Deciding When To Pull The Plug

© Angela Henry 2010 all rights reserved

I read a lot of mystery series and many of the ones I love are still going strong after the fifteen and twentieth book, while others are on life-support and clearly need either a serious overhaul, or to be put out of their misery. For instance, I stopped reading one particular series because the main character was still the same age after ten books. Talk about a creative rut. Who wants to read a series where the characters don’t grow and change? Not me! But just when does an author decide to end a series?

Sometimes your publisher makes the decision for you. Declining sales, an editor that leaves the company, or a publisher going out of business can stop a series in its tracks. And while it is possible for an author to move a series to another publisher, many publishers don’t like to take on an existing series because they don’t own the rights to the author’s backlist.

Some authors have a preset number of books in mind when they start writing a series. But often the very nature of the series dictates how many books will be written. In author Daniel Handler’s case, his series of unfortunate events, written under the name Lemon Snicket, tells the tale of the luckless Baudelaire orphans, and logically ended with unlucky number thirteen. And I’m assuming Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone series, which are titled after the alphabet, will end at book twenty-six.

Boredom can also be a deciding factor. Much like a love affair gone bad; many authors just get sick to death of or their main character and can’t bear to write another word about him/her. So they end it. That’s what one author confided to me when she ended her series after only four books. “I’m just so tired of _______. I want to write about someone else,” she told me. I guess that said it all.

My fourth Kendra Clayton mystery, Schooled In Lies, was recently released and my fifth Kendra book will be released in 2011. Who knows what the future holds. While I’m not yet ready to stop writing my series, I don’t know how I’ll feel a few more books down the line. But I suspect I’m going to keep writing my series as long as people want to keep reading it.

About the author:

Angela Henry was once told that her past life careers included spy, researcher, and investigator. She stuck with what she knew because today she's a mystery writing librarian, who loves to people watch and eavesdrop on conversations. She's the author of four mysteries featuring equally nosy amateur sleuth Kendra Clayton, and is also the founder of the award-winning MystNoir website, which promotes African-American mystery writers, and was named a "Hot Site" by USA Today.com. When she's not working, writing, or practicing her stealth, she loves to travel, is connoisseur of B horror movies, and an admitted anime addict. She lives in Ohio and is currently hard at work trying to meet her next deadline. You can visit Angela online at:

http://www.angelahenry.com/
http://www.angelahenry.blogspot.com/
http://aamysteries.blogspot.com/
http://www.twitter.com/mystnoir