Description:
How do you decide how many books should be in your series? It's not as simple as picking a number out of the air.
In this episode we cover what a series is versus what it isn't, how to understand how much story you have, cutoff points, and questions to ask yourself to help decide if the number you're thinking is the number you'll end up with.
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You are listening to The Novel Writing Podcast, Episode 168.
I'm your host, Colleen Mitchell. Grab a cup, cozy up, and let's get to writing!
Today we're going to figure out how many books should be in your series. And buckle up, since this is going to be a bit of a longer episode.
The Importance of Series Writing
While writing a series is not a requirement, it's becoming a huge driver of author success in today's reading world.
Personal Experience: Rethinking Series Length
New authors tend to think that the story they want to tell will take up way more books than it actually does once you start writing it. When I first started writing Mark of Stars, the first book in my series, I was dead set on 5 books. I don't remember why, just that I wanted it to be five books.
But once I started writing the book, and through editing, I realized that I didn't have enough story to fit into five books. I didn't really settle on four books probably until I started writing book 2, when I had a much better idea of what the rest of the series was going to look like.
A Helpful Challenge for Series Writers
If you're planning a series but you're stuck on book 1, then The 60 Day Novel Writing Challenge can not only help you build momentum by finishing your first draft, but by applying everything you learn in the challenge to a series arc—not just the first book in it. Check out the links in the description to learn more.
Using Harry Potter as an Example
As we talk more about series, I'm going to use Harry Potter as the main example, so there might be some spoilers. But stick with me because Harry Potter is a really good way to understand how a series works... even if your story isn’t going to have seven installments. Not all series need that many, and honestly it's easier to keep a reader on a shorter series than a longer one, but we'll talk about that later.
Defining What a Series Is
So, to figure out how many books should be in your series, we need to talk more about what a series is and what it's not.
A series is a collection of books that, together, tell an overarching story from start to finish. However, each installment of that series in and of itself tells a contained story that has a clear beginning, middle, and end, and the end must wrap up the main plot of that book in the series. No ending on cliffhangers that leave the core plot unanswered. Each book in the series must be pushing the overall story arc toward conclusion, not just telling a bunch of serial stories in the same universe.
Example: The Harry Potter Series
For example, the Harry Potter series tells the overall story of how Harry defeats Voldemort, and each installment of that series builds up to the final climactic battle in the 7th book.
What a Series Is NOT
A series is NOT a serial. A serial would be like Clive Cussler's Dirk Pitt novels, or Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot mysteries, or any collection of books that have the same characters but the stories are more like a TV show than a movie.
A series is also not multiple books in the same genre by the same author. Michael Crichton, for example, wrote a heck of a lot of science fiction novels, but not all of them were a series. Jurassic Park and The Lost World are probably the only two in all of his books that would be considered a series, or rather, a duology, since there's two of them.
Series vs. Universe
A series is ALSO not a universe. This is happening a lot especially within the fantasy and sci-fi realms, where authors may have one or multiple series inside a single universe, like I do, but then there are spinoffs, prequels, sequel series, duologies, etc. that all take place within that universe, but are not themselves part of that established series.
For example, Harry Potter is the seven books from Sorcerer's Stone to Deathly Hallows. The Cursed Child play is NOT part of the series. My personal opinion is that it's not even part of the canon since JK Rowling didn't write it, but that's another rant entirely. The Fantastic Beasts movies, while they've been called prequels before, are actually spinoffs because they don't involve any of the main characters from the core series except Dumbledore, but Dumbledore wasn't the focus of the books. Harry was. If JK Rowling decided to write a book or series about the Marauders, THAT would be considered a prequel because it directly involves what happened right before the main story, and it involves characters that are close enough to the characters in the series that it wouldn't be considered a spinoff.
All of this to say that a series is not the same as the universe the series is in, and when we're talking about a series it's essential that one big story is told from the start of that series to the finish, in addition to each installment telling a complete story along the way.
Checking In
You still with me? Awesome. Let's keep going.
Structuring Your Series
If the concept of "how much story do you have" is what determines your series length, how do you decide where to make the cutoffs and how to even structure the series?
In an ideal world, you'd figure this out by mapping the entire series out first, but in many cases writers start with one idea that becomes a series as they write the first book. I actually love this because it allows for creativity to build over time. When I was writing book 1, Mark of Stars, I had zero clue what was waiting for me in book 3—which as of this recording, is in copyedits. Not outlining the entire series in advance (but still knowing vaguely where I wanted it to end) gave me the flexibility and freedom to let the characters lead me, and boy have they led me somewhere that wasn't even on my radar in book 1.
Natural Cutoff Points
The cutoff points between books in the series need to be natural, wrap up the plots in each installment, yet still leave readers hanging enough that they want to pick up the next book. If there's no promise of more at the end of a book in your series, then you don't have a series. You have a standalone, though many newer authors should consider writing a standalone that COULD ALSO WORK as the first in a series, in case your reader feedback on the first one (or publisher, if you're going traditional) doesn't indicate that you have enough story to complete a full series.
Example: Naomi Novik's Scholomance Series
Naomi Novik did a fantastic job with cutoff points in her Scholomance books, where the end of book 2 perfectly wrapped up the plot of book 2, but ended in such a way that I just HAD to read the 3rd one as soon as it came out. She balanced completion and the cliffhanger so well that I was mad for a bit but in a good way.
Questions to Consider for Your Series
When you're thinking about your series, whether you haven't started it or you're a book or two in, here are some questions to answer to determine if the number you have in your head is actually going to be the final number once you write "The End" in the last installment:
1. Do you have enough story to fit into the number of books you want?
Remember, a series is an overarching story made up of individual installment stories. If you want your series to be seven books, can that overall story be chopped into seven sections, each of which is also a complete story, with mostly the same characters, all driving to the conclusion that readers are waiting for?
In Harry Potter, I'm pretty sure JK Rowling knew when she wrote the first book that the series was going to be seven books long—one for each year of school at Hogwarts. And despite the many plot holes fans have found throughout the years, it's obvious that she clearly thought out what she wanted to happen from start to finish.
Part of how I realized that my series was going to be four books rather than five was when I started writing book 2 and finally realized where the story was going. Readers of mine who have read book 2, who know how it ends... that development was what drove the fact that there could only be two more books after The Prophet's Ruin. There just wasn't enough story to make it into three without dragging it out, or adding stuff that takes away from the overall story.
2. Are your characters or your stories strong enough to carry the series for as long as you imagine?
This one might get some pushback, but it ties into the fact that longer series are harder to keep high read-through rates. I consider a long series to be anything that's 5 or more books because of how long it takes to write, edit, and release books, but that definition will change depending on who you ask. In any case, read-through rates are the percentages of people who go from book 1 to book 2, from book 2 to book 3, and so on. Strong read-through rates mean your series can probably go long, but if your read-through rate is low at the beginning or drops off after a few books, then you might not have strong enough characters, a strong enough story, or a plethora of other deficiencies. Getting reader feedback, especially early on from critique partners, alphas, editors, betas, ARCs, and reviews, is what will give you an idea if your read-through rate will be high enough to support a longer series. If you notice your read-through rate dropping off earlier than you want to end the series, it's a sign to wrap up the series faster.
Successful long series depend upon clear and strong character development, the promise of a satisfying ending, and a solid through-line from start to finish.
One of the many reasons Harry Potter was a smash hit with seven books was how strong the characters were, how invested the readers got in the stories and the character relationships, and the fact that the story was progressing toward a clear final confrontation between Harry and Voldemort. If she'd kept going after book 7, it would have started becoming contrived.
(Side note, this is why I hate two-parter final movies in series adaptations. Splitting the 7th Harry Potter book into two movies was completely unnecessary.)
3. What is the reason or your motivation for the number in your head?
If you can't clearly articulate why that number makes sense from a story or character perspective, you're probably going to lose people along the way. I recommend talking to a writing friend to get a second opinion when thinking about series length, because we can get so wrapped up in our own ideas that they will seem like good reasons even if they aren't from a reader's perspective.
Because that's really what it comes down to. We have to think about a series from the reader's perspective. If you take a step back and consider your plans as if you're a reader, you might find that the number you're planning for your series might not actually make sense.
The Dangers of a Series That Runs Too Long
The true dangers of a series that runs too long are first of all, losing readers, but also the risk of ending up jumping the shark. If you've never heard that phrase before, Jumping the Shark is what it means when writers run out of good, quality ideas and just start putting their characters into increasingly ridiculous and contrived scenarios. It comes from the end of the Happy Days show when the character Fonzie literally jumps over a shark while on jet skis. The show had reached the point where there was nothing left with substance.
Final Thoughts on Series Length
So how many books should be in your series?
Only you can answer that, but hopefully you'll do it with the input of writing friends, critique partners, editors, and early readers, and it might even change while you're writing the first installments.
Maybe it's two, a duology. Or three, a trilogy. It might be fewer than the number you initially thought, but it's equally likely that in the course of writing the first few books, you find that you have way more story than you initially realized, and you end up with more installments.
I think what's important is to be flexible, and not locked in on a certain number just because that was your first inclination, especially if you haven't even finished writing book 1.
Conclusion
That's it for today's episode! Thanks for joining me, and remember, the first draft is supposed to be garbage.
Show Notes
Dive into the first episode of the Novel Writing Podcast with your host Colleen and her sometimes-guest Halie Fewkes Damewood! Here, we give you the gist of who we are, what we do, and what you can expect from this podcast.
What to do next…
Halie & Colleen are both authors! Find their books below:
Secrets of the Tally, by Halie Fewkes Damewood
The Chronicles of Talahm, by Colleen Mitchell
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