Hi all, I'm just about finished with my first draft of book 1 in a fantasy trilogy. While I of course have a timeline of events planned out for books 2 and 3, I have gone ahead and started to properly plan book 2's timeline before I finish book 1 properly (there are a few loose ends that I need to be certain of in book 2 before I confirm them in book 1). I write the books from four PoV, with the narrater alternating each chapter. While doing this I have realised that the story I want to tell in book 2 is much more diverse, and requires more PoV switches. Book 1 has two 'sections', each with 13 chapters totalling 26, and hits around 120,000 words. Book 2 needs more than 26 chapters but will hit a similar wordcount. The '13 chapters per part' is an important part of the gimmick in the books, so either I stick at 26 chapters for book 2 or I go to three sections, totalling 39 chapters. Long story short, my question is: Can each of your trilogy books have a different layout? With the exception of Harry Potter where the wordcount vastly increased throughout the series, most trilogies I have read tend to be similar in length and structure. My second question is: Can you 'cheat' the claims to have a trilogy by splitting a book into Part 1 and 2? (Again I think of Harry Potter as the example) This would total the book count at four and would mean I can keep each book at two parts/26 chapters, but I really wanted to keep it a trilogy if possible (for expenses reasons if nothing else).
I can't imagine anyone putting down the second book in a trilogy because the structure differed from the first. It's just not a concern most people have. As for splitting one of them into two, that's ultimately the publisher's decision. If the first book sells well and they feel like they can get away with charging for the second half of book two then they're definitely going to do it, especially when the alternative is eating the increased printing cost of a single, larger book.
