Starting to read a novel for the first time, what I can't cope with is the introduction of too many characters at once. I read the first few pages and one or two people are described, and I try to hold images of them and their relationships in my head. Then suddenly another three characters appear, all with their own lives and histories. Then another four people turn up, somehow connected to the others. We now have several people whose names and appearances are all blurred and jumbled in my mind and it's too much information for me to process. At this stage I have to go back to the start of the novel and try again, taking notes of the characters or finding a synopsis on the internet. I always finish books I start, but it can be painful getting through this expository stage. It's much smoother once I'm into the flow of the plot and I'm familiar with everyone. So my plea to authors is to introduce no more than one character per ten pages, and give them all radically different names. We can't have a Brad and a Brod, or a Robert and a Bob. And similarly we can't cope with have several names for the same character. I've been known to reach the end of a thousand page novel not realising that Amon and Fuzzy were the same person, but one was a nickname. Why would an author do that to me?
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