The set-up for book two

These days, publishers want writers to produce a series of books.  It's rare that the first one takes off, and publishers want to tempt readers back to a second book with familiar characters. 

When I published Panthera : Death Spiral I did the same.  I wrote the first chapter of Panthera : Death Song and put it in the back of the first book.  The chapter has been referred to in one of the reviews of my book, and I've already had advance publicity for Death Song as a result.  

This first chapter should be the set-up for the next book, which means you have to get the characters' problem or challenge into that text.  There's no point in writing a leisurely beginning that doesn't tell the reader what the problem is.  This is the art of the set-up, but once you've put  it out there it ties you in to writing that particular book. 

With Eyemind, I'm about to submit it to Angry Robot in their open reading period, and I want a set-up for book two, but I don't want to tie myself in to the second book I've already written.  It's one of two possible stories, and I want to keep my options open and allow the publisher to choose either option.  This means making my set-up more vague than I planned.

I've solved this by having Uxiim, my Intel Chief, call Keri and ask her to go to a meeting, but refusing to tell her any detail about it over an unsecured com line.  That way, when she goes to the briefing, I can use the storyline of either follow-up book.  I get to keep my set-up to show there is a second book, but I also make it general enough to accommodate either storyline.  Result!