever written to me and said, "Hey, it's unrealistic for the most popular girl at school to have only three good friends!"

But how do we make all these characters sound different from each other? It's easy for characters to all talk the same and react the same way. The big gun for fighting this problem is to create unique backstories for everyone. 

Let's look at two different stories from completely different genres to see how this plays out:

The Harry Potter series:

Harry: Born to a wizard and witch but raised in a non-magical world.

Ron: Raised in an old but poor magic family. Doesn't know a thing about the non-magical world.

Hermione: Born to two non-magical parents and, until receiving her invite to attend Hogwarts, knew nothing of  the magic world.

Gilmore Girls:

Lorelai (the mother): Raised in an old money family by parents whom she felt she could never please. 

Rory (the daughter): Raised by a single mother. Lots of freedom but also lots of responsibility.

It's probably easy to see at a glance that these characters are going to move about the story in a different way. Hermione will care a lot more about doing well and looking like she belongs than Ron, who already knows he belongs. Rory will feel very different about an expensive present from her grandparents than her mother will.

Another tip that has really helped me develop my cast of characters is the advice that we are all the main characters in our own story, and our characters should feel the same way.

In the Ellie Sweet books, Ellie is my main character, but Lucy doesn't think of herself as The Former Best Friend, Palmer doesn't think of himself as The Love Interest, and Chase doesn't think of himself as A Complication.

Yet in so many of my first drafts, you would think the other characters of the book are just sitting around waiting for my main character to walk onto the stage so they can be defined. How do we fix that?

We give them their own things to do or worry about. Palmer is trying to settle into the right group at his new school. Lucy has parents who are divorcing. Chase has a family that struggles to make ends meet and two brothers who are in jail.

When you've solidified in your mind what other characters are working toward and thinking about, this keeps conversations from revolving around your main character and his or her issues.

Even still, I like to ask myself:

How does this character's issue intersect with the main character?

Using the ripple effects of another character's choice or actions to impact your main character is one way to make them feel vital to the story. Like in the Ellie Sweet books, Lucy's parents divorce, which leads to Lucy moving, which changes the social dynamic at school for Ellie.

If you're watching season of Turn, there's been loads of great examples of this recently. The main character, Abraham, is in being held in jail as a spy. The only character who can clear his name is Major Hewlett, but he's been captured by the rebel army. Two other characters—Anna and Mary—devise a plan to get Hewlett back so that Abraham can be freed. But them choosing to get involved actually interrupts Hewlett being freed by someone else, and therefore the audience's hope of Abraham being freed is now delayed.

Sometimes these ripple effects happen effortlessly—doesn't that feel amazing when it all comes together?—but more often they take work to create, so don't grow discouraged!

Who are some of your favorite non-main characters from novels? What is it about them that stands out to you?