To Series Or Not To Series

Currently Reading - Kitty and the Silver Bullet by Carrie Vaughn

This subject's come up a couple of times on the BookEnds, LLC, blog in the last few months. A young lady was getting conflicting advice about whether or not to write the second book in her propsed series.

I commented that the desire for series was cyclical, but if she's excited about her story and she's learning her craft to go ahead and write it. One other gal agreed. The next anonymous commenter believed writing thte sequel was a total waste of time if she can't sell the first book, and if she wanted to be happy, she needed a new hobby.

There's three issues here:

1) Like everything else in the publishing business, the wants/needs of a publishing house change. Twenty years ago, everyone and their mother was writing triloges. Ten years ago, you couldn't sell one even with Ed McMahon standing next to you with a giant check. Now, guess what everyone wants?

2) Anonymous missed the point I tried to make. Is she moving forward and improving her craft or is she spinning her wheels? If she's still making the same mistakes in Book #2 that she made in Book #1, she's not doing herself any favors. Is Book #1 a stand alone novel, or does it leave too many plot threads dangling to the point it's obvious Book #1 is really Act 1?

3) Most important of all, how does she feel about writing about the same characters for years, if Book #1 does sell?

These are all issues to consider before hitting the keys on your computer.