By Kathryn Evans
Is it even a thing? Second Book Syndrome? Surely, once you've been published, your confidence is sky high and your second book just OOZES out of you.
Not in my experience. I am currently trying to turn my second book into something worthy of the name and it is HARD. Especially as my wonderful editor pointed out, it shouldn't be AS GOOD as the first book, it needs to be BETTER.
And she's right. I know she is.
On paper, this is me:
Kathryn Evans, author of More of Me, winner of the Edinburgh Book Festival First Book Award, Nominated for the 2017 Carnegie Medal, shortlisted for multiple regional awards and translated across the globe.
In reality, this is me:
What If The Next Book Is Rubbish?
I have readers who want to read what I write next because they loved More of Me. I need to blow them away with Book Two. It needs to be brilliant, to be different and fresh and full of depth and have amazing characters and a plot that zooms along and tension that keeps you turning the pages and..AND
AND
AND
Oh yes. Second Book Syndrome exists. You've got expectations to fulfill.
So, I did what I always do in an MODP (Moment of Deep Panic), I turned to my writer pals for advice and reassurance. They did not let me down. Many, many writers have suffered Second Book Syndrome. Not Chris Priestley, just so you know, he's got his own Syndrome Syndrome in which he's worrying he doesn't have a Syndrome but THAT is a whole different story.
Here's what the others had to say:
Here's what the others had to say:
Sue Wallman
Sue Wallman is the author of YA psychological thrillers Lying About Last Summer ( Selected for the Zoella Book Club) and See How They Lie
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| Sue Wallman |
"2nd (or 3rd etc) book syndrome is for me a terrible panicky feeling that things aren't coming together. Sometimes I think it takes a long time to fall into your story because your heart still belongs to the characters in your last book, or you've simply forgotten how hard writing and rewriting actually is. The only solution I know is to keep chipping away and trust that you'll get there eventually."
That made me feel a little better until I read:
Rhiannon Lassiter
"Your second book should be entirely different from your first. It creates range and space and avoids being trapped in a box. That's not what I did, of course."
NOR ME!!!! Is that true? Please let that not be true!
Cath Pickles
Author of the Worzel books:
"The worst thing you can do with a second book is think about it too much"
All I DO IS THINK ABOUT MY STUPID SECOND BOOK!!
Jo Franklin
Help I'm an Alien author, is always practical:"It's easier to write book 2 if it's a series, as you already know the characters and their world. Though writing for an editor, rather than yourself, brings a whole new anxiety. It's best to get Book 2 well underway before Book 1 is out. The anxiety about securing a second book contract is another matter entirely."
Tell me about it!
Miriam Halahmy
Author of Hidden and Illegal:
Miriam is now on her seventh book and says she didn't suffer from second book syndrome. She's now in the process of finishing her seventh novel.
It's kind of nice to know it doesn't afflict everyone.
Shirley Mcmillan
Shirley's debut, A Good Hiding, came out last year. The Unknowns will be published by Atom ( Little, Brown) at the end of 2017:
"I finished my second book a week before the deadline. How clever of me! I thought. And then, immediately, The Fear. The first book, A Good Hiding, was written during a Master’s degree when I had more time and fewer children, and, crucially, nothing at all to lose. The second was written under contract, with a small teething child and a first book to promote and OMG WHAT IF THE FIRST WAS A FLUKE AND THIS ONE IS SH*T AND MY LOVELY AGENT AND AMAZING PUBLISHER ARE ABOUT TO FIND OUT THAT THEY MADE A MASSIVE MISTAKE?! During that week I sent my new one off to several friends, one of whom read the entire thing, all of whom emailed their reassurance. At the end of the week, I let it go. That was the lesson- do your best, try to trust yourself, and then let it go."
That's better, I found that very reassuring - until I realised - she'd written her second book before her first book was even out !!!
Patrice Lawrence
Patrice's debut Orangeboy was shortlisted for the Costa Book Award, and won the Waterstone's Older Children's Book Prize and is garnering accolades EVERYWHERE:
"You have a bubble of an idea. It gets bigger and bigger and then it bursts. You look around for more bubble liquid but either there's a big vat of it and you get carried away blowing loads of tiny bubbles, or there's a dribble in a bucket, far, far away. So how come the bubble turned out all right last time? Was it really this much work?"
"As an inexperienced debut author, I signed up to write a trilogy, thus unwittingly walking into a lethal combo of second book syndrome plus middle book syndrome. The latter has at its conflicted heart the brain-numbing dilemma of trying to write a book that is ‘more of the same’ (so that it will appeal to the reader of the first book) while at the same time ensuring that it is sufficiently ‘different’ not to be a clone. Oh yeah, and it has to set everything up for the grand finale in book three, where everything is resolved. Or not. Whoever said that the middle book was the hardest to write in a trilogy was NOT kidding!
My advice? Just have fun raising those stakes higher and higher …
Olivia Levez
Star Kirkus Reviewed author of The Island and The Circus, due out in May but which I've already had a sneaky peak at and LOVED says this:
"I hit the wall at 30,000 words THREE times. Need I say more?"
Okay, that's better. If Patrice has bursting bubbles, Eugene has muddling middles and Olivia hit the wall three times and they still got there, I can do it too!
Kiran Millwood Hargrave
Author of the wonderful The Girl of Ink And Stars, winner of the Waterstones younger children's book award AND the overall winner :
"I wrote the first (short, terrible) draft of 'The Island at the End of Everything' at my grandparents' house in Norfolk, in three desperate weeks after 'The Girl of Ink & Stars' was put out on submission. Fuelled by ale and tears, I paused only to read the rejection emails pinging into my inbox. The Island at the End of Everything is quite different from 'The Girl of Ink & Stars', and maybe some of that is knee-jerk reaction to the feedback I was getting. In any case, I trusted my ability to finish a lot more because I'd finished one already - and that was something, even if the first wasn't going to be published. Two days after I finished my first draft, I got my offer from Chicken House."
Keren David
Keren has written many fantastic books including When I was Joe, Salvage, Another Life and This is Not a Love Story.
"I had Third book Syndrome, not Second Book Syndrome, because my second book was a sequel and it was already half written when I got my first publishing deal. But my third book - Lia's Guide to Winning the Lottery - was harder. I had a deal, and therefore a deadline. My mum was ill, and my husband was considering a job abroad. I had a new narrator, and instead of writing a psychological thriller, I was trying a romantic comedy. It wasn't easy, and I ended up finishing the book i a massive rush - the ending had to be completely redone in the editing stages. Funnily enough, it's the book that has had the longest afterlife - we're adapting it into a musical, so I have been thinking and talking about those characters and that story for years now. I feel forever trapped writing and rewriting that third book - but loving it!"
Eve Ainsworth
Award winning author of Seven Days, Crush and the newly published Damage :
"I found writing my second book difficult in that I had an editor now, and someone "to please" but Crush slotted in well with Seven Days. Book three, Damage, was far, far harder for me - more challenging to break away from the setting and voice I'd already established."
