How Many Are Too Many?
Way back in 2005, when I submitted a proposal for a new book to my editor, I never dreamed that 7 years later I’d still be writing stories connected to that one. TAMING THE HIGHLANDER was a stand-alone book when I came up with the idea – then called TAMING THE BEAST – and until I turned it in and my editor began editing it, I never even saw the two other characters just screaming for their own tales.
But she did.
The MacLerie Clan series expanded to those three books and then to two more, set almost 500 years later and involving descendants of the original characters in Regency Edinburgh. One, a novella called BLAME IT ON THE MISTLETOE, became my award-winning, RWA RITA-finaling, sweetest-romance-I-ever-wrote story. (I still cry when I read that one!)
So, when my editors asked me to consider another Scottish medieval series, I knew I had to revisit the MacLeries and see how their children would fare when they were of marriageable age. And I knew we would have to meet up with (and DEAL WITH) the parents too. But I was ready to see Connor and Jocelyn, Duncan and Marian and especially Rurik and Margriet again.
A short story reintroduced the Clan to readers and then the new series began. It’s been fun for me to torment the parents with all their sins of the past and to make the young man involved face the ultimate alpha-male, Connor MacLerie (the formidable Beast of the Highlands) in trying to win the heart of the woman they love. Whether father, cousin, laird or earl to them, Connor has been and is still the pivotal character in the entire series.
Now, it looks like there will be a total of 11 inter-connected MacLerie novels, novellas and short stories when I finish writing them!! Wow – eleven! And BTW – TAMING THE HIGHLANDER has been my most successful, best-selling, most translated book — coming out in about 20 countries and languages including the lovely brand new version above (to the right) from HQN in Spain! The one below to the left is from Germany and the original US cover is at the top! Love the different covers!
But, 
I wonder – and I want your opinion as a reader on this — is that TOO many about one clan/family/theme? Do you get tired of reading connected series? Or do you love them to continue? I’m getting nervous because I’ve just discovered the history of a clan vs clan feud in medieval Scotland that lasted more than 350 years and my imagination is running wild at the possibilities in that for generations of stories in lots of different locations! LOL!
What do you think?
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