This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Last month we brought you books that had a sequel attached as an ebook novella. A few weeks before that we brought you books that had been published as ebook serials. This week, I'm fascinated to bring you – as I've only just discovered its A Thing – ebook novellas as a prequel to a traditionally published novel. Where have I been?! For a book nerd, this is nothing short of fabulous. The following are just five novellas or short stories with a tale that occurs before the novel.
1. Honeymoon in Paris as an ebook prequel novella to The Girl You Left Behind by Jojo Moyes – Honeymoon in Paris takes place a few years before the happenings in The Girl You Left Behind. It is set at a time when both couples from the novel, Sophie and Edouard during the First World War, and Liv and David almost a century later, have just married.
2. The Last Rose of Summer as a short story prequel to The Perfume Garden by Kate Lord Brown – This very short story prequel is about Liberty when she meets John, the love of her life, at an abandoned house in Spain during the Festival of San Juan.
3. Don't Tell Penny as an ebook prequel novella to Don't Tell the Groom by Anna Bell – In Don't Tell Penny, Penny tells her friend Lou that she thinks her boyfriend Mark is about to propose, but Lou wonders if that really is the case. It appears that marriage is not actually on Mark's mind. Unfortunately, Penny has failed to notice.
4. Where There's Smoke and Larger Than Life consists of not one but two ebook prequel novellas to Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult – Leaving Time, Jodi Picoult's new novel (out October 14 in US, Canada and Australia and November 4 in the UK) has two prequel ebook novellas. Where There's Smoke introduces Serenity Jones, one of the three narrators from Leaving Time. Serenity is a psychic whose efforts to boost ratings have compromised her clairvoyant instincts. In Larger Than Life, we find out more about Alice, the character at the centre of Leaving Time. She's a researcher studying memory in elephants on a game reserve in Botswana.5. The First Lie as a prequel ebook novella to Necessary Lies by Diane Chamberlain – Setting the scene for Necessary Lies this novella is set in 1958 in rural North Carolina. Thirteen year old Ivy Hart lives there. Life is hard but she likes to have adventures. Then Ivy's sister gives birth and suddenly everything changes.
How do you feel about novella prequels? Do they add more to the main novel for you? Can you think of any others I should try?