Are serials making a comeback?
Books and newspapers aren’t what they once were. Not long ago nearly every household took a daily paper. Bedstands almost invariably sported books beside reading lamps, because novels took the mind away from the day’s stress to ease sleep. Some of us still do that.
Sometimes, the two were coupled in the serial — a fiction story published a little at a time in a newspaper or magazine (not so much “Fast and Furious” times nine, more like “Harry Potter” in order). Perfect for short attention spans, and a nice break from serious news.
Serial novels were immensely popular in the 1800s and early 1900s and included famous authors. In the old days they especially appealed to the poorer classes who couldn’t afford books but could buy a newspaper.
I’m not sure what drove them out of fashion, but The Press is bringing it back — with a futuristic flair.
Saturday’s beautifully illustrated cover story in our Coeur Voice section (online at Cdapress.com) introduced Mik, a mysterious young pilot down on her luck in “Nomad: Episode 1.”
Some serial novels were like this one, written specifically for installments in a periodical. “The Woman in White” by Wilkie Collins, a ghostly mystery which became a separately published book and movie, is a famous example. Others such as George Eliot’s “Middlemarch” were full-length novels first. Both methods brought authors more exposure and boosted their book sales.
Who started the serial craze? While serials certainly predated Charles Dickens, he is still credited with it, probably because all of his works were serialized. “The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club,” also known as “The Pickwick Papers,” was published in 19 monthly installments beginning March 1836 under his pseudonym, Boz. Readers ate it up — it wasn’t his first serial, just more popular — so he published all his novels the same way first.
The serial’s wait-and-see approach has its downsides — a little patience and an attentive memory. On the other hand, pausing the action is bait for the next installment.
A few other famous books published first in serial form:
“Treasure Island” by Robert Louis Stevenson (1881)
“The War of the Worlds” by HG Wells (1897)
“The Hound of the Baskervilles” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1901)
“The Phantom of the Opera” by Gaston Leroux (1909)
“A Farewell to Arms” by Ernest Hemingway (1929)
“And Then There Were None” by Agatha Christie (1939)
“In Cold Blood” by Truman Capote (1965)
“Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” by Hunter S. Thompson (1971)
“The Bonfire of the Vanities” by Tom Wolfe (1984)
The last two hint that the serial never entirely died; it just went out of style, especially in newspapers. The New Yorker magazine still publishes serials by acclaimed authors, such as Zadie Smith.
Some evidence (beyond our enthusiasm for the “Nomad” experiment) suggests the serial is making a comeback. An article in The Wall Street Journal publihsed April 11, 2013, argued as much, pointing to serials sold by Amazon for Kindles. Some online magazines are also publishing fiction in short, sequential bursts.
We think serials have their place in newspapers, too. Maybe this era of clickbait and low tolerance for long reads is ripe for reading a novel in more digestible bits.
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Sholeh Patrick is a columnist for the Hagadone News Network who loves a novel in any form, as long as it’s not backlit. Contact her at Sholeh@cdapress.com.