Starting a New Series

by Kaye George
This isn’t something I haven’t done before. Or, to eliminate the double negatives, I have done this—several times before. So far, I’ve started four published series, and now a fifth one due out in March. I’ve even started several others that never made it to market. But we don’t speak of those.
How do I start? I think my first point of reference is usually the setting. My other series have been set in Texas, Illinois, Minnesota, and somewhere in North America (that’s the prehistory series before there was a North America). Write what you know, right? I’ve lived in all those places, so that aspect is covered.

I’ve found out something about myself, regarding using settings.

That is I prefer to write about a place I used to live. As soon as I move away from a place I have a clearer perspective on it. I think the area is distilled in my mind, condensed down to the main aspects, making it easier to write about it without every single detail being present and getting in my way.
Here’s how I set my other series. My first series published was the Imogene Duckworthy humorous Texas series, set in the area of Wichita Falls TX, where I lived for about three years. I started to write about it as soon as we moved to the Austin TX area.
My musical mysteries are set in Illinois and Minnesota, both places I lived for several years before getting those published. I actually started to write a Minnesota series when we lived there, but didn’t get it off the ground. I was able to cannibalize some descriptions when I came at it with a new approach a few years later.
The Fat Cat series (written with the pen name Janet Cantrell) was set in Minneapolis entirely, so I had the years there to draw upon for that one.

When I approached this new cozy series

I wanted it set someplace very cute. I’ve never lived in Fredericksburg TX, but have vacationed there several times and love the darling little touristy town. My agent liked that idea. In fact, my New Jersey agent had been there! So this setting is a bit of a departure for me. I never knew the area well, like I did my others. Thank goodness for Google, Wiki, and phone calls and emails to people who live and work there.

The next task for me is always creating my characters.

My agent, however, didn’t like my original ideas for the rest of it. For this series, the basic idea and the characters were changed many times at the request of my agent. In fact, they changed so much with her many edits that I needed to change all of their names. They were not the same people I started out with. They work, though, because she sold the series and it’s being published.
Their names are important to me. I try to give them appropriate names that the reader will remember. Family is always a big theme for me, so my characters carry the names their parents gave them. Their names say as much about the parents as they do about the characters. When these went through so many changes, they were no longer the same people and I had to rename them all. That’s the first time I’ve had to do that. But I love the people they turned out to be.
This is a sort of standard cozy, where my sleuth has a shop (selling vintage sweets). In this case I wanted her to locate next to her best friend, already in business on Main Street. (I used real street names and some real shop names, but made up a lot of others.) The best friend, Yolanda Bella, told my sleuth, Tally Holt, when the space next door became available and Tally jumped at it. Yolanda needed a business, too, so I have her selling custom-made gift baskets. She often uses Tally’s candies and sweets in them.
The name “Yolanda Bella” tells my reader a bit about her ethnicity, about her family. She’s half Italian and half Hispanic.
I really like the name Tally Holt. It’s dynamic—supposed to make you think of Tally Ho! It’s not a common name because her parents are not common people. They are talented performers who, at the time of these stories, roam the world with their song and dance act. They get into all kinds of sticky situations, an additional worry for Tally and her brother, Cole. Additional, besides the worry of the murders that take place in the cute, quiet little tourist town.
I also took great care naming the cat, a Maine coon Tally acquires during the first book. I settled on Nigel after considering quite a few other monikers. My son’s family had a Maine coon and I thought he was a dignified chap, so I wanted a dignified name. (The family cat’s name was Friendship, named by the kids. I used to tell him he was as big as a ship and that’s why they named him that. He never appreciated me saying that.)
Setting, characters, occupations, families, are mostly decided at this point. Now I need plots! Victims, suspects, murder methods, clues, alibis. All that fun stuff. That part is different every time. Here’s where I draw on my resources of classes, TV shows, news—wherever I can find material.
This is a new publisher for me (Lyrical Press) and they do things a bit differently than my other publishers have. I gave them the proposal with the setting, characters, plot sketches, as usual, and—to my surprise—they put the titles of all three books into my contract. I decided I like that. I’m writing the plots to go with the titles. The first one given to me was Revenge Is Sweet. That implies revenge, which implies payback for a previous perceived wrong. In this case, I put the original offense way back there, as a secret in someone’s past. Things happen in the present that precipitate the need to do something about the old offense. That was fun setting up, and it kind of gave me a ready-made scenario.
The second book is called Deadly Sweet Tooth. I hope I’m not giving too much away by saying there will be a poisoning. And someone who really like sweets will be poisoned.
That’s it! That’s how I start a new series. Now I’ll have this to refer to if/when I start another one. Thanks for the opportunity to share.

Kaye George is a national-bestselling, multiple-award-winning author of pre-history, traditional, and cozy mysteries (upcoming is the new Vintage Sweets series from Lyrical Press). Her short stories have appeared online, in anthologies, magazines, her own collection, her recent anthology of eclipse stories, Day of the Dark. Her short story, “Grist for the Mill,” in the anthology, A Murder of Crows, has been nominated for an Agatha Award. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, Smoking Guns chapter, Guppies chapter, Authors Guild of TN, Knoxville Writers Group, Austin Mystery Writers, and lives in Knoxville, TN.
Want to write short stories but don’t know where to start? To add clues, red herrings, or twists? Author Kaye George explains how in her online class, Clues to Writing a Short Mystery with Kaye George, April 13-26.