What Happens to Characters That We Love?

by Julie Coulter Bellon

I have been following a lawsuit involving J.D. Salinger, who was trying to stop the U.S. distribution of an unauthorized “sequel,” to his novel, “The Catcher in the Rye.” A Swedish author, writing under the pseudonym John David California, wrote a book called "60 Years Later, Coming Through the Rye." From the sounds of it, the book is quite similar to the famous Catcher in the Rye in the fact that it is sixty years later and the main character, “Mr. C” escapes from a nursing home and explores New York City, much like Holden Caulfield did in the original Catcher when he escapes an elite prep school and explores New York. The lawsuit has sparked quite a few discussions on copyright and whether someone can try to ride the coattails of a classic. The author of the sequel, whose real name is Frederik Colting was quoted as saying, “I wanted to explore what happens to characters. When a book is finished, do the characters cease to exist, or do they live on somehow?”

When we read books we love, I think we’ve all wondered that at some time or another. We all want to know what happened to the characters we identified with or came to love. I’ve seen a few other sequels to classics like Gone With the Wind and Pride and Prejudice, none of which seemed particularly wonderful to me because they couldn’t match the quality of writing and vision that the original author had, in my opinion. It got me thinking though, (I know, I know, maybe I should stop that). What if we were to write sequels to other works, and tell what happened sixty years later to characters or stories that we loved, like Mr. Colting did?

Nancy Drew—The Grandma Years, The Case of the Missing Eyeglasses




Where the Red Fern Grew Before They Built a Shopping Mall On It



Lord of the Flies—Return to the Island: Wheelchair Wars




The Work and the Glory Vol. 38—The Steeds Move to Tooele




Lord of the Rings—Gollum’s Grandson Gets Revenge



Twilight—Renesmee Goes To College





Do you have characters or stories that you would love to read in a sequel?