Before I start with the actual post, let me first apologize for being absent the past few weeks. Classes started at the end of August. I now have classes all five weekdays (sighh) and work weekends so finding time to blog is getting even harder than before. I can barely find the time to read (if I didn’t commute to campus, I doubt I’d get any reading done).
I’m trying to get through all the ARCs I [foolishly] requested/accepted during the summer. I’m regretting it immensely now and have vowed to myself to not request or accept another ARC until next year (we’ll see how well that goes).
All that said, I will not be updating consistently in the coming weeks. I won’t be participating in any features at the moment [not that I was consistent in posting them anyway ]. And I [sadly and unfortunately] probably won’t be reading a lot of blog posts. I’ll try of course, but as of now, I make no promises.
Many YA Fantasy authors (and some from other genres) prefer expanding their own created universe instead of creating another one. Some of these authors include Cassandra Clare who has been continuing the Shadowhunters series for 10 years now and is now on her 14th book in that universe. Rick Riordan who has continued his mythology series, both his current ones have cameos of characters from Percy Jackson and Heroes of Olympus. Leigh Bardugo has five books in the Grishaverse with one more on the way. Maggie Stiefvater has her upcoming Ronan Trilogy coming out, about a beloved character from her Raven Boys quartet. And the recent news about V.E Schwab expanding her A Darker Shade of Magic world with a new series.
And not only Fantasy, but a few contemporary authors also write spin-offs with cameos from their earlier works. Becky Albertali’s Upside of Unrequited featured characters from Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda and she has another spin-off coming out about Leah [also from Simon vs.]. When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon is also getting a spin-off book about Rishi’s brother, Ashish. I’m sure there are more I’m missing.
I for one absolutely love world expansion. I get [overly] invested in characters and their worlds and knowing I get more stories about them makes me ecstatic. All the book series I mentioned above are favorites of mine and I CANNOT WAIT until their sequels or spin-offs come out.
Expanding a world also allows an author to explore all aspects of its society and culture and answer questions that may have been left out in the first series. I think Cassandra Clare does a great job of this where each of her new Shadowhunters installments goes deeper and deeper into the world without contradicting anything she wrote previously.
But that isn’t to say I want every author to expand their world; sometimes, the story they need to tell just consists of the books in their series and they need to leave it at that.
So what do you think? Are you for or against world expansion? Are you excited for any of the books I mentioned above?