Merry awesome stomping robots! (C. Lonnquist's MAGi Book 2 is out today)

If you were irrevocably sucked into the mystic mecha/fantasy/action world of C. Lonnquist's debut novel, The Will of Machines, rejoice! The Will of the Faithful, drops today, picking up the story of these mammoth mechanical beasts and the intensely human characters who pilot them.

From the flap:

In the eagerly awaited sequel to The Will of Machines: MAGi Book I, C. Lonnquist returns fans to the planet Alterra, where the MAGi—giant sentient suits of armor that mysteriously fell from the sky—carry their Pilots through the embattled Warlands of Ord. A year has passed since the fall of the Black Palace and the revelation of the MAGi’s origins. The Pilots go their separate ways, driven apart by a horrifying new threat to the homelands they love. The Faithful, Cardinal Ecclesius’ army of corrupted MAGi, readies to march on Jarn. Soulless. Insatiable. Unstoppable. 

Kaie, the young druid from Jarn, has grown from a girl to a woman to a warrior, fully prepared to die defending her peaceful people and the traditions they hold dear. She pilots the behemoth Cern—for now. The MAGi’s personality is evolving, becoming more complex. Some say dangerously so. Kaie and Cern, accompanied by resourceful Rozo and sarcastic scientist Max Roarn, journey to the mysterious Lizard Islands to seek help from the most reclusive Jarn tribe. Only their mystic boneseer can tell them if they’re already too late. 

Oliver, a ruthless witchhunter turned spiritual warrior, walks towards a new light but is still plagued by his past. Piloting the Devout while struggling to regain his own lost humanity, Oliver leaves for Roku to meet two new MAGi Pilots from the Silent Lands. But someone else—a darkly beautiful destroyer—lies in wait, patiently calculating, plotting to reduce Oliver’s ironclad cynicism to naked vulnerability.

The Warlands rumble as old conflicts awaken, and now, the presence of the MAGi threatens to upheave a precarious status quo the disparate nations have maintained for thousands of years. The giant machines carry within them immense power, and the Pilots within them struggle with each other and with themselves—good and evil, war and peace, life and death, destruction and salvation—as the fate of Ord itself hangs in the balance.

This remarkably talented young author is a Transformers fanatic who grew up to be... well, he's pretty much still a Transformers fanatic, but he's evolved along with the genre and brings a more thoughtful voice than the typical mass paperback. It's been a privilege to edit the first two books, and I can't wait to see what happens in Book 3, set to drop in 2017.

Fun Fact: Chilling, wormy-mouth cover art is by the author's brother, Erik "DoA" Lonnquist, a world-famous eSports caster who lives in Korea. (Also notable: these ridiculously cool dudes are my nephews. I feel like my best shot at a little checkmark on Twitter is to change my handle to Aunt Joni.)

Series Sensibility

Lately, I've been in the mood for "comfort reads," many of them books belonging to series I've enjoyed for some time. From Eve Dallas and Roark's capers in J.D. Robb's In Death series to Mma Ramotswe's latest adventures (if you could call them that, since not a lot ever happens) in Alexander McCall Smith's Tea Time for the Traditionally Built (from the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series) to Harlan Coben's Myron Bollitar, I've been tending toward known quantities in a time of uncertainty.

None of this is to say that I don't love and enjoy (and generally prefer, in fact) stand-alone titles. I've just been in a mood, that's all, and it's extended to my writing, where a secondary character from next month's release Beneath Bone Lake stormed into my head and demanded a book of her own. I'm editing that manuscript, called Hangman's Bayou, right now, and it's got me thinking about the pros and cons of writing a series.

Pros

1. Can save the author time on research, world-building, and character development.
2. May build reader loyalty as people enjoy revisiting "old friends" or need to find out what happens to characters in which they already have an investment.
3. Sells backlist titles with each new release.
4. Allows author to enrich fictional world with each addition to the series.
5. Gives the publisher an opportunity to "brand" the series, release titles back-to-back, and keep backlist titles in print.

Cons
1. Increases the chance for errors, as author may forget details from manuscripts written years before. (Many authors keep detailed series' notebooks to help keep things straight.)
2. Some readers won't pick up any books in a series until it's completely written for fear of being burned by dropped series. (Series are often dropped due to weak sales or other factors.)
3. Many readers won't start with the author's current release but insist on beginning with the first book in the series. (As I reader, I tend to do this.) So unless the series gets off to a very strong start and the publisher keeps the backlist readily available, sales of each title may drop off.)
4. Author has little control over gap between publication of the titles, backlist staying in print and in stores, etc. Without strong publisher commitment, even a terrific series will fail.
5. Author can get "trapped in" a world that loses its freshness. Readers may reject any other offering from this author, possibly requiring her to use another name and start over if creative needs take her in another direction.
6. Readers (and author, see above) may grow tired of the series (especially if characters never significantly grow.)


I often see unpublished writers make the mistake (or what usually turns out to be a mistake) of writing sequels to their unsold projects. The trouble is, beginning writers (if they're any good) improve so much with each manuscript that by the time they complete a saleable manuscript (this often happens around Book Three) the first one looks godawful in comparison and may never sell. Also, as my brilliant agent warned me, when writing series, authors tend to hold back "the good stuff," saving it for future books. But there won't be any future books in the series unless you put your very, very best into the first one.

So what are your views on reading and writing series? Are you loyal to any of them? Have you written or are you considering writing any? Why or why not?