The Neverending Series

Now that I find myself living near the Hollywood library, in Portland, I've been reading more. I'm sure you're just dying to find out what, exactly, it is that I've been reading, so I'll tell you.

I started out with Exile's Return, by Raymond E. Feist. I was pretty excited to read this, as it's the last book in the series Conclave of Shadows. Basically, this guy, Kaspar, former duke of Olasko finds himself exiled to the far side of the world for doing some pretty bad stuff and has to find his way home, turning into a much better person along the way. As it is the last book in the series, I was expecting to have some sense of closure at the end. Unfortunately, this was not to be the case. As I got near the end, it became obvious that some important issues were not going to be wrapped up in time. They were to be saved for a different series, the Darkwar Saga. I just finished the first book in that series, Flight of the Nighthawks, on Sunday. Now, I have to wait an undetermined amount of time for many copies of the next book to be returned and checked out by other people with holds until I get my turn to read it. Then, I get to wait a year (or so) for the last book to be published. This isn't too bad, all things being considered.

Look at the other book that I read, Phantom, by Terry Goodkind. It is the TENTH book in the Sword of Truth series. I don't even remember how long ago I started reading these books, but it was probably about ten years ago. That's a long time. When I started them, there were maybe two or three books out. Unfortunately, I really liked them and couldn't wait for the next one to come out. And it went like that for the next decade. I'd read one book and get really excited about it and then it would end, and I'd have another year (or occasionally two) to wait until the next book came out. In the meantime, I did other things and pretty much forgot what was going on by the time I got to read the new book. Did I mention that this went on for, oh, at least 10 years or so. And now I've read 10 books. The next book, thankfully, is the last book in the series. It is called Confessor. I'm sure it will be good. But I won't know for sure until it comes out, supposedly on November 13, 2007. The wait is almost over.

But what about for those breathlessly waiting for the finish of the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan? For a while I was a close follower of this series, as well. Then it started taking two, or even three years between each book. This is ridiculous. And then, Mr. Jordan comes down with amyloidosis and cardiomyopathy, so there is a very real possibility that he might not live to finish the series. Personally, I hope he finishes it because I'd like to read it sometime. I'm not sure what book I'm actually on, but I'd just start at the beginning and read them all. I won't hold my breath, though. The 12th and final book isn't due to come out until 2009 (a staggering 3 or 4 years after the 11th book was published).

I don't know how it became stylish to write such long series. It was sort of cute back in the day when Douglas Adams wrote his Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy that ended up being five books long. But a dozen books is just too many, especially when many of the books approach or exceed 1000 pages in length.

I guess I can understand with the Harry Potter books. A book for each of the years at Hogwart's, though I'd have to say that at least one of the books was a whole lot of nothing happening and probably could have been squished into one of the other books without losing much.

In summary, a series should generally contain a number of books suitable for counting on a single hand. In rare cases, two hands may be necessary. Under no circumstances should I need to use both my hands and a even a few toes to tick off all the books in a series.