Writing a books series is often a bad idea, especially for new authors. And I can prove it with math.
Yes, there will be a bit of math in this episode, but stick with me.
In order for readers to buy book #2 in a series, they have to first do four things:
- Purchase book #1
- Read book #1
- Finish book #1
- Enjoy book #1
Depending on whose numbers you use, the average book sells 100-250 copies in its lifetime. That average is pulled down by many books that sell almost no copies.
Math for a Series
Let’s start with an above-average book #1 in a series that sells a total of 1,000 copies.
Now, let’s generously assume that 80% of the readers who bought the first book started reading it. That brings us down to 800 readers. And before you judge, just ask yourself how many books you own that you haven’t started. Some readers own several lifetimes worth of future reading.
Next, let’s assume that of those 800 readers who started reading your first book, 80% went on to finish the book. I know this is generous. Most books don’t have an 80% completion rate but remember, this example book is above average, and 80% of 800 starters means you’ll have 640 finishers.
Of the 640 people who finished the book, 80% of them enjoyed it enough to want to buy the sequel. That brings us to 512 readers for book #2. The total addressable market for a sequel to a book that sold 1,000 copies is 512 readers. If you had their email addresses, you could sell 500 copies of your book with a handful of emails. But after you sell 512 copies, your sales will drop until you can get more readers to buy, read, finish, and enjoy book #1.
Math for a Standalone
Now, let’s compare that to the total addressable market for a standalone book.
Let’s say you write in a genre where 75,000 readers buy a book in your genre every month, and another 300,000 readers buy a book in that genre every year. This means that in any given month, there are around 100,000 readers looking to buy a book in your genre. That is a sizable market!
You can market a standalone book to all 100,000 readers. But for the sequel of a book that sold only 1,000 copies, the potential market is only 512 people. And if you don’t have their email addresses, you may have no way to tell them about book #2.
These numbers are bleak.
So why do so many authors recommend writing books in series? Let’s go through reasoning to see if writing a series could still make sense for you.
Cost of Reader Acquisition
The primary advantage to writing books in a series is that if book #1 is a hit, the cost to acquire readers for subsequent books is very low.
Let’s first clarify the jargon.
Cost of customer/reader acquisition: the marketing cost to acquire a new reader.
If you spent $500 to sell 100 copies of your book, your cost of reader acquisition is $5 per reader.
Let’s say it costs you $5 in advertising to acquire one reader for book #1. And let’s assume your ebook is priced at $4.99. After Amazon takes its percentage from the sale, you make $3.49 per reader. So, if you spend $5 in marketing to acquire a reader worth $3.49, you are losing $1.51 per reader.
To fix this problem, you could raise your price or write books in a series.
If 50% of book #1 readers also read book #2, you make $3.49 on the first book and half that on the second book. Technically, you are making the same $3.49 on the second book, but you have half as many readers. But to keep the math simple, let’s say you are making $1.74 in profit for the second book. If we add that to the $3.49, that brings the lifetime value of a reader to $5.24. So, with a two-book series, your advertising nets you a profit of $0.24 per reader, and each subsequent book makes the series more profitable.
That is the math behind the pro-series argument. But it all has one weakness.
It all depends on book #1 being a hit.
Most authors can’t acquire readers for $5 each. Traditionally published authors get paid so little that they can’t afford to advertise at all. Many indie books lack sufficient appeal to make the ads work at all.
In publishing, all the easy paths lead to poverty,
Thomas Umstattd, Jr.
and the shortcuts all lead to despair.
Some books can acquire readers but have a completion rate of about 25%. If only 1 out of 4 book buyers finish a book, selling that book’s sequel is nearly impossible.
Before you can thrive in advertising, you must first write a book that readers want to buy, want to read, want to finish and want more of when they are done.
There are no shortcuts to making a book that appealing.
As the adage goes, “Good advertising helps a bad product fail faster.”
Or put another way, advertising only works for appealing books.
If book #1 is not appealing, adding sequels only makes the problem worse. You’ll have to pull readers through an unappealing book #1 before they get to a potentially more appealing book #2.
Beware the Rookie Year
When you start your career by writing book #1 in a series, the nature of the series sends all new readers through your freshman effort for the rest of your career. Before readers can enjoy your better, more polished writing, they must first read your oldest, sloppiest writing. When readers tell their friends, “Author Smith’s series gets really good around book 3,” Author Smith is in trouble.
Marketing a series with a weak first book is like trying to run with weights on your ankles.
Larry Correa says that publishing is the only industry where you are forever judged by the performance of your rookie year. For authors who write in series, this is often a sad reality. But it’s not true for everyone.
Authors who write standalones can make their rookie year disappear.
To prove it, let me ask you a question. What was the title of C.S. Lewis’ first novel? Sound off in the comments if you know the answer from memory.
His first novel was Pilgrim Regress, which is perhaps his worst-selling novel.
Most C.S. Lewis fans have not purchased, read, finished, and loved Pilgrim’s Regress. If C.S. Lewis would have forced readers to read Pilgrim’s Regress before his other books, he would have had a marketing disaster.
C.S. Lewis’ world-changing impact on culture, religion, and fiction may not have happened if he had followed the currently popular advice about series.
Pilgrim’s Regress didn’t change the world. Narnia did.
A handful of you are thinking about how Pilgrim’s Regress is a masterpiece, and I agree that it’s profound. However, a novel needs to be both profound and fun to read in order to change the world. For a scholar like C.S. Lewis, writing profound literature came easy. Writing fun-to-read literature took practice. Eventually, he figured it out, and the Narnia books are both profound and fun to read.
If it took C.S. Lewis several books and 17 years to figure it out, don’t expect that you’ll figure it out with your first book. Besides, C.S. Lewis had a major advantage you don’t have in that J.R.R. Tolkien read his early drafts and gave him notes. Even with that advantage, it still took him years to figure it out.
Imagine if Brandon Sanderson had made Elantris book #1 in the Sel Archive series. His career may have stalled out right there. Elantris wasn’t a bad book, but it never sold enough copies to justify a true sequel.
When he wrote another book that took place on Sel, he made it a standalone book as well. In Sanderson’s recommended reading order for his Cosmere series, Elantris is second to last. That means he recommends readers read almost 3,000,000 words of his novels before reading Elantris. Elantris is for super fans, so it’s a good thing he didn’t make it the first book in his series.
Still not convinced?
Let’s look at the king of book series writing, a fellow by the name of James Patterson. His first book wasThomas Berryman Number, a standalone novel. On Amazon, it has only three stars. It’s really hard to get three stars on Amazon, especially since it has over 1,000 reviews. But many of James Patterson’s fans find his first book boring. They certainly wouldn’t buy, read, finish, or enjoy it enough to justify a series.
It took time for Patterson to find his voice and his audience. If every Patterson fan had to read the Thomas Berryman Number before reading his other books, Patterson would not be the household name he is today.
Patterson started writing standalone books in 1977. He didn’t write the first Alex Cross novel until 1993. For 16 years, he wrote standalone books, and then he started his signature series.
Nowadays, everything Patterson writes is a series, but he had to earn that with hard work and reputation building. Don’t expect to find a shortcut through the early years of hard work.
Thankfully, these authors didn’t follow the advice of putting their first books in a series. They saved themselves from being defined by a rookie effort that would have doomed their careers.
Beware Survivorship Biased Advice
Let’s say you do an experiment where 1,000 people flip a coin, and everyone who flips tails has to sit down. Those who flipped heads kept flipping coins and sitting when they flipped tails. After a while, one person who flipped heads a dozen times in a row will still be standing. Don’t ask that person for coin-flipping advice.
When you see the author whose first book is a breakaway success, you don’t see the 999 authors who tried and failed to find a significant readership for their first books. You also don’t see all the trunk books the author wrote and didn’t publish.
Every year, millions of people ruin themselves financially by gambling. But every year, some people win the lottery. When a lottery winner who went into debt to buy lottery tickets tells you to follow his example, don’t listen to him! His luck is not transferable.
Beware of fellow authors peddling the same kind of advice. “Yeah, man, if your book is not selling, write a few more sequels and then spend thousands of dollars on Facebook ads. It totally worked for me, man!”
Don’t judge a guru based on his own success. He might just be that lucky person who flipped heads 12 times in a row. Judge mentors based on the success of their students. Listen to sages whose disciples also find success.
The best advice for the author whose book just sold 1,000,000 copies is to write a sequel. Even if we use the same math, that’s 500,000 additional sales for book #2 and likely another 500,000 for book #3. If the book was a hit, it likely had a higher-than-average read-through rate. Plus, hits generate more sales as social proof kicks in.
Writing a series is good advice for authors who have written a hit book.
But what about the other 999 authors whose books sold hundreds of copies? Should they write a sequel? Not if they want to write for a living.
They will likely make more money writing another standalone book. They should figure out why the first book was not appealing and work to make the next book more appealing.
Sequels tend to be similar to the books that came before it, and if readers didn’t go crazy for book #1, they won’t buy book #2.
Beware of Battered Reader Syndrome
This fixation on series has created a problem for the publishing industry called battered reader syndrome.
Two of the most popular fantasy authors, George R.R. Martin & Patrick Rothfuss, never finished their series. It’s hard to blame them. They both have a postmodern philosophy, and when postmodernism is followed to its logical conclusion, it tends to end in black pilled nihilism. Admitting that everything is meaningless is not a satisfying way to conclude a story, so it’s easier for them avoid writing a conclusion. It saves them from facing the emptiness of their worldview.
By refusing to finish their stories, Martin and Rothfuss have annoyed readers and hurt their fellow authors. Fantasy readers are twice burned and have become hesitant to begin a new series, especially one by a new author who has never completed a series or standalone book.
Every genre is littered with incomplete book series and authors who will never complete them. Many authors follow the “write a series” advice, and most of them give up on writing before they complete their series.
When battered readers see that a book is the first in an unfinished series, they’re hesitant. That book #1 designation is a liability instead of an asset. It tells readers this story may not have a satisfying ending, or perhaps no ending at all!
Readers who don’t know you won’t trust you to complete all three books in your trilogy. They may wait to buy book #1 until you’ve published book #3. Battered reader syndrome makes it really hard for new authors to attract readers to new series.
Fortunately, there is an easy way to build trust with battered readers.
My Advice: Write a Standalone Book With Sequel Potential
One solution is to write book #1 as a standalone book. Keep any numbering off the title. Don’t include a series name. Just write a good story with a good ending.
This is what C.S. Lewis did with The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. The first edition had no number indicating it was the first and no mention of the Chronicles of Narnia. He made no promise of future books. Plus, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe has a satisfying ending. Lewis didn’t leave readers on an unsatisfying cliffhanger. He doesn’t even leave any plot threads dangling.
Your copy of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is probably from a later printing and likely includes a number and series name on the cover. Depending on where you bought the book, it might not even be listed as book #1in the series!
(Speaking of which, I think we need to hold an ecumenical council to proclaim all Narnia box sets with The Magician’s Nephew as book #1 as apostate. The published order is the best order to read the Narnia books. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is and should always be book #1. If you disagree, make your case in the YouTube comments, and the council of nerds will decide your fate.)
In this age of battered readers, it’s a lot easier to turn a successful standalone book into a popular series than it is to use a series to make the first book successful.
Advice for New Authors
If you are unpublished or only have a few books on Amazon, write a standalone book. Make it the best book you can possibly write. Open strong and stick the landing. Prove to yourself and your readers that you can write a satisfying ending. Keep enough characters alive that there is potential for them to go on another adventure, but don’t promise to write a sequel.
If your standalone sells like crazy, then you can write a sequel. If it doesn’t take off, take everything you learned while writing that first book and write another even better standalone book. Rinse and repeat until you write a book that resonates with readers. Once you’ve written your big hit, you’ve earned the opportunity to write your sequels.
The mathematical expression of the principle is this: If you can acquire readers to your standalone book for $5 per reader or less, then it makes financial sense to write a sequel. If it costs you $5 per reader or more, start over with a new standalone book.
This approach reduces your risk while giving you access to the advantages of having a series. It’s like switching from buying lottery tickets to investing in appreciable assets. You’ll still have the potential to write a series without committing to writing sequels to an unpopular book for the next five years of your life.
Advice for Established Authors
If you already have a tribe of readers and have learned how to write books they love, and you want to commit to a series, go for it! You’ve earned the trust of your readers to write a series.
But don’t tell brand-new authors with no platform to follow your example. It hurts them by committing them to books that may not find an audience. It also hurts you by contributing to battered reader syndrome, which scares readers away from books altogether.
New authors haven’t yet gained the trust of their readers. They don’t have the caliber of skills you have. If you encourage a new author to write a series, you may be dooming their careers without realizing it.
When I was in little league, I really wanted to steal bases. Our third-base coach would never let me steal. He let his son steal bases, but he never gave me the signal to steal. I thought this was very unfair. So, in one game, I stole a base anyway. Or at least I tried to steal a base. I was tagged out. It turned out the third base coach knew something I didn’t know. He knew his son was faster than I was.
To make matters worse, our team kept getting hits that inning, and I would have made it to home plate if I had taken the bases one hit at a time. But by trying to go fast, I ended up on the bench with an angry coach yelling at me for not following directions.
The moral of the story is to practice running and get fast before you implement the advanced strategy of stealing bases. In the same way, practice your writing and learn to write an appealing standalone book before trying your hand at the more advanced strategy of writing a series. Be faithful in the little things.
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Great article! Thanks for sharing your advice, Thomas! This is so good to know!
Totally agree about reading the Narnia books in the published order!
Finally. Some real advice that tells it like it is without making new authors feel completely doomed.
I totally get it! Thank you for the excellent logic and supporting statistics.
Hi Thomas, I agree with you 100% about the series. But, how about writing stand-alones in the same world with the same characters? It irritates me no end to read a book from a favorite author and discover at the end that I have to wait a year to get the end of the story when he finishes book #2. But, some of my favorite authors write stand-alones in the same world.
Great question! There is a difference between having characters in a shared literary universe and a series. The biggest difference is plot. In a series, the plot continues from one book to another. In a shared literary universe the setting and characters connect otherwise standalone books.
Technically Narnia is more of a shared literary universe than a true series. Each book works as a stand alone story. No major plot threads connect the different books. This is why it is possible to have multiple book orders.
And I think that is the test. If the books must be read in a certain order, its a series. If the books can be read in multiple orders its a shared literary universe.
Brandon Sanderson has standalone books in his shared literary universe. He also has series in that universe.
For more see: https://www.authormedia.com/literary-universe-marketing/
Thanks Thomas! This makes total sense.
Totally disagree with everything except the Narnia order! Main points:
1. First, you need to specify what you mean when you say “series.” If you’re talking about a story that leaves major plot points unresolved, then I agree. I do understand that that’s where most (but not all) fantasy series fall. Sci-fi is often written in series that are episodic—readers love the situation and the characters (think Firefly). Mystery series with the same detective are still considered “series,” and often have character arcs that take far longer than one book. (I read Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache series as much for the Three Pines characters as for the main mystery.) A romance series with a family of siblings has an HEA for each book, but there are often overarching plot threads that carry through the entire series. If you want the romantic ending, you get it with each book. If you want the family saga, you’ll read the whole series to get it.
Any of these types of series can be started at the beginning of a writer’s career and, if not successful 2-3 books in, the author can pivot to a new series with better characters/plot and skill set.
2. Your stats of read-through from Book 1 to Book 2 being 50% sound fine, and often typical. But you didn’t consider that read-through from Book 2 to Book 3 is usually more like 80-90%. Because a reader liked Book 1 enough to buy Book 2, they are much more likely to go on to Books 3, 4 and 5. At no cost to the author thanks to newsletters and back-of-the-book links.
3. I agree with your stats of $5.00 to gain a reader for a $3.50 return. However, if you don’t write a series, you’re going to spend that same five dollars to gain a $3.50 reader for your second book and *every* stand-alone book after that. If every book is going to cost the author $1.50 to sell, why try to write for money? You wouldn’t even be able to write for love at that rate! Also, saying that Book 2 will only sell to your newsletter followers is disingenuous. Ever hear of social media, Amazon “also-boughts” (even if they’re going away), and general book recommendations?
4. Why do you say that an author is forever judged on his/her Book 1 if they begin their writing career with a series? Why do you think that an author only ever writes one series? Or that readers only ever begin with the first series? If an author sees that a series isn’t working, they can stop and start a new one, as mentioned above. If an author finishes a series, they hopefully have learned a lot and the next series will be better. And *that* would be the one they advertise for $5.00 a reader and earn $20.00 in read-through from that reader, some of which would go on to read the earlier, not-so-well-written first books.
Just for reference, I am not a magnificently-successful outlier. My income ranges from the low 3-figures (esp if I haven’t released in a year) to the low/mid four figures a month. I expect it will go up if I ever truly figure out advertising. I have two clean/Christian romance series of six books each, the second of which does MUCH better than the first. (I probably should have stopped the first series earlier, but at the time I thought it was doing great.) I am now starting a spin-off of the second series, which will give my readers two entry points to my more successful books.
My belief is that a new writer *should* begin with a series as long as Book 2 isn’t completely dependent on reading Book 1. I’ll echo your closing thoughts-seriously connected stand-alones make a great series! But a new writer would do well to plan the series part of it from the beginning.
Good points, actually. That makes sense.
I disagree that you can get two to three books in then pivot if it is not working is a useful strategy for a beginning author. A big part of any set of interconnected novels, however they relate to each other, is the foundational premise. Let’s say you write fantasy and you choose for your premise a cheese based magic system. Book one deals with cheddar magic, book two deals with gouda magic, book three with brie. All unrelated and can be read separately so not technically a “series”.
However, would you rather not want to know that cheese magic does not sell after one book and rather pivot to vegetable magic that goes gangbusters and you have begging readers to write more?
My first cozy mystery has been out for 2 and a half weeks, and has 29 reviews on Amazon, averaging 4.7 stars.
One of the most common reviewer comments is that they’d like another book based in this world, with the same characters.
Based on this, I’ve started working on a sequel.
However, is it worth putting a pre-order up on Amazon? Or only announce that there’s going to be a second book when it’s nearly ready to publish? I estimate it’ll take about 6 months to get this written, beta-read and edited. (And that’s a fairly optimistic estimation.)
Can having a far-off pre-order hurt sales?
I have an episode to help with that very question: https://www.authormedia.com/pros-and-cons-of-pre-orders/
Thanks!
“One solution is to write book #1 as a standalone book.” I think this is the key. If readers respond to the first book by saying they’d like to see more stories with those characters, then go for the series.
This was an excellent article. Thank you. Your arguments are compelling.
At last, some sound advice on writing book series, especially for us who write in the horror genre. Horror is generally regarded as being less suitable to writing in series, perhaps because there’s more mortality.
I’ve always agreed with the marketing principles of series often being easier to promote, but no one before has ever – so well done, Thomas! – seemed to consider the risk of spending time and effort on a duff series idea! Yes, maybe some amount of pivoting is possible for books 2 and 3 etc, but for me writing standalones allows you to embark on a series if and only if the book is successful. Thank you Thomas for confirming my preferred strategy.
There’s also the question of writing something that your heart is truly into. I’ve always felt slightly pressured (actually a tad resentful) into having to write in series, but after this excellent article, no more! I’ll write a sequel if I’m fortunate enough to have a hit, but not before unless I really feel I need to get a book 2 out there. Standalone authors stand firm!