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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/41392
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/41392
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Your issue is common to many novels and other long works. Your characters aren't just dropping into and out of your MC's life (like you often see in, say, TV shows where the MCs have friends for one episode then suddenly they have a big event and no one shows up). Your MC is changing settings. With set changes it's normal and expected to change supporting characters.

Making those secondary characters well-rounded without making the reader invest too much in them is indeed the hard part. I'm handling this by giving secondary characters full lives and backgrounds and individual personalities. But for myself. Very little of my backstory is getting into the book (a lot of the characters don't even get page time, let alone names, though I know them all). But what does make it through is personalized and not random.

My aim is to cut to the core of the character and bring that bit in. But really, they're there for the purpose of supporting the main character in service to the story. They have their own full lives and you will make that clear, but to the reader, they are there for a reason, not for themselves.

Your reader will invest emotional energy around the same level that your MC (or narrator) does. Something like bootcamp is an artificially close environment, so friendships get accelerated. But it's still only a few months. These are not lifelong friends, they're friends of the moment. Convey that and your reader will act accordingly.

Some of these friends might pop up later, or even become longer lasting regular characters. Or your MC (or others) might mention them. Doing this occasionally will help your reader feel that all that time spent getting to know people wasn't a total waste.

As long as you don't delve into a supporting character's backstory too much within the novel before ghosting them, your reader will go along with it. Changing casts is normal and expected.

Original score: 10