Writing bigger speculative fiction stories

In his 2017 best seller, You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Story, Houston Howard admonishes writers to create larger stories which he coins Super Stories. Your goal as a writer is not just to create a great story, or a great book (or movie script). Your goal is to create Intellectual Property (IP). Stories so big they launch entire universes, or even multiverses of characters, narratives, and experiences across all kinds of media. As the name implies, it’s a big job. Let’s look at how we can accomplish this.

It’s all starts with your characters

While intricate plots can carry books, to launch an IP you need a cast of characters readers can fall in love with. Super Stories require extraordinary characters. They must have some quality that makes them likable right away, but also have an arc that can span multiple stories. You have to go crank up everything you know about creating characters to a new level. You have to know them better than you know people in your ‘real life’, but still have wonderful things to discover about them.

And you need more than one. Each must be unique in their own way, with their own lessons to learn and obstacles to overcome. Every orbital character possesses the potential to be the principal character of another story or series. Sometimes their arcs may cross each other and even bring your characters into conflict with each other. This can be a good thing as fans will want to see who comes out on top.

No character in your story should be a cardboard cutout from central casting. The simplest guard could wind up rising to a general. One of the great training lessons for creating characters was my time running various tabletop role-playing games. My players took singular pleasure in walking up to any random passerby and grilling them on their life story. It prepared me to make sure each character, no matter how minor, was the hero of their own story.

And your unique story world

In science fiction, the ship often becomes a character in its own right. In a similar way, your story’s world, and universe needs to be a character. You need to flesh out its history and geography. Ninety percent of what you come up with won’t make it into the first book, but you’ll need it for book five, or maybe even book seventeen. It allows you to plant little offhand references reference to places or historical events that can become a hook and a thread to explore in a future story.

You can’t “pants” your way to an IP

This is going to require planning and some level of outlining. I know some of you just ordered shields up and red alert, but hear me out. If writing stories with a “by the seat of your pants” discovery method has been successful for you, keep doing that. What requires planning and outlining is the IP. Have a long-range plan of the general, big picture idea of the kinds of stories you want to add to your IP.  You should have a more detailed short-range plan of the stories themselves.

This allows you to…

Foreshadow across books

Rowling mastered foreshadowing in her Harry Potter series. (Please note there are spoilers for the Harry Potter series to follow, but I think we’ve past the statute of limitations at this point). From book one, Harry’s adopted family, the Dursleys, are moody and mean to Harry. When we discover much later that Harry is the last of Voldermort’s horcruxes, and the effect a horcrux has on the people around it, you see the Dursleys’ treatment of Harry in a whole new way. Another example is the complicated relationship between Harry and Snape. Early on, Snape appears as a villain and an antagonist. His mission is life is to humiliate and thwart Harry.  He even puts a curse on Harry. Later, you learn he was truly an ally, seeking to aid and protect Harry.

You can check out this post for more examples of this. Maybe J.K. got lucky and fell into these, but more likely, she carefully planned each one. You can, and should look do this in your series as well. Fans love to discover these kinds of things.

In addition to foreshadowing, it allows you to…

Cross-pollinate across your stories

Have a character or multiple characters from your earlier novels appear as characters in your other novels. Alternatively, place a character into your novel you intend for a major character or orbital character role in a future novel. While the most famous examples from the world of film is the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), A.C. Williams does this in her novel, Ronnie Akkard and The Brotherhood of Blades. Barb and Jim Taylor, the main characters from her earlier book, Meg Mitchell and The Secret of the Journal, play a minor role in aiding the protagonist.

But each book must standalone

A major advantage of Super Stories is they give future fans multiple points of entry into your world. Discovering any of your books leads inexorably to the others, and with characters they are already familiar with. It lowers the trepidation of exploring your other works.

For this to work, each book must standalone as an outstanding work on its own. While it’s referential to your other stories, write with the assumption that every book is the first book in your world this reader has experienced. The connections and references are Easter eggs to delight your most dedicated fans. They should never be key to understanding the story or any character’s motivation.

This is true to the greatest degree in your debut novel. If that one doesn’t do well, it threatens the entire IP. Like a great first chapter, your debut novel must deliver an outstanding experience on its own, while also launching your readers into your world.

Ted Atchley is a freelance writer and professional computer programmer. Whether it’s words or code, he’s always writing. Ted’s love for speculative fiction started early on with Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, and the Star Wars movies. This led to reading Marvel comics and eventually losing himself in Asimov’s Apprentice Adept and the world of Krynn (Dragonlance Chronicles). 

After blogging on his own for several years, Blizzard Watch (blizzardwatch.com) hired Ted to be a regular columnist in 2016. When the site dropped many of its columns two years later, they retained Ted as a staff writer. 

He lives in beautiful Charleston, SC with his wife and children. When not writing, you’ll find him spending time with his family, and cheering on his beloved Carolina Panthers. He’s currently revising his work-in-progress portal fantasy novel before preparing to query. 

• Twitter: @tedatchley3
• Twitter: @honorshammer (gaming / Blizzard Watch)