I finally got around to reading an online Writer’s Digest article I’d flagged from a month ago, which turned out to be both fun and reaffirming as I make final preparations to publish my next Other Worldly novel, Aliens Watch, and begin bittersweet drafting of the eighth and final story of the series featuring Rowan Layne, Alien Origins.
The article was “5 Tips for Writing Series Characters” by author Libby Cudmore, someone I wasn’t familiar with yet I appreciated her short, succinct guidance. I also felt an immediate kinship when she began by stating, “I’ve always dreamed of writing a series. As a kid, I devoured all the…Ramona Quimby books there were….Revisiting the same characters felt like I was visiting old friends each time I cracked a new spine.”
With that last phrase, I realized Libby Cudmore has a way with words that make you hear in your head what you’ve just read, reminding me what it was like as a child to open library books whose spines did indeed crack upon reading, whether new or not. Cudmore also made me realize that Beverly Cleary’s books were my very first series read.
Eventually, novel series I’ve voraciously consumed as an adult—including Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse novels and Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum “by the numbers” novels—are what lead me to write my own, and also to attempt to write speculative comedic fiction. Hence, I thought I’d see if my work measures up to Cudmore’s suggestions, finding much of what she said resonated on myriad levels. So let’s get cracking on those five tips.
First, Cudmore said, “Start with compelling characters. Readers can tell when an author gets bored with their characters, so that means finding what compels you to write about your characters with each new story, without snipping the threads that bind stories together.”
Hopefully I haven’t snipped much in my Other Worldly novels, where I’ve striven for continuity, so much so I go back and read each novel as I’m beginning to write the next one. In doing so, the threads almost wrap themselves around me to pull me into the path of my main character Rowan Layne’s next adventure. Coming up with new characters I find compelling have also helped me weave new threads into an ongoing story.
What’s been more difficult for me is getting rid of characters, as in killing them off. That’s the kind of snipping that leaves me concerned with upsetting my readers. Something I’d never dreamed of grappling with when I first began drafting my series. But grappling I am, especially in Aliens Watch.
Second, “Don’t neglect your supporting cast” is advice I’ve embraced, though I’ve often questioned if I’m introducing too many secondary characters—not to mention too many suitors for Rowan whose names begin with R. But as Cudmore said, “A dynamic supporting cast of characters will go a long way to help link your series without having the main characters do all the work…And who knows—you could even write a spin-off!”
Words near and dear to my heart. Why else create kiddos who are all-female alien sextuplets, as well as alien triplets that include one with past lives and another possessing telekinetic abilities, plus a quad with unusual names to be born in the final story, if not to write adventures of the next generation? Plus, toddlers can make literally anything funny. As one beta reader said, “Their antics had me in stitches.”
Every now and then I fear I’ve weaved too many young character threads, yet I know this is the ultimate way to never have to say goodbye to Rowan Layne, their honorary aunt. Perhaps a spin-off will also keep me spinning along as I age, and remembering what it’s like to be young.
“Leave room for characters to grow throughout the series,” was Cudmore’s third tip. “They don’t always have to be major revelations—after all, how many major journeys do you go about on a weekly basis?—but they do need to be strong enough to keep the characters feeling like they’re moving forward.”
Uncanny that she used the word revelation, because from the first revelation that aliens are among us in Alienable Rights, they just keep coming for Rowan Layne, including discovery of extraordinary abilities stemming from her alien and fae DNA.
And as for keeping characters moving forward, Rowan has had a lot of healing to do, and now feels like she’s moving both backwards and forward in time in the upcoming Aliens Watch. But the greatest revelation of all will occur in the finale, Alien Origins, and is one I hope readers don’t see coming, because I for sure didn’t when I started on this fantastical fiction-writing journey.
Which actually leads to the fifth and final Cudmore tip, but first the fourth: “Pay close attention to time. In a series, you have to keep very close track of when the previous story happened.” Like Cudmore, I’ve had to create a timeline for when each book ends or begins, not to mention the ages of everyone when each new story begins. Mostly because those aforementioned alien kids age faster than humans, and Rowan Layne, who was my age when I started writing the Other Worldly series, has aged slower than me in the past four years, damn it. Then there’s Red Orbiters who can stall aging…
But finally, the fifth imparted wisdom from Cudmore: “Make a trail of breadcrumbs. Not everything will be revealed in the first, second, or even third book. But when you begin writing a series, you need to drop a few hints about what’s to come.”
Boy howdy, as Rowan would say. But here’s the irony. In many instances, I didn’t realize I’d been dropping hints. Indeed I had no idea where this story would ultimately take me—and Rowan Layne.
When I opened the fifth novel, Alien Sensation, with a scene in Salem, Massachusetts, where Rowan snarks it up about the Salem Witch Trials—also mentioned in Being Alien, fourth novel set in Scotland—I had no idea what relevance that historical reference might have to final revelations in Alien Origins. It’s actually taken me by gobmacked surprise that it will probably look like I’d been dropping crumbs all along.
There are similar uncanny breadcrumbs dropped to resurface later, sometimes on other planets, from creatures such as the Luna moth with enhanced auditory abilities, to dragon references that manifest in Aliens Watch. Yet none more prevalent and scintillating for me than Rowan’s Honeycrisp apple dream in the opening chapters of Alienable Rights.
That dream comes full circle, like so much else for Rowan Layne, in Aliens Watch, wherein Rowan travels to Minnesota where the apple hybrid varietal was created. Most importantly it is revealed just who it was that was actually eating the Honeycrisp in Rowan’s reality.
While in Minnesota in Aliens Watch, Rowan tastes an offspring hybrid of the Honeycrisp called First Kiss. Given it is now apple season, I recently dared try a new apple varietal myself, because the name, Cosmic Crisp, called out to me. Though it has more red in its hue than the Honeycrisp.
Surprisingly in light of its name, a huge misfire for me. Why would anyone want an apple that tastes floral? Absolutely awful. Thank goodness Rowan didn’t feel the same about her First Kiss in Aliens Watch, coming up next in my Other Worldly novels with a few titillating breadcrumbs dropped for Alien Origins, where threads will weave all the way back to England…in Earth’s thirteenth century. Now all I have to do is write it, after a bit of research, and maybe a few fortifying Honeycrisp apples.