I recently began reading The Complete Chronicles of Conan Centenary Edition by Robert E. Howard, this weighty tome may well require the strength of a barbarian to lift it, such is the mass of stories it contains. The pages are filled with dozens of Conan’s adventures, plundering treasure from the towers of evil magicians, slaying fiendish monsters and rescuing a whole harem of impractically clothed women. The more stories I read the more I realised my appreciation for the fantasy series, for the journey I never wanted to end.
Perhaps more than any other, the fantasy genre is famous for the scope of its work, populated by a number of long-running series. I’m sure you’re already thinking of some of your favourites. But it’s not just fantasy works, other genres like sci-fi and urban fantasy often grants us extended stays in imaginary worlds and more time with our favourite characters. While people might warn the perils of too much of a good thing, the series format of writing can offer some truly spectacular benefits.
Even in the door-stopper books of epic fantasy there is a limit to how much the author can cover. The story needs pacing to keep it from getting bogged down, it must obey certain rules about structure and the content it can include. To write in a series changes the timeframe the author has to work with. They can allow for a much greater build-up to the drama (within reason), teasing out plot threads and side notes to give their stories so much more depth than anything that could be accomplished in a single novel. An offhand remark about some faraway place could become the setting for a great adventure, the chance for discovery and exploration that would otherwise have to be cut from a single book. Rumours can be chased down if the author thinks there’s a story to it, and the action doesn’t have to stop once the bad guy falls.
Character development can span a score of different books, the reader can watch them change as they journey through a host of different adventures and situations. A traumatic event can scar the protagonist for several books, only to find closure in a later novel. The reader may find their feelings ebb and flow for a character as they change, allowing for a more complex relationship. There is the potential for far more detailed encounters – fraught love affairs and epic romances, steadfast friendships and cutting betrayals. It can be a shock when a character stabs our hero in the back, but think how much more weight such an event would have if they’d travelled together with the traitor for seven books.
Plots can be taken in new directions, becoming ever more nuanced as the weight of history of the series feeds back into itself. Fans of anime and manga might look at the development of One Piece, how the stories and characters have changed over such a long running series. Past acquaintances from previous adventures may appear again at a vital time, events in the present trigger memories of things the author foreshadowed several books ago.
Usually a series format will follow one of two different routes, there’s the grand, epic storyline that stretches across multiple books but including several arcs such as in Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen, or the series will take an episodic format as in Hamilton’s Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter, with each book focusing on a specific narrative within the world. There is also the potential to merge these two types. Imagine a series twenty books in with a cast of characters the reader has come to know and love, they’ve fought hard and beaten numerous foes and situations. Now imagine the impact when they realise all their work has been in the service of an over-arching villain masquerading as one of their group. These kinds of stories just aren’t possible outside of a series where the reader has a high level of investment. Think how devastating it would be if one of those characters in that series was suddenly cut down, Game of Thrones style, what a sense of loss the reader could feel.
There’s comfort in the familiar as well, it’s easy to pick up any Discworld novel and jump right into the story. A few memorable characters like Rincewind might pop up, or a recognizable place like the city of Ankh-Morpork. The feel of the books provide a stable, homey environment, like sitting in a favourite chair. The reader knows what to expect, they’re looking forward to it, just putting their feet up and settling in for the ride.
When you get to the end of the novel there is there sense of finishing a great trip through the world of the story, depending on how fast you read it may have taken hours, days, or weeks. To follow a whole series may cross years or decades of your life. You live with stories of these characters, get a sense of time passing as you pick up each book and the story has more weight.
A series is something the reader invests in, they engage with the characters on a deeper level, they grow to inhabit the world of the story. Escapism is one of the great joys of reading, why not make the escape just a little bit longer?
Richard Marpole
Jennie Ivins