|
The number of characters your book can support without confusing the reader depends a great deal on your skill at differentiating characters. If you are careful to make your characters distinct, memorable, and easily identifiable -- and if you are adept at dropping subtle clues to remind readers about the character -- then thirty or forty named characters is not out of the realm of possibility.
Most authors aren't that skilled, though. (I'm certainly not.) For beginners, I'd recommend sticking to ten or twelve named characters, and be sure to introduce them one at a time.
|