The Process of Plotting a Mid-Series Book.

There are many different ways to write a book. As I’ve been working on the Vigilante Magical Librarians series, I thought I’d take the time to talk about how I’m breathing life into the midway book of the series. Booked for Theft will release in March of 2025, and you can preorder it now at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo Books. Apple Books will be coming soon.

When I start a series like Vigilante Magical Librarians, it goes one of two ways: I know where the series conclusion is at… or I know where a concluder for a major arc is at with room to expand if the book sells well.

Fortunately for me. Vigilante Magical Librarians is in the first category; as far as risks go, a five book series isn’t terrible. (It is when the series flops, as this one has done in book 2, but I’m only on the hook for three books that probably won’t earn back unless a miracle happens and, say, 30+% of people who read book 1 mystically decide to give book 2 a try and THEN go on to read book 3.)

This isn’t happening. I know it, and I’ve cheerfully accepted that my little failure of a series is going to make brutal attacks on my wallet until the series is completed and it rides off into the sunset, hopefully never to be heard from or seen again.

I’m finishing it because I want to, and well, I’m passionate enough about writing I’m just going to take the losses with a smile plastered on my face.

Book 1 just didn’t appeal enough to people, and that’s on me.

So, back onto the main subject of this post: plotting a mid-series book. As I mentioned above, I went into Vigilante Magical Librarians knowing where the series was going, knowing the titles, and having a pretty good feel for Point A (Murder), Point B (Kidnapping), Point C (Theft), Point D (???) and Point E (Also ???)

You can probably guess the titles if you follow the theme of the series.

Hint: Things are gonna be going down in flames, and it’s a politically oriented Urban Fantasy. (This is not supposed to be difficult to guess.)

As Point E tends to be the biggest fish to fry, it makes absolute sense to ride off into the sunset following that book. That was the plan from the beginning, and the plan has not changed.

And no, I will not be revisiting this world. (Even if I had characters/plotlines I wanted to follow, which I did for about ten minutes, but then book two flopped and I was unwilling to further invest in a dead series/world.)

Five books will be plenty, especially as it has very slim chances of ever recovering from the book one to book two flop.

In good news, I’m (finally) over the vast canyons of general disappointment that came hot on the heels of book two flopping as badly as it did.

… which is why book three is being worked on. In better news, my expectations are so low for book three that it’s basically going to have to sell no copies at all to be a disappointment. (Spoiler alert: there are people interested in preordering it, so it’s already surpassed my general expectations.)

Anyyyyyway, now that I’ve rambled a great deal, here’s how Booked for Theft began to come to life.

1: I isolated the primary plot arc of the book and wrote it down in a 2-3 sentence summary. (That summary became the core of the book’s description with the spoilers removed.)

2: I did a detailed plot outline of the opening of the book, the lead in to the book’s primary arc, and streamlined it to match the description of the book. (I want my book descriptions to match the openers of the book in question, and I generally do not want to spoil what’s going to happen in the book; I usually pass on books that seem like it’s spoiling what’s going to happen deep in the book.)

3: I planned my basic character arcs on the opening of the book.

4: I established what the climax of the book would be. (AKA, where the opener is leading to in the end of the book.)

With steps 1-4 completed, I am now ready to start writing the book. I have all the pieces in place needed to make the book happen. But… in actuality, a few more things will happen first.

1: I will be doing a thorough rereading of the series and recreating my story bible. (My previous story bible was lost in the move from hell, and I’ve been winging it ever since. It’s probably chilling out with my missing Switch and games and digital docks…)

2: I will be tone checking against books one and two to make certain that things remain consistent on that front.

3: I will be doing a basic character arc outline for the librarians and other core secondary characters; with the loss of the original story bible, I have to go back and do this… because there’s been so much time since the first two books coming out. (This is fine, it just needs to be done.)

Re: 3… I do this with my series ALL the time. My brain is full of book stuff, but some of that stuff escapes, so I go back to earlier books in the series to refresh so I can be as consistent as possible.

The real problem is this: I mature as a writer with every book I write, so my style becomes more refined and changes a little. It’s very hard to maintain consistency with older books like this.

I, as a writer, have changed.

And that’s fine. I’m constantly trying to improve my writing skills. I pay the price for that in having to struggle with consistency between newer and older book series.

Too bad, so sad. I’ll get over it.

Hopefully, Booked for Theft does better than Booked for Kidnapping did, and that the third book in the series breathes life back into the Vigilante Magical Librarians.

It’s much easier to keep trucking along when people want the show to go on. Otherwise, well, it’s a drag for everyone involved, and we just don’t want that, do we?

So, how can you help breathe life back in the Vigilante Magical Librarians?

Here are a few (free) ways you can help!

1: Pop on over to goodreads and make use of the 4 or 5* ratings button for the first two books in the series. If you haven’t read them but want to see the series finished, add all three books to your shelf.

2: Pop a positive rating or review over at Kobo, B&N, and Amazon. (If you use Apple Books and can, that really helps as well!) Ratings really help, because number of ratings and the rating value definitely influence things. If you can spare some time to pop a review, that’d be great–even if the review is something along the lines of “I’m really looking forward to reading the entire series!”) It helps.

3: Share the link to Booked for Theft with your friends/circles to spread news the book is coming out next year.

4: Request the book (and then check it out) from your local library.

As I have to rebuild my story bible for this series (hissssss), I will be doing a blog post (or two) about what information I gather while doing my read through, why I gather it, and how it helps me continue writing the series.

Phew. Thanks for putting up with me!

~R.J.

P.S.: I have major dental work tomorrow, and I’m not okay.