Five Reminders When Writing a Book Series By Carla Laureano

Carla Laureano

Have you written a series? If so, did you interconnect the characters in an intentional way? Award-winning author Carla Laureano is here with tips for planning ahead so you can avoid pitfalls. Enjoy! ~ Annette



2020 has been a big year for me in terms of series completion. Not only did I release the last book in my Supper Club series, but the long-awaited third book in my MacDonald Family series, Under Scottish Stars, released after a long five-year wait! While it’s always nice to see a group of characters get their happily-ever-afters—they begin to feel like family when you’ve lived with them for so long—it’s also bittersweet to know that you have to move on.

But there are particular considerations that go into writing a multi-protagonist book series that determine whether you and your readers give it a tearful “goodbye” or a relieved “good riddance.” And the planning starts before you put the first word on the page.

1. Realize that your characters’ lives start before they appear on the page and continue after the reader closes the book.

It’s easy to act like your characters don’t exist until they appear in your book. But the richness of an interconnected series comes from a sense of shared history among all your (eventual) point-of-view characters. Before you begin writing, make sure you understand their shared backstory. Otherwise, series books can come off as a procession of stand-alone stories about people who just happen to cross paths once in a while. And while interconnected stand-alone books have their place, they’re not what a series is about.

2. Know your characters well, even if they aren’t the main focus of the current book.

It’s tempting to put all your focus on the main character of the current book and treat the other series characters like window dressing. But part of what makes a series work is the feeling that the other characters are just as interesting as the protagonist of the current volume. It’s what keeps readers intrigued about the next story in line and coming back for more.

3. Don’t be afraid to be a little mysterious.

Just because you know your characters well doesn’t mean you have to spill all their secrets. Once you’ve got a secondary character’s backstory figured out—and hopefully know where their story is going in the future—hints are a powerful hook to keep readers moving through future volumes. It’s enough to make readers wonder what the whole truth is . . . and get them to pick up the final book in the trilogy.

4. Realize that once it’s on paper, you’re stuck with it. Make sure that you can live with—and work around—any plot twists.

It can be tempting to throw in shocking plot twists for the good of the current book. But if the main character’s best friend gets hit by a car and falls into a coma—and that best friend is supposed to get her own love story in the next book—you need to understand how the accident and coma impact her arc. Don’t paint yourself into a corner by introducing elements that will be hard to work around in future books.

5. Have your exit strategy planned from the beginning.

The last book in the series is particularly tricky, because not only do you have to write a fully formed story for your protagonists, you also have to wrap up the stories of the early books’ characters. Have an idea of how you’re going to bring them full circle early on. If they’re scattered across multiple continents, you’re going to have to get them in the same place so readers can say goodbye: make it a plot point. If they’re struggling with real-life issues that arose after their happily-ever-after, make sure that the main character is somehow involved so that the reader can see the situation through his or her eyes. And plan how you’re going to tie off loose threads, either in the course of the last book or through an epilogue. There’s nothing worse for a reader than investing attention in characters whose story seems to have no adequate conclusion. A series ending should leave a reader with a happy sigh and the feeling that after the last page is turned, all will be right with the characters’ world.
While writing series can be trickier than their stand-alone counterparts, they allow for a richness of story world and an emotional investment on the part of the reader that is without equal. A little planning and foresight early in the series can pay big dividends in creating a satisfying, long-term reader experience.

“The richness of an interconnected series comes from a sense of shared history among all your (eventual) point-of-view characters.” Planning ahead for writing a series. #SeriouslyWrite #amwriting @CarlaLaureano

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Under Scottish Stars

Releasing July 7, 2020

Recently widowed Serena MacDonald Stewart focuses on her children to the exclusion of her career, her art, and her sanity. When her brothers ask her to oversee the family guest house on the Isle of Skye, it’s a chance to dust off her long-ignored business skills and make a new start. But her hopes for a smooth transition are dashed when the hotel manager, Malcolm Blake, turns out to be irritating, condescending . . . and incredibly attractive.

Malcolm Blake gave up everything—his home, his girlfriend, and his career—to return to Skye and raise his late sister’s teenage daughter. With few job opportunities available on the island, he signs on as the manager of the MacDonald family hotel, which he’s soon running successfully without interference from the owners. That is, until Serena shows up, challenging his authority and his conviction that there’s nothing missing from his new life on Skye.

Before long, Serena and Malcolm have to admit the spark between them is more than mere irritation. But as single parents, there’s more on the line than their own hearts. Will their commitment to family be the thing that draws them together or the only thing that could keep them apart?

~~~~~

Carla Laureano is the two-time RITA Award–winning author of Five Days in Skye, London Tides, and the Saturday Night Supper Club series. She is also the author of the Celtic fantasy series The Song of Seare (as C. E. Laureano). A graduate of Pepperdine University, she worked as a sales and marketing executive for nearly a decade before leaving corporate life behind to write fiction full-time. She currently lives in Denver with her husband and two sons.

Lessons I Learned from Writing a Character Just Like Me by Carla Laureano

Every character I write has some bit of myself in him or her. Many times, when I’m writing someone who is utterly unlike myself, I give them a few of my own characteristics, just so I can relate to the character better. But this time around, Analyn Sanchez—the heroine of The Solid Grounds Coffee Company—has more than just a few similarities to me: she’s the cautionary-tale version of myself.

At the beginning of the story, Ana is a high-powered crisis publicist, dealing with clients who are various degrees of unsavory to repair their tarnished reputations. Every element of her life is scheduled from morning to night, all planned to give her the most efficient, perfect day possible. Of course, if you’re familiar with how these stories go, you know that doesn’t last long . . . and it’s the crumbling of her seemingly perfect life that helps launch her into the story (and, of course, into the hero’s arms).

It was easy to write Ana because I knew those temptations all too well. I, too, had worked in a corporate discipline that was long on appearance but short on balance. I took that same mind-set into my writing career, packing more into a single day than was actually possible or healthy, especially considering I had small humans at home to keep alive. But over the last several years, I’d gotten that tendency under control. I was taking more time for myself. I was working less, spending more time with family, and focusing on my health. I was on the other side of those issues, which meant that I had the perfect vantage point to write the character.

Or so I thought.

The funny thing about being a writer, especially a Christian writer, is that you start a book thinking it’s for other people, and by the time you’re done, you realize it was mostly for yourself. As I brought the story to a close, I realized that like Ana, I might have eliminated much of the hustle from my daily schedule, but I hadn’t completely dealt with the reasons behind that need for hustle: the quest for excellence that really just represented the desire for control of my own life, the buried belief that my worth was mostly tied up in my accomplishments, the prideful lie that people around me were counting on me to be perfect. Oddly enough, it’s not the first time I’ve written this theme in a book, and yet somehow I still find myself surprised that it applies to me.

I’m praying that this time, the lessons that I learned through writing The Solid Grounds Coffee Company will stick. But I think I finally understand, as Ana comes to in the end, that there’s no shame in being a work in progress.

"...you start a book thinking it’s for other people, and by the time you’re done, you realize it was mostly for yourself." via @CarlaLaureano #SeriouslyWrite #amwriting

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Carla Laureano is the two-time RITA Award–winning author of Five Days in Skye, London Tides, and the Saturday Night Supper Club series. She is also the author of the Celtic fantasy series The Song of Seare (as C. E. Laureano). A graduate of Pepperdine University, she worked as a sales and marketing executive for nearly a decade before leaving corporate life behind to write fiction full-time. She currently lives in Denver with her husband and two sons.

Write Free by Carla Laureano

Carla Laureano

Does it ever feel that no matter what or how much you do, it’s never enough—or good enough? Read on and embrace Carla Laureano’s encouraging words. 

~ Dawn

Write Free

Before I sat down to write this post, I logged on to Facebook to see how many likes my status update had gotten and where my newest release stood on the Amazon rankings. I’ve stopped reading reviews because I’ve found they’re detrimental to my creativity and peace of mind, but try as I might, I haven’t yet completely cut the cord of internet validation.

When I started pursuing writing as a professional career, I didn’t realize that it’s not at all a solitary endeavor. We write alone, yes, but we publish in a community. We seek the approval of our agents and editors, perhaps our contest judges or our peers. We spend long hours on social media, cultivating our “platform” because we’re told that’s what we have to do to get an agent, get a book deal, get on the best-seller list. And even when you do all those things, sometimes you still find yourself on the receiving end of a rejection letter or a disappointing royalty statement.

The thing is, if we’re not careful, we begin to lose sight of why we begin writing. We begin to lose sight of our own creative agenda. We begin to lose sight of the Creator who put this desire to tell stories within us. We begin to mold ourselves not in the image of our Creator, who formed the world with such wonder and creativity, but in the images of our critics, our naysayers, those who have rejected us. We begin to wonder what other people are doing better. We begin to subtly change ourselves, thinking, “Maybe if I do things like this person, I’ll be more successful. Maybe if I’m not so [insert character trait here], I’ll be more appealing as an author. Maybe if I act more Christian and make my work more overtly spiritual, God will see how much I want to serve Him and give me that publishing contract.”

Let me be clear—I’m not against hard work and learning from others and giving my work to the Lord. Completely the opposite! Those are all good things. The problem comes in when we convince ourselves that we are not enough—that God is not enough—and begin to measure our worth in terms of false values. We imprison ourselves in a cage of others’ expectations and chain our creativity in the pursuit of impossible measurements.

In God’s eternal currency, book sales don’t matter. The status of your agent, the prestige of your publisher, how many books a year you can write—all irrelevant. Those things don’t make us better people or more loveable or more worthy in His sight. That’s all been taken care of. Our accounts are filled. As children of God and followers of Jesus, we can cease striving.

And rather than feel discouragement that things are so far out of our control, we should feel a great freedom. To follow God’s plan for our lives. To write the stories of our heart. To be true to the calling we’ve been given, which may look nothing like your next door neighbor’s or your critique partner’s or the authors on this month’s best-seller list.

Maybe that means reaching a hundred thousand readers. Or maybe it means reaching that one, that single person who needs your message in only the way you can write it.

So let us go on promoting and marketing and diligently performing the tasks our publishers and agents expect of us. But let’s not allow it to become the sum of our endeavors, the only validation for our paths.

Write free, write brave, and follow your calling.

Beneath the Forsaken City

Beneath the Forsaken City

Conor and Aine have barely escaped Seare with their lives. Conor knows he must return to find the harp that could end the Red Druid’s reign of terror, but in the midst of their escape, he and Aine are torn apart once more. Surrounded by despair and thrown into as much danger as they left behind, Conor and Aine must cling to the whispers of Comdiu’s plans for them and the homeland that depends on their survival. But at what cost? Will they learn to depend on Comdiu completely? Or will they give up hope?

Carla Laureano is the author of the Celtic fantasy series The Song of Seare (as C.E. Laureano), as well as the RITA® Award winning romance Five Days in Skye. She's an avid cook, an enthusiastic but untalented singer, and a thwarted world-traveler. She currently lives in Denver with her patient husband and two rambunctious sons.

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