Secondary Character background information...needed or not?

I like to see secondary characters rounded out a little. To me, it makes the whole book feel deeper.

Going into some detail is always good, especially if they're recurring; I've rarely had any complaints about stories paying too much detail into a character.

Give them only as much background as is needed to be relevant to the story.

Don't spend pages upon pages info dumping the background info. Most readers, myself included, prefer dashes of it here and there.

The background should be there. That's work for you to do, even if you don't reveal everything to your reader. But if you take the time to flesh out the recurring characters, you'll find that you can't help but write bits that infer information about their life. Readers will be able to piece together the parts you don't say explicitly, especially if you've done the work in your head.

BethS said:

Give them only as much background as is needed to be relevant to the story.

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This exactly.

My personal feel is there's never a good time to infodump backstory through narration, even for main characters. All backstory needs to come out in a way that's relevant to the story. Figure out what you want from a secondary character in the story, then reveal as much about the character as needed for their decisions to make sense.

I tend to find that secondary characters end up being more interesting than MC's because we don't know as much about them.

Keep the info relevant, but definitely provide a few details about any characters that are recurring. It bothers me when I'm not sure why an MC is friends with another character, for example.

Jason Renaissance said:

Hi,
I have a couple of secondary characters but they don't really have a background. Friends of the MC, co-workers and such, but I don't delve (or infodump as I've seen it been called 'round these parts) into their lives and back story.

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Don't confuse info-dump with character development.

ETA: Just realized this could be construed wrong. What I mean: you can develop characters without info dumping.

Even secondary characters need some rounding out. The way to learn how to round out characters is to read plenty of novel and see how published writers do it.

It is good to have 3D secondary characters (we want our stories to feel real and everyone has a background and fears and hopes and dreams) but don't add information just for the sake of it, especially not in infodumps. Little spatterings of info throughout the MS can be incredibly effective in creating well-rounded secondary characters without overwhelming the story.

I like learning about secondary characters. I think they give some insight into the main character also.

If I'm not told very much about a particular character's background I assume it's not relevant or of any importance to the story and only the writer knows whether it's relevant or not.

One sentence can be enough to cover background.

How can you understand who a character is if you don't know much about them? The reader doesn't have to know more than hints, but I would hope the author knows them fairly well. The mystery of the secondary character can be part of the charm, but exploring a secondary character may take the MC down roads you hadn't planned. Short answer: yes.

When writing mysteries, anything you say about a secondary character could be relevant, such as...

"Yeah, Jim's a good guy, used to own a bait shop until his wife died."

If you then go on to the main action (MC, plot, storyline, etc.) you will leave some readers wondering why that fact about Jim, who seemed unimportant at the time, was mentioned.

Of course, maybe that's just how the speaker always thinks of Jim - as Jim, the bait shop guy whose wife died. (I remember my grandfather referring to his friends who had the same name, Dave-the-redhead, Dave-who-owns-the-Caddy like that was their full name.)

(Dave was a redhead even after he went bald.)

I just sold a story with several background or secondary characters and each had a definite 'hold' on the reader because of what they did, where they lived or what they looked like.

Hmm, maybe I do that so the reader will remember who is who.

I hate it when I self-analyze.

Jason Renaissance said:

Hi,


I have a couple of secondary characters but they don't really have a background. Friends of the MC, co-workers and such, but I don't delve (or infodump as I've seen it been called 'round these parts) into their lives and back story. My question therefore, is how integral is secondary character development to my story?

Phew.

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an infodump is an infodump; delving into a secondary character's backstory may or may not be. is it relevant, or is it just filler slowing the book down?

quicklime said:

an infodump is an infodump; delving into a secondary character's backstory may or may not be. is it relevant, or is it just filler slowing the book down?

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But information about a secondary character can also be 'color' or a way for the reader to recall who's who. (Or for the writer to remember all his characters.)

Not everything one writes has to be relevant to the story, otherwise no one would mention things like the color of a dog or the fact the MC's mother has a nervous twitchy eye. However, a brief mention is all that's needed. Too much information about minor characters, scenery, the weather, etc. becomes tedious and can slow down the story.

You are the only one who can say how much of the secondary characters' background is relevant to your story. However, you ought to know their background so you can make them something more than stock characters.

At the same time, don't go overboard. There's a limit to the number of fully developed characters you can handle in a single novel—probably no more than half a dozen.

Give as much information as is necessary to make the characters as real as they need to be, given their status in the novel. Main characters need more history and personality than secondary characters.

To illustrate: the novel I just finished has one MC and two major secondary characters. They are vital characters and without them, there would be no novel. Throughout the novel, you learn in-depth about their personalities, their motives, their histories, who they are and what makes them tick. Then there are two supporting (tertiary) characters. They don't show up through the entire novel and their presence isn't vital to the plot. But they still serve a purpose. For them, I give a few details to help establish their personalities and their histories, but I don't go into great depth. What I do provide is revealed through the character's actions and through small bits of dialogue and exposition.

Backstory is fine, provided the character has earned the right to it. What you want to avoid is infodumping, which is where you dump the entire backstory at the reader in an inappropriate fashion. Don't interrupt the story in order to tell us all about the character's history or personality. Weave the information in so it doesn't interrupt the story.

If you're unsure how much backstory to provide, consider that character's place in the story. Picture a pyramid, with main characters at the bottom, secondary characters on top of that, tertiary characters on top of that, and walk-on characters at the very top. The higher they are on the pyramid, the smaller the pyramid is, the less necessary the character is to the story, and the less information you need to provide. Also consider: does it serve a purpose to provide this information? Does it round out their character in a necessary way? Does it add to the plot? If so, go ahead and give us the information.

It all depends on how much/often this character is featured and whether you want the reader to develop an emotional attachment to the character or not. For instance, my secondary characters all have some backstory, but I work it into the thread of the main story so it's not "infodumping". My main secondary character, however, I do want my readers to gain an emotional attachment to. So I worked a part where he tells his story himself into the book, as opposed to telling ABOUT him myself. I think this is much more acceptable than just saying, "Bob works at McDonalds, goes out with a girl named Linda, plays pool every Saturday night, and runs around the block 5 times every morning." Know what I mean? hahaha