Sequels

[The Dark One]

I'm sometimes astonished on writers' forums, including this one, to read of people planning trilogies, or even longer series of novels before they've written Word One of the first book.

I'm not suggesting this is the wrong way to do things - everyone works differently - it's just that I could never work that way. For several reasons, and I'm the quintessential Planner but WITHIN a novel.

Despite being a Planner, and working methodically towards the ending I'd planned, I always have much better ideas by the time I get to the end - surprising both myself and the readers with twists that were buried in the story's DNA, so make sense despite being very hard to see coming.

That sort of thing might completely ruin plans for a trilogy.

The reason I'm interested in sequels at the moment is that I'm writing one. But rather than having planned it before writing the first book, I've taken a couple of loose / unconcluded threads from the first book, blended those with some new ideas, and bingo! I've got a really strong plot already and motoring towards a first draft that will be finished before the first book is published (next year).

I have great confidence in the first book so this might be the first time I'm able to jump off the momentum of a book to generate interest immediately in the next one.

I read a lot about momentum being the key to book / brand marketing so very much looking forward to having a go myself.

 

[ThinkerX]

The reason I'm interested in sequels at the moment is that I'm writing one. But rather than having planned it before writing the first book, I've taken a couple of loose / unconcluded threads from the first book, blended those with some new ideas, and bingo! I've got a really strong plot already and motoring towards a first draft that will be finished before the first book is published (next year).

That is pretty much what happened with me with 'Labyrinth.' Supposed to be on the shorter side originally, 10-15.000 words. But it kept growing. Rewrite time, I had to toss well over half what I'd written, and it still almost doubled in size. Started thinking about the ending, few dangling threads...and 'Labyrinth' became 'Labyrinth: Journal,' followed by 'Labyrinth: Seed.' Book III...well, I'll get to that someday.

Going the other way, 'Empire' was intended as a series right from the start - a series of 30-35,000 word novellas, each set in a different location. Now, they're into the 60-80,000 word range...

 

[skip.knox]

I, too, scratch my head at people who plan three or five or ten books in advance. Perhaps it's because I've read very few multi-volume works that justified their length. I refrain from actual criticism, though, because everyone deserves a chance to fail.

I'm working on a fairly ambitious novel that keeps threatening to turn into a duology. If it turns out I do that, it will be because there are two rather different stories that happen to have the same main characters and at least one common theme. But I could just as readily leave the second phase unwritten. Every time I consider the duology, all the other stories that have been waiting their turn queue up at the counter waving their numbers at me. Some of them have been known to become quite unruly.

I have concepts that could serve for a series, but their numbers are much higher and they'll have to wait their turn. First and foremost I want to tell particular stories. Length is a distant also-ran.

 

[Prince of Spires]

I think there's two things at work here. The first is that everyone is different, and even for the same person every story is different. Sometimes you start small and find out there's more going on. Another time you know a big conflict and even the parts you have in there and "feel" it spans more then a single novel.

I have experienced both of these. I've written a short story, where as I finished it I discovered that it was actually just the beginning of a longer adventure, so now I'm writing a novel which has that short story as a starting point. And now as I'm writing I'm thinking that when I reach my intended end I will have wrapped up the story itself, but there is a grander story at play here which will probably require another novel (or even a couple).

I've also had the opposite, where I started with a story I wanted to tell and quickly realized that it would require 3 novels to tell the story. There were a couple of logical cut-off points which shaped it into a nice couple of novels. The trilogy was just the right format for that story. Though it must be said that I never actually finished that story (got stuck somewhere in chapter 4 or so...).

The other side is that everyone is shouting that the best (or only) way to make decent money self-publishing is to write series. It's what readers want and once you hook them in the first book they will buy the rest and you can play around with price and all that sort of thing. And as a result a lot of people think the way forward is to write series and as such start with that in mind. Never mind that if it's your first book then it might very well suck and good luck selling people a series if the first book is bad.

As for myself I don't care much about what will be best for selling books. Every story has an ideal length and a way in which needs to be told. trying to force it into something different will not do the story much justice. So if a story is stand-alone then that is how it will be written and if it turns out that it will be a series then that is the way forward.

 

[The Dark One]

Interesting that you could finish the small plan story and grow into a novel, but couldn't finish the grand plan story.

Is there anyone here who has planned and finished a grand theme series (without leaping naturally to the next book after finishing the first, as I am doing)?

By the way - a shout out to Skip - I think your website looks and feels excellent.

 

[ThinkerX]

Interesting that you could finish the small plan story and grow into a novel, but couldn't finish the grand plan story.

Is there anyone here who has planned and finished a grand theme series (without leaping naturally to the next book after finishing the first, as I am doing)?

By the way - a shout out to Skip - I think your website looks and feels excellent.

sort of, with 'Empire' - though, as stated, it was supposed to be a novella series to start with, tales set in the imperial heartland instead of the periphery. However, the 'grand theme' didn't come about until book 2 or so. (currently engaged in the painfully slow rewrite of book 6, the concluding volume)

 

[The Dark One]

So, kind of a mini grand plan that grew in the telling.

Congrats on finishing a six novel series - impressive.

 

[Prince of Spires]

Interesting that you could finish the small plan story and grow into a novel, but couldn't finish the grand plan story.

That's not so much due to the story or plan, but rather that finishing stories is something you need to learn. The grand plan story was in a very different phase in my life (10+ years ago, student, no kids). I've had to settle down and get the patience to see things through to be able to finish novel size stories.

Of course, a small plan story that grows in the telling is both more motivating and less daunting to tell. A 6.000 word story takes me a week and a half or so to finish and you get the satisfaction of seeing it done and then knowing there's more to tell. That's very different from facing a 200.000 word mountain when you set out, especially as a first or second novel...

On a different approach, I like the idea of one day writing a novella serial. Something like 5 or 10 (loosly) connected 20.000 word novella's. I just haven't had an idea to do this with. But it's simmering in the back of my mind.