There is no right or wrong answer to whether you should write a stand-alone or a series of books. The determining factors are your readership, your purpose in writing and your time to get things done.

If you are looking for demographics to read your series, you should look to people who are avid readers; those men and women who put reading above many other activities. People with lasting attention spans who fall in love with your characters and want to spend more time with them in the future. Authors who have successfully engaged their readers are names like J.K. Rowling and James Patterson.

People with short-attention-spans, teachers, and busy people are less likely to choose a book that takes more than one cover to complete. If your readers are students, teenagers in general, or traveling executives, then the stand-alone choice is for you. Authors who have successfully written stand-alone titles are people like Stephen King and Ray Bradbury.

Regardless of whether you write stand-alone or series books, be aware of your own time. Do you have the wherewithal to write a long-term series, or are you more the one-hit-at-a-time type? If you are the latter, do not venture into a series unless you know how it is going to end before you begin. If you start and do not finish a series, your readers will not thank you. Instead, they will take the time to write a horrible review about how you left them hanging and did not give them an adequate conclusion.

One word - Misery. If you know this King classic, you know what can happen if your avid readers and fans learn that you have not done things the way they expect. None of us want to be kidnapped and hobbled, do we?