Many authors who write book series, James Patterson, Janet Evanovich and Sue Grafton, to name a few, have written books that have common words in them. Patterson uses the word ‘Cross’, as in his character, Alex Cross, in such books as Cross My Heart, Cross Country, etc. Interestingly enough, however, he started out titling his Alex Cross books with nursery rhyme references like Along Came a Spider and Jack and Jill. 

Janet Evanovich uses numbers for her Stephanie Plum novels. She started with One for the Money and is about to release Hardcore Twenty Four. Sue Grafton used the more limiting letter scheme for her titles. Starting with A is for Alibi, she is now about to release Y is for Yesterday. Having titles like these for a series is a great marketing idea and, in the case of Evanovich and Grafton, it gives you an idea…