Saga, Series, Roman Fleuve
Katharine Kerr channels my process.
When I was a kid, I couldn't write short stories because I always thought about "What comes after." When I closed a book, often I wondered about how everyone's life would change; in my stories, I could actually live it by writing it down.
I stopped reading Nancy Drew at about age 12 when I realized that her life was never going to change. No matter what she experienced, nothing happened after. I wonder if writers, nudged into writing sequels to successful books who basically rewrite the same story only with bigger stakes, can't really see what happens after. So instead they take their successful plot, and make it bigger.
That is just a guess. I don't want to imply that there is a better or a worse here, it's just that some of us can't get away from "why" and "what happened after."
When I was a kid, I couldn't write short stories because I always thought about "What comes after." When I closed a book, often I wondered about how everyone's life would change; in my stories, I could actually live it by writing it down.
I stopped reading Nancy Drew at about age 12 when I realized that her life was never going to change. No matter what she experienced, nothing happened after. I wonder if writers, nudged into writing sequels to successful books who basically rewrite the same story only with bigger stakes, can't really see what happens after. So instead they take their successful plot, and make it bigger.
That is just a guess. I don't want to imply that there is a better or a worse here, it's just that some of us can't get away from "why" and "what happened after."