Sequels are tricky little creatures. Sometimes they arrive like an invited guest bearing dessert, and sometimes they show up unannounced, wearing muddy boots, asking where the snacks are. The question I am pondering today is, who gets to decide whether a book deserves—or even needs—a sequel?

My answer is simple… the writer does. The author. The artist. The person with the story rattling around inside them, refusing to sit quietly in the corner. Writers write as they dream, or at least that is what I believe. And who are the rest of us to say there is more—or no more—to someone else’s story?

That said, as readers, we certainly have opinions. Oh, do we ever. We finish a book, close the cover, stare into the distance, and think, “Excuse me, but I was not finished living there.” Some stories politely end. Others leave the porch light on and expect us to come back.

I have read books that come in threes, such as Nora Roberts’ Irish Born Trilogy, Born in Fire, Born in Ice, and Born in Shame… and her Cousins O’Dwyer Trilogy, which begins with Dark Witch and continues through Shadow Spell and Blood Magick. Each book leads us gently, and sometimes not so gently, into needing the next one. I do not think that is an accident. I think that is storytelling with a very good pair of walking shoes.

Some stories are one-and-done, and that is perfectly fine. Not every book needs to pack a suitcase and move into a series. But some stories have rooms we have not entered yet. Some have doors left cracked open, voices down the hallway, maps only half unfolded. Those are the ones that make us want more. Need more, even.

One of my favorite book series is Jean M. Auel’s Earth’s Children series. The Clan of the Cave Bear, published in 1980, led to five more books, with the final installment arriving in 2011. I waited for those books. I devoured them. I needed her to keep writing after I finished the first one.

Auel’s descriptive wordsmithing made me feel lost in time in the best possible way. I could sense the struggle, the love, the danger, the wonder of a world long before ours. That takes talent. Not just the kind that writes pretty sentences, but the kind that builds a world so completely that readers keep one foot in it long after dinner is cold and laundry has been ignored.

Of course, I have loved many series over the years. When I was young, The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew mysteries tweaked my imagination and made danger seem delightfully organized. Later, I was amazed by the Harry Potter series and the way one book after another pulled readers deeper into magic, friendship, and the serious business of choosing the right side.

But deciding which books need sequels? I suppose that remains a writer’s privilege. A reader may beg, plead, pace, and dramatically sigh near a bookshelf, but the writer is the one who knows whether the story still has breath in it.

I will admit, though, that I loved Scarlett, Alexandra Ripley’s sequel to Gone with the Wind, written long after Margaret Mitchell was gone. It gave me an adventurous dream of what might have happened after an ending I had known for so long. Was it necessary? Maybe not. Was I happy to go? Absolutely. Sometimes a sequel is less about necessity and more about being handed one more ticket to a place we thought we had already left.

So perhaps the real test is not whether a book “deserves” a sequel. Books do not stand before a literary court wearing tiny spectacles while we judge their worthiness. Maybe the better question is whether the story still has a pulse—and whether the writer still hears it beating.

I admire the tenacity, devotion, and creativity writers have when they continue stories of romance, mystery, magic, adventure, and everything in between. They keep our imaginations stretched and our dreams well stocked. They let us drift back into worlds we were not ready to leave.

And if an author decides the story is finished? Well, we can respect that. We can close the cover, sigh like civilized people, and move on.

Mostly.

Because somewhere, some reader is still whispering, “But what happened next?”