I started reading a new-to-me mystery series book, and it was interesting enough that when I was done, I looked to see what else was available, which was when I realized I’d read number nineteen in a thirty-seven book series.
THIRTY-SEVEN????
The mind boggles. It’s all I can do to keep a three book series interesting (well, Bob helps a lot by shooting people and blowing things up), I can’t imagine trying to keep characters arcing for thirty-seven books. But having read the next two, I want to go on. For one thing, the protagonist just adopted a wild cat. I want to see what happens with that cat.
(Note to self: Add wildcat to next book.)
So I have questions for serious readers (aka Argh):
• Do you prefer limited series (say, three books) or long-running series? Why?
• At what point do you abandon a series? What makes you stop reading?
• What makes you keep reading a series even if it goes on forever?
• If you pick up a book that’s a middle publication in a series, do you go back and start over with the first or push on?
• In general, do you prefer series books to one-offs? Why?
(Asking for a friend.)
As always, we thank you for your support. And patience.
Edited to add: I’ve just discovered that the original author only wrote the first thirty-three of the series. Someone else picked it up and wrote the last four. Thirty-three is still a lot, and it wasn’t her only series. I’m in awe.
143 Responses
As long as it stays interesting I don’t care whether it’s a series or not. I do find that series tend to get awfully same-y. I have quit on the “in Death” series even though I still reread the early ones. I have also started series in the middle either without knowing they were a series or else the library didn’t have them all (Corinna Chapman) and gone back to pick up the early ones. I abandon them whenever I get bored. (Not something I anticipate happening with you and Bob.)
• Do you prefer limited series (say, three books) or long-running series? Why?
It depends. In a straight romance series, the author has to keep pairing off new protagonists in each book and to me that quickly grows excessively contrived. By contrast, in many mystery series, with Meg Langslow as an extreme example, you have a slow-burn romance as a subplot, but eventually the couple marries and it turns into a straight mystery series. Some science fiction series, naval fiction series, other kinds of historical, etc. , follow the entire career of a protagonist—Flandry in Poul Anderson; Lord Darcy (Randall Garrett) to some extent; Hornblower; Aubrey-Marurin. 1632 had a sort of through line written mostly by Flint (which only got up to 1637 by his death) plus near infinite offshoots sharing the setup but few characters (like some romance series). A series can also have a strong background arc or can nearly repeat a la Groundhog Day—Perry Mason, much of Sherlock Holmes, etc., what has been called a template series. I think less popular now than it once was.
(Posting this much to start. )
Maturin, not Marurin.
I see I didn’t really answer the preference part of the question. Too many variables to answer, I think. Heinlein never wrote series with the same protagonists (possible except for Lazarus Long, but better to pretend that everything Heinlein wrote after 1966 doesn’t exist) and he only rarely had overlapping characters (but did have a common background for many works in the Future History series). I like a lot of early and middle Heinlein. I also like Poul Anderson’s various series with continuing characters. And many of his one-shots. I like Bujold’s series. I like Heyer’s romances with only a few continuing characters and no continuing protagonists.
It’s not only mystery series that can have a slow burn romance that a few books later leads to marriage, with afterward some marital issues but no longer classical romance. Jack Campbell’s Lost Fleet series, for instance.
Jenny, is there any chance you could tell us what series this is?
I want to read about it wild cat!
It was MC Beaton’s Hamish Macbeth series. I think the cat shows up at the end of Book 20 in the epilogue, and it’s still there at the beginning of Book 21 (Death of a Dreamer) which I just started to see what became of the cat. The cat, you will be happy to know, is just fine and sleeping on Hamish’s bed.
Patrick’s comment about slow burn romances applies here, except he has several of them running with Hamish, which is interesting but . . . 37 books?
I feel a need to read the last one to see if he ever marries any of them. Also, every woman in these books so far (two) has been hipped on marriage. I should look at the publication dates, although they are set in a very small, very old-fashioned town in the Scottish Highlands. I’ve enjoyed the first two, but I’m still mind-boggled by thirty-seven.
Oh, and all of the ones I’ve read have been on Kindle Unlimited, so if you have that, you’re home free to check on the cat.
Edited to add: M C Beaton only wrote thirty-three of the novels; she died in 2019.
I tried the first couple of books in that particular series and just couldn’t get into them. But apparently BBC made it into a TV series, so I might try that.
Deborah, I tried the BBC series and that that the story lines did not age well. I dropped it aftertwo episodes.
I didn’t realize MC Beaton (Marion Chesney) had died. I read a lot of her regencies a long time ago, plus the first few of the Agatha Raisin books, but I found that what was fun in small doses became annoying in larger doses. (Also, I really hate the trope of “desperate woman chasing a man in stupid ways, despite being a very smart/competent woman,” which features heavily in the Agatha Raisin books I read—I can overlook it if the rest is good, but when repeated, it became too much to overlook.)
If anyone’s interested, the Hamish MacBeth series was turned into a tv show starring Robert Carlyle. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamish_Macbeth_(TV_series) I haven’t watched it, but I believe it got good reviews. It’s apparently available to watch on Tubi, Amazon, Acorn, and Britbox, etc.
I really enjoyed Marion Chesney’s romances but couldn’t stand Agatha Raisin. I never tried the Hamish MacBeth series.
So, one reason to abandon a series, didn’t like the characters or the direction the author took the characters.
I almost abandoned the Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series because she ended book 2 wrong. (I believe just so she could put book 3 in there.) Only due to a trustworthy friend did I continue. I still believe the ending was WRONG. (He should have trusted her as the solution was so blatantly obvious. Emerson would have believed Peabody. Also apologies if no one gets my references,)
Same here.
(What happened to the rest of my post? It should be: Same here. Could not stand Agatha Raisin so never tried Hamish McBeth.)
Couldn’t stand Agatha Raisin either after I read the first few too, for just the same reasons Gin.
I did watch the BBC Hamish MacBeth series when it first came out and really enjoyed it – it might have been of its time and also place. The highland village is now a major tourist destination but is incredibly small and overrun now. The books I found harder and gave up after a few.
• At what point do you abandon a series? What makes you stop reading?
I think the most frequent reason is excessive sameness between books. I consciously decided to leave the In Death series because I got tired of killers killing mostly women in mostly horrible ways.
Cumulative annoyance at a screwed up background will also do it. Robb’s carelessness about the (imagined future) background eventually also got to me. I’ve pretty much given up the Lord Julian series because of the utter disregard of the supposed historical background, partly biggies such as completely ignoring the Year Without a Summer, but also cumulative little things such as American ham rather than English mutton for Easter dinner or not realizing that the C of E was distinctly Low Church for the most part in the Regency, before the Oxford Movement.
Alternatively, sometimes I lapse from a series more from not having seen the latest books or from having been distracted when they came out and never having gotten back to them. Maybe my public library stopped buying the series. I may restart reading a series like that when I see it again or I may decide I’m not in the same head space any more.
re the “In Death” series – same here. I hate serial killers and I hate books about serial killers. “In Death” had too many of them, especially considering the first umpty-nine books were all supposedly taking place within a couple of years of story-universe time.
I still read In Death; her murderers got boring (although I am willing to believe a big city has many serial killers) but her characters keep developing and I like her sense of humor. I am glad she’s sort of gotten back to garden variety murders instead of implausible plots. And I have some sympathy for her predictions for the future coming smack against the reality of that future 30 years after the first book.
You have pinned down what has made me let go of Lord Julian. He lives in some alternate world Regency where only the dates are the same.
• What makes you keep reading a series even if it goes on forever?
The author has to keep things fresh somehow. Andrews does this in Meg Langslow at least partly by aging the characters (although slower than the calendar, and although her grandfather has been stalled out at 90 from the start and seems to be getting younger if anything). The twins weren’t born at the start and are now in their early teens. Chief Burke used to be suspicious of Meg and is now friendly. Meg has more license to meddle because of her job as assistant to the mayor. Also, in a mystery series, there pretty much has to be resolution delivered in every book, and there is.
Jack Campbell may be losing steam with the Lost Fleet series. He’s also written completely outside it and has resorted to to the spinoff Lost Stars series and to prequels set centuries earlier. But the main series is divided into subseries with resolutions for the subseries as well as for the individual novels. On his website Campbell says he will come back to the series only if and when he can think of a good new storyline, which by this time has gotten difficult. But he has managed it pretty well for something like 30 books at this point.
• If you pick up a book that’s a middle publication in a series, do you go back and start over with the first or push on?
When I was dependent on physical books on the library or on what showed up on the paperback racks, I often pushed on, or only filled in from reprints or physical used book stores as opportunity arose. The internet has made it much easier to start from the beginning, so I will often, but not always, do that. Less often if the series does not have much of a background arc, i.e, is more nearly a template series.
• In general, do you prefer series books to one-offs? Why?
I think I answered this under other headings. (With “it depends.”) I will also say that usually but not always, a given writer’s one-offs have enough commonality book to book that they retain some of the same familiarity that a series does.
Hmm I prefer limited series unless the long-running series has a fantastic world, like great support characters that makes you want to hang around. Long running series can get a bit samey otherwise. On the other hand I read a whole series about detective cats, without remembering or caring about the mystery as I loved the town and characters
I abandoned a series, when they stopped publishing the books in the UK. I loved the UK cover, the US one didn’t resonate me, also I read the next book and the reason they dropped her was the author stopped being coherent, I think she must have lost an editor as her story was all over the place
I stop reading, when it stops being fun, once when they replaced the co-author and the replacement didn’t even bother to read the original books. I need a series to have good continuity
I will read a series to the end as long as they keep it interesting, character development, satisfying conclusion. Knowing they’re not milking it to make it last.
I might start a series, if the mid publication book is good, if the story isn’t wonderful, might just read on to see how it ends without investing in the beginning
I like one offs, also some series books should have enough info to be stand alone to get people interested. A series is a big investment of time, so they have to be better, establish the world and make me love it
I have read some long-running series, even when my experience of particular books varied, if I was thoroughly invested in the main characters. In this category: the Amelia Peabody mysteries, which I think got better and better right up to the last one Elizabeth Peters wrote, because at a certain point she decided to take the historical context seriously. Also the Mary Russell books by Laurie R. King. I don’t adore them all, but the world is so thoroughly imagined and the central relationship so compelling that I keep going back. I continue reading the Speedwell & Stoker series by Deanna Raybourn, despite the central relationship being derivative of Peabody & Emerson, because it’s so refreshing to see central characters whose chief interests are intellectual BUT whose milieu is not academia. I buy them on sale, though. I read the Maggie Sullivan mysteries by M. Ruth Myers, and the Holmes books by Nicholas Meyer, and of course I have read everything by Dick Francis and Ngaio Marsh.
I read lots of romance mini-series of many flavors. Typically 3 to 6 books sharing a setting, or a friend group, or some other self-limiting factor. These need to be tied up before they start getting ridiculous, e.g. importing a new character who exists for the sole purpose of pairing off that last person in the original group, or taking a whole chapter to bring the reader up to date on what the rest of the group is doing, or using a whole chapter to tease the next in series. That’s just annoying.
I haven’t found many writers doing what I perceive myself to be doing, which is writing a sprawling real-world-ish story universe with multiple settings within which characters cross over and interact. I think of my world as a series because there is a timeline, various characters’ events are firmly placed on it, a lot of characters know each other, and several events have consequences in multiple storylines. No story is an island, not even the one set in part on a South Pacific island. 🙂
There’s a bit of that in your books, Jenny, which is one of the many things I enjoy about them. They are real-world-ish and taking place in a limited geographic area: it’s logical that some characters would cross between various story subsets.
I abandon a book if, having given it a fair shot, I determine it’s a waste of my time due to predictability, unlikeability, or plain poor writing. I abandon a series if the preponderance of plotlines involve devices I dislike (see: In Death) or the same gags keep turning up (see: Lady Sherlock).
If I read a book I’m really impressed with and it’s part of a series, I’d probably try another in series to weigh the benefit of reading the rest. A lot would depend on the series setting and themes. I tend to try new authors quite often. If I think the writing in a series book is marginal *or* the setting is something I just don’t care for (motorcycle clubs, mafia, hockey), I’m more likely to go to the next new author.
In romance, I’d say I prefer single title or short-series approaches versus a long series (I have read only one Bridgerton), unless the long series were constructed like mine. Ha! That’s why I’m writing the damn things. 🙂
In fairness to Barbara Meertz aka Elizabeth Peters she got her PhD in Egyptology long before she wrote the first Amelia Peabody. I think as time went on she trusted her readers to care more about it.
I love that series and also her Vicky Bliss books, probably in no small part because she introduced me to my now favorite medieval sculptor Tilman Riemanschneider.
Oh, yes. Her history and art history was always solid, which is what initially hooked me.
Oh, chacha1, my reaction to the Peabody mysteries was exactly the opposite! Without the romance to draw me in, I didn’t have the patience to pay enough attention to the mystery. I considered Elizabeth Peters one of my favorite authors for many years, but I much preferred the single titles like Legend in Green Velvet or Summer of the Dragon.
To me, a series is a big investment of time only if it has a very important background arc, or in extreme cases if each volume does not really come to a resolution. Far from demanding investment, some series are not even written in internal chronological order, such as Penric or Hornblower. Especially some older template series such as Perry Mason or Sherlock Holmes (the Doyle originals, not the various continuations) have next to no background arc. A reader can walk away at any point.
That should have been a response to Kay.
For some reason A Second Chance in Taylor’s The Chronicles of St Mary’s is currently 99¢ at US Kindle. I don’t know for how long.
Repeated from earlier for greater visibility. I just rechecked and price still holds. I haven’t made up mind about the series but some here really like it.
I think there are three types of series in my head:
1) Plot / character arc: have to be read together, really one story in multiple volumes
2) Episodic: each has a separate plot arc, can be read in any order
3) Interludes: we pop into a character’s life while something is going on. Life progresses but generally doesn’t have a strong series arc.
Happy to read any number of the second and third types as long as they’re interesting, but the first one should be no longer than three books, and I really prefer romances to be one and done, although there are exceptions. I particularly hate when the HEA of one arc is broken to set up the next arc (e.g. Star Wars). I also dislike it when there is a different love interest for an ongoing protagonist in each and every book, particularly if each book presents that pairing as the protagonist’s “one true love”.
I also really like stand-alones. I tend to alternate if I’ve read too many of one in a row.
If I pick up a book mid-series and like it, sometimes I’ll go back to the beginning, sometimes I’ll read the one immediately preceding. With some series the first book is so poor I wonder how I ever came to read the rest of the series.
I also hate when HEAs are broken to further a series. Or even a breakup of a functioning marriage such as Mammay did between first and second Planetside books. And then hasn’t even followed up with any unambiguous new relationships.
Sometimes coming in mid-series works well, when characters change love interests. I think one of the reasons I like the St Cyr mystery series that I came in at the beginning of the protagonist’s second love interest (whom he ends up marrying), so when I went back and read the first few books I wasn’t expecting the relationship with his first love to work out.
I particularly hate three volume romances where they get together in the first book, fall apart in the second and get back together in the third. Just makes me feel like I’ve been jerked around.
I read lots of long series.
Balogh, Bujold and Pratchett come to mind as examples of three very different ways of constructing long series. Bujold is mostly showing the character arc of Miles and making him deal with lots of challenging conflicts. Balogh does a number of related characters and then pivots to a new set in the same world. Pratchett has a number of miniseries within tbe bigger series so we can watch various characters and various challenges/ conflicts.
But I also like standalones and short series.
I drop a series when the author starts phoning it in. Two authors who I thought did some of the greatest historical romances, confronting the real challenges of love in their time, then started getting repetitive, are Connie Brockway and Laura Lee Guhrke.
An overbroad generalization would be that I will read a series when I want to know what happens to the main character or a handful of characters and how they develop. That’s why long series of romances with different characters don’t generally work well. But Balogh makes it work.
I think Bujold’s Vorkosigan saga is the only long running series that I love because her characters evolve so much. My favourite Miles book is right bang in the middle: Memory. That’s the point when he turns thirty and basically grows up properly.
Bujold designed it so that you can read any book as a standalone which doesn’t work for a lot series.
My first read of the series was The Warrior apprentice when it came out so I have read the series in publication order from the start. It is not quite the chronological order but it worked fine for me.
People in my book club who hadn’t read several Vorkosiverse books already tended not to like the later books that were selected. Although they could understand the plots, they evidently worked less well without the resonances from earlier. Probably best either to start from the beginning or to come in later but read several books before deciding against the series.
Similarly, you don’t have to start Aubrey-Maturin from the beginning (I didn’t) but people appreciate the depth of the series more after several books, and likely it would be ideal to start at the beginning.
Also, I like the Vorkosigan books more unreservedly from Memory on, so that might be a good entry point, if you stick with the next several books and are not discouraged like some book club members were.
I tell people to start with Memory.
Bujold’s Miles series is definitely an example of one that really worked, probably because there was major character growth in Miles, and you also got books about some of the fascinating side characters, like Cordelia. Also helps she’s just an amazing writer.
I don’t have any preference between either stand-alone books or series, I just keep reading authors I like, unless I stop enjoying their work.
I think a lot of the popularity of series comes from writers rather than readers. Once you’re built up a background, whether characters or setting, why throw it away after one book? Admittedly, after a while maintaining continuity and freshness may cost more than the savings in background construction, but most authors can manage five or ten books. To be sure, there is also reader and publisher demand, especially for very successful series.
Bah! “Once you’ve…”
I’ll read one-offs, short series and a few long series. Some of the long series I’ve dropped when they’ve pretty much run out of steam or become too repetitive. Ones I’ve liked are Pratchett (of course) Donna Andrews, Jodi Taylor and Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peabody. Most of those have a great community surrounding the mains., not so minor characters that can come forward of fall back as the plot requires.
Generally, I like planned shorter series, especially in romance or science fiction. One-offs are always great.
I’ll read something in the middle of a series and if I enjoy it, I’ll go back and read from the beginning. I have no problem leaving something at the one middle book.
I’m probably pretty much in line with everyone else-read what is enjoyable and when it no longer ‘sparks joy’ move on.
C.J. Cherryh’s “Foreigner “ series is up to 22. She writes in an arc of 3 books. One way she keeps things fresh is people age and politics flex. Humans have landed in unknown space, find a planet with alien life, fight over staying or going. Crew and passengers split (trouble down the line), passengers land, make friends (bad word), fight a war, make peace that only allows one human contact, our boy Bren is the interpreter. She also has several series that overlap to some degree. I believe the galaxy ranging different series are coming to a juncture. Downbelow (Hugo award winner) I consider the start. Humans went to space, spread out, fought amongst themselves and stumbled across aliens and caused problems. Not to mention the split among humans. Cyteen (also Hugo winner) They are the enemy in Downbelow humans who believe in cloning and overthrowing loyal earth stations, they have no problem with sabotage. The “Chanur” series features space faring aliens including the Ha(but only females leading to problems). A lone male human is a prisoner with valuable knowledge as he is an unknown species. The various species all want to lay hands on him. There are 5 books in that series. As Pyanfar says “it’s bad when your enemies are more trustworthy than your own species. Politics can mess things up. A treaty at the end with humans withdrawing at the end leaving Tully behind. A new series “Alliance “ (2 so far), so called the hinter stars which are the oldest of the human stations and rapidly being bypassed and hanging on by a thread. Those pesky politics again! Which brings me back to Foreigner. They are told there is trouble further out by an unknown species who wage war. A few books later a lone human captive meets with Bren who sends him away. She also has stand alone books populating this space. It’s a vast overview of humanity spreading out, upending traditional politics and fighting. Meanwhile Earth feels they still control all humans in space and are willing to sabotage and fight to prove it. I have all in hardback, ebook and audio. Yes she is one of my favorite authors.
These are all SF, her fantasy is a completely different style.
I haven’t read C.J. Cherryh in years. Maybe I should again.
I do remember enjoying enormously one of her Fantasy books set in an alternate Venice. I can’t remember the title or the plot though. Merchant houses, arranged marriages and women kept in seclusion… that’s about it.
I think you are referring to Angle With The Sword. Another fantasy series by her is the Fortress series. Paladin is also fun and a one off. What I find interesting is her different writing styles. Fantasy is flowing, SF is tight and faster moving. I love both. She has military sf ie Rimrunners and others part of the Downbelow Station world. The action is based on the individual choices and ethics, usually working around the politics of leadership.
I’ll keep reading a long running series as long as the characters and scenery are fresh and the author doesn’t get too repetitive. Some authors give all their characters the same personality and the plots are too similar.
Suzanne Brockmann kept her Troubleshooters series fresh by expanding her world and developing secondary characters (and moving previously primary characters to secondary and yet keeping them interesting).
Nalini Singh’s Psy-Changelings I still anticipate and read new releases, but they’re less memorable as individual stories and more as the entire world.
I used to read a lot of mysteries and only recently picked up detective series again. Lord Julian isn’t a great example, especially because the romance aspect is not getting anywhere (though there was a whole bucket of wtf in the last one, so maybe the relationship will grow).
But overall for detective series, I prefer to read in order and fit there to be character growth and change, but be able to read them out of order.
I recently read Michael Nava’s lawyer/mystery series and maybe it helped that he took a few years to write each book, but they generally felt like we were checking in with Henry Rios in a slightly different phase of his life while he got dragged into some big case. It is a couple of years later and things have gone wrong in a new way and he has new allies and enemies and his relationship isn’t going well right now or whatever.
I love both long series and trilogies. The former are far harder to pull off well, and in my experience most long series deteriorate sooner or later.
I’ll stop reading a series if it gets too samey, if the author is just treading the same ground over and over again and nothing is ever resolved. So I want a good solid arc for each book. I’ll also stop if it gets too ridiculous, as has happened in some supernatural series, where the heroine/protagonist ends up with more and more extraordinary powers, and every possible supernatural being lusting after her.
I’ll keep reading if the characters are great, if the character development continues (and doesn’t get absurd), and if each book is solid on its own. I also appreciate it if the author takes some risks instead of getting too comfortable. Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin Napoleonic seafaring series is a great example. So is Reginald Hill’s Dalziel and Pascoe.
If I pick up a book that’s in the middle of a series, and love it, I’ll usually go back to the first one, because I want to know the origin story.
I do love series, because the entry point is lower. I already know the characters, I know the world, I know there’s a really good chance that I’m going to like the book if I’ve loved all the ones in the series beforehand.
Lol. I keep being reminded of series that I tried and quit, while reading everyone’s comments. Sookie Stackhouse was like this for me. Every. Single. Male was in love with her.
And I had a friend who was into Anita Blake. It was always to dark for me, but she gave up in disappointment too. Said the author lost her mind.
Yeah, unfortunately once Anita Blake became “so much polyamory I can’t keep track of them all,” I quit. It was too much, not actually fun, and I felt terrible for someone who was all, “the longest I can go without having sex is twelve hours now.” HATED THAT PLOT DEVELOPMENT of mandatory constant sex. Couldn’t she just leave that with the Merry series?
Yes, Anita Blake was one of the series I was thinking of when I made that comment. The whole thing just became ridiculous, and at the same time, the author was complaining online because writing these books took her to ‘such dark places’. It seemed to me there was a fairly simple solution for that!
LOL, I have friends who like Anita Blake before the polyamory thing and friends who like it after – and I think I’m the only one who likes books in both periods although I think the more recent ones are less consistent and looking at my book log I haven’t read Anita Blake in a decade. Stopped Merry Gentry after Sholto was killed 🙁
I pick the books that interest me most, whether they’re a series or not. That said, I read primarily for characters, so it’s a bonus for me when I can spend more time with the ones I like. Plus, it’s a lower entry point, like Lian said (although I guess it’s a higher entry point for new readers to go find the earlier books.)
I like to start from the beginning. I will read a long series until I’m not enjoying the characters anymore. Sometimes that’s because of inertia and not having the decision power to spare to find and start something new. (I’m often reading older series where I can easily get the next one from the library as I need it.)
I do think shorter series are often more deliberately or carefully crafted. Maybe for the long ones it’s more like Star Trek, where it changes as you go? I’ve heard of authors planning stuff way out, but I’ve never tried it.
The only long series I really have read was Pratchett’s Discworld. But in them he actually breaks it up into separate series. And some standalones. Other than that, I think 3 to 5 books are enough and probably three actually.
The character Stephanie Plum comes to mind for me. I realized one of her stories was #something and I had to go back and start at the beginning. When it got to double digits and she couldn’t make up her mind I quit.
But then there’s the In Death series. I now find myself on hold at the library for the latest and I haven’t read any leading up to it. So, I’m no help.
I was waiting for Stephanie Plum to come up. When they keep on making the same mistakes over and over. Grow up already. I also did the math and realized Grandma was around 75, and her knees hung down to her ankles and her breasts hung down to her knees. I gave up at 8.
I read Jayne Anne Krentz, Jayne Castle and Amanda Quick; are those considered series? I’ve read Bridgerton , but skipped 1/3 of one.
I’m a limited series reader. My favorite length is three books. I’ve gone as many as nine, I believe. For example Cindy Dee’s Medusa series.
The alphabet series by Grafton, I read about to D, and then it was like okay, I get it. I’m done. And it wasn’t that the books weren’t enjoyable. I just was done with that series.
If the writer is excellent (Bujold, Greenwood, Stou, Crusie) I am happy to keep reading as long as they keep having good ideas.
Books where the author has set them in a town and we work through the inhabitants or a set of sisters I find mostly blah- so often the main character of book one is very cardboard in book two, and I sometimes feel the only reason we are calling heroine 2 “Betty” is to fit it into the “series” not because there is any real carryover. Exceptions to this are Joanna Bourne (whose characters are unbelievably amazing but satisfying) and Courtney Milan series
Stout? Yes that’s another one I’ve happily read all of. There the plots are strong and both the reccuring and the new characters interesting and once Archie met Lily his character started to develop.
•Either, so long as they’re good. Easier to stick with limited, but Sue Grafton’s Alphabet series is a staple in my bookcase.
• I abandoned the Stephanie Plum series when it got redundant, lacked character growth, and when it became formulaic (almost like someone else was writing it for her).
• I will keep reading an ooongoooooing series if the writing is excellent and if it stays interesting and not too repetitive.
• Depending on how the series is written I’m good with either (but do like beginnings)–as standalone books within the series (Sue Grafton), or as confusing tomes (I started book 4 of the Outlander series and was lacking too much back story, so bought the first 3 and started over).
• No real preference here so long as the writing is stellar, but I have missed characters and wished there was a series /longer series.
I’m a bit commitment phobic when it comes to long series. They are intimidating to start and I don’t trust them. Looks like most of my reasons are stated above. It gets boring, the author breaks the hea (really really hate that), the author is doing it for the money rather than what is right for the story and then the ending sucks…
I have abandoned all the long series I was reading. In Death (the timeline really bothers me and I can’t unsee it now), Stephanie Plum (the ghost writer ruined those for me.) and Nalini Singh ( so samey). The only long series that I followed and have on the apocalypse library keeper shelf is Kate Daniels by Ilona Andrews and that was close when they killed off a character that I really liked. But it’s a very character driven series and they knew when to end it. They have some spinoffs in the same world and that is fun and they know not to mess with an hea.
I think that series that don’t revolve around the same mc all the way through work better in general. And I much prefer a limited series overall. To me it means that the author already has an end in mind and can pace the stories accordingly.
Do I like series? I confess that I do. Many, many series.
During my naval career, reading what was available in the ship’s library involved lowest common denominator books. For example, I read at least a dozen of the Tarnsman of Gor series. I would never spend money on those books, but I’d read them if they were available. The same goes for Longarm, which series has 435 books. I read somewhere around 50. A similar series was Lone Star – “a long-running Western saga spanning over 150 books, following Jessie Starbuck and her martial arts partner Ki as they battle outlaws, cartels, and frontier threats across the American West.” I read forty or so. There was another series in which Doc Holiday was a sidekick, but the name escapes me.
At the same time, I was reading The Executioner, The Punisher, The Destroyer and such-like. That last spawned a movie. All of the stories named so far devolved into multiple authors writing as the original author. Later books… still had plenty of sax and violins, but by now, NONE are all that memorable.
My list of series overlaps Patric M‘s. Asimov, Anderson, Blish. He mentions the Flandry books but leaves out the Falkayn and Van Rign books. Bujold gets a mention, but she did three very different series – Vorkosigan Penric and Desdemona, and the Sharing Knife serieses. Douglas Adams Hitchhiker series. Sir Terry’s Diskworld series.
Diane Mott Davidson mystery food series.
Rachel Vincent’s werecat series.
Esther Friesner’s “Chicks in Chainmail” series.
JoAnne Carl’s Chocoholic Mystery series.
Nathan Lowell’s Golden Age of the Solar Clipper Series.
Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series.
Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover series.
The Vixen Warbride series.
All those 1632 series books!
All those Honor Harrington books, until Honor became super-powered.
All those “Legacy of the Aldenata” books.
I do enjoy a good series, and a few bad series. In some cases, I quit the series when I had to spend my own money.
I read and enjoyed all the other sf series that Gary mentions. (Except that I read only a little Pratchett, and of course Discworld was fantasy rather than sf.) I was using a few as specific examples of types of series. If memory serves, Chicks in Chainmail from the start was a multiauthor fantasy short story affair where Friesner was mostly the editor. I don’t think all the stories were in the same universe; they just all had, well, humor and chicks in chainmail or a close approximation. That’s a collection of theme anthologies, which I suppose is a series in one sense.
I forgot to mention Susan E. Philips Chicago Stars series.
I forgot to mention Patricia C. Wredes’ Frontier Magic series.
I never was restricted to the library resources of a submarine, but for the two years I lived in Germany in the 1980s, though a civilian I had access to the local Stars and Stripes Bookstore, which has a surprisingly good selection of recent paperback sf. The small US base library also had good sf, including many of the classics that the publisher Walker has reprinted in hardcover mostly for sale to military libraries. I don’t remember the situation for other genre fiction; I think I was reading mostly sf at the time. I have read a few of the Executioner books that happened to be written by a friend of mine who wrote them purely for the money while writing sf and fantasy for satisfaction.
My spellchecker keeps wanting to change had into has, and got away with it once above.
Gor! My library had an entire shelf of them and I read them all in 1968, fascinated by how consistently bad they were. Sort of a writing course in what not to do.
I gave up on Lucy Score’s Riley Thorne Dead Guy series. Loved the first one, second was okay, but got too outlandish by the third and really dislike the fourth. It was as if she was just writing something because the first was successful.
And I won’t read on if the author breaks the HEA.
P. S. Is this replacing Happiness Sunday? I have been bursting at the seams with happiness news. LOL!!
What is it?!!!
Well, since you asked. LOL!
My last book, My Heart Belongs to the Maverick, was on the NYT Bestseller list for mass market books. That makes me a freaking NYT bestselling author!!!
Outstanding!
Congratulations, Carrie!
Wow that’s fabulous !
Congratulations, Carrie!!!!
Thumbs up!!!!
Oh, I’m so happy for you!
Yay! That is a very big Happy! Congratulations!!
Wow! Congratulations!
Luckily I was at home when I read this because I whooped!
Woohoo! Congrats!!
congratulations!
Woohoo, Carrie! Congratulations!
Congratulations! 👏
Oh wow, Carrie, that is amazing!!!!! Brilliant stuff, congratulations!
I have read only one very long series Mrs. Jeffries by Emily Brightwell, 40 ish books. I read them all while walking on my treadmill. It was my incentive to walk! Mostly I liked the MC smart, kind, humorous, caring and cunning Yorkshire woman. Every character had a compelling backstory and positive evolution. People who worked together in difficult times.
Other series Balogh, C.J.Archer, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kristan Higgins, Rachel Gibson. They have great storytelling powers, as you do.
It really depends on the series. There are a number of longer ones I liked, including Anne McCaffrey, Bujold’s Miles books, a number of mystery series (I marvel at Donna Andrews’ ability to continue to keep her series interesting at 37 some books). On the other hand, there are definitely others that just lost that certain something (or in the case of the Harry Dresden books, just got so grim I couldn’t take it) and I gave up. Sometimes I just wander away without intending to, and then can’t remember enough of the ones I’ve read to pick it up years later.
I much prefer to start at the beginning of a series, if I can, so I will go back and read earlier books if I accidentally start in the middle.
Good questions, Jenny! I think I prefer three-book series. It gives me more to look forward to without having to wait to read multiple volumes. I have read more than three of the Paladin books, the bird-titled books, and the time travel books, but not their whole series, as they got repetitive. I love one five-book series by Nora Roberts because of the characters and the town.
I stopped reading some mystery series (alphabet, and others like it) when every book got more and more violent, or the books began to sound the same. I will read any number of the books with dust bunnies in them just for the fun of the bunnies. Deborah’s series are good, because they have new characters and plots.
I will read your books, and the ones written with Bob, because they are so well written and hold my interest. Any number is OK.
There are 58 books in the Chalet School series by Elinor M Brent-Dyer, originally published between 1925 and 1970. Her sloppiness regarding characters, families and the timeline is legendary, and generally referred to as EBDisms by fans.
Admittedly these are school stories so there is a fairly regular introduction of new characters. I think a lot of people, myself included, loved the world she created , both when we were children and as adults. In many ways it was a self contained bubble with little or no reference to world events or social change, with the exception of a couple of books which dealt with the start of WW2.
Oh yeah I read the Bobbsey Twins and Nancy Drew as a kid. And some other series that I think my mom ordered by mail? I read everything (my first own purchase at 6 was a children’s dictionary) and I think my mom was just trying to keep up.
Maybe that’s what got me started on series? The need to read a lot?
It’s harder to find good stand alones by different authors than to just get the next in a series.
The Bobbsey twins, for those who didn’t read them, always had the older twins double the age of the younger . So 8 and 4, 10 and 5, 12 and 6… this bothered me but not enough to stop me reading them. I even went on a local radio show called swap to try to find books I was missing.
I read some Bobbsey Twins and never noticed the inconsistency in the age gap. Shame on me and good for you!
My favorite children’s series were the more sfnal ones such as Tom Swift, Jr. and Tom Corbett (I was too young for the TV show but I read the novel series).
As an adult I’ve read some other sample volumes from olden times, including Nancy Drew and some of the original Tom Swift (Sr.).
I’m with you Rachel – loved these books as a child and continued to love them as an adult. I would also add EJO’s Abbey Girls series as well 🙂
First, a PSA, T. Kingfisher’s ebook, Hemlock and Silver, is on sale for USD $2.99. Second, I think many people have already said what I would say. But if you’re counting numbers, here’s my 2 cents. I’ll read anything if it’s good, be it series or standalone. If a series has good writing, engaging characters, and/or interesting plots, I am more than happy to continue on, forever if need be. If the writer starts losing the plot (ha!), I’ll just move on.
Another PSA, Martha Wells’ Queen Demon is also $2.99. That’s a lot of good authors on sale this weekend (as OGH pointed out. Rocky Start is on sale too)!
Free start to a series: since Patrick regularly reports on Andrew Warham books I went to get a sample and discovered the first in his series “a poor man at the gate” is now free at least on Nook (Barnes and Noble).
I haven’t tried that one—I’ve found Wareham more enjoyable for me in the 20th century and, with exceptions, in the 19th, but for free I just grabbed it.
Coming very late to the party:
I prefer to stay in the universe of a book I loved.
It’s so hard to find a book you fall in love with and have to leave the characters behind.
However, a series that is crafted intricately to have one arc usually works for me if it’s not too long – life might intervene and I really don’t like to leave a series without the chance of completion. See Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files. He seemed to have started out with a pre-planned arc for 20 or so books, but to have the reader keep engagend we need to get our grubby hands on the next installment regularly. The writer needs to keep the rhythm. And the resolution needs to be a good, strong one – which is difficult enough with a limited length series (e.g. Harry Potter – imho, the epilogue was NOT satisfying).
For such a limited-well-arc series, a good number seems to be what Bob and you already write – a trilogy. Or for longer series 5-6 books (I absolutely love the Lymond Chronicles with its 6 books)
A great idea is what Rick Riordan does with “serial series”: his Percy Jackson series started out with 5 books, followed up with another 5 books in the same universe but more protagonists, another 5 books picking up where the 10 previous books left of, with interlinked trilogies that could be read independently (his spin offs into Nordic or Egyptian mythology).
I’m sure it’s easier to have the right momentum for 3 to 5 books, more freedom to put the focus on more than one set of characters.
Another concept with an open end is having an MC or MCs that take us along on their job – easiest for mysteries I guess because a new case brings new excitment. E.g. Lindsey Davis’ Falco series – Falco is a private detective in ancient Rome and each book is dealing with a new case (which can have repercussions for him for x-books on end). I loved it for a long time because of its mix of well-researched historical background, classic concept of Marlowesk detective and having Falco closely interconnected with a large community (his family, friends, colleagues, whoever hires his services etc.). Eventually I stopped reading the installments around the time when his family obligations seemed to bog down Falco too much – it felt very realistic but I prefered the earlier installments with an MC who could be a bit carefree ;-). The nice thing is, the author can continue writing as long as she/he feels like it, runs out of ideas etc., it doesn’t need to have this one great arc but resemble life more closely.
Another variety of this concept is to have one universe and write interconnecting stories, e.g. like Ashlyn Kane and Morgan James’ hockey series. It’s set in a more or less fictional league, and with players getting traded you can meet characters again that were either main or side characters, but the sense of community is there.
Also: if you loose interest, it’s okay to stop writing as each book in itself is complete. No arc is getting left behind/dropped. If a reader starts with book 3 (as I did), it’s extra fun to pick up the earlier books and yes, we learn a bit more about who some characters but are not completely lost.
Rachel Reid’s Game Changers series is a bit like this when you don’t focus on Ilya and Shane: The first title I read was Role Model, book 5 in the series. This was in my pre-hockey-love days so I didn’t really fall in love with Role Model yet, liked it fine but had too little knowledge and love for hockey yet. It still worked because the romance was strong enough. I read most of the series out of order – at least I kept The Long Game for last. But being able to remain in the GC world for six books is great.
What didn’t work for me: When the glue/arc is doesn’t work for me – I stopped reading the Stephanie Plum books with number 6. Nowadays it would make sense to have it as a why choose book but then there’d be no underlaying conflict?
Looking back at what the others said: I guess I really prefer limited series. If they are interlinked, fine. But it seems to be really hard to keep things fresh with a long series.
I loose interest and move on when it gets repetitive, too violent, the writer is suddenly killing off important characters, seems to have lost their way around the characters or goal. Or the series has lost its freshness or gets to close to “adult life”: I do prefer the Vorkosigan books pre-Cryoburn, a book that I still haven’t managed to finish. The stories kind of lost their quirkyness, got too “adult” for me. I guess I just don’t like to grow up myself…
Cryoburn was very hard for me the first time round because it came out just after my dad died and I couldn’t reread it ages after that. I have reread more recently and I really like it. It’s one of those books within the series where we see Miles from someone else’s perspective and that’s great fun.
My parents are still alive and kickin’ with young minds, but the years are piling up (not just for them).
I was too chicken shit to continue reading.
I much prefered Bujold’s earlier Vorkosigan books, I don’t know why I can’t connect as easily to them as in the past. But I noticed that there’d been a major stumbling point when it comes to reading around the birth of my first child. I just couldn’t immerse myself as easily into books around that time. I’ve very much improved since then, but a number of books have been affected back then, the later Miles books are some of them.
Miles doesn’t get the word of his father’s death until, if memory serves, the end of the last chapter of Cryoburn, just before an epilog on how others react to the death. The novel’s plot is essentially finished before Miles gets knocked off course by the news. I think Dodo already realizes this, but I mention it in case others with issues about parental death have been avoiding the novel entirely, rather than just the last bit. True, there’s a lot of other death earlier, but then that’s true of most of the Vorkosigam novels.
Well, the whole book is about an economy based on trying to avoid death.
True (and I’m sure Bujold disapproves), but my point was that the on-stage death rate is no higher than in many earlier novels, and a reader who could tolerate them should be able to tolerate this.
Dodo, do you read the spinoff with Falco’s daughter? I enjoy it too.
I’ve downloaded one audiobook but somehow haven’t been in the right headspace yet to listen. Too many books on my tbr Everest.
But very good to read that you’d recommend it!!
If memory serves, for a while the Falco series was getting by in using intentionally anachronistic names for things in the classical world (I remember maître d’, for example), but then branched out into frank anachronism, such as a Roman travel agency, at which point I bailed.
I might have stopped earlier as I don’t recall a travel agency 🙂
It’s in #17, See Delphi and Die, but I don’t think I’d actually read all 16 of the earlier ones.
I guess my steam ran out around book 13 or 14. Prior to the Accusers for sure. I guess I was not prepared delving into parenthood and being an adult. Not interested in those topics at all around that time.
Stephanie Plum and company are forever stagnant characters. Not much point in reading them after awhile.
Yep, if the characters are stagnant, even the most interesting cases get boring because you live through those characters.
I too loved the Lymond Chronicles, each book a different country.
Yes, yes, yes! They – and Niccolo – actually even influenced my bucket list for countries to visit: relatively easy to visit where London, Edinburgh, the UK Border region, Malta and Gozo and Comino, Cyprus. I might have forgotten some. No Istambul (book 4) and Russia or Lithuania (book 5) yet, and I still have to convince dh to go on a trip to France (neither of us speak the language in spite of having had 3 years of French at school).
I think it depends on the genre of story. I am reading a mystery series that is on book 31 and I’m ready for 32 to come out. It works because it’s the same characters each book but the adventures change each book. The author does a really good job at character development. Book one the heroin was a disaster, book 31 she has skills and is actually good at her job of finding people and avoiding crazy murderers. I have a hard time with romance that has that long of an arch. There is only so much break up-back together-break up I can tolerate before I get board and want the people to wise up. I think you and Bob could pull off an extended series and I would LOVE to read them all.
I agree that one can’t plausibly stretch a romance arc in a mystery series that long, although it once was common to keep a detective’s or superhero’s girlfriend in that status almost forever. As I said earlier, more commonly today they marry early in the series and go on detecting as a couple. Even Lois Lane and Clark Kent get married in many recent iterations
Is that the Moneypenny syndrome?
Come to think of it, the constant girlfriend in days of yore was a trait of being a template series, with no real plot arc. It was as if all the characters got their recent memories wiped after every book/story/episode, so nothing ever changed romantically any more than it did anywhere else.
You’re reading the Hamish Macbeth series, right?
I usually try to read series from first to last, but it doesn’t matter so much with Hamish.
The Wish I Knew Then podcast had a good episode on this somewhere, and I think they said that 7 us about the max. However, some people play on the same world with stand-alones on a series, and that’s great. I think maybe Debra Clopton does this. Definitely check out Tessa Dare. She has lots of cross-over characters in the same regency world(ish). Personally, I get overwhelmed by that many unless it is like Sue Grafton’s alphabet murder books since the elements that stay the same are comforting (like a mystery show where you enjoy the world, like the mysteries each week, but have cozy). Also, check out (on Amazon) the fun and beautifully shot Australian mysteries about a former copy and a retired head nurse who meet by chance. There are two over-arching mysteries (who framed him and why did her husband die in Australia) that overarch the series. Each had a fun cozy stand-alone mystery attached, but the arc is great. It’s called, “Darby and Joan.” Great show.
The one thought I have that isn’t already in the thread– series constructed with individual book-length plot arcs featuring different main protagonists can go on forever for me, as long as things stay interesting, but with series constructed around a single protagonist or main group of people, there eventually seems to come a time where the needs of the series–that interesting things keep happening to the protagonist–start to conflict with my affection for the protagonist and wish for them to have a happy, or at least peaceful, outcome. When my reaction to a new book is “oh dear, I thought things were wrapped up for [protagonist] in the last book and they’ll finally get to have a decent, low-stress life, now what is [author] doing to them?!” it’s time to start reading.
STOP reading. Not START reading (sigh…)
I prefer long series with some caveats: no repeats and there has to be character growth. My favorite long series are the Rivers of London books by Ben Aaronvitch and the Miss Fortune books by Jana Deleon. I don’t know how they manage to come up with situations that aren’t retreads of previous plots, but I suspect their inclusion of supporting characters with rich backgrounds helps.
Something else that will put me off a series is Jessica Fletcher syndrome, where it seems the crimesolver’s every relative or friend stands in grave danger of being murdered. I ditch such series. The proper way to do it is to have at most one or two such cases (possibly none) where the amateur picks up a reputation for solving murders, and thereafter is consulted either by a widening circle of acquaintances or strangers who have heard of the solver’a abilities, or by some member of the police (which may result in romance but does not have to).
As an exception, Meg Langlow herself discovers an excessive number of bodies, but they’re almost always strangers.
Speaking of series, The WIzard’s Cat is finally in paperback! It’s not cheap, but at least it’s available in that format.
My favorite long series are Deborah Crombie’s Duncan and Gemma series with it’s every expanding family and the variety of cases set in and around modern London. Also Rhys Bowen’s Royal Spyness for the same, plus the historical detail. Of course, Murderbot. Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peobody series also and Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache. I think mysteries work really well for long series because the cases vary.
I still read Stephanie Plum, for the fun, but I don’t buy it. Also because it became repetitive. Romance series set around siblings can work for me, but sometimes one or another sibling isn’t as interesting as the others.
A well-crafted sci-fi or fantasy world can grab my long-term interest too.
Very few series beat Pern, IMHO. I’ll read anything I find interesting, series or not. With series I prefer to start at the beginning and go on to the end—unless I get bored or it gets repetitive.
I like open-ended series better than stand-alones (except in romance, where the only “series” I like are more a matter of a shared setting, like what Jayne Ann Krentz does, not the same h/h in each book, or even a set of siblings) in both books and tv.
I’m currently reading a long-ish series (but not 33 books), the Rockton (and Haven’s Rock, a continuation of sorts) thriller series by Kelley Armstrong. There are 11 books so far, and I’m finishing #10 in audio, and still looking forward to the next one, although I’m noticing repetition (not so much in plot, but in emotional baggage stuff) more, and getting impatient with it, but it’s dumped in brief enough bits that I’m willing to put up with it for the rest. Unfortunately, I’m reading by audio, which makes it harder to skim/skip these passages. But the rest of the storytelling is compelling enough to make up for the two or three times when I get bored.
From personal writing experience, I’m not sure I have that many books in me for a given protagonist/setting. I wrote several of the books (8 maybe?) in the 30-ish-book Danger Cove series, but I seem to run out of ideas for a given protagonist after about 4 books, so there are two different protagonists (a quilt appraiser and a farmers’ market manager). I’d stopped the Danger Cove books at 7, and then I had an idea for a cross-over between the two subseries (quilt appraiser is involved with a death at the farmers’ market). I stopped at four books in the Crazy Cat Lady series too, although I had an idea for a fifth one, mostly so I could use the title, Five Cat Stud. The Helen Binney series is at eight, according to Amazon (I lost track), but half of them are novellas, rather than novels, so again it’s four full-length stories when I stopped having full-book-length ideas for them.
And finally, as an aside (and a teaser for anyone interested in reading about wild cats), my secret project (cozy fantasy) features bobcats who are security guards for the main characters. And, just to be a bit contrary with my previous comments about stopping at four, I’ve got at least five full-length books either written, outlined, or pre-outlined (premise only), with vaguer ideas for another three or four.
I LOVE series books: so comforting to get back into another world but not have to learn all new culture and characters! That said, I LOVE all of Jen’s books, alone or with Bob, mainly for their irreverent attitudes, sly but hilarious remarks about Republicans and about Ohio, the dogs and precocious kids in many, the music references, and mostly for the smart chat and humor. I do love that even when one of her books is not part of a series, there is often a reference to characters which a reader might recognize from a previous book, such as Nick and Tess appearing in What the Lady Wants; I loved Davey Dempsey appearing in both Welcome to Tempation and Faking It. I would LOVE to read a book each featuring followups to some previous characters, such as Alex’s brother and Nina’s friend (together or separately) in Anyone But You, or the girl who doesn’t get paired up at the end of Bet Me, and am very glad Jen and Bob are following up on the kids from Maybe This Time and Faking It.
All I can say is it varies depending on series, plot, and situation.
I do like a series, but…if the writer keeps inserting the back story of family characters…I KNOW, you wrote that before, again and again in all the series books. I have stopped reading some series because it is terribly annoying.
Magazine serials used to start with a What Has Gone Before summary that readers could easily skip if they’d read earlier issues. Similarly, in Beast Business, Ilona Andrews provided a catch-up or reminder chapter that readers could skip if they were au courant.
I’m an echo of other commenters. I read a lot of series…until it feels like the author is writing the same novel and using search and replace with the characters or that that author has grown to hate their character. Then I either stop reading that series or it becomes an “only if the library has it” choice. I do admire an author who recognizes that the story arc is complete. Someone here noted Kelley Armstrong’s Rockton series. Another that comes to mind is Ilona Andrews’ Hidden Legacy, the Nevada Baylor arc.
Huh. I was completely caught out by the change to Daylight Savings Time. I just now realized that my phone, which automatically reset, disagreed with my clocks. Lots of manual resetting in my future!
Patrick, I do that on purpose and take my time adjusting to the change.
• Do you prefer limited series (say, three books) or long-running series? Why? I enjoy them both. The best part of a short series is conclusion. Even if you love the series, it’s nice that it wraps up. No worries about the author stringing you along and then dying (Robert Jordon). Another thing that I’ve seen authors do (Pratchett, Shalvis) is to create a world but have various series going. So, you can have a short series but within the same world/town/verse. I guess if forced to pick one, I’d go with a limited series despite loving E. Peter’s Amelia Peabody series and other mystery series. Just occurred to me, I think I like long running cozy mystery series as it enables a long relationship arc and I don’t have to learn new characters/settings despite the “never move to Cabot Cove” syndrome because why does Jessica Fletcher keep finding murder victims to last 246 episodes? I’d likely want fantasy to be within 3-5 books. Sci-fi, I don’t read often but probably 3 book series but there can be multiple connected 3-book series. Romance – I like stand alone, but also could be like Sci-fi. I don’t read westerns.
• At what point do you abandon a series? What makes you stop reading?
I’m not sure what makes me stop. Harry Potter – after book 4 because it got too dark. Possibly, if the series isn’t finished and I’ve wandered off before the next one is published. If it seems I’ve read this before aka the author is writing the same book over and over but using different names. Jill Shalvis got this way with me even though it was more each series has the same base characters – 3 hunky dudes, 2 are related and 1 grew up with them as a brother because his family was wretched… I made it really far in the Amelia Peabody series by Elizabeth Peters and have intentions of returning to it. I think I stopped in the mid to late teens (book 15-19). It was getting a bit far-fetched.
• What makes you keep reading a series even if it goes on forever?
I love the characters. They keep growing. The author – their writing style, humor, etc. It feels safe and comfortable.
• If you pick up a book that’s a middle publication in a series, do you go back and start over with the first or push on?
I will go back and start at the beginning 99.9% of the time and hate it when I don’t. I don’t care how much an author says it is a “stand alone,” I can tell I’ve missed a lot of the back story because I haven’t read the first stories. Just did this with SEP’s latest. It was like the 11th in her Chicago Stars series. I enjoyed the story but could tell I was missing stuff from the previous books.
• In general, do you prefer series books to one-offs? Why? What I like about series is that if I enjoyed the first one, I can gleefully look forward to more like that. One-offs can be nice and I’m happy with them too. They can become a favorite comfort read that gets revisited without the time commitment of reading many. The risk is that the first book is where an author puts all the good stuff and the second book is meh. Also, sometimes an author does great work but in subsequent stories either emphasizes a storyline I didn’t care as much about (Serenity the movie) or recognizes a cash cow and puts out a book of “fluff” (Wheel of Time). Benefit of a one-off, no risk if the author dies. (Robert Jordon, Terry Pratchett, etc.)
Also, please put in a wildcat in your next book!
Most importantly, absolutely put a wild cat in your next book.
I read both series and stand alones- but I have to like the author’s voice and the world they’ve built. Susanna Kearsley has a fabulous historical fiction series about the Jacobites with a revolving cast of characters that I adore. Jasper Fforde Thursday Next series is one of my yearly re reads and the scream I screamt when they announced a new addition was bothersome to my neighbors.
I will absolutely DNF a series if there is too much violence/sex for the sake of violence/sex and zero furtherance of plot or the author couldn’t be bothered to do the research about time/place/special interest.
Which is also why I agreed above with everyone about Elizabeth Peters and still have several of her books on my annual re reads. Also will read all dust bunnies books and Murderbot lives in my head now.
I am not sure any of that helps, but I hope so. Because I do own all your books and Bet Me is on my annual re read list. Also Agnes and the Hitman.
Dustbunnies Me too. I don’t even remember what happened in those books, I’m just in it for the dustbunnies
I really shouldn’t post at o’dark 30 in late night. I should have added Michelle Sagara also writing as Michelle West. Both are long series. The Cast series is up to 22 (Sagara). This series is standard length reading . With the West books I started with the House War series (8). Warning! Each book in the series is big and fat. If you love a looong read these are for you. She had so much trouble with the publisher on the length she has started self publishing. You can read these as a stand alone set, however there are related series same world with crossover characters showing up for short amount of time. I’m girding my loins to start on them lol.
I have a lot of long running series on my shelves – Janet Chapman’s Highlanders etc., Julia Chapman, Heather Blake, Laura Griffin’s Tracers, Julie Garwood’s FBI (and a heap of the rest of her historical ones). I also have trilogies and one offs. I think it depends on the characters and the author. Also reading Ian Rankin’s Rebus from the first and Peter James’ Roy Grace too because I have been reading random ones and want to experience the story arch.
That said I am I also have a lot of stand alone books, some because I read others by the author and didn’t like them, some because they don’t have them in the library system.
I love a series. I read til I get bored, or the same things keep happening. Mysteries make good series, but there are so many problems finding a new crime, much less a new murder. It is easier in a city setting, harder in places that are thinly populated. Romances suffer from having to keep finding new couples to pair off, but benefit from a shared world and shared characters, and glimpses of past main characters living happily now. You did that with a couple of your early books – we saw the Strange Bedpersons couple again in What the Lady Wants, and it was delicious.
I also like the people who can imagine a whole new universe, and then place a bunch of different, slightly overlapping stories there. CJ Cherryh wrote about Alliance/Union fights across decades, and then when she wrote about a whole new suite of species with one single human in it, she could refer to her Union/Alliance peripherally but it was enough to know things were all happening near and around each other. I guess that happens in SF a lot, because Ann Leckie does the same thing, as does Elizabeth Moon and others, I am sure. I love catching those clues, it feels like I get to put together a secret puzzle.
I can answer this both as a reader and as a writer.
Many readers LOVE series, and they will read through an entire series (assuming they like it). My longest series is currently 18 books long, with two new books coming out this year in that same series. My other series are shorter. My long series isn’t all about the same couple. Many couples in a close-knit family/friend group get their own books. Many couples get follow-up books. My readers love these. I plan to start a new long-running series featuring the same couple. (In these long series, there is character growth and change, but the focus is on the plot and relationship, not on continuous character arcs.) My shortest series is three books (but now it has a three book spin off series, so really it’s six books now.) I have a six book series that’s about to get another book. I have an 18-book series that has no end in sight because my readers want MORE. Series are everything! There are some readers and writers who don’t like series, but from a business perspective, series sell well.
As a reader, I LOVE series. I’ll keep reading them as long as the books are satisfying.
Limited series – because the others I’ve tried started to feel ‘rinse and repeat’
Abandon when it feels ‘rinse and repeat’ or the arc has arched
Keep reading if it has a wide cast of interesting characters (when the series isn’t simply one character’s perspective – that can get old)
Yes – l go back and start over with the first
I like well crafted series because the joy just keeps on keeping on. You know/trust the tone and the writing. Often it’s a comfort thing.