It’s pretty easy to overpopulate
a story.
Usually, it’s to make things seem
realistic (an office should have people in it, a party should be crowded).
Sometimes it seems like a clever
ploy (with 73 suspects the reader will never guess who the murderer is!).
Or it can be a way to give
different types of readers someone to root for. These characters are the love
story, these guys provide the adventure, this one will appeal to older women,
this one to comedy fans...
Too many characters often make a
story hard to follow, confuse the reader and create unnecessary complications.
But once they’re in, taking them out can seem daunting, like pulling at a single
loose thread that ends up unravelling the whole cardigan.
It’s really not that hard,
though.
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