Wednesday's Writer's Tip - A Last Bit On Writing The Fiction Series #MFRWauthor

Karen Wiesner has gathered much information from many authors about writing series. Looking and reading this book has given many hints and clues to what makes series work and live on. There are just two more points I'll address. Series Recognition and Series Releases.

When writing a series there needs to be little points that make a reader know this is a story from the series. One of the points is helping a reader with points of recognition. These could be places in a town or changes in the town that returning characters recognize or wonder when an event happened. In several of the contemporary series I've written, there are places that each character has memories of visiting. Perhaps it's the hospital, a favorite restaurant, a particular house. Making these little bits can lead the reader to remembering other stories in the series. "Oh, yes, the hero in the last story loved that place. I remember the heroine in the third book visiting that particular place. This kind of recognition draws the series together and perhaps sends the reader to search out the book in the series they missed.

Releasing a new book in a series is important. Releasing too soon and the reader may skip that one. Releasing too late and the reader may have forgotten the series and the book is passed over. This can be a problem for the writer for the momentum they have obtained in releasing the series can fall flat. I wish I knew the answer to this since writing one or more series at a time can be exhausting at best. I really don't know the answer to this bit about releasing. We all know of series that one is waiting eagerly for the next book even if years go by before the book is released. There are other series that a new release is overlooked by the reader.