A full cast of characters

If no man is an island, then our characters shouldn't be islands, either.

There are exceptions. It is possible to write an entire book with only one character. But what a challenge--and that character had better be doing something reeeeallly interesting, like making a major scientific discovery or fighting a killer storm or canoeing through a wilderness full of adventure. Even then, inanimate objects or forces of nature are likely to function as characters.

Most of the time, we will have multip...