Developing a new series is exciting.
For me, the creation phase is one of the best.
It’s freeing to explore new characters and plots.
But when new writers aren’t careful, they end up stuffing so many ideas into their world they end up with a 10-book series.
As always, this is fantastic if you’re writing for yourself. Enough material to last for years is a dream. Unfortunately, if you intend to write for a living, or have any inclination to sell your work and build a fan base, 10-book series aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.
It’s counter-intuitive, especially since you’re no doubt thinking of your favorite epic right now. You love immersing yourself in a world and its characters, and it’s a good thing to find a story you like and know there are a dozen books to dig through.
Why wouldn’t you want to do that yourself?
You should! And you will. But the numbers are against you if you try to do it in your early career.
I’ve already discussed why it’s best to start small.
Learn the vocabulary of writing and storytelling. Study story structure, dialogue, and characters. Practice them by writing drabbles and short stories.
Once you’ve done that you may feel ready to tackle the main story you’ve been thinking of for years.
But there is a solid case for holding off.
Consider these two facts:
One: new readers only find you through the first book in a series.
Two: a significant portion of readers drop out between books.
Almost no one picks up the second book in a series. It just doesn’t make much sense. Therefore, the more first books you have, the more opportunity for new readers to read your work.
Not everyone who reads your first book continues on to your second (or 3rd, 4th, 5th…). This means you will experience diminishing financial returns for each book in a series. When weighed against the effort of writing book 4 of your original series or book 1 of a new series, this greatly impacts your bottom line.
If you support yourself with your writing, it’s an incredibly important statistic to know.
The most popular fantasy series have, by various estimates, somewhere between 30-70% reader retention rates from book 1 to book 2. This is called the “read-through” rate.
Readers who finish book two typically go on to book 3, so that read-through rate is higher.
Let’s suppose your first book gathers 1000 readers.
With a “mid-range” read-through rate of 50% from the first book to the second, and a higher 80% for each book after that, this is what your 10-book series might look like if you sold each copy for $2.99.
These numbers are obviously speculation. It depends entirely on your marketing efforts, whether you’re traditional or self-published, and the price and market appeal of your book.
But as an example, it illustrates that the 10th book in your series may only sell 84 copies, earning you a mere $251 for what might have been months of work.
But what happens if you focused on writing trilogies?
Let’s assume you can get 1000 new readers for each new series, and that everyone who finished the last series buys the first book of the next. If we use the same read-through rates, this is what we get:
Not only have you tripled your revenue, you’ve increased your readership by 60%.
This has a snowball effect, as word-of-mouth will recommend your books to more people, and each person has 4 possible entry points to your work that might appeal to them.
Repeat this process over years, over decades, and the exponential rate of improvement trilogies bring to your career will far outweigh the benefit of longer series.
There are two caveats:
One: data is notoriously difficult to find in the publishing industry. These numbers are the most accurate according to my research, but they will differ greatly for everyone.
These charts are only meant to illustrate a hypothetical but plausible situation. It’s worth considering as you plan your career.
Two: Math and money shouldn’t stop you from writing what you want to write.
After a few trilogies, a longer series could very well make perfect sense depending on the stories you want to tell and your current income level.
A ready fan base will skew these numbers upwards as time goes on.
There will always be exceptions to this rule. You may write a lengthy story that hits the mainstream and is adapted for television.
If it happens, fantastic! But don’t bank on it as you plan your career.
Many new writers plan an epic world to write in for years, but it’s a risk if the first book doesn’t pull enough readers.
If you want to make a career out of novels, it’s worth thinking about the numbers.
There’s a progression which maximizes your chances of success.
Start small to build your skills.
Write standalones to practice telling complete stories.
When you’re ready, write trilogies to get familiar with multi-book narratives and give new readers multiple ways to explore your work.
Finally, when it’s time—when you and you’re audience are ready—write the epic.
