I’ve been thinking a bit about the way fiction is both written and read (mostly in terms of scifi/fantasy literature, since other genres and mediums have interesting market constraints). I’m beginning to suspect that one reason that series are so popular is that they allow you to accumulate context and familiarity.
When, for instance, I read the second book of a trilogy (having previously read the first) I come into the story with some amount of context already established. I know who these characters are, and the sorts of people they are, and the decisions they have faced before. This does not have to be established from scratch, which allows us to skip, for the most part, the ‘getting to know you’ stage of the fiction. At least in theory.
And yet… and yet this seems not quite right. I have read before (though no example springs readily to mind) books which start sort of from scratch, but without that ‘getting to know you’ phase. They drop you in, and while they don’t provide you with context and familiarity directly, you end up with them anyway. You end up providing your own context and your own familiarity, and projecting them where they are needed.
It’s a process that I grow more and more fascinated with each time it is brought to my attention.
Thomas
They drop you in, and while they don’t provide you with context and familiarity directly, you end up with them anyway.
That’s my preferred way, both for reading and for writing. I can best gain the context and familiarity when I’m thrown square in the middle of things and get to know the characters and situations in action.