Today’s work read was the first in what I think will be an awesome fantasy series. So of course I’m disappointed that I’m going to have to wait who-knows-how-long for the next one, and the next one, and however many more there might be.
I don’t have a hard and fast rule about reading series. Mostly, however, I prefer to wait until I know that things are completed and done. I have heard all the Robert Jordan/Wheel of Time horror stories, and I’m glad I never started. I really hope George RR Martin keeps his cholesterol down so he can finish Song of Ice and Fire, though I don’t regret having started them already.
Trilogy readers, what’s your opinion on things? How do you handle it when a favorite author starts a new series?
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7 responses so far ↓
1 Brad K. // Jun 20, 2007 at 7:03 am
Robert Asprin’s Myth Adventures was a delight when I found the first three. Then agony as the next three came out, a rationed 24 months apart. But then I think I liked the fractured quotes on the chapters as much as the story!
Elizabeth Moon’s SheepFarmer’s Daughter was a wonderment. Thankfully, the kind people at Future Fantasy in Palo Alto, CA, recommended I not start the second until I had the third in hand. Agony waiting, but sound advice for this very strong novel/sequence. I have read the trilogy at least six (6) times since then, along with the others that came out based on the first three.
Mostly I take a book as it comes available. Re-reading, I will locate all the volumes first, then dig in. I often re-read the first volumes as each new entry is release, before reading the new one.
2 Imani // Jun 20, 2007 at 2:46 pm
Hmm. None of my favourite authors are really series writers. They do trilogies, maybe quartets (is that the right word?) but no looong series. Which is a good thing because I hate ‘em, except for romance because I know the authors will finish it and the writers are young enough that I don’t have to worry about their cholesterol levels.
3 Superfast Reader // Jun 20, 2007 at 3:11 pm
I think it’s mainly a problem in the fantasy/scifi world… though I don’t read romance so maybe it happens there, too.
4 Shari // Jun 21, 2007 at 9:06 pm
I like to wait until at least the 2nd book is out/available at the library. Unless of course, I’ve found nothing better. I’ve heard the bad stories of Robert Jordan too and stayed away. Here’s a question, how many books do you think you can stay with a series? 5,7, more?
5 Superfast Reader // Jun 21, 2007 at 9:24 pm
Hey Shari!!
I think 7 is reasonable, if the series is a good one & the world original. At a certain point I definitely want things to end, though.
6 Brad K. // Jun 22, 2007 at 2:18 am
I think the longest series I stuck with was the enjoyable ‘Honor Harrington’ books, David Weber. I don’t recall what particularly moved me to pick up ‘On Basilisk Station’, the first one. Possibly I was so please with Weber’s ‘Mutineer’s Moon’ — but the Harrington books are great. It is tough to say how long the series is, since there are serious branches in the story line, and a few collections of short stories featuring different authors written in the story world (’Worlds of Honor’, vol 1-4 that I have read).
I picked up three or four each of Lydia Adamson’s ‘Dr. Nightingale’ and ‘the cat’ series’. Not really a series, each is a fluff mystery story, young female professional heroine. Pleasant release. I do look for any of Kelley Armstrong’s books. Light macabre/parapsychic, good writing.
C.J. Cherryh’s ‘Pride of Chanur’ series was way too short, at four novels plus the spinoff ‘Chanur’s Legacy’.
I am re-reading Christopher Rowley’s ‘Bazil Broketail’ series at the moment. Just finished Pierce’s ‘Magic Circle’ and ‘The Circle Opens’ quartets.
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