Comments on: Querying With a Series and Series in General

By: Angelica R. Jackson

Angelica R. Jackson — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 20:09:32 +0000

Your asterisked comment cracked me up–”and have this be true.” Because as I was reading “This project has strong series potential but this manuscript tells a complete tale and stands alone” I thought, “She’s going to get a lot of that now, from people who genuinely believe it.”

And I’m not trying to be snarky; I queried a book a few years back that I absolutely believed was finished and polished at the time–I was wrong. I just needed to learn some more things before I could see that.

By: Kaia

Kaia — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 17:48:26 +0000

I have enough trouble keeping the story of one book straight, not to mention write it a decent ending. I couldn’t even imagine writing a whole series, that’s just terrifying.

By: Suzie

Suzie — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 06:29:54 +0000

Thank you. Valuable information!

By: Trish

Trish — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 22:39:44 +0000

Great post. Thank you for the advice, Mary. I have a series, but have only completed two. My books are all stand alone, and I always mention that in my query letters, but now I’m thinking it’s best not to mention the ones I’m still working on.

By: Dee White

Dee White — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 19:32:01 +0000

Thanks for this post. As an author, this seems to make good sense to me, too. I’m writing a YA psycho thriller series, but each book is a stand alone…and I’d rather have a home for the first one before I embarked on writing the other three. Apart from anything, it means I don’t have to complete the series before seeing the first one on the bookshelves.

Dee

By: Gayle C. Krause

Gayle C. Krause — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 03:48:03 +0000

I’m a fan of series, especially fantasies such as “The Sevenwaters Series” by Julliet Marillier. I can see how it would be a daunting task to plan out 3 to four books. So to me, it makes sense to write a stand alone book first. In my writing I find that as the first book comes to a climax the implications for a second book make themselves obvious.

Thanks for this information from an agent’s perpective.

Gayle

By: Abby

Abby — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 16:36:48 +0000

This is such great info! I’ve been wondering about this for a while, and there is so much contradictory information out there, it’s hard to know how to approach this in a query. Thank you!

By: Wendy

Wendy — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:52:21 +0000

This is really useful advice for me, having written a series… or at least started one. I’ve been dithering back and forth, unsure how to query it and this has helped a lot. Thank you.

By: Mara Berkley

Mara Berkley — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 20:53:23 +0000

I am a reluctant serialist. Well, not reluctant so much as astonished to discover new stories everyday. I am completing the book that has given birth to so many ideas (though a prequel nudged itself in the world) despite uncertainy. This article clarified my goal and was to the point. In addition to sage advice, it is important to have something specific to say, such as: “This project has strong series potential but this manuscript tells a complete tale and stands alone.”

Thank you, Mara

By: Wendy Peterson

Wendy Peterson — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:30:45 +0000

Oh, well, that’s music to my ears as I’ve written a paranormal but it’s taken years to write as it’s a huge epic. It is also very stand alone, and the happily-ever-after has already happened. However the story is for adults so it’s not the Twilight type of thing…it’s a deep, spiritual story.