Question about series vs chapters

[FictionalName]

I am writing a chapter-based story, and I am wondering if I am doing it correctly. I've read a few stories that have hyperlinks at the bottom of the page for parts 1, 2, 3, etc. and I was wondering how I go about doing that. Is that what a series looks like? Or is that something I have to ask an Admin to do when I publish my work? I currently have 1 chapter published, 1 pending, and 1 draft as I am waiting to see how to proceed. I don't know if I should be submitting the chapters one at a time, or save up to have 3-4 chapters and submit them all at once? I've been looking around, and while there has been a lot of help here and on the site FAQ itself, I'm still confused by the process here. Any help y'all could give would be GREATLY appreciated! <3

 

[Ssbbw4u1974]

Idk but what I've done is;
After having one story published already, I've written another chapter and at the admin notes I wrote:
Please add this chapter to my story, "XYZ".

and it works

 

[FictionalName]

Oh okay! Thank you!

 

[StillStunned]

If the story title includes something like " Ch. 1" or "Part 1", this will automatically create a series. Your other alternative is to create one manually, under the "Series (Beta)" option in your control panel. These series have to be approved, which can take up to a few weeks (or longer, if you forget to actually submit the request, like I did). Then you can add whatever stories you want.

Once a story is part of a series, the series icon will show on the story page (three sheets of paper on top of each other). And all the way at the bottom, you'll see a sidebar saying "More stories in this series".

One thing to bear in mind with series is that people are less likely to click on anything that says "Chapter 2" or whatever, and even less likely the further into the series you are. Viewing numbers typically drop by about a half or two thirds between the first and second instalments.

What you can do is to give your stories similar names, to indicate that they belong together, without numbering the chapters. For instance, I have "Flesh for Fantasy", "Flesh for Another Fantasy", "Flesh for a Third Fantasy" etc. And "Too Cold Not to Fuck", "Too Hot Not to Fuck", "Too Early Not to Fuck" and so on. But these won't be automatically put into a series, you'll have to do it manually.

If you want to put hyperlinks to the other chapters in your story, you can do that with <a href=[https link]>TEXT</a>. Bear in mind that you can only link to pages on the Literotica website.

 

[FictionalName]

Ah shazbot, maybe I will do that for my subsequent chapters as I have already got my next one pending. Thank you for the insight!

Do you write these then as their own sort of short stories that are tangentially related to the last? Do you include a bit of a synopsis of the last entry before you start the next? Or do they read exactly like chapters would? Before I started submitting I didn't realize that there was a) an editing process and b) a significant delay between submitting and publishing. I don't mind that there are these things, but it is certainly making me rethink my approach to how I try to post here!

 

[StillStunned]

In those series, the instalments are pretty much stand-alone stories. There are references back to previous instalments, but they can be read without knowing what happened. I think that telling your readers up front that there are prior events they should be aware of is likely to turn them off. If you just begin with your story, they'll hopefully be drawn in and keep reading.

I included a short synopsis in another series, "The Rivals" (where the instalments are labelled Chapter 1, 2 etc.), but I kept it to an absolute minimum: "Author's note: For those of you who are joining us for the first time, here's the deal. She's a warrior woman who flies a giant bird. He's a scholar and explorer. There's mutual attraction, but some betrayal and anger as well. That's as much depth as there is to the story. Now let's get started!"

I'm not sure what you mean with "editing process": once you submit your story, the only thing that happens is that it's reviewed for approval or rejection. Any editing you'll have to do yourself, or with your own editor.

 

[FictionalName]

Right, I misspoke, I meant the approval/rejection. I suppose I should start combining chapters together and publishing them as a series of short stories then, in order to get the most people engaged and interested. I realized I may have a problem when I wanted to write a setup chapter that featured, like, no sex. Seems like a bad idea considering the place I'm posting to...