Hmm, I don't know if I agree about swallows and Amazons being sequels. (I still have all of them upstairs, though I have never actually read Great Northern for some reason). The books are all very standalone and feel more like a crime series with the same detective rather than sequels. The characters also do not really develop apart from Roger getting a bit older. Think how interesting it would be if John and Nancy (or Susan and Peggy) sneaked off together sometimes.
You’re right about the characters, but the books do have a world with a chronology (except for the ones that don’t). Great Northern is my least favourite of them. Agree that John and Nancy at least are teenagers and the lack of interest is striking to an adult reader. What also struck me rereading them as an adult was how both John and Roger would have been in the navy by 1939.
Not sure a chronology makes it a sequel. George Bellair's Inspector Littlejohn series of detective books (56 of them!) has a definite chronology and a world view but they are definitely not sequels. Note I'm not trying to be difficult here, I'm really trying to get at what makes something a sequel and I'm struggling to pin it down to my satisfaction. Mind I only read crappy detective stories these days so I may be compromised wrt to classification :-) My feeling at the moment is that somehow the plot must carry forward from the previous book, but the books should also be able to stand alone at least a bit. If one ends with a cliffhanger that is resolved in the next that feels more like a part-work than a sequel. LoTR to me is just one hulking great book and it really doesn't feel like a sequel to the Hobbit.
Susan and Nancy and John and Peggy would work better.
Hmm, I don't know if I agree about swallows and Amazons being sequels. (I still have all of them upstairs, though I have never actually read Great Northern for some reason). The books are all very standalone and feel more like a crime series with the same detective rather than sequels. The characters also do not really develop apart from Roger getting a bit older. Think how interesting it would be if John and Nancy (or Susan and Peggy) sneaked off together sometimes.
You’re right about the characters, but the books do have a world with a chronology (except for the ones that don’t). Great Northern is my least favourite of them. Agree that John and Nancy at least are teenagers and the lack of interest is striking to an adult reader. What also struck me rereading them as an adult was how both John and Roger would have been in the navy by 1939.
Not sure a chronology makes it a sequel. George Bellair's Inspector Littlejohn series of detective books (56 of them!) has a definite chronology and a world view but they are definitely not sequels. Note I'm not trying to be difficult here, I'm really trying to get at what makes something a sequel and I'm struggling to pin it down to my satisfaction. Mind I only read crappy detective stories these days so I may be compromised wrt to classification :-) My feeling at the moment is that somehow the plot must carry forward from the previous book, but the books should also be able to stand alone at least a bit. If one ends with a cliffhanger that is resolved in the next that feels more like a part-work than a sequel. LoTR to me is just one hulking great book and it really doesn't feel like a sequel to the Hobbit.