Series or Standalone?

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alaskamatt17

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I'm nearing the end of the second book in my science fiction trilogy, and I'm beginning to doubt that I can sell this story. It's not that I think it's unpublishable (I wouldn't have written it if I thought it was bad), it's just that it may be unpublishable by me at this time.

For the first time in my life, I've thought up a standalone story that might have mainstream appeal, and I'm wondering if I should write this new book before going on to the third book in my trilogy. Any thoughts?
 

gp101

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All of your books should be stand-alone's. If three just happen to be ready-made for a series, great! But a reader should know what's going on in the third book as much as he does in the first book, without feeling lost like they came in the middle of a conversation. They also shouldn't feel like the story has a lot of loose ends, in the case of a first or second novel of a trilogy.

And just what is it with so many people on these boards writing trilogies? Seriously... I admire your creativity and planning and voracity, but wouldn't it be easier to write one solid story, sell it, then maybe pitch a trilogy? Is this what Harry Potter has done for us? I mean this not in a condescending way. I just find it fascinating that so many have trilogies lined up. Most of them writing Sci-Fi or Fantasy.
 

Mistook

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gp101 said:
All of your books should be stand-alone's. If three just happen to be ready-made for a series, great! But a reader should know what's going on in the third book as much as he does in the first book, without feeling lost like they came in the middle of a conversation. They also shouldn't feel like the story has a lot of loose ends, in the case of a first or second novel of a trilogy.

And just what is it with so many people on these boards writing trilogies? Seriously... I admire your creativity and planning and voracity, but wouldn't it be easier to write one solid story, sell it, then maybe pitch a trilogy? Is this what Harry Potter has done for us? I mean this not in a condescending way. I just find it fascinating that so many have trilogies lined up. Most of them writing Sci-Fi or Fantasy.


To be fair, I think when a writer goes to all the effort of building a decent fantasy or sci-fi world, and making these outrageous characters believable, isn't it a waste to abandon it all after one book? SF-Fantasy has always been given to trilogies - long before HP came along. I think it's just the nature of the beast. Readers of those genre agree, I think.

Most who are writing in FSF today are die hard fans of the previous generation, and there were sozens and dozens of epic trilogies and series to fall in love with, LOTR being just the most obvious example.

It's true, your first book out of the gate should stand alone, and every othe to follow should stand as alone as it can, but why should it be silly to write multiple books in the same universe? It's a universe after all.
 

loquax

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Harry Potter's not a trilogy. If it were only one book, I don't think it would be as popular.
 

azbikergirl

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Mistook said:
To be fair, I think when a writer goes to all the effort of building a decent fantasy or sci-fi world, and making these outrageous characters believable, isn't it a waste to abandon it all after one book?
I enjoy writing stories of other characters in the worlds I create. Partly because I don't want to "waste" all that time/energy I spent coming up with the world, and partly because after one book, I'm not really done with that world. Maybe the book isn't suitable for a trilogy (my first three novels made a trilogy, but I've gotten away from thinking about stories in sets of three), but I still like to write about the world. I've told stories about other characters in that world and why they are who they are, which have nothing to do (plotwise) with the novel. I like it when other authors do the same.
 

Richard White

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Actually, trilogies and longer series have been around a LONG time before HP.

When I was a kid, there were two sets of books, the books that shared the same setting but were unique stories, (the Tarzan Series by Burroughs is the prime example, along with Conan).

Others were definitely epic tales stretched out over several books. Moorcock's Elric, Zelazny's Amber, Alexander's Black Cauldron, Cook's Black Company, Lewis's The Silent Planet series, LeGuin's Earthsea and others.

In fact, one of my favorite authors, Glen Cook, has two different series (among others he's written), with the "Black Company" that definitely relies on people being familiar with the preceding book to know what's going on and his "Garrett, PI" series, which is a set of stand alone books, but if you've followed the series since Book #1, you catch a lot more of the in-jokes as well as get a richer read since you're already familiar with some of the back story.

Currently, I'm working on stand-alone novels, but I do have two "series" under development for when I get to the point where I think I can sell it as a series. Some of the worlds I'm developing are have too much potential to just "write off" after one book. I think I've just scratched the surface in one specifically.
 

icerose

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Yeah I don't know what sci-fi and fantasy books you have been reading but there are many series.

Anne McCaffrey always (or almost always) writes several books for each world. Dragons of Pern, Dragon Riders of Pern, Dragon Singers...and so on and so forth is just one world.

Orsen Scott Card: The Seventh Son Series also has at least 6-7 books in it. Both of these authors and books were out years before Harry Potter. LOTR like someone else mentioned.

Series and trilogies are certainly not new. The reason why I am writing a series, it has gone from a trilogy to 5 planned books, is because I have that much story to tell. Now if you want a two thousand + page book, then it could be one, but I really don't think you want one that long. My other series has 3-4 planned books because it will also take that long to tell the full story as well.

I also have a few stand alone books. Twin Earth (about half way done), Town Curfew (finished!), Quest for the Suntar, Search for the Unicorns. (two of these are working titled and are subject to be changed) and a few other ideas I haven't written yet.
 

David McAfee

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gp101 said:
And just what is it with so many people on these boards writing trilogies? Seriously... I admire your creativity and planning and voracity, but wouldn't it be easier to write one solid story, sell it, then maybe pitch a trilogy? Is this what Harry Potter has done for us? I mean this not in a condescending way. I just find it fascinating that so many have trilogies lined up. Most of them writing Sci-Fi or Fantasy.

In my case, the genre is horror (though I don't agree with the tag), and I, too, am writing a trilogy. The reason for three books is, quite simply, the story is too darn long to sell as one book. It would be somewhere in the area 1,000 t0 1,200 pages, maybe more. First-time authors have a hard enough sell as it is without trying to pitch War and Peace. There are three distict, complete sections of the overall story, and the whole thing wraps up in the third, so I went with the trilogy concept.

Doesn't mean it works or will ever see the happy side of a press, but that's the reason. For me, anyway.
 

Danger Jane

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They're nice when the story would otherwise be just way too long.
 

HapiSofi

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My best advice is to learn to write at shorter length. I'll give you two reasons, one artistic, one commercial.

Commercial: it's getting harder to sell long fantasy or science fiction novels by small-time or first-time authors. It's like mysteries: once a series is established, it generally keeps selling fairly well. It's getting established that's the problem. And until you get to that point, a novel the size of a household appliance, written by an author who only sells a few thousand copies per title, is necessarily going to be a very expensive book. Economies of scale are a major factor in book pricing. High pagecount plus low print run equals high cover price. There's real reader price resistance above $25. When the big chains and distributors see a $27.95 book by an unknown, or by an author whose last book netted 4K copies retail, they cut their orders. That's bad.

Artistic: A storyline is like a rope stretched from here to there: the longer it is, the harder it is to keep it from drooping in the middle. If the point of the story you're telling occurs in some later book, the current book will tend to feel slack.

Or try a completely different simile. Imagine that you're in possession of a 100% clear, reliable, and accurate prophecy which says that eight years from now, you're going to meet the true love of your life, and that it's going to be one of those earthshattering, stars-fall-down loves that leaves everything around you in ruins but is celebrated in song and story forevermore. Got that? Okay. Now imagine that in the meantime, you have another relationship going. It's nice enough. Companionable, even. But on some level, it's got to feel like you're just marking time until the real thing comes along.

I've heard more than one editor describe their sense of faint dismay when they get a cover letter explaining that this manuscript is the first in a series of [howevermany] volumes. A reader standing in front of the bookstore shelves never buys the not-yet-written third or fourth or fifth book in a series. They buy a book now because they believe it will make them happy now. If this book doesn't deliver, they won't buy the later ones.

The book that really set the style for multivolume epics was The Lord of the Rings. There are two things about it you should bear in mind. First, it wasn't written as a trilogy. It was written as a single volume. Tolkien's publisher insisted on splitting it into three books. Second, LOTR's total wordcount is less than some of the fantasy novels sitting on bookstore shelves right now.

Worldbuilding genres naturally tend to run long. Writers and publishers have fallen into the habit of letting their books sprawl. That can't go on forever. If you're bored by overlong books and inconclusive series, you can assume other readers are too. If you want to stand out in the crowd of wanna-be writers, just write the book at hand and make it good. If you succeed, there'll always be room for sequels.
 

icerose

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Hi HapiSofi,

It is good advice, however with my stories that are series they aren't just about overly long books and such, the story has very distinct sections all of which could stand alone but are still a series and are all connected. They are all pieces of one big journey. I plan on getting my stand alone books out there first and then once I get a name going for myself work on getting the series out for me. Also the first books are left dangling as in there is more story to tell, but they have an intricate story line all of their own that finish at the end so I am not leaving the reader completely hanging either. Series I think are harder to write than stand alones because with stand alones you are done and over with and don't have to worry about the sagging middle. (Well you still do with single books. All stories have that middle section that you have to watch and make sure it isn't sagging.) *shrug* just defeated my own argument.
 

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To offer an answer to alaska's question about whether to write the standalone book before going on to the third in the trilogy: why not? If your muse moves you, go with it.

Many experienced writers will advise you to put a manuscript aside after finishing a draft so that you can gain a little perspective before tackling revision, so what do you do during that time? Write something else. And a totally unrelated story is probably a good thing to tackle. I usually play this kind of leapfrog with a couple of stories. I'll do a first draft of one, then work on something else for a while before starting revision on the first one.
 

alaskamatt17

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Thanks for the advice. I'm leaning more towards writing the standalone now, I should give myself a break from the milieu of my SF trilogy.

I'm going to join the defense of series by saying that this trilogy originally started off as one book, but I realized it had convenient points for breaking off the story in which I could wrap up most of the story for that particular volume, so I went for it. Given that the second book is almost up to 200,000 words, I'm glad I did. I'm going to have to cut the length on this one by at least 20,000 words, probably more, to get it down to a reasonable size. If I'd left all three of the books together I might have had a 500,000 word book. That just wouldn't be publishable.
 

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And in a different genre, Stephen King! But I think only well-known, proven authors can get away with this. Many of King's books could have profited immensely by being cut in half. And remember, one of Rowling's books was over 700 pages!

The story should be just as long as it takes to tell it, and not a word longer. It's your story and you get to say how it will be set up, so please yourself.

If your short piece can stand alone, write it and submit it somewhere: to the slicks or e'zine sci fi sites. A good way to get the public used to your characters, setting, etc., so when the book comes out, they'll feel comfortable with it.

Good advice from Hap.
 

alaskamatt17

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scribbler1382 said:
Tell that to Neal Stephenson. :)

Or Tad Williams. I think part of my problem stems from being a big fan of his. As far as I know, he'd only written one book under 600 pages. He has some short fiction, but when he writes a novel, he makes it long.
 

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Wow, i'm having trouble getting my head around the story for just one novel.

Out of interest, what kind of story structure do you have planned in the horror genre that needs 1000+ pages within which to tell it?.
 
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