Inventing Reality: A Guide to Writing Science Fiction

Not all characters in your story are created equal. Some of the utmost importance while some are fairly insignificant.

The most important characters are the ones who face and overcome a number of serious problems and obstacles in a story. They are called major characters. In “Star Trek”, they would be Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy. In “Star Wars IV-VI”, they would be Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and Han Solo.

In contrast, minor characters face few obstacles and often none at all. Because of this, minor characters have few lines of dialogue and usually appear only incidentally. They are part of the background, necessary for advancing the plot and giving the story a semblance of reality, but they are not who the story is about. In “Star Trek,” they (typically) would be Sulu, Scotty, Uhura, Chekov, the transporter chief, the red shirt who dies on the planet. In “Star Wars IV-VI”, they would be the stormtroopers, the Jawas and the cantina musicians.

It’s not necessary to develop all of your characters. In fact, the fewer you develop the better, especially if writing a short story or novella. This allows the reader to focus on a single character (or small band of characters) who must overcome the story’s central problem.

At the same time, don’t skimp on minor characters if they’re needed in your story. The tale about the scientist professor making a startling but dangerous discovery probably needs to include a research assistant, department secretary and bored students. There’s nothing wrong with including these side players. Just make sure they seem real (that is, they shouldn’t be stereotypes) and that they don’t attract the reader’s attention too much.

You Do It
Open a magazine and make the person in a picture on that page the main character in a 250-word piece. Now add a minor character or two to the piece to give the story an even greater semblance of reality – however, in adding these minor characters, do not allow the piece to go longer than 300 words.