I have 15 Bell Mountain books in print, with three more planned, one of which is written and is currently being edited (Ozias, Prince in Peril).
I don’t know how many characters I had to make up to populate these books. At a guess, say three or four hundred. Some come back in book after book. Some appear only for a walk-on. But as they say, you can’t tell a story without characters.
Where do they come from, all these characters?
Some I create to carry out certain jobs demanded by the plot. Having done so, they either remain in the story to do more, or quietly fade away.
A few start out as just a cool name. I borrow a lot of names from various sources–Greek and Roman history, ancient Welsh stories, Norse folklore. And then, often, a character takes form around the name. You can’t let a handle like “Abombalbap” go to waste.
Even fictional characters, of course, have to live somewhere. I had to invent a bunch of countries to house my characters. Obann, Wallekki Land, Abnak country, Arachosia–oh, all sorts of countries! And cities, too.
To invent all this stuff, nothing will prove more valuable than years and years of reading. It’s fun hanging out with Herodotus or Sir Thomas Malory; but you can also learn from them. The more you read, the better. And it’s okay to concentrate on reading the kind of stories you would like to write someday.. I have no time for Serious Mainstream Literature. Give me The Lord of the Rings or The Worm Ouroburos any day.
And that’s enough of this for now.
As it is said: Readers are Leaders.
You need to be a reader, and have a good imagination to craft those fictional cities, towns, countries, and characters.
I have written a few such stories as illustrations and placed them in a few of my books. But those illustrations only covered a few pages. To fill a whole book, to craft a story, well, that is a skill that brother Lee took many pages and years to acquire.