Living the Fictional Dream

Last weekend, I read Meg Cabot’s new book, Airhead. Let me start out by saying that I very much enjoyed the book. I’m a Meg Cabot fan, and love everything of hers that I’ve read (The Princess Diaries, Jinx, An American Girl, and even her adult novels, like the Heather Wells mysteries), and, despite the title, Airhead was no exception. Em Watts is a fabulous character with believable issues, but Meg also managed to make the celebutants/models sympathetic, as well.

But, while reading, I started to worry. My page count was rapidly dwindling, and it felt like the main plot had yet to really get going. And when I reached the end, my worries were realized. Airhead, to me, doesn’t actually feel like a complete story… it feels like the first installment of an ongoing series.

This got me thinking about the novel-writing biz. Everything I’ve read — author blogs, agent blogs, etc. — stress that in the writing game, you shouldn’t think about writing a good series. You need to think about writing a good novel. The series will never sell if the novel doesn’t stand on its own. After thinking about it, especially in relation to books I’m reading, I have to agree.

I’m not saying that every novel needs to tie up all loose ends. That would be no fun at all. But I think that a series is better served if each installment has its own specific plot that can be resolved by the end of that book, leaving just the overarching character development and possibly a larger series-long mystery to spin out between books. Some great examples of this method are the Golden series by Jennifer Lynne Barnes, the Gallagher Girls series by Ally Carter, and the Midnight Louie series by Carole Nelson Douglas. The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling also does it well. The more I think on it, the more great examples that come to mind.

This method works because the reader gets a sense of closure at the end of each installment of the series. The reader can feel content with the money that they paid for the book and relax while they wait for the next installment to be written (which usually takes at least a year!). And yet, there is still a sense of anticipation because there are elements that the reader wants to find out more about. It’s the best of both worlds.

After reading Airhead, I wish that I would have waited to buy it. The first novel was quite good, but it was just enough to get me really into the characters and the storyline, but by the end, nothing had been resolved. It was all setup for future stories and not a complete story in and of itself. Mysteries upon mysteries were set up, as were many, many relationships (friendship and romantic), and yet none of them got any kind of resolution. Had I known that going in, I would have known that this is a series that I should wait and buy all of in a clump (or at least three or four installments in a clump). I still would have read it eventually, but I wouldn’t have done so now. (Especially not for the price of a hardcover!)

Of course, Meg Cabot is a best seller, so she can write whatever she wants. The advice I read in agent and author blogs doesn’t apply to her, as she already has a publisher, an agent, and many more people lined up to accept anything she decides to write (what an awesome place that must be, right?). And she’s not the only writer who does this. George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series is totally like this… one novel fades right into the next, each one ending in a huge cliffhanger that leaves readers gnashing their teeth and cursing his name for two years until the next installment is published.

Perhaps the conundrum is similar to the difference between an episodic TV series with continuing elements and season long major plot arcs (like Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Supernatural) and a soap opera or a soap opera-esque series like Lost. I like both types, but I really prefer the former and tend to watch the latter in large clumps of episodes as opposed to every time it airs. I also feel like that the episodic series model works better in the Y/A genre than the soap opera model — of course, that’s just my personal opinon, and I’m sure that many people think just the oposite.

If I’m ever lucky enough to be the published author of a book series, I’ve already made my decision. I would definitely go the route of each installment being its own story with continuing elements, instead of using the other formula. I wouldn’t want someone to finish reading an installment in my series and be disapointed the way I was when I reached the end of Airhead. And, when it comes to Airhead, if you like Meg Cabot, I defintely recommend the book, but I would advise waiting to buy it at least until the sequel (Being Nikki) is released so you can read them both at the same time.