Today’s topic comes from QSFer Shira Anthony: “More questions come up along the lines of series… For readers: Do you wait until the series is complete/published before starting? Do you care if it’s complete? Do you like spinoff series? If you’re reading a series romance, does it matter to you if the HEA comes at the end of a series? Do you need closure at the end of each book? What do you think about HFN?”
I’ve always loved series – and historically you’ve always had to wait for a year or two or more for the next book to come out. There was something great about this – it stretched out the experience, so you could enjoy a beloved series over decades. It almost became like an old friend that you could revisit for a new conversation every now and then.
But the downside was that you often forgot a lot of the details between books.
Now, a number of authors are writing and releasing series all at once, so you can binge read them.
I’m really conflicted on this – on the one hand, it would be nice to have all the books ready to read at one time. On the other hand, this puts a huge burden on new writers – writing a first book is HARDF. Writing an entire trilogy, which will then be released and then “over” in a month or two? That strikes me as crazy.
So what do y’all think? I’ll defer to Shira’s great questions above.
Jamie, I shamelessly stole your graphic for this topic. :P