Everyone gets annoyed when someone flubs the continuity in an ongoing series. Fans will shout, “But that’s not what you all said back in Issue/Episode/Movie #X!” From the outside, it looks simple enough to keep track of established facts of your universe.
Well, I have sympathy for all those poor bastards working in long running universes (Star Trek anyone) because it’s damn hard keeping my own continuity straight in my Hostile Takeover universe, and it’s only three books, and I wrote the whole thing. Just as far as setting goes; the first trilogy had about eighty planets established, 32 that were mentioned directly in the text. I’ve had to put together a little database just to keep track of them. Not to mention all the historical details. . .
It ain’t easy.
1 Comment
aeros51 · September 20, 2007 at 11:55 pm
As fans, we have simple needs, and in fact you can reduce it down to one simple requirement to keep in mind while you write: we demand PERFECTION! 😀
Joking aside, I quite understand, especially as I age, the difficulty in trying to remember what I did the day before, much less what I may have written a decade ago. I have yet read a series of books that was able to maintain perfect continuity throughout. At least your apparant frustration shows you are trying to keep continuity. Many authors who come back to writing about a universe don’t even make the attempt.
aeros51
(in the cheering section)
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