November starts on monday... and with it comes NaNoWriMo. Doesn't seem like a whole year, does it?
if anyone wants to friend me, i'm here. This year, i'm doing a sequel to a story i wrote about a hundred years ago.
It's the second sequel i've ever attempted - the first was abandoned after my sister beat me with a Doc Martin boot. She gets very... punchy on the subject of sequels, and most of the time i tend to agree with her. After all, at best a sequel takes a bunch of characters you love and throws them back into a terrible situation, after they spent all that time and effort getting out of danger. At worst, they kill off the people you care about and sabotage relationships (hello, Alien 3 and Men In Black II, respectively). Plus, as someone much smarter than me once pointed out, a movie (or book, or whatever) is supposed to be about the most exciting/interesting story in the character's lives. So any sequel is going to be about the SECOND most exciting/interesting story in their lives. And who wants to pay £6.50 for that?
Don't get me wrong, i've nothing personal against sequels. Some of my best friends are sequels. I may be the only person you'll meet who's watched The Fly II more times than both the originals put together. Piranha 2 had flying piranhas AND Lance Hendrickson ditching a helicopter into the sea. Terminator 2, Aliens and Ghostbusters 2 were all better, imo, than the originals, altho i'm sure not everyone would agree.
What i dislike is the current trend for setting up franchises. Every freakin movie you see these days seems designed as the first in a series. No one gets to kill the bad guy, save the love interest and live happily ever after anymore - the bad guy has to survive, the love interest has to stay fiesty and out of reach, and we all go home and wait for the next movie. It irks me.
The Bitter Script Reader said something similar recently, which is maybe why it's on my mind.
so i'm wondering, is the same sort of thing happening with books? Does every novel need to be the start of a franchise? (Or, at least, the first of two or three?) Do we need to start being like Brian Keene and STOP THE GODDAMN STORY RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE?
It's got me thinking because i was talking to a few of my writery friends (we were in a coffee shop and everything), and, apart from me, they're all working on the first of three books (or the second of five, or... you get my point). It seems to be the done thing at the moment. Now, is this a corresponding trend in the publishing industry? Do publishers look at submitted manuscripts and say, "well, it's good, but it's a stand-alone novel. There's no way we can get a sequel out of this. PASS."? Would you get marked down for NOT leaving potential to continue the story?
why can't stories be told in a single book or film anymore?
does that question make me sound old?
i'll see y'all for the start of Nano on monday. :)
