More of the Same but Different

by Nancy

Many published authors have told me, "when you sell, be prepared to write more of the same but different." The first time I heard this, it sounded really, seriously weird to me. "The same but different?" Isn't that a contradiction in terms?

Well, no. Not when I sat down and thought about it. That's what I look for as a reader--something that will give me the SAME buzz but with a DIFFERENT plot. I've found that I get this from reading series. Or trilogies.

I suppose I could blame the late J. R. R. Tolkien for my tendency to read trilogies and connected plots. His massive trilogy, that Lair favorite The Lord of the Rings, continued its story over many, many pages. It was more and more and more of the same--same characters, same Middle Earth setting--though in different areas--same quest, to destroy the ring of power. But the characters faced different, escalating problems as the story progressed. That's the first trilogy I remember reading, but I cut my teeth on series books.

I have only vague memories of Dick, Jane, and Sally, but I loved the Bobbsey Twins, two sets of fraternal twins who went around solving mysteries. The Bobbseys never aged, and their lives never changed.

The same went for Nancy Drew, whom I also loved. Nancy and her "chums," the very feminine and pretty Bess and tomboyish George (short for Georgina or some such). Nancy did eventually acquire a boyfriend, Ned, but the relationship was the same from one book to the next. Nancy started around 1930 and drove a roadster. She went through an updating in the 1950s or 1960s, and the roadster became, I think, a convertible. She had another updating in the 1980s or 1990s, but the cast of characters and the basic structure of her life didn't change. Only the mysteries did.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson shared "rooms" at 221B Baker Street through several adventures. Watson's marriage changed their living arrangement (for which Mrs. Watson was undoubtedly grateful), but they continued to solve crimes in much the same way.

The same went for series television. Captain Kirk sailed where no man had gone before with the same crew in the same ship week after week. Ensign Chekov arrived at some point, but that was the main change to the crew. But the space sector and the specific problem changed.

Then trilogies and series with continuing plots became popular, especially in science fiction and fantasy. Romance started doing series in the form of linked books. More of the same--same characters but with different hero/heroine combinations and different problems. Battlestar Galactica, Heroes, and Lost did evolving storylines, kind of like soap operas but with fewer recaps and less sex.

Now I've come to prefer series in which characters evolve. That's one of the reasons I like the In Death books so much. Eve Dallas grows in every book, and her relationship with Roarke evolves, not always smoothly. They clash over the same issue--where the line of what's right or wrong is--but the cause of the clash is always different. It's more of the same but different.

And just by the way, Tuesday of next week--one week from today--is the launch of Indulgence in Death, the latest Eve Dallas adventure.

Jessica Andersen's Nightkeepers place different characters front and center in each book, but their problems are usually seeded in earlier books, opening the way. Jessica will be back next Wednesday to give us a peek at the next book, Blood Spells, which resolves Patience and Brandt's ongoing issues.

Sabrina Jeffries' current series, The Hellions of Halstead Hall, puts a different sibling in the featured couple of each book, but the rest of the family is still around, and we're getting hints of pairings to come.

Claudia Dain's wonderful Courtesan series also features connected characters. Daring a Duke, the most recent book, features several couples from earlier books in addition to the courtesan, Sophia Dalby, herself, with enticing peeks at Sophia's past.

In Julie Kenner's series about Kate Connor, Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom, Kate's marriage changes as she becomes involved in demon hunting again and her husband eventually learns of it.

What about you? Do you like your books, movies or TV shows to be "more of the same but different?" Or do you prefer them as different as possible? Why did you choose what you did? What's your favorite series?

To Take a Thief

by Nancy Northcott

Today, we welcome Karen Kendall to the Lair. Some of you may remember Karen from last year, when we discussed the video for her first romantic suspense novel, Take Me If You Can. On April 6th her new book, Take Me Two Times, will be released. It’s the sequel to Take Me If You Can, and several characters from that prior book will reappear. Karen joins us today to discuss the joys and pitfalls of sequels and series.

The joy part is easy: as the author, you get to revisit favorite characters that you’ve already developed. Though Take Me Two Times is Gwen’s story (secondary character from TMIYC) it was great fun to bring back Avy (an art recovery agent for the company ARTemis, Inc.) and Liam (the sexy and incorrigible British master thief) in Take Me Two Times. I also delighted in keeping Sheila, the obnoxious office manager for ARTemis, alive on the page and torturing Gwen. And crazy rock star Sid Thresher is back, too! I have such a soft spot for Sid, disgusting as he is . . .

Now for those sequel/series pitfalls.


One of the dangers of bringing popular characters back is their tendency to try to steal the show from the hero/heroine of the new book. This is hard to avoid, because the author has already spent a lot of time fleshing out the former characters—and if the author is like me, she’s banging her head against the keyboard while trying to get a handle on the new ones! Oh, how tempting it was to let Avy and Liam have extra chapters instead of diving deep into the old hurts and conflicts of Gwen and Quinn, her old lover. I had to rap my own knuckles several times.

Another difficulty in developing a sequel and working with former characters is keeping those characters’ conflicts alive . . . you know, the same conflicts that you slaved to resolve in the prior book. Or you can invent a whole new set of conflicts that spin off from the old ones—but again, this is hard work. And then how do you engineer the plot so that the subplot connects properly with it? Believe me, that was an issue that led to further head-banging on my keyboard. In fact, I’m pretty sure that the “t” key and the “y” key are still embedded in my forehead and will one day have to be surgically removed.

But, wait! There are even more problems in series. Have you planted the characters for the next book solidly in the previous one? And have you developed a series “arc”? And what if you made a character an only child in one book but then desperately need to give him a brother in the next? Ooops. What if you’ve made a character a villain in an early book but then decide you’d like to redeem him and bring him back as a hero in a later one? Everything an author does in those early books of the series affects what she can do in later ones. (Does anyone remember the sequel to National Velvet? Was I the only person who noticed that the horse in NV was a gelding, and therefore couldn’t possibly have produced the foal that stars in International Velvet? Again, oooops.)

I’m still developing the third book in my TAKE ME series, Take Me For a Ride (to be released in November ’09) and due to something I mentioned in the April book (Take Me Two Times) I had to set it in a city that I’ve never set foot in! I could have kicked myself as I bought stacks of guide books and looked at Google images and studied maps and did research on the internet. Yep, I had to take off like a rocket on my armchair travels . . .

I hope very much that I’ll get to write more books in the TAKE ME series. But I’m sure that those books will bring their own sets of problems, many of them generated by what I wrote in the first three. Of course a lot of these problems end up being enjoyable puzzles to solve, but I’ll never admit that publicly. What’s that you say? I just did? And on the internet, too. I guess we just discovered yet another pitfall of series and sequels: the art of keeping certain things hidden throughout the books until you’re able to reveal the Big Secret in the end.

Yes, I do have a big secret in the TAKE ME series—and that’s the identity of Kelso, the silent partner in ARTemis, Inc. (Well, sometimes he’s not so silent, but nobody has ever seen him and believe me, they’ve tried.) Who do you think he is? If you want to take a guess, go ahead!

And please feel free to ask me any questions about the characters and books in this series, which revolves around an agency that recovers stolen art. Thanks! Happy reading.

When you read series, do you find yourself becoming interested, as Karen did, in different places? Have you ever read a series in which a character who initially looked like trouble turned out ot be a hero or heroine you loved? Do you have a favorite series with an plot or character question that isn't resolved until the end?

For more about Karen and her books, visit her website, where you can also read an excerpt from Take Me Two Times.

Hi, my name is Trish, and I am a series glommer

I have loved books for as long as I can remember. In fact, the first book I remember reading was a Little Golden Book called The Runaway Pancake. I remember the absolute glee each time I'd get a shipment from the Weekly Reader Book Club when I was in elementary school. And the book fair at school was better than a candy store filled with chocolate (and that's saying a lot considering the size of my sweet tooth). I'm guessing everyone here has this passion for books. But are you a ginormous fan of series like me? Not series as in the numbered category lines put out by Harlequin and Silhouette, but a series as in a number of books with the same continuing characters. Once I find a book I like and realize it's part of a series, I glom them -- as in I read all of the released books in the series then wait none too patiently for the next in the series. I have to know what happens to my favorite characters, people the author has made seem so real I wouldn't be surprised to meet them on the street.

Series I love:

The Black Dagger Brotherhood by J.R. Ward
The Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer
The Blood Books by Tanya Huff
The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling
The Kate Shugak mystery series by Dana Stabenow
The Anna Pigeon mystery series by Nevada Barr
The Gemma Doyle trilogy by Libba Bray
The Gardella Vampire Chronicles by Colleen Gleason
The Weather Warden series by Rachel Caine
The Mediator series by Meg Cabot
The Midnighters series by Scott Westerfeld
The Stephenie Plum series by Janet Evanovich
The House of Night series by P.C. and Kristin Cast
The His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman
The Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder

With the exception of the two mystery series and the Evanovich books, these books are all paranormal. I wonder if that is because a great many of the series on the shelves now are paranormal or that's just how my current reading tastes are running. And of these 13 series, five are series for young adults. It's my impression that teens will really latch on to a series they like and be dedicated to those books and the author until the series' end. Witness the massive midnight turnout for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the final installment in Rowling's series, and the large crowds Stephenie Meyer is drawing at her signings. And at least for now, the paranormal is still very popular among teen readers.

So, are you a series fan? If so, of what series are you a dedicated follower? What fabulous series have I not mentioned? There are at least two on my to-be-read list -- Sherrilyn Kenyon's Dark Hunter series and Jim Butcher's Dresden Files. Leave a comment and you could win the first in a new series by Harlequin Superromance author Anna DeStefano. Because of a Boy is the first in her new Atlanta Heroes series.






And if you're so inclined (and I REALLY hope you are), head on over to the Romantic Times Web site tomorrow to vote in the American Title IV contest. My finaling entry, Out of Sight, is the first of what I hope will be an exciting paranormal series about a gal who can make herself invisible and who gives a whole new meaning to "undercover" work. Your vote for Out of Sight helps it come one step closer to being published, which is the grand prize for the winner of the contest. Thanks in advance!