{"id":8222,"date":"2011-03-17T12:00:34","date_gmt":"2011-03-17T16:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/?p=8222"},"modified":"2011-03-17T08:22:04","modified_gmt":"2011-03-17T12:22:04","slug":"sequelitis-a-visit-from-the-mighty-russel-d-mclean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/2011\/03\/17\/sequelitis-a-visit-from-the-mighty-russel-d-mclean\/","title":{"rendered":"“Sequelitis” (A Visit From The Mighty Russel D. McLean)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Ladies and gentlemen,<\/p>\n

I am not Chuck Wendig.<\/p>\n

Chuck Wendig is in this box here [points to large wooden box wrapped in chains. The box shifts as though something is struggling to get out]. But don\u2019t worry. I\u2019ve left him a couple of airholes.<\/p>\n

I think.<\/p>\n

Anyway, my name is Russel D McLean<\/strong><\/span><\/a>. If you have any trouble understanding me, don\u2019t worry. That\u2019s because I\u2019m Scottish. I\u2019m also a writer \u2013 author of two noir novels, the second of which, THE LOST SISTER<\/strong>, has just been released upon your United States. In celebration I\u2019m doing a series of invasions of other author\u2019s blogs in a manic attempt to shill\u2026 uh, I mean spread the beautiful word.<\/p>\n

Anyway, while Chuck\u2019s locked away I figured I\u2019d talk a little about sequels. Because, ya know, the new book is kind of a sequel (or at least the second in a sequence that started with THE GOOD SON<\/strong>) and I found myself thinking a lot about what that meant.<\/p>\n

A sequel has to achieve a lot of stuff. It has to pull in new readers while pleasing old ones. It has to remain true to established facts while giving something new. It has to stand on its own and yet acknowledge the past.<\/p>\n

It has to do something different.<\/p>\n

Oh, yes. That\u2019s the one that most people forget. While it\u2019s considered the safe action to rehash old glories \u2013 see National Treasure 2<\/strong>, The Mummy 2<\/strong> etc etc \u2013 what you wind up doing is boring people. Because while people think they want the same experience, what the really need is that same sense of excitement and unpredictability they got the first time round. It\u2019s just tougher to put that into words than it is to say, \u201cmore of the same please\u201d.<\/p>\n

Why is THE GODFATHER PART II<\/strong> considered a perfect sequel? It expands upon and gives new life and new perspective on the first movie while still telling its own perfectly logical narrative. You could see GFII on its own, conceivably, and catch up to this world without having seen the original. Sure, some of the grandeur would be lost, but you wouldn\u2019t be so confused as to throw the movie away and then batter your head against a brick wall until your brains dribbled out your ears.<\/p>\n

Sequels.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re tough.<\/p>\n

And not just when it comes to movies.<\/p>\n

With THE LOST SISTER<\/strong> \u2013 which is a novel, not a movie* \u2013 I wanted to tell two stories. First there is the story that stands on its own. The one about the missing girl. Mary Furst, a girl who has no apparent reason to run away, is missing. There are questions about her disappearance, facts that don\u2019t add up. As Our Hero \u2013 J McNee \u2013 digs into her life, he uncovers some very uncomfortable truths.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s my A story. And sure it could have been enough to hold the book by itself. After all, we established our hero in book 1 and if you want, you can keep a series character static. Many people enjoy that kind of thing. Some writers do it wonderfully. Robert B Parker kept Spencer is stasis for decades. Lee Child rarely changes Reacher or gives us any more about him than we need to know.<\/p>\n

But I\u2019m not that kind of writer. I need to let my characters change. Be affected by events. So THE LOST SISTER<\/strong> became a chance for me to explore my central character and find more about what makes him tick. I wanted him to confront some of his own choices over the course of the book, to see things in the case that made him question his own ideals and motivations. I wanted there to be something different in his outlook by the end of the book. In short, I wanted to tell a different kind of story with the same characters. Because otherwise\u2026 what\u2019s the point? It\u2019s like eating lukewarm leftovers. There\u2019s something in there you recognise, but really it\u2019s not the same.<\/p>\n

I also wanted to explore the supporting cast and to see how they reacted in different situations. People I hadn\u2019t expected to see again. Susan Bright, for example, who was supposed to be a throwaway character in THE GOOD SON and became something far more important. And David Burns, local \u201cbusinessman\u201d who is one of my favourite characters to write for: a man who does bad things for what he believes to be all the right reasons.<\/p>\n

THE LOST SISTER<\/strong> changes all of these characters by the end of the book. Not all of them get to \u201clearn\u201d from their experiences, of course. I think we\u2019re all lucky that I\u2019m not God. Because as cruel as He can (allegedly) be, I think I\u2019d be even worse in charge, winding folks up just see how they\u2019d react. But then that\u2019s the job of a writer \u2013 wind those characters up and watch them go!<\/p>\n

Word so far on THE LOST SISTER<\/strong> \u2013 both at home and now in the US \u2013 has been positive. I like to think that it\u2019s a good sequel, that it does more than rehash former glories, that it changes things for our characters, that it presents with new challenges and new situations. I\u2019ll tell you what, I had a bloody ball writing it.<\/p>\n

The Lost Sister is out now from St Martin\u2019s\/Minotaur as shiny hardcover or e-book.<\/p>\n

*At least, not yet, if any prospective producers out there are listening\u2026<\/p>\n

— THE LOST SISTER at Amazon<\/strong><\/span><\/a>, and B&N<\/strong><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Russel D. McLean is an author, reviewer and general miscreant from Dundee, Scotland. You can read more about him here, at his website and author page<\/strong><\/span><\/a>. Click the pic to follow him on Twitter.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My name is Russel D McLean. If you have any trouble understanding me, don\u2019t worry. That\u2019s because I\u2019m Scottish. I\u2019m also a writer \u2013 author of two noir novels, the second of which, THE LOST SISTER, has just been released upon your United States. In celebration I\u2019m doing a series of invasions of other author\u2019s blogs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[33],"class_list":{"0":"post-8222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-guestpost","7":"tag-otherwriters","9":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pv7MR-28C","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8222"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8222\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8230,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8222\/revisions\/8230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/terribleminds.com\/ramble\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}