Should you write all three books in a trilogy before publishing the first one? There are two thoughts about this:
- If you are an experienced author, you can do it however you wish because you know before you start how long it will take to complete the trilogy. This is important because an author should get books out in a timely manner, on a prescribed schedule, so readers will know when to expect the next book and won’t forget the author exists and ignore the books when they come out. If you know your schedule, you can publish your first book accordingly and at the end of the book, suggest when your next one will come out so your readers will be expecting it.
- On the other hand, if you aren’t an experienced author, then you’d be better off finishing all the books in the series before publishing any of them so you can have the next book in the series ready to publish at the correct interval. In this case, you do the same thing at the back of the book and let your readers know when the next book will come out so they’ll be looking for it instead of forgetting that you exist. Publishers of new authors don’t know how fast that author can write books so they normally, in an abundance of caution, insist on all books being finished before any are published as a way of making sure they can all be published in a timely manner that they can let their readers know about ahead of time.
