first novels in series

[minervaK]

Please take a look at this post:

http://minervakoenig.com/2009/06/10/feeling-serie-us/

I'm confused. Published authors of series, please respond!

Thanks -- MK

[Jon Loomis]

What I did, and it sort of worked, was write/polish book one, get rejected by a ton of agents, find agent, do major revision at agent's request (spot-on stuff, it turned out), write up summary of book 2, get rejected by maybe seven editors, get (small) two-book deal based on book one of series and summary of book two. I don't think, had book one been rejected universally, I would have gone ahead with book two on spec, mostly because it would've been gambling yet more of my limited years of writing time on a book that felt like a commercial dead end. On to other projects at that point for me.

[Dana King]

I'm not published, so i was going to establish a precedent and keep my mouth shut, but your example here closely resembles my situation.

I wrote Book 1, and got an agent who advised working Book 2 while she flogged 1. A publisher requested an exclusive perusal period on 1, and kept it until I had finished Book 3 before rejecting Book 1. I gave up on Book 1 and flogged Book 2, while wrking on Book 4, as i was told a publisher might be inclined to look more favorably on a new author if they liked the first book (in my case, Book 2) and knew there was a possible franchise there, and that the writer had the discipline to keep working ahead.

Well, all four of them are "in the drawer" so to speak, as I try to sel another book that is completely unrelated. The current WIP is something else again, though it is being written as a possible series.

I haven't given up on the first series. I like the characters and the arc of stories. I'm just not going to do much new with him unless some interest is generated.

[B.R.Stateham]

Neil needs to get on this comment--but I seem to remember reading Clive Cussler's NUMA actually started with book two or three. If I recall correctly, Raise the Titanic actually got the series off the ground, but it was not the first book.

[Neil Nyren]

Yup, Clive's first manuscript was Pacific Vortex, featuring a guy named Dirk Pitt. After many rejections, he put it on the shelf and wrote The Mediterranean Caper, which got published as a pb original, then Iceberg, then Raise the Titanic, which finally broke him and Pitt through. Two more books followed, and one day he casually mentioned to his publisher that there was an unpublished Dirk Pitt laying around somewhere in his house. The publisher gasped -- and Pacific Vortex finally saw the light of day. Because it didn't have the complex plotting and more detailed writing that Clive was doing now, though, it was released as a pb, not a hardcover, with a foreword from Clive explaining its origins.

[B.R.Stateham]

Damn! I actually remembered something this time! And correctly, too! I've got to sit down and fan myself.

[Toni L.P. Kelner]

I wrote Down Home Murder, and spent a year trying to sell it. No luck.

As I was flogging DHM, I wrote The Smell of Brimstone, which is in no way related to DHM. Then I started trying to sell Brimstone.

In the midst of that process, an already published writer I know (Sarah Smith--all hail to her name) read DHM and suggested major re-writes. So I kept trying to sell Brimstone as I rewrote DHM. But no luck with Brimstone.

I then started flogging the newly rewritten DHM, and got an agent who then got a contract for it and two sequels. She also read Brimstone, but wanted some substantial rewrites, so I shelved that project.

So I published my first novel, but not the first version of it, and my second novel is still waiting for me to get back to it, 17 years later. (Though I've written and published more novels since then.)

[Holly West]

I can only speak for Sue Grafton--she wrote at least one book that was never published before A is for Alibi. She says it should never be published. Guess it's that bad!

[Clair Dickson]

As a writer trying to launch a series... I am still flogging book #1. I am working on a book that would come before book #1, partly as something to do, practice writing another novel (though I have four trunked from years ago,). The prequel to book #1 is a gentler introduction to my character... if I sell Book #1, I have a prequel or a freebie for fans. If I don't sell book #1, I'll flog the prequel and maybe revise book #1.

If I go on and write book #2 in my series before I sell anything, I will probably write it so it could be the start of the series. I may finish the planned story arc even without selling anything.

Some authors are lucky in that they are able to launch their series with the first book. Harry Potter, for example. Sometimes that means the author finished their first book and nailed it on the first try (or at least nailed it commercially).

Also, look at your series mysteries. Where in the character's lives do they start? While S.Plum started when she got the job as a sleuth, Kinsey Milhone was already a detective long before the books started. The latter series could have started anywhere. Harry Potter started with him learning about his heritage, but the first published Phillip Marlowe story (can you call these a series, anyway?) was really just another case.

I'm still hoping to nail it with Book #1... or the prequel. And if the prequel lands the deal, my readers may never know which was written first. They may just see the first two books that start a series.

[Kris Neri]

I can't think of an example right now, but I've read some series where I could tell it wasn't the first-written book. The series setup aspects were just tacked onto a novel meant to be a subsequent book. I admire writers who believe enough in their books to keep going when the first doesn't sell. But then they really need to make the first-published feel like the first, series-setup book.

[Jack Cheng]

Just to tie up a loose end: Evanovich? She was pretty established with romance before One For the Money.

Also, at the Grub Street conference in Boston this year, Anne Patchett was the keynote speaker and said that she felt the quality of short stories is much higher than novels simply because people throw away short stories that don't work. Meanwhile, they get too invested in a novel and can never let it go, even though that book in the drawer is probably an important learning experience, if not a great publishing experience.

Of course, someone asked Patchett if she had thrown away a novel and she said that she had. She had published a few stories about a single family ( a la Salinger) and then got a contract to write a few more to make it a novel but when she read the whole thing together, she realized it was not publishable.

[B.R.Stateham]

Splicing stories together to make a novel--didn't Chandler do that with his first novel?

[Dana King]

Chandler did that with most of his novels. I read a collection of his complete short stories a few years ago, and found myself smiling throughout as I recognized sub-plots from the novels. He'd try them out in a story, then roll them into the longer works. THE BIG SLEEP is, essentially, a fleshing out of two short stories.