I’m taking a break from posts dealing with punctuation to spend some time on content.
This is a brief post about how secondary characters and subplots can potentially steal the limelight from your protagonist and/or antagonist if you aren’t careful.
Characters other than your primary protagonist/antagonist are there to move the plot along. Having extended portions of your story being told from the viewpoint of a secondary character can take away from the pacing of your manuscript. A few details about such characters and a little of their point of view can be great for a story. However, it is best to keep in mind who the primary personalities are and be sure to feature them.
It’s not just writing from a secondary character’s point of view that can be a problem. It’s just as easy to spend too much time talking about the worldview/problems of a lesser character as a narrator. You don’t want so many subplots that you’re going to take away from the meat of the story. Try to make sure that each subplot/secondary character helps to move the plot along. That’s why they are there.
When a lesser character starts to take over your manuscript so much that you’re narrative might be drastically changed, it might be time to begin a new manuscript with that secondary character as the protagonist/antagonist. If your writing muses are feeling that character, don’t hesitate to put aside your current WIP and start something new with him/her in a primary role. I’m not saying to abandon the original manuscript altogether. I’m just advising that you go with what you are feeling most passionately about right now.
I know that the previous paragraph will make this a controversial post, but I’m ready for it. I’m standing in the corner of the metaphorical writing boxing ring with my gloves held in front of my noggin.
All right, WG2E peeps. Feel free to swing away. Let me have it!
Good advice!
I’ve built a table of characters for my trilogy with my heroine and hero at the top with the antagonist, then three crucial secondaries, then bottom layer with minor characters who have to work really hard to stay in the story. I have killed a few off over the past two and a half years.
My fourth book takes one of the important secondaries as its protagonist/heroine and it’s proving to be a fascinating ride…
Thanks, Alison!
I’m sorry I’m responding so late in the day. I had to find another computer to access the interwebs with today while activating my replacement cell phone. Wednesday night, both my cell and my Macbook Pro were killed. It’s been a little stressful, but here I am.
I think it’s a great idea to develop secondary characters and then give those that most speak to your muses their own vehicle to develop further organically.
I’m not necessarily advocating murdering characters willy-nilly, but I don’t think you should feel remorse for terminating those that just aren’t pulling their weight and don’t seem to have the potential to do so.
Best of luck!
Matt, IME there are several choices in this situation.
1. Open a bank account. That is, put your notes/ideas about that character into a new doc & stash it away for future use. Maybe, as Matt says, that secondary character will play a leading role in the future. Always nice to have money in the bank to draw on later.
2. Let em rip if you’re in first draft. See where the character goes. Edit/cut/prune later.
3. Surgery: cut them out. Cut them off. Cut them down. Change their looks, attitude, persona.
4. Extreme termination. Kill him/her. Send him/her on a trip to Saturn. Put him/her in jail/prison. Basically, get rid of them.
The writer is boss. Never forget that.
Hi, Ruth.
Those all sound like very sound ideas. I didn’t mention changing a character if need be to make them more viable. I especially liked that one.
I hope you’re having a great weekend!
The characters in my first two YA ebooks will appear as minor characters in the rest of the series. I know a lot of authors who have created books from minor characters, some because readers have asked about the characters. In the MG books I had been working on, a couple of the minor characters in the first book (best friend and a bully) have their own stories later on (second and third) book. And in the children’s book for 6-9s I have written, I mentioned another boy who will get his own story in the next book in the series, and so on and so forth.
Hi, Julie!
That sounds like you’ve got some great characters there. Wishing you many more!
KO, Matt! Great post, and I agree with you. As painful as it may be, sometimes you just have to roll with it.
Thanks, Tamara!
I hope you’re enjoying the characters that are springing from your imagination. I hope they all end up being contributors for you.
Cheers!
I usually just tell them to go get coffee (or a scotch if they are totally alpha) and hang out, they’ll get there story later. I call it ‘daisy chaining’. My characters come back in future books so readers can see after the HEA and when they (the readers) start a new book they already have seen the leads (at least one of them) before.
Hi, L.C.!
Sounds like you have your system all worked out. I wish you all the best!
This particular post hits a nerve with me. The reason? Plot holes in the first book of my series need to filled in with a back story. Unfortunately, the character is not one of the two VIP’s of this particular book. Plot holes? My fault entirely.
And just to prove that even the edit dude is not perfect (sorry, Matt)….
“you’re narrative might be drastically changed”
Hi, S.J.!
Wow! Thanks for pointing that out. YOU’RE completely correct. I’m hoping that YOUR characters are treating you well. Heh.
You’ve read my mind, Matt! I’m in the midst of a rewrite and I’ve got one character who insists on being front and center. So right now I’m evaluating her position and trying to figure out if I can give her a book of her own. After all the nagging she’s done, I think she’s going to get it.
Thanks, Sheila!
I think it’s great to give secondary characters their own stories. I’m wishing you and her the best of luck together!
Great post, Edit Dude!
But…I’ll take an exception to this…
I do think there’s a very viable option for secondary characters to really shine, and that’s when you write ensemble casts!
I write very much in ensemble cast mode and am constantly writing as if my characters are about to star in their own sitcom! And wow do my readers chime in that it is in fact my secondary characters and sitcom-esque casts that they luuuvvv most and that they ask to see return in my books again and again. (i.e. The Mom Squad and Company)
So, I do think this can work…if you’re working in an ensemble cast type of storytelling mode.
Think of Friends, Cheers, Seinfeld, Sex and The City, The Gilmore Girls, Bunheads (yep, I ‘m a huge Amy Sherman Palladino fan
)…all of these shows/story lines work/worked because of the entire ensemble cast, not just the primary characters and their story arcs.
I love the idea of an ensemble cast, D.D., and it turns out that my characters tend to write themselves into this type of storytelling mode, whether I like it or not (because after all, they’re the ones taking ME on THEIR journey!). Gotta love those characters with minds of their owns…
Great post, Edit Dude! And great input as always, D.D.
Thanks, Riley!
I agree!
Hi, D.D.!
I completely agree with everything that you wrote. I think an ensemble cast can make for a wonderful story. I love your mix of characters, and think that it’s great how you use them to connect readers of one series to another series. What a great idea!
I don’t have anything against secondary characters. My point was just that we not let a particular secondary character, regardless of how many there are, take over the narrative from the protagonist of the current story. That’s all. Colorful secondary characters can add a lot to a story and even drive the plot for brief periods of time, but they shouldn’t be taking over the story completely. If they’re interesting enough, they’ll get their own.
I’m pretty sure we actually agree with each other. I didn’t mean to imply that I don’t think secondary characters are an important part of a story, and I’m sorry if I gave that impression. Hope this clears up what I meant to say.
Cheers!
Comma splice alert in second sentence. Sorry folks.
Hi, David! I like vibrant secondary characters an enjoy when there is one that I end a book thinking – ‘you’re next’ — but I also agree they cannot be allowed to clutter the clear thread of the protagonist’s arc.
I have never had one so strong that I had to stop a WIP. I don’t begin a work unless I have a pro tag I feel strong enough about to carry me through.
Hi, Alicia!
That sounds like a sound policy.
I hope you’re having a great weekend!
I write epic fantasy, so there are usually three sets of ‘character pairs’ rather than a clear protagonist/antagonist. Kind of like a television series like Battlestar Galactica (the new one). I also write part of my story from the viewpoint of the bad guy. It’s hard to do. You have to be very careful to keep each stand of the braid equally thick as you braid the different viewpoints back and forth or your story arc gets lost.
Interesting post, TED!
For me, I think the issue is more about keeping the story on track than focusing on specific characters. One could just as easily throw the reader with excessively detailed irrelevant flashbacks with what you call a primary personality.
Not everything has to drive the current plot, but it should enrich it in some way. That’s true for me whether it’s with a “secondary personality” or a primary one.
In today’s digital market especially, it’s nice to have a rich universe which can spawn different stories…and ones at different lengths. Those secondary characters may make a good “extra” in publication, or an inexpensive short story.
I like that you want people to be mindful of the process.
Thanks for the helpful advice. As a writer I will take it to heart. As a consumer it is frustrating to want the story to move forward, only to be sidetracked onto a road to nowhere. There is one epic story that I’ve been following for many years. The main characters are wonderful, fun, and exciting. In books eleven, twelve, and thirteen, new long-winded minor characters keep stepping in the way.
With this in mind, I was on book five of another epic story. Here they come again, long-winded blowhards that flattened out the story. Forget books six, seven, and beyond (all as yet to be written.)
The lesson I learned? Frustration trumps curiosity.