There are a lot of novel series like James Bond and Twilight where each novel has a completely different title. Why do authors choose not to have a series title on their novels? Wouldn't a novel sell better if it was clearly labelled as belonging to the same series as a previous novel?
book series without a series title
- Thread starter Extrocomp
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If they're shelved together in the store and they're listed as "Book 5 of the James Bond series" on the cover and on Amazon.com, what difference does it make if the title is "Moonraker" or "James Bond: Moonraker"?
In fact movies are getting away from that very practice, too. We have "The Dark Knight", rather than "Batman Begins 2: The Dark Knight".
In fact movies are getting away from that very practice, too. We have "The Dark Knight", rather than "Batman Begins 2: The Dark Knight".
I get the impression that the book trade, certainly in the UK, regards that sort of blatant branding as a bit vulgar and only really for kids' books and licensed tie-in stuff.
Also, it's not really up to the author, unless they're already well-known and successful enough to make demands. Sales & Marketing generally make those sorts of decisions - if they'd decided they were going to brand my novels, which are a series, like that and slapped 'WILDE/CHASE 1' above the title, then they would have done it because they thought it would increase sales in the target readership. As it is, they're 'branded' in the sense that the cover designs clearly follow a pattern, but you have to check the back to see where you are in the series. It's the same for most British serial authors - it's rare to see something like "Book 5 in the Brad Thrust series" actually on the front cover.
And I think it's better that way - nothing puts me off buying a book quicker than seeing that it's part whatever of a series of which I don't have #1
If it's a series by a single author, then doesn't the author's name on the cover serve that purpose? True, some authors write multiple series, but if you follow the work of a given author, you're generally able to keep track of what belongs in which series.
And most books that are parts of series do have various ways other than blanket titles of promoting what they are. There can be additional text on the cover saying something like "The new James Bond adventure" or "The stunning sequel to Ringworld!" (The recent Fleet of Worlds and Juggler of Worlds by Larry Niven and Edward Lerner are both captioned "200 years before the discovery of the Ringworld," even though they only have the general background and a couple of characters in common with the Ringworld series and are only promoted that way because Ringworld is the most famous subset of Niven's Known Space universe). Books in a series can be linked by theme titles (an approach I hate), like Sue Grafton's (Letter) is for (Word starting with that letter) series. Often, books in a series will share a common cover design and title font. There are multiple options besides just using a blanket title.
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