I recently finished Orson Scott Card’s Mithermage series – good stuff. At the back of Book 2, The Gate Thief, he writes an afterward (always read the epilogues and afterwards) explaining why the book was six
months late. It wasn’t that he was busy binging Battlestar Gallactica, it was that he got the structure of the story wrong and had to fix it or turn in a book that he knew could be much better.
Essentially, he was going to end one part of the story and then tack on the ending of the second part. He says you must promise the story you are going to end. I transposed that into its corollary: You must end the story that you promise. Similar but not the same. It took me a while to realize that.
What Card means is that you must build things in throughout the story that make the ending satisfying. It doesn’t mean that you must provide a “happily ever after” story. It just means that the ending must flow from the story itself and not simply be scabbed on in the last chapter or two.
That’s got me busy thinking about Book 3, Ash, in my own series. What story am I going to end?
Honestly, it wasn’t until I wrote the last chapter of SPARK that I knew there had to be a second book, and maybe a third. Will and Feral’s story wasn’t done even though I thought it was at a decent stopping point. How long do I have to follow these two? Until they die or retire? Maybe. Maybe not.
I knew Janne’s story was far from complete, particularly her Teacher Janne incarnation.
How do you end a war you didn’t start and didn’t want in the first place? How can I promise the story that I’m going to end?
I was griping about this to one of my critique groups. I said I didn’t know how it was all going to end, and I have developed a fear of Robert Jordan/Brian Sanderson/George R.R. Martin tales. Jordan died without finishing Wheel of Time. Brian Sanderson (@briansanderson) was selected to finish that 15 (14 plus a prequel) book series. In fact, he had to finish three of them.
Sanderson recently announced that his latest series, The Stormlight Archive, will be ten books with one targeted for release every three years. I immediately stopped reading the series. Four books (and two novellas) are out. I don’t know if he counts the novellas (novellae?) as part of the ten. This guy is productive! Still, that means up to eighteen years (or more) before the tale is complete. He may not live that long. I may not live that long. If we both live long enough for him to finish, I’ll pick the books back up. If I can find my glasses and even remember the books by then.
George R.R. Martin writes fast but wasn’t fast enough to keep up with HBO’s production of Game of Thrones, so we ended up with two seasons that were largely written by others. I think GOT suffered for it. He’ll likely never write the novels that would have satisfied his readers.
So, there I am, griping. One of the other authors said that he’s already written the epilogue for his series. He knows how it ends. He began with the end in mind. That’s Habit #2 from Franklin Covey.
Book 2, Fire, is due to my publisher on March 1. I better get busy.