Charlie Stross
#WritersCoffeeClub Do you set out to write a series of a certain number of books?
Yes, but it never quite works.
The Laundry Files was just this short one-shot novel (I'm now rewriting book 14 …)
The Merchant Princes started with a 4-book pitch: it ran to 9 books and book 4 of the OP ended up as the last three chapters of book 9.
I have a couple of 2-book trilogies too (book 3 never got written).
Economics overrules enthusiasm, after a certain point: success in the market buys sequels.
Charlie Stross
#WritersCoffeeClub As I've turned 60, I've got a new rule going forward: no more series works, only shared settings. So there won't be any dangling inter-book plot threads if I die before I finish.
Charlie Stross
@AshtonLaval There have been discussions about a Culture tribute anothology (with his literary estate). Problem is, living up to his standards is almost impossible for any other writer. Anyone good enough to do it is already ploughing their own field.
Your fantasy genre metaphor is this: there's no Brandon Sanderson waiting in the wings to pick up Iain's work and continue it. (And Iain died too suddenly to leave extensive notes for the rest of the series.)
Ashton Laval
@cstross I kinda wish Iain Banks made his Culture series a shared universe.
Mishell Baker gladly
@cstross Doing the exact same thing at 49, which I never expected I'd have to. Wise even if you don't have a set expiration date though. It shows you think of your readers as more than paychecks - as people who deserve to find satisfaction.
May you write another 20+ years anyway.
Charlie Stross
I've also finished one million-word series with a story arc and am currently final-drafting the last book in another 1.7Mword series/story, and I began both of them before I was 40 and I will probably not live to finish another.
So … I'm planning another hopefully-million-word series, but it'll be readable as separate standalone novels (possibly connected, but with full closure at the end of each book).
Fazal Majid
@cstross an anecdote from a book signing with Steven Erikson:
> When asked whether he was planning on extending the series beyond the planned ten volumes, he mentioned he had the outline of all ten almost from the very beginning (keep in mind it took him 8 years to get The Gardens of the Moon published, and that only happened after he moved to England). There is still a lot of room for spontaneity — as he puts it, if the author is bored when writing the actual books because he put too much effort in preparatory notes, the readers are likely to be bored as well. Erikson also committed to giving “payback” to his readers for sticking with the story (sounds ominous, doesn’t it?), with some snide remarks referring to Robert Jordan’s ever-lengthening Wheel of Time series. The anecdote he mentioned was that of a 75 year old woman who was asking a bookseller when the next installment by Jordan would be published, because she was afraid she might die before that series was completed… In all fairness, Jordan has announced the next volume will be the last, bringing closure to long-suffering fans.
(This was 2005, two years before Jordan’s untimely death)
Charlie Stross
@fazalmajid I'm almost always bored with whatever I'm working on because … well, right now I'm redrafting one book, thinking about the rewrite work on the next, and planning the two after that. It's about a 2-3 year work horizon at any given time.
Charlie Stross
Not exactly.
Originally, Palimpsest was going to get a novel-length expansion, but that's problematic—it's really hard to write.
Meanwhile the other trouser-leg-of-time from the story—the wormholes-for-space-colonization leg—exists as a space opera but needs a redraft next year. And I have plans for another story in that setting.
(It's a Culture-scale universe that got steamrollered by the two other huge multi-book series I was working on. Now Laundry's nearly done, it may emerge.)
Dr David Mills
@cstross Will Palimpsest ever get a sequel?
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