Just this week I reread two of Stephanie Laurens’ shorter books, both originally published as Harlequin Historicals, Fair Juno and A Comfortable Wife, and noticed something. There were scattered plot devices/elements in both of them that show up in several of the Cynster stories and yet they are by no means the same story.
That got me to thinking about how authors choose to explore various topics again and again without actually telling the same story. The only other author I’ve really made special note of doing this is Jayne Ann Krentz but I’m sure others do. Maybe it’s more noticeable with her because she has so many books on her backlist.
To me, this recognizable recurrence of the use of favorite elements and devices is something like an author’s fingerprint and is almost a comfort factor when I like the author, but would not the reverse also be true and maybe claims of authors producing the same book over and over might be more linked to reader discomfort with an author’s favorites?