Trilogy Links

I’m not sure if this is a growing trend or if it has just struck me now. But Jen Holling’s McDonnell Bride trilogy has an underlying plot throughout all her books that the final mystery will be solved in the last book of the series.

Maybe series have been doing this all along and I just didn’t notice. But this struck me as obvious because Linda Winstead Jones just did the same think in her Sun Witch trilogy that I just finished reading a few weeks ago. (Different Publisher)

I really like this idea. I don’t think the older romance series did this much (if at all). The connection with most older romance series is typically the family membership… brothers, sisters etc.

Now The Sun Witch Trilogy does have the three sister theme as does the McDonnell Bride Trilogy BUT they have a mystery plot that is woven through all the stories that will be put to rest in the last book. I really like that and think it’s a nice added tool to keep your readers reading until the end. I also think it is extremely wise that publishers published these types of trilogy books close together (within a few months of each other).

I’m on the last book of the McDonnell Bride series. I’m sorry that I had stalled in reading the first book. I picked it back up on Saturday and realized how well she linked meaningful scenes and objects to give the reader that Ah Ha moment. What am I talking about?

Spoiler Alert…

In Jen Holling’s second book she used a lot of interesting connections. Ms Holling introduced our heroine with her going to a witch for a love potion to make her betrothed fall in love with her. I loved that . Anyway, the hero suspected heroine did something and didn’t drink the potion but the heroine thought he did. The hero accidently gave the potion to the dog… and the dog fell all over himself obsessed with the heroine. So much so (the dog belonged to her sick father) that her father gave the dog to her. Anyway… later in the story the obsessed dog was used (by hero) to find the heroine when all had given her up for dead. The thought of the love potion was also used for added conflict for the heroine and hero. The hero wondered what it was… if heroine had tried to poison him and she thought his affections were due to the love potion and weren’t genuine. I loved that too!!

There was also a ring that was important in the story… this was also used in the story. The ring was cursed. Both the dog and the ring were used a little further than mid way in the story.

So she used these “tools” throughout the story… not just introducing/hinting of its use in the beginning and using it in the end. Now I'm thinking... I can't remember that "thing" that she introducted in the beginning and used in the end. Well, she did use her "gift" but that didn't just happen at the end either. That too was used probably three quarters into the story. See? She used these tools throughout. Obviously so. She also introduced new "things" mid way in story and used THOSE at the climatic moments in the end. A Doll was used in a ending climatic scene for the hero. The doll had not been introduced until mid way. Okay... I'm thinking of one loose item that could have been introduced better. Words scribbled backwards on a piece of paper that hero read as a final clue of who one of the villains were in this story. Then and there... the hero thought... I once knew a man who wrote in "code" writing the words backwards... meaning... the reader got no earlier hint of this ability of the hero's to figure out to read backwards... "nave" written on the paper when it should be read backwards "Evan." As a reader I readily accepted this ability to figure it out by the hero but as a writer who is studying this story... sees that this was not too well done. BUT the rest was... so we won't complain ;)

Other novels use tricks (like the dog and ring) like this too… but it was obvious to me in this particular story. Anyway, I could gab about this in length but the point is that I’m very excited to see the BIG PICTURE in this particular book AND her series. I am extremely glad I read this Scottish Historical Series. And I will use this BIG PICTURE knowledge to help me plot out the BIG PICTURE in the series books that I will develop this week (See This Weeks Goals in earlier blog post).