Episode 222: Writing and Reading Duologies

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Today on Fable and the Verbivore, we’re continuing our conversation on different types of stories by talking about reading and writing duology books.

These stories tend to be some of our favorites. In this episode, we’re talking about some characteristics of these stories and some of our favorite duologies including Six of Crows/Crooked Kingdom, We Hunt the Flame/We Free the Stars, and The Wrath of the Dawn/The Rose and the Dagger and a little of what we like most about them.

Throughout this discussion, we talk about the things that we like best about duologies. Like:

  • Their ability to explore characters more in depth than in a standalone story, more space also allows for a slightly bigger cast of characters

  • Unlike a trilogy, you don’t have to end in act two of the overarching story which typically is in a really dark place or can drag

  • In terms of structure, the first story in a duology typically ends at the midpoint of the overarching story — often having the first book plot wrap up in a satisfying way, before then leaving you on a cliffhanger with a surprising twist

  • The broader scope of the story and allowing space to dig deeper in with the themes and plots

Towards the end of our conversation, we talk about how the best duologies are really designed to be companion stories of each other and often contain mirror images contrasting the ending with the beginning. Our take is that in order to write solid duologies that feel conhesive, knowing where you are going can be imperative. In that, there’s definitely a benefit to either writing both stories together or engineering your ending to fit well with where your story begins.

We hope you enjoy this episode! We’ll continue this conversation next week talking about duologies.

Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,

Fable & The Verbivore

Notes:

We open by talking about writing and reading a duology vs. series vs. a standalone book. Here’s an article that breaks down the difference:

The Verbivore mentions Pixar’s Storytelling Rules. The rule is: “Number 7 - Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front.” Here is a link to them:

Here is our other conversation within this series:

Books Mentioned:

Music from:https://filmmusic.io
‘Friendly day’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com)
Licence: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

Bethany Stedman