Vox had an interesting post about the number of characters in epic fantasy novels and why this is the fundamental reason that the fat, boomer, George Rape Rape Martin will not finish his excretable fantasy saga before his heart pops and he dies.
I am not a fan, I found his books unreadable, and the very basis of his writing to be foul beyond words. it is the antithesis of why I read any fiction. Fiction should have something of the heroic in it. it can be a noir, it can be gritty, harsh, all of the above, but without some sense of the good, some numinous influence towards higher things, what is the point. the nihilist emo-goths that only want to write about rotting flesh and despair can all die in nuclear fire for my money.
Anyway, this is not about G Rape-Rape Martin and his crappy writing and even worse philosophy, but about the hard-core fact that go towards building an epic sized story.
Now I don’t write epic fantasy novels. I have done a couple of divertimentos in the Inferos Vortex books, and maybe one day they may add up to a decent sized book, but I am not sure if they qualify as fantasy. They tend to be a mix of quasi-horror, gritty gun stuff, some dark humour and a splash of science fiction “technology”.
What I have written, and God willing will also continue eventually, is epic Science Fiction. Nazi Moon clocks in at 827 pages, and since Vox made me thing about how many main characters I have, and I keep notes (so many notes, you have no idea how autistic I get about my SF world-building) I went to check, and over that length, I have some 63 characters, but several are just one-time appearances and others temporary ones, because I like to give some credence and personality even to the “extras” on my mental film set.
When it comes to primary characters I have about 15, which sounds like a lot, and there are about an equal number of secondary or lesser characters that have repeat appearances, but then, in truth, I am only half-way. I do plan to write three more books in that series. When I will get to them I do not know, but if I don’t die in the apocalypse first, I will finish them.
