Here's an interesting question: what do the following have in common?

The Pickwick Papers
Sherlock Holmes
Henry James
Herman Melville
Harriet Beecher Stowe
The Three Musketeers
The Bonfire of the Vanities
Jules Verne
Heart of Darkness
Scheherazade

That's right—serialized storytelling.

Not that I would ever imagine tossing my hat into the prestigious ring listed above, but for some reason, I am intrigued by the idea of writing in such an age-old tradition.

Maybe it reminds me of podcasts or everyday storytelling. I mean, how many times have you started describing your day or a favorite story to a loved one or friend—or the other way around—only to be interrupted by some distraction or other? Whenever that happens to me there's an almost palpable sense of incompleteness, especially if there's a cliffhanger involved.

Of course, movies & TV series rank as the most popular form of produced episodic storytelling since so many viewers are devoted fans who've been known to binge-watch previous seasons while waiting for the next episode/season to come out.

But as you probably know, online reading in various forms has been steadily gaining steam in the serialized fiction world for some time as well, as a quick search can show.

Anyway, as you might've guessed by now, I've started wondering what it would be like to serialize a novel I've already sketched out but haven't written . . . or a new story, for that matter.

Just food for thought on an April morning.

Till next time,

Drew
Drew Faraday
Pearl Fields and the Oregon Meltdown