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278 Part IV: Developing Your Plot and Structure
The minimum number of stories you can connect with this kind of structure
is three, and the most about six, because after this number the overall story
tends to become too fragmented and readers may have difficulty engaging
with the number of characters.
It’s not always easy to find ways of linking characters, but this exercise should
help you:
1. Take three to six characters you’ve been working with and make notes
on each one, detailing their interests, routines and work and family
lives.
2. Now use these to help you think of a situation that can bring the characters
unexpectedly together and throw them into close proximity.
These could involve an accident, a holiday, a marriage, a neighbourhood
or a common interest.
Short-story collections always sell fewer copies than novels do, and so a good
idea is to link short stories together if you can. You can then sell and market
the book as a novel.