I'm thinking of ending it all

[oneagainst]

Need some advice. I've been building up to an Avengers End Game scenario over the previous nine books and story series. It all comes together in Only Consenting Adults starting in 3 weeks. The chapters pull together the end of everyone's stories, so there's cheating wives, dommes, bondage, whipping, romance, heroes doing wonderful things, redemption, and dark people doing awful things (of course).

As per the laws of trump categories, it's going in NC/R due to the non-con elements in some chapters. But, here's the rub... 86 characters across 25 chapters. How to provide context/background, or even whether I should...?

One way is to do a few paras of exposition but that totally blows chunks when my usual mode is to want to drop the reader into the passenger seat of the speeding car in the first sentence. Also, the chapter that ties into the Lost and Found story event would double in size with tedious backstory for every main character in the chapter.

Ideas?

 

[AchtungNight]

Employ a character killer to cut down the threads you have to manage. My buddy Wade Wilson here is skilled at his job and doesn’t charge too much if you can put up with his mouth.

Or seriously, pick the most important characters and concentrate on them. Let them react to the side characters, address each briefly, clear them out of the plot, then do main hero vs main villain in whatever form you have planned. Go read a conclusive volume of a similar series if you need ideas. Brandon Sanderson’s A Memory of Light or CS Lewis’s The Last Battle come to mind.

 

[Constories]

"And the award for the most click-bate-y thread name goes to...."

*Drumroll*
*Opens envelope*
"Yowser, with "Good Titties"!
*Angry murmers*
*whispers*

"I'm sorry, folks! I've just been notified that there was a miscommunication, and Yowser was disqualified, because his thread title was infact "Good TITLES!" The actual award for the most click-bate-y thread name goes to..."

*Drumroll*

*Opens envelope*

"Oneagainst! With "I'm Thinking of Ending It All!"

*Uproarious applause*



[But to answer your question, all I can say is, maybe... IF YOU HAVE TO... Create a short summary work, and link it in. Laurel can do that, right? Like a "previously on..." in TV shows?]

 

[oneagainst]

Yeah, could do. The story's basically an ensemble cast, so @AchtungNight 's suggestion of whittling down to a few main characters isn't going to help here. You're basically talking about sound a Foreword...?

 

[ElectricBlue]

I'd say just write the story, no preamble, no forward, no back story, no explanation.

A good story should rely on itself to be internally consistent, rolling out context as required, within itself. If you can't do that within 25 chapters you need to take up knitting, or lion-taming, something else.

Look at it this way - you don't need to read the Silmarillion for The Lord of the Rings to make sense.

 

[Altissimus]

I don't get the problem. It's chapter 26, isn't it? Doesn't matter what category it's in, the reader will know there's 25 other chapters and they can read them if they want to.

No one is going to jump in and start at chapter 26.

If the concern is 'changing category', I've changed categories in several series and never noticed a difference in readership response - because people start at chapter 1 and continue on if they like it.

All you do by posting a new chapter is flag up on to the 'new' pages "hey look, another chapter of this awesome series you may have missed is out. Want to give it a go?" but that's useful too, and no reason you shouldn't 'advertise' in a new category for that.

ETA: if it's a new series in the same world and not ch 26, and pre-knowledge of that world is a necessity, then you need to solve it with an author's note: "This series follows on from XYZ, and doesn't stand alone. Read ABC first."

 

[AchtungNight]

Yeah, could do. The story's basically an ensemble cast, so @AchtungNight 's suggestion of whittling down to a few main characters isn't going to help here. You're basically talking about sound a Foreword...?

Yeah, sorry. I was pulling an idea out of my head before reading the story. I’ll let more experienced authors take over from here.

 

[Djmac1031]

Most people aren't watching Endgame as their first Marvel movie.

And as a writer of a long series myself, I understand most people unfamiliar with my series aren't clicking on Part 26.

If the premise intrigues a new reader enough to go back and start at the beginning, great. That does happen.

But most readers who'll click on it will already be up to date.

So I wouldn't worry too much about long recaps etc.

 

[lovecraft68]

My thought is if people followed this thing all the way through, they know the characters and I can't see someone hopping on new at that point so I'd skip the background.

 

[lovecraft68]

Employ a character killer to cut down the threads you have to manage. My buddy Wade Wilson here is skilled at his job and doesn’t charge too much if you can put up with his mouth.

Or seriously, pick the most important characters and concentrate on them. Let them react to the side characters, address each briefly, clear them out of the plot, then do main hero vs main villain in whatever form you have planned. Go read a conclusive volume of a similar series if you need ideas. Brandon Sanderson’s A Memory of Light or CS Lewis’s The Last Battle come to mind.

Off topic, but DP began as such a great character back in the 90's and they just ruined him. "Oh, a super hero that swears and makes x-rated joke" Great.
I managed to get through the first movie because I saw it in the theater and was with other people. The second was at home and my wife wanted me to watch it with her. When they got to the part where it was a five minute routine on "shirt cocking" I told her she was on her own.

To think they're bringing back Logan after his epic ending in his last movie just so Reynolds and Jackman can have a bromance buddy movie...

 

[AchtungNight]

Off topic, but DP began as such a great character back in the 90's and they just ruined him. "Oh, a super hero that swears and makes x-rated joke" Great.
I managed to get through the first movie because I saw it in the theater and was with other people. The second was at home and my wife wanted me to watch it with her. When they got to the part where it was a five minute routine on "shirt cocking" I told her she was on her own.

To think they're bringing back Logan after his epic ending in his last movie just so Reynolds and Jackman can have a bromance buddy movie...

It’s all about the money, man. Jackman’s career is in a downturn and Reynolds wants to make his movie popular. Maybe it will work, who knows?

Back on topic, I suggest creating a checklist of important plot points and situations to address. Then write the story ticking them off one by one.

If you don’t want to do a flashback reflection, try a party. That scenario helps tie up various threads the same way the epic battle did in Endgame. I did this with my ensemble piece “Counseling”. Some villains get kicked out of the party by security, others get in but a drunk they pissed off earlier spots them and you can guess what happens next. Meanwhile a reporter gets interviews to address various scandals and emotions, learns that for various people everything is ok. A spy tracks down the main lead character and learns she’s also ok, they get together to fulfill mandatory shagging. Meanwhile another couples shags and are interrupted by phone calls that handle other situations. This allows me to put in a public service announcement about turning off your phone during sex. The main character also reflects on other situations she resolved- sex excites her introspection. Thankfully her lover is patient enough to allow this along with the phone calls and hopefully so are readers. Readers can read around the interruptions if they must and concentrate on the shagging. We are left in a comfortable place.

Write your story and see how it resolves itself. If you please yourself and beta readers, your regular readers should fall in line and vote highly. That usually works out for me anyway. More experienced less burned out writers can take over from here.

 

[oneagainst]

I'm quite interested in the aspect of back referencing the initial stories. As detailed on other threads, there's a lift across the entire corpus when a story goes live, but actually backlinking should enhance this effect. Perhaps the golden solution is to have the equivalent of footnotes using <a> tags that point back to an MC's origin story. Keeps it short in the new story while allowing interested readers to get context.

 

[John_Vandermeer]

If i understand the problem correctly, you are going to wrap up substantially all your extant work in a new 25 chapter novel. That is… ambitious. First off, there is the problem even the most devoted fans are unlikely to have read all your work. So some characters are going to be new to them. So even though all their lives are clearly intertwined, focus certain chapters on certain characters? I would recommend highlighting who in the short description/subtitle. I do not know how, but perhaps a relationship map of whom has interacted with whom might be useful too. With a defining attribute or two (eg, who is a “cheating wife” and who a “Domme”). But, frankly, i do not know. Such a magnum opus is beyond my ambitions…

 

[oneagainst]

I would recommend highlighting who in the short description/subtitle. I do not know how, but perhaps a relationship map of whom has interacted with whom might be useful too. With a defining attribute or two (eg, who is a “cheating wife” and who a “Domme”).

That might work. A list of Dramatis Personae in the Foreword, with links to their stories. Then a brief ref in the top of each chapter back to that list. I want each chapter to be able to stand on its own two feet also, but have refs if the reader wants to explore. It's a fine balance....

 

[ElectricBlue]

That might work. A list of Dramatis Personae in the Foreword, with links to their stories. Then a brief ref in the top of each chapter back to that list. I want each chapter to be able to stand on its own two feet also, but have refs if the reader wants to explore. It's a fine balance....

Think of other long stories you've read, both here on Lit, and published novels. How many of those works have preambles and introductory back stories, all those other devices you're thinking about? Not many, I bet.

You're over-thinking the importance of the previous stories, I reckon. I'd work on the basis that nobody has read them (you being one of a thousand current authors on Lit, there's plenty of content), so your current story should stand on its own two feet, with no need for the other stories at all. If you're writing is good enough, that's when folk will start working through your back catalogue. Otherwise, they're just reading "this" story, and the others are irrelevant, really.

 

[Winter_Fare]

I want each chapter to be able to stand on its own two feet also, but have refs if the reader wants to explore. It's a fine balance....

One author I follow has a complex story universe and many characters and lists details in their bio:
https://literotica.com/stories/memberpage.php?uid=4254741

 

[AchtungNight]

When in doubt change the format. My stories Passion 1-3 had a framing device where the lead character reflects on her past and tells other characters her thoughts. For Passion 4, which came out after a several month hiatus, I dropped that format and did a straight in media res. Guess which part of the series gets way more hits and comments over time.

 

[flynn99]

Sometimes books will have an appendix with a brief biography of all the MCs, relationships, etc. And maybe a timeline. That would be really helpful... I gotta admit that I struggled my way through the names in An Equal Division... That could easily be an article. You might have to do a couple time - bound versions if the characters evolve. "as of beginning of OCA" "OCA+1 year" or something... But there will be readers without as much devotion to your universe who might not absorb the cross-referencing well, so each story or arc should stand alone too...

 

[oneagainst]

I guess I'm about to find out... locked and loaded!