writing as a craft – Kara Jorgensen

I know a lot of writers writhe in angst over writing sequels or second books in a series, but I think I’m in the minority here as I actually much prefer writing sequels to the initial book. In this week’s blog, I hope I can help you to make writing sequels a little easier in the future.

As per my usual writing caveat, what works for one writer doesn’t work for another, so take all writing advice with a grain of salt.

Why I like sequels and struggle with book 1:

Book one is a blank slate. I have no idea who the characters are when I start writing, or what I know of them is very fuzzy until I’m a decent way into the manuscript. This means, there’s a lot of stopping and starting to figure out if what I’m doing seems out of character for them or that I need to take another look at their backstory to make sure what I want them to be makes sense. By the end of book one, I know who these characters are. I know their personalities and desires, so when I’m setting up book two, the internal growth thread is significantly easier.

With sequels, we have the basis of the world, we have the foundation for the main characters (or most of them) ironed out, and parts of the plot might even be ready to go before drafting book two because they appeared in book one. I worry more about people not liking book two as much as book one than I do the actual writing of book two. There are also some tips and tricks I’ve learned while writing my first book series, which had 3 different pairings that rotated between six books. The books were not a continuous series, but the plots were interwoven into each other along with the growth of the main cast.

While this advice may not be super helpful for books that have totally disparate casts within the same world, a continuous or linked series would probably benefit from the tips below.

Create a “story bible”

As I write my books, I grab the important information like character descriptions, major setting descriptions (or at least the locations of those descriptions), and a reverse outline of book one (with a timeline) and dump them into a document. These catch-all documents are often referred to as story bibles. If you aren’t sure what to include, there are plenty of resources for building story bibles, including various apps. Having a story bible makes it super easy to locate important information later, and I don’t have to read the previous book a hundred times. I still reread the last book before writing the next one to remind myself of how the characters speak and interact, but this cuts down on having to find things constantly.

Trust me when I say nothing is worse than belatedly realizing that a major plot point cannot happen in a later book due to a reason or conflict in an earlier book. If you’re writing a linked series or one that bounces between characters, keep track of timelines especially.

Be careful that this doesn’t become a time suck or procrastination method. I find it easier to grab the info as I write or when I finish the book, and I only add niche items when I absolutely need it. Keep in mind that too much random info will make it hard to pick through, and it will be useless to you unless it’s very well organized.

Follow the Threads

This is something you should think about while writing the first/previous book, though sometimes they pop up unintentionally. Threads are basically loose ends or questions that are left unanswered at the end of a book. Sometimes newer writers think they need to wrap-up absolutely everything in a book, but if that book is intended to be a series, it makes sense to leave smaller questions unanswered in order to get readers to want to go on to the next book in the series.

As a caveat, this doesn’t necessarily mean the book should be a cliffhanger. I’m not a huge fan of cliffhanger endings unless your books are coming out very close together or it’s a traditionally published continuous serious. They generally frustrate audiences as they lack closure.

Threads, on the other hand, are minor mysteries or side plots, little things that seem important and get carried through the book or brought up at the end only to go unsolved or unanswered. With The Reanimator’s Heart, some threads might be how might Felipe change now that he’s undead or whose heart was it in the jar? Besides those, there are also little hints of things in both main characters’ pasts that could be important later.

Why are threads important for sequels? Well, for one, they help to figure out the plot or shape of subsequent books. The character development from one book to the next should make sense and should build off each other. Readers reading your book in sequential order (aka the vast majority of readers) will be excited to see the things you mentioned in book 1 appear in book 2 or 3. It makes your choices feel purposeful, rather than accidental. Even if you’re bad at playing the long game, this helps to create cohesion.

Sequels are siblings, not twins

Much like eyebrows, sequels are meant to be siblings of the books that come before and after them, not twins. What I mean by that is we need growth between books, but the books need to stay true to the tone and general feel of the others. You shouldn’t have a large genre leap or one book be super tragic and the next silly. You can certainly have a very dark book 2 where it feels like hope is lost before they triumph in book 3; that shift in tone is a logical one. If you mess around with genre or tone too much between books, you will turn off readers who liked the preceding book but will feel cheated by that sudden change.

On the flip side of this issue is sequels becoming twins. This is what happens when books in a series are too similar. Often, the problem is caused by not enough character development or plot movement happening between books. With certain genres, like detective fiction, we expect varied plots with a fairly stable main character, but in the vast majority of genres, it’s expected that your characters will grow and change. If you make that change too slow or have them move forward and then revert to how they were at the beginning of the previous book, you will frustrate your readers because they will end up reading basically the same book arc-wise.

This is more like conjoined twins, but a sequel is also not book 1 broken into two books. There’s a difference between the plot/character arc of a series running over two books (a duology) and snapping a single arc like a breadstick into two books. It throws off the pacing horrendously. If you have a proper duology, each book has a properly paced arc that also fits neatly into the series arc. Micro and macro arcs, so to speak.

To keep these issues from happening make sure your characters grow, your tone/genre are similar or compatible, and that each book has a separate arc but also ties into the larger arc of the series (especially if it’s a continuous series).

Just remember when working on series and sequels that book one laid the foundation for all future books. When in doubt, reread the previous book(s) for inspiration and guidance on how to move forward.

Before I get started, I want to make it clear that I believe writing critique groups can be a fantastic resource for bettering your craft if you’re in a group with the right people and dynamic. The key word is if. I should also specify what I mean by critique group. Other names for this might be a beta reading group or workshop group. I use these in my creative writing classes and participated in them in graduate school while getting my MFA in creative writing. Overall, I really enjoyed getting feedback on my work and I find my students get some valuable input regarding their pieces, but outside of a scholastic setting (and inside it if your professor isn’t actively working to keep it from going toxic), they can be very hit or miss. I have put rules in place in my classes to maintain order and keep the participants in my workshops happy, or at least, I try to keep them from leaving workshop dissatisfied. Here are some factors you may want to keep in mind if you are trying to create a workshop group of your own:

Find people close in skill or career level.

The problem with critique groups is that, ultimately, someone always get screwed over if the group dynamic isn’t perfect. To have a successful critique group, you need to have people who are of a very similar level in terms of skill. This means skill as a writer and skill as an editor. Sometimes you have someone who is a better editor than writer, which means they can be a very useful feedback partner, but if you have people of very different skill levels, the lower members of the group might feel like the feedback they get is harsh (especially compared to the feedback others are getting) and the higher members will get useless feedback that strokes the ego but doesn’t really improve their work. As much as I love a good ego pat in a workshop group, it’s demoralizing when week after week, you get told, “great job!” and nothing more. The highest people aren’t getting anything out of it. The lower people are made to feel bad if they aren’t accustomed to feedback or the other members are harsh/rude/not focusing on big picture issues. Often a lower writer will get a shit ton of knitpicky feedback, which is overwhelming but not useful if what they really need to focus on are big picture issues like character development or pacing. The people in the middle who are all close in terms of skill level or are in a place where they’re upwardly mobile with their skills gain the most from the group.

Be selective and expect change.

At some point, people will come and go from the group. That is just a fact of life, but as people outgrow the group or stop writing due to whatever reason, the group will change, and you will need to be careful about maintaining the dynamic within the group. It sucks because many of us in writing groups become friends or start to depend on people within those groups to give good feedback. At the same time, if you are in a group and find you aren’t getting anything out of it, don’t be guilt tripped into staying. The whole point of a group like this is that everyone should benefit. If you find you’re giving good feedback and getting nothing or if you find that your personalities aren’t meshing, leaving is probably for the best. For those creating a workshop group, I highly suggest being at least semi selective. You want people who are of similar skill levels, so you might want to ask to see their work and/or have them give feedback on a piece. I wouldn’t focus on grammar and such, as that is an easy fix, but check if their level of craft would meld well with the rest of the group. Some might think this is being elitist or exclusionary, but in order for a group like this to work, you can’t have a brand new writer stumbling into a group of seasoned writers where they are completely out of their depth and vice versa.

Rules, rules, rules.

The other issue is that you really need some sort of mediation or rules to keep the group structured. What I’ve seen happen online is that there’s one eager person who posts A LOT of material and asks for feedback while others post less often. Resentment grows for the frequent poster and the responses to their work dwindles, especially if they aren’t as eager to give feedback. Basically, the give-and-take balance needs to be maintained. With a workshop in a class, it’s fairly easy to maintain that balance because workshops happen at regular intervals, everyone [hypothetically] posts their work to their group, and those group members [hypothetically] respond to everyone within the group. There’s equal give-and-take and a fairly standardized amount of work that can be submitted. This keeps one person from completely overwhelming the group or being the only one giving feedback all the time. My suggestion would be to make subgroups if the group is decently large (keeping groups to 4 or less people) or create some sort of posting schedule with page limits to keep one person from monopolizing the group. Trust me when I say that in grad school, the person who handed in 10 pages when the limit was 5 got many a resentful eye roll during class. Don’t be that person. You also need admins to enforce the rules fairly and maintain some semblance of order. Toss out those who don’t pull their weight or repeatedly break the rules.

Use virtual meetings apps for workshops.

Something that I am very adamant about with my students is that they give feedback face-to-face or at least voice-to-voice. The problem with leaving feedback without explaining it aloud is tone. It is so easy to get bent out of shape because you think someone is being harsh when they don’t intend to. On top of that, people are less predisposed to casual nastiness if they know they have to say it to the person’s face. I have gotten myself in trouble as college student because I posted feedback to a classmate that they took issue with. I was too blunt and they took it more harshly than I intended. Face-to-face allows for tone or clarification along side written or in-text feedback. I have used Google Meets with my students, which has worked well, and I would imagine something like Discord would work as well. If you are able, I would suggest setting a time that works well for the group and holding it at the same time at regular intervals.

Don’t be an asshole.

I stress to my students that criticism really means constructive feedback, not strictly negative feedback. Constructive feedback instructs the person on what needs to be fixed, is specific, and possibly suggests how to fix it. If you just say, “it sucked,” or “I hate this character,” or “I liked it,” that isn’t helpful at all. Don’t be the person who is needlessly harsh to others. As someone on Twitter once said, “When you’re brutally honest, people remember the brutality, not the honesty.” Make sure your feedback is helpful and coming from a place of instruction and wanting the person to better themselves. How would you feel if someone gave your best friend that feedback? Would you be mad for them? I know we all think we can dish it and take it, but consider if you would be pissed hearing your bestie get the feedback you’re giving others. If you find someone in your group is giving feedback that is harsh (but not offensive), have a discussion to correct them. It might be difficult if they struggle with tone as some people do, but if they can give extra explanation/context with their feedback, it may smooth things over.

At the same time, expect to get criticized.

The inverse of the previous issue is that some people cannot handle getting non-positive feedback. If you’re one of those people who is easily wounded by criticism, don’t join a critique group unless you are purposely working to modulate those feelings. Otherwise, you’re going to resent the people in your group or tank your mental health if you take every bit of criticism as evidence your work sucks. The best writer still has room for growth, and if you join a writing group, you should expect that others might point out where you need to work on your craft. Positive feedback only isn’t going to help you grow. That’s just a fact of learning. I think it’s important to be told what you’re good at, but too much only grows the ego. I find people who reject all feedback as a personal attack particularly annoying in a workshop group, usually because they’re very willing to critique others (hypocritical) or all their feedback is praise (useless). They’re usually the hardest to correct. If you see yourself in this description or take personal offense, you may want to work on your ability to take feedback before you start asking for it. It only gets worse once strangers on the internet read your work.

Those are my tips for how to best deal with a workshop group. If you’re starting your own, please consider the logistics ahead of time, if you’re able to put in the time and effort required, and if the people you invite to join are as committed as you are.

Tag: writing as a craft

On Writing Sequels