Wickeds, this week we are celebrating the dual release of Charity’s Burden by Edith Maxwell and With A Kiss I Die by J.A. Hennrikus. Both of these books are more on the traditional side of the mystery world. Since we all write different series, how do you maneuver the different worlds you are creating?
Sherry: Congratulations on the new books! I can’t wait to read them. I’m the newbie to the “writing more than one series” club. I’ve finished a first draft of From Beer to Eternity the first Chloe Jackson Redneck Riviera mystery. At first I thought I’d work on one series in the morning and the other in the afternoon. But I quickly scraped that idea. I’ve tried to make Chloe and Sarah’s worlds and personalities different from each other. Chloe is younger and has moved to a place she’s never been before.
Jessie: This is a fun question! Like Sherry I only work on writing one series at a time. I can write one and revise another on the same day but I don’t write first draft of both on the same day or even in any sort of alternating way. For me the trouble has more to do with drawing from the same well in terms of type of work than it does from the series being somehow easily confused. I have no trouble keeping things straight between series or characters but rather from using the same sort of mental muscle on more than one project at the same time. One of them suffers if I do so I don’t.
Barb: So far I’ve only written one non-series book while writing the Maine Clambake Mysteries. (Jane Darrowfield, Professional Busybody.) I’ve worked on the books and novellas serially, with only the usual interruptions for copy-edits and page proofs, though that happens within a series anyway. And then there are the blog tours and other promotional activity for the book that’s coming out. Series or non-series, we’re always working on more than one book.
Edith: I work on only one first draft at a time, but, as Barb points out, there are always pesky interruptions, especially with three books in year in three different series. The copyedits that come in are rarely in the same series I’m writing the first draft of, but occasionally the timing works out so the proofs will be of the just prior book, which is actually good. It reminds of exactly what happened in that story, so I might think of continuity issues to fix in the new one. I love going away on solo retreat to immerse myself in a first draft. I once wrote almost half a book in a week. Seriously. Reality rears its pretty head, though, so that’s rare.
Julie: Edith, I love it when the timing works out! I am finding the more separate I keep the worlds the easier it is to navigate between the two. I do find my thoughts drifting though. I keep wanting to add a character from one series to another. That could be fun, but would also be confusing.
Liz: Congrats on these books, ladies! For me, with a new series and a whole new world that’s a bit different from what I’ve been doing, it’s easier to keep the worlds separate. With the Pawsitively Organic series and the Cat Cafe series, I would sometimes catch myself confusing things!
Readers, do you have trouble separating the worlds when you are reading different series? Fellow writers, how do you maneuver your worlds?