The Big Mistake With Writing A Series

Authors hear that editors love writers who have a series. In fact, I mentioned it yesterday! Yes, there are some great benefits. Readers love to dive into your first book and then want to know more about another character in your story. You have them hooked and they are off to get your next book. Woo hoo! You are on a roll. This is what we want, right?

However, so many authors screw this up big time! Let me explain why.

When authors write that first book, they have often already decided that they are going to write a book 2 and 3. So, as they are writing that fantastic book 1, that should be there to hook the reader and suck them in, they end up spending far too much time trying to set the stage for book 2 and 3. They seem to think that if they don't do this here, there won't be enough to make them want to read more. And that is a problem.

As they spend all of this time on the other stories, they are forgetting the central story arc of book 1. This is word count they are losing for the characters who deserved their own book. Now, when the editors and agents are reading book 1, they will see a story that is lacking the depth they really wanted.

I always like to think of it this way. If you have ever seen those competition cooking shows you will get this. The chef is being tasked to cook a single dish. But in an effort to showcase that single dish or ingredient, they add another dish on the side. Seems like a good idea, but when that second dish is not that strong, the judges slam dish 2  and that reflects on dish 1, which was the one that was supposed to be the most important. 

Make sense?

The secret is this. If you think there can be some potential for a book 2 or 3 (or more) have those ideas in the back of your head. Have those characters in the first book but have them only on the page long enough to support book 1 and then get them out of the scene as fast as possible. Show their personality enough to make us like them, but don't worry about their plot. We don't care about that. We just want to like them.

I hope that helps!