Ruts in the road…
I admire J. Michael Straczynski for his screenwriting associated with Babylon Five, the TV series. He considered the five years of episodes just chapters in a novel, but I considered them five novels forming a series of books (yeah, some would have cliffhangers, something I eshew). In any case, he set out with a finite constraint in mind. That’s wonderful restraint that Hollywood rarely exhibits with TV series or franchise films like Mission Impossible or Star Wars, as they try to extend a good run ad infinitum.
Many authors write book series; for some, that’s all they write, e.g. Sue Grafton. Straczynski knew when to quit; he planned when and how to quit! Last time I checked, Grafton hadn’t made it to Z, but I stopped reading her alphabet series long before that. For me, Sue got in a rut, and I suspect her publisher helped keep her in it. Perhaps Sue is the exception, but do series authors know when to end a series?
I suppose we can call a book series the opposite of writer’s block, especially if we take publishers out of the picture, making it only the author’s choice to continue a series. Each book in a series appears because the author has more stories to tell about the main characters in the series and/or wants to develop the main characters more. The danger is that the writer gets in a rut.
While I might add another novel to the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” (seven novels now, with The Midas Bomb as #1 and Gaia and the Goliaths as #7), I’m aware of that danger. I thought the novella The Phantom Harvester (free download found on my “Free Stuff & Contests” web page) might be another one featuring Castilblanco’s adopted kids, a new novella You Know I’m Watching will appear here in installments, and the main characters Castilblanco and Chen have cameos elsewhere (and short stories about their other cases), but I’m leery of jumping back into the series right now. I don’t think I’m in the proverbial rut, but I’m afraid of risking it. But who knows?
That “who knows?” is key, of course. If I can convince myself that the rut isn’t there, I might do it. To consider another genre, some nice readers and reviewers have compared my sci-fi to Dr. Asimov’s, but that’s a stretch. However, Dr. Asimov provides a good example in that sci-fi genre. He wrote the famous Foundation trilogy (clearly George Lucas read it); he also wrote the robot novels Caves of Steel and The Naked Sun (really sci-fi mysteries, the second featured in a previous post), and the time-travel novel End of Eternity. He then stopped writing fiction for a few decades—maybe not in a rut, but temporarily tired of fiction—and wrote many popular science books. When he returned to fiction, he made the extended Foundation series, adding many books to those six already written and masterfully tying everything together (four of them are mentioned in Thursday’s post).
I definitely can’t repeat Dr. Asimov’s performance! First and foremost, I don’t have decades to wait! Second, three of my series are already connected, although many readers don’t realize it: the detective series, the “Clones and Mutants Trilogy,” and the “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy,” with The Golden Years of Virginia Morgan as a bridge between the first two, Soldiers of God a bridge between the second two, and Rogue Planet as a tag to the whole thing (readers can follow this in “The Future History Timeline,” a free PDF they can download). A. B. Carolan’s The Secret Lab and The Secret of the Urns fit in there too.
Of course, more novels can fit in that very long series, and short stories and novellas already have and will continue to do so (for example, the Dr. Carlos stories—a new one just appeared here—and the aforementioned two novellas). But will I write more novels in that huge series? Again, who knows?
I don’t see any ruts in the road ahead. However, my readers are the passengers in my speeding car, and they might see some I don’t. From my point of view, I just see a reluctance for more travel on that one particular road. Rembrandt’s Angel is becoming a series with its sequel Son of Thunder (OK, it could be considered a spin-off from the detective series); Goin’ the Extra Mile makes the “Mary Jo Melendez Mysteries” into a trilogy; and my new book The Last Humans definitely (to be published by Black Opal Books) has series potential. We’ll see how it goes. My muses (banshees with Tasers) just “insist” I keep writing. I will, as long as I can.
Maybe authors should just avoid series altogether to avoid ruts in their writing roads? What do you think?
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Comments are always welcome.
Goin’ the Extra Mile. The U.S. made the MECHs (“Mechanically Enhanced Cybernetic Humans”), Russia stole them, and now China wants them…and will kidnap Mary Jo Melendez and her family to get them. Returning to the globe-trotting suspense and action of #1 with many of the same actors as #2, this third book in the “Mary Jo Melendez Mysteries” is a rousing finale for this trilogy. Available on Amazon and Smashwords and all the latter’s affiliates (Apple iBooks, B&N, Kobo, and so forth).
In libris libertas!
