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such as Melvyn Burgess s Junk (that is not to say the series literature is
not similarly well crafted it s just more formulaic but I would never
knock it). What you need to aim for is a book such a reader would
read for pleasure, in their spare time, as a challenge, as a treat; in other
words, for the same reasons you read. These readers are already reading
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prescribed books for school examinations, but they need something
else. At the lower end of the age scale they may be reading writers such
as Joanne Rowling, Jackie Wilson, Philip Pullman, Paula Danziger, Judy
Blume and Anne Fine. Edgier writers like Robert Cormier, Aiden
Chambers, Dodie Smith, Alan Garner and Melvyn Burgess begin to
come into the frame as the age scale grows, as does reading maturity, and
you are now sitting on the difficult cusp of the teen/adult market. If you
have a great story it is a great place to be. If not, think seriously about
sitting here because it is probably the toughest writing position of all.
Series fiction
Victor Watson, in the introduction to his book Reading Series Fiction,
quotes a wonderful little anecdote from a schoolchild who said: starting
a new novel was like going into a room full of strangers, but starting a
book in a familiar series was like going into a room full of friends
(Watson 2000: ). Indeed, I am sure we all feel this when we finish a good
novel; we wish we could just go on and on. Once I begin, I could read
Anne Tyler or J.M. Coetzee endlessly.
Series fiction has its highs and lows. I particularly admire series
fiction writers such as Tony Bradman, for Dilly, Humphrey Carpenter,
for Mr Majeika, Jill Murphy, for Worst Witch, Judy Waite, for Horse
Healer, and there are many others. There are also many multi-authored
series to be commended: Scholastic s Point series is very well written.
Then, of course, there s the other side of it. It is only a personal opinion,
but the heavily stylised, formulaic, Animal Ark, from the mythical Lucy
Daniels, leaves me cold.
There are some very important rules to be considered when writing
series fiction. As someone who has written thirteen novels in a series,
as a television tie-in, I will give you some idea of what you need to pay
attention to.
Character continuity is very important. It is for this reason that you
might find it wise to create a series bible . In the bible you can write
down the name of each major character (i.e., each character who will
have a repeating part throughout the series this is not required for
occasional bit-part players). In Dilly the Dinosaur, for example, Dilly,
Dorla, Mother and Father are defined through specific personality traits,
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use of dialogue, viewpoint and so on, and these have to be maintained
through each story (not as easy as it looks, I can assure you). Imagine,
too, what would happen in the Mr Majeika series if Hamish Bigmore
became something he is not, like nice (unless it was part of the plot).
For a larger series, the bible helps you to define your characters, giving
them an age, family (or not), definable traits, like scary, sporty, posh and
so on. In the series of novels I wrote there were so many characters,
ranging from Emperor Nero and his sidekick Snivilus Grovelus, to Ben
the Baker and a collection of fictional children. The bible had already
been done for the animation films and I found it extremely useful when
developing the personalities of the children in the novels.
The bible, then, does not mean your characters cannot develop.
They can and do, but you must be careful to make development slight.
If your reader does not read the stories in sequence, for example,
development can become confusing. Acquiring a new baby brother in
book six when he did not exist in book two, for example, is the kind of
change that could be problematic. As Victor Watson (2000: 8) reveals,
Antonia Forest once admitted in an author s note to The Thuggery
Affair that her characters had aged only eighteen months in a historical
period of seventeen years and that was only the sixth novel in a series
of ten.
It is in this sense that Enid Blyton gets it right by keeping the
same characters in her series fiction. Joanne Rowling might find this to
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