How to Manage information and details about all minor characters and things in your novel?

[Anonymous_Buttfart]

In my novel, there are a lot of characters aside from the protagonist and his family and friends. I mean LOTs AND LOTS...

I even named trivial characters so that it could be easy for me to write the scene, without referring to the character like that 'Blonde chic' or that 'one-eyed old fart', etc. Calling the characters in a scene became repetitive and also weird. hence I just end up naming these characters although, they don't have to play any actual role in the plot.
But sometimes when I need to reuse that same character, I tend to forget the name or misspell his name.

Yeah, I tried managing writing it down on a notepad, but later it became so hard to read, that one might mistake it for some encrypted code message.
So I end up deleting it.

So how do you properly organize such information while making it easy to refer to this information?
Not only the names of a minor character but also like places, the tavern, bookstore, magical weapons, villages, etc.
Any tips are appreciated.

 

[Leti]

There are some online web tools that does the organizing for you. As long as you provided the required information first. One of them is called Novel Factory. It has dedicated sections for characters, places, and items. If it's not enough for you, you can try more complex tools like World Anvil and Campfire. Have fun!

 

[ForestDweller]

The glossary? The best part about writing in this site.

 

[Alienix]

The glossary? The best part about writing in this site.

And the most underrated :kek:

 

[Friend]

I start in a software program called Quoll Writer. Free, open source, written in Java (which I know to program), maybe not so pristeenly polished as Scrivener ... but it's my go-to tool.

Each writing project is a database of the chapters and characters and locations. It's slightly extensible too, once a person gets started.

{EDIT: For characters and items and locations within a project, it also provides a listing of the 'chapters' where those objects can be found; plus a more thorough search functionality exists too. In other words, cross reference to the things you add as well.}

And then there's other things too, but since it is open source I may or may not have been working on a more updated clone of it.

 

[DDTStudios]

I usually keep track of all my characters in Notes. The minor character who only appears for a scene or two, yes I keep track of then too.

 

[CupcakeNinja]

In my novel, there are a lot of characters aside from the protagonist and his family and friends. I mean LOTs AND LOTS...

I even named trivial characters so that it could be easy for me to write the scene, without referring to the character like that 'Blonde chic' or that 'one-eyed old fart', etc. Calling the characters in a scene became repetitive and also weird. hence I just end up naming these characters although, they don't have to play any actual role in the plot.
But sometimes when I need to reuse that same character, I tend to forget the name or misspell his name.

Yeah, I tried managing writing it down on a notepad, but later it became so hard to read, that one might mistake it for some encrypted code message.
So I end up deleting it.

So how do you properly organize such information while making it easy to refer to this information?
Not only the names of a minor character but also like places, the tavern, bookstore, magical weapons, villages, etc.
Any tips are appreciated.

Cornell notes, bitch. All day, every day. Wassup

 

[TotallyHuman]

In my novel, there are a lot of characters aside from the protagonist and his family and friends. I mean LOTs AND LOTS...

I even named trivial characters so that it could be easy for me to write the scene, without referring to the character like that 'Blonde chic' or that 'one-eyed old fart', etc. Calling the characters in a scene became repetitive and also weird. hence I just end up naming these characters although, they don't have to play any actual role in the plot.
But sometimes when I need to reuse that same character, I tend to forget the name or misspell his name.

Yeah, I tried managing writing it down on a notepad, but later it became so hard to read, that one might mistake it for some encrypted code message.
So I end up deleting it.

So how do you properly organize such information while making it easy to refer to this information?
Not only the names of a minor character but also like places, the tavern, bookstore, magical weapons, villages, etc.
Any tips are appreciated.

It's not that big of a deal if you misspell the name of a minor character tbh. It's not like if you introduce them again you'll just go: "and then Chris came in" And expect the readers to know who tf is Chris. Just give a short reintroduction and the readers won't mind if Christina became Chris

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

Most of my side characters die sooner or later. In my first novel, they kept, in fact, dying like flies. Some didn't even last a single chapter.

So that is how I managed them. If they are dead you don't need to worry about them.

 

[TRNRLogan]

In my novel, there are a lot of characters aside from the protagonist and his family and friends. I mean LOTs AND LOTS...

I even named trivial characters so that it could be easy for me to write the scene, without referring to the character like that 'Blonde chic' or that 'one-eyed old fart', etc. Calling the characters in a scene became repetitive and also weird. hence I just end up naming these characters although, they don't have to play any actual role in the plot.
But sometimes when I need to reuse that same character, I tend to forget the name or misspell his name.

Yeah, I tried managing writing it down on a notepad, but later it became so hard to read, that one might mistake it for some encrypted code message.
So I end up deleting it.

So how do you properly organize such information while making it easy to refer to this information?
Not only the names of a minor character but also like places, the tavern, bookstore, magical weapons, villages, etc.
Any tips are appreciated.

Do like the books Game of Thrones is based off of. Add a Glossary that has a list of characters and who they are in relation to others. Then just in author's notes mention that you've actually used the Glossary.

 

[atgongumerki]

I organise my characters based on affiliation.

Pretend you have a nation:
There is the ruler Name1; there are the cities, governors, generals, and all those important people.
Make a list of these positions and slap a name on them. (governor of city1 is name4)

In city1 there is a blacksmith, tanner and whatever else.
Make a list of these professions and slap a name on them.

For everyone who is more closely intertwined with the story:
Make a character list, and add details. (name7, blacksmith of city3, had a discussion with name28, the discussion escalated, name7 stabbed name28 and had to flee the city; then comes their relation to the mc and how they met; add anything you think noteworthy)

 

[K5Rakitan]

If I don't plan to ever use them again, I don't name them. There is one character I didn't name who became relevant again later, but it was easy to give him a name later. My excuse is that the protagonist is based on me, and I'm bad with remembering names, so of course she wouldn't have remembered his name even if he had told her during the indirect dialogue I used to introduce him. Indirect dialogue is a great way to avoid the boring "Hi, my name is _______" stuff.

 

[queenofthefuzzybugs]

I've got a terrible memory for details so if I don't keep my notes organized writing anything over 5K is basically a hopeless endeavor. I take notes on Google Docs using the Paragraph Styles (under Format). I can everything for a single story into one file and quick jump to the information using Headers (under Paragraph Styles). I have no idea what the limit of sub-headers is but there's at least 6. The nice thing is you can use the sub-headers to indicate more precise or less important information (that you still need quick access to). I cntrl+X to move junks of information around withig the file as needed.

What I've shown in my example is only using Header and Header 2. There's 25 pages (9K words) of notes in the example. Before doing it this way, I'd probably have a single file for each major bit of information. The only downside to this method is that on slow computers (like cheap Chromebooks) it takes a while to load the file (once it's loaded there's no problem).

I know there's lots of different ways to do this, but I write almost exclusively in Google Docs because it lets me jump onto any computer, tablet, or phone without losing access to my files. I write mostly on my Chromebook and I find adding a bunch of add-ons slows the browser down, this method also avoids that problem.

The Example:

 

[CatsAreCutest]

If I don't plan to ever use them again, I don't name them

Same idea. If the reader dont need to remember the character, you prolly shouldn't be putting a name for them.

For your organization problems, make a table or something with columns like

Name	Description/relevance	First appeared on:
Kayla	Innkeeper of _____ Inn where the MC first stayed in.	Chapter 5

 

[Lulible]

I use an excel sheet