How do you read lengthy series?

sxt

Do you read em start to finish or what? or do you take a break and change genres between each book read?


I think I read Martins Fire and ice series straight through( 1 or 2 books left i know), every other fantasy series since then- i just don't want to continue on, because i have so many books that I want to read in so may different genres!

The procrastination!:(

Black Sheep

Interesting question.

I used to buy trilogies and completed series and read them right through. This certainly works with relatively short series (for example, a trilogy like Guy Gavriel Kay's 'Fionnavar tapestry'). But when you consider that some contemporary series are now sprawling out to encompass 10+ books, there are two reasons a straight 'read through' may not be possible-

1. Some series like Jordan's 'Wheel of Time' and Martins' 'A Song of Ice and Fire' are unfinished. Unless you're going to wait years for the final volumes then necessarily you're going to have to break the series up anyway.

and

2. Considering the length that some of these series are running to unfinished I'm not sure that that many people would want to read the same author for months on end - perhaps I'm wrong here, but it does amaze me that someone could read all the current 'Wheel of Time' books one after the other without getting a little anxious for something else... No matter how much you enjoy them, it's a lot of time to invest in one author.

I think with the larger series out there it has been a bit of a blessing in disguise that there have been publishing delays. You can read five or six volumes, then naturally have a gap before going back to later published volumes.

I guess these larger series also put a new importance on the concept of the 're-read', and I think on-line re-read summaries with commentaries genuinely have their place in relation to Jordan, Erikson etc.

At the moment I've still got the last three or four Malazan books to go, but it's been years since I read the previous volumes. When the times comes I will probably go through wiki pages and re-reads rather than do a total re-read of the books themselves.

And to think that once upon a time I thought Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings' was a long read. :pac:

Whether more is better is another debate.

AnCapaillMor

Have to read them all. I get into something, i have to get in to everything on it. I'm one who has to know what happens next, i remember paying more on shipping than the book to get the saga of the seven 2-3 weeks from the US. Currently i'm on book 9 of the wheel of time and i've read nothing else since book 1.

BTW the wait for the next song of ice and fire is killing me.

n0irin

If the books are all available - like they were for a couple of Robin Hobb's series' before I started reading them - I'll buy them all in very close succession and just read straight through. When it comes to series' like that I find it very hard to put them down, and if I know the book is out there I must have it. I love the excitement of cliffhangers, though!

For series' which aren't out in their entirety yet, I'll wait patiently because I must, but as soon as the next book appears I'll buy it right away!

ixoy

I started a similar thread myself before. I've rarely read a series back-to-back. For one I generally like a bit of variety. Often of course the next installments aren't out either!

My biggest problem is trying to remember what happened before. It's particularly trying when reading "The Crippled God". I'd re-read but I've too many books and too little time (as well as the fact that I'm not a fast reader).

I need to quit my job and do this properly...

Teferi

When I find an author that I really like I tend to go hell-for-leather on their books - starting from the first and going up to their latest printed book.

Zapp Brannigan

I try and always read them as one. If that means re-reading an entire series, then it has to be done. Other books be damned!

ixoy

Zapp Brannigan wrote: »

I try and always read them as one. If that means re-reading an entire series, then it has to be done. Other books be damned!

Even for the mega-epic series? Would you read all 3.5 million words of the Malazan sequence to prepare for the last book? All 13 books prior to the final instalment of WoT? Wouldn't that take weeks/months?

bonkey

ixoy wrote: »

Even for the mega-epic series? Would you read all 3.5 million words of the Malazan sequence to prepare for the last book? All 13 books prior to the final instalment of WoT? Wouldn't that take weeks/months?

Up until book 7 of the Malazan Book of the Fallen, that's exactly what I did.

I joined at book 3, so I read the first three back-to-back. Then for book 4, I read 1, 2, 3, 4. Continued this way, once a year, until 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

For book 8, I only re-read 6 and 7.
For book 9, I only re-read 8 (and Esslemont's NoK and RotCG)
For book 10, I only re-read 9 (and Esslemont's Stonewielder).

I do intend to re-read the entire Malazan content, starting in the next year or so (Erikson and Esslemont both), and will almost-certainly do it back-to-back. I'll start with NoK (chronologically first), then onto GotM, and off with me.

If I'm buying a completed series, I tend to read back-to-back, unless I'm interrupted by something I've really been waiting for being released (or if its just not working for me).

If I'm re-reading something, it tends to be the same.

ixoy

bonkey wrote: »

I do intend to re-read the entire Malazan content, starting in the next year or so (Erikson and Esslemont both), and will almost-certainly do it back-to-back. I'll start with NoK (chronologically first), then onto GotM, and off with me.

It's the only series that I'm determined to re-read. Reading "The Crippled God" I'm missing out on some of the detail with certain characters (particularly the Gods).
Also with all the reveals that have been happening (I'm on about page 500), I really want to see how cleverly (if at all) it was set up and foreshadowed.

pH

I've stopped reading all SciFi and Fantasy series until its all published, then read them back to back. Too annoyed with that happened to WoT and GRR Martin to be led down that path again!

Antar Bolaeisk

I tend to take breaks between books, even to the extent of swapping genre such as reading high fantasy then science fiction. As much as I enjoy the stories I don't think I could do a marathon of something like Wheel of Time. I tried it recently with the Dark Tower Series and got to the end of book 4 before I had to change (though to be fair Wizard and Glass was always tough going for me).

Zapp Brannigan

ixoy wrote: »

Even for the mega-epic series? Would you read all 3.5 million words of the Malazan sequence to prepare for the last book? All 13 books prior to the final instalment of WoT? Wouldn't that take weeks/months?

Yeah I started re-started the WoT in October and am just about to go onto book 13!

I won't get to read The Crippled God til probably next year because I don't have access to my Malazan books

nesf

All in one go usually. Some rereading for longer series when a new book is published. Mainly due to abysmal memory due to psychiatric issues. I only reread the Malazan series last year and I've forgotten nearly all of it and will probably have to reread it again before trying to work through Toll the Hounds again before trying The Crippled God. Need to kill time waiting for the Kindle edition to be released anyway.

Dan_Solo

How I usually read a series is as follows:
Read book one in its entirety.
Decide I don't think it's that great.
Read book one of a different series.
I always read a book to the end, but if the opener hasn't grabbed me, I don't feel like I want to spend the next year reading 9 other episodes of it. Only the odd one makes it past this vetting...

coffee_cake

I wouldnt read them all in a row unless i've just discovered a completed series i love and have to devour. These days it's more likely I find a book then have to wait 2 years for the next one
I usually manage to start a book halfway through the series by accident
I think I started WOT on book 6

Sin_J

I tend to like reading a series all in one go. I like it when i start a new series that has a lot of books already written.

The last one i read like that was the Dresden Files, which had 12 books released when i started. Picked up the first book storm front on a whim and 3 weeks later had finished the last book. Loved the character and so just kept reading, i couldn't stop.

Its great to be able to just blitz through them as the story feels a lot more cohesive. This is especially true if you have a series like WoT that has 1 or 2 slightly slower low key books. If you read it all in one go, it just becomes one big story rather than individual books, so the slower pacing isn't as glaring as a standalone bit of reading.

5starpool

bluewolf wrote: »

I wouldnt read them all in a row unless i've just discovered a completed series i love and have to devour. These days it's more likely I find a book then have to wait 2 years for the next one
I usually manage to start a book halfway through the series by accident
I think I started WOT on book 6

This is like saying you only started watching the simpsons 6 or 7 years ago.

coffee_cake

5starpool wrote: »

This is like saying you only started watching the simpsons 6 or 7 years ago.

Well i've read all of them of course. In my defense I was in spain at the time and the english section was small :pac: I loved it so much I had the cover torn to tatters in no time
When I said I manage to end up starting halfway through a series I mean I read them out of order, not that I don't read the first ones

Branoic

When I first started reading Fiest he was up as far as Rise of a Merchant Prince, so I read those 11 books from Magician to there all in one go. Once I caught up with them I just read them as they're published. Up to number 28 now.

giftgrub

I started Wheel of Time years ago....but never got into it.

I don't know...I'm slightly reluctant to get into anything longer than a trilogy.

Saying that with Game of Thrones on de telly, I am going to give A song of Fire and Ice a go.

iguana

The longest series I've ever read is Katherine Kerr's full Deverry series. 15 books - nearly 16 years or half my life. I read the first 4, the Deverry cycle, in 1995 when I was 16. I read the second 4, the Westlands Cycle in 1996 at 17. Then I read the next 3, the Dragon Mage Cycle, as they were released between 1998 and 2001. And I read the last 4, the Silver Wyrm Cycle, December to January this year.

So I've pretty much read this one series in all the possible ways. I found the 1st cycle years after it was written and read it straight. I used to walk around with all 4 books and read them piled on top of each other as they were 1 1400 page book.:D I got the 2nd cycle, from my parents for Christmas, several months on and read those straight. Then I had to wait for the 3rd cycle book by book as it was released. And for the last cycle I waited until it was all written and bought them all reading them pretty much straight through.

I'm now re-reading the 1st cylce again and once more I'm keeping the 4 of them together like 1 giant book.

coffee_cake

I love Katharine Kerr. I think I may have missed out on some of the last books though - have them all over the place and can never remember which is in which cycle :o

iguana

bluewolf wrote: »

I love Katharine Kerr. I think I may have missed out on some of the last books though - have them all over the place and can never remember which is in which cycle :o

The first cycle is mainly Jill and Rhodry's relationship with Nevyn's involvement and the past life stories are all of Nevyn's involvement with them (the only series where he exists in the present). This is the best series by far.

The second is set 40 years on (and spans about 20 years) in the present and is mainly about Dallandra and Evander's attempts to have the Guardian race born as creatures of flesh. Rhodry features a lot but Jill is much lower profile. The past life stories are about them and Aderyn, Rhodry's past, the end of the 100 years civil war and one about Jill and Rhodry during the first series. (This is my least favourite series, I'm not a fan of Dallandra and I don't care about Evander.)

The third has more about the original humans in Deverry, the escaped bondsmen at Cerr Cawnen, and goes into more detail about the horsekin and the gael de thea. The past lives are mainly about the end of the civil war. (I preferred this series to the second.)

The fourth series is about Branna, Neb and Rori. Or at least it's supposed to be. The first book certainly makes it seem that way, unfortunately there is way too much Dallandra at all the other characters' expense. The past lives are a bit muddled, imo. One in particular seemed too much of an unnecessary retcon (the Morwen and Gwairyc one). My other main problem is that I really wanted to experience more of

Nevyn/Neb and Jill/Branna as a couple. I wanted to see what happened with Jill and Nevyn after she apprenticed to him, so we could see why she comes to love him. And I wanted to see more of their love as Neb and Branna then we do because as far as we've seen so far Rhodry is her true love not Nevyn. As it was the last past life sequence shows us another Jill/Rhodry love story, set even before the events that set the whole story in motion.

coffee_cake

It's all coming back to me now - I think I must not have missed anything then. I can't remember when I ended up but what you've said rings a bell, and is quite true.

Nodin

giftgrub wrote: »

I started Wheel of Time years ago....but never got into it.

I don't know...I'm slightly reluctant to get into anything longer than a trilogy.

Saying that with Game of Thrones on de telly, I am going to give A song of Fire and Ice a go.

I had my doubts, gave it a go, but only lasted to book 6. Far too derivative and some of his characters crawl up my nose (and not in a good way).

Think the longest series I read was the "Chung Kuo" books (8 in all) by David Wingrove, which were ok, if somewhat overblown.

Demeyes

I generally buy 1 or 2 books from a series. I'll read them and if I like it then I'll get more and read them, usually through to the end of the series. I'm thinking of changing it up a bit in the next lot I read, I've had a hard time getting through some of the series and find I can leave the book for 2/3 weeks before resuming the read. I think I'll have to get some smaller books to read as a break in between.

mcgovern

I've been taking a break in between ASoFaI books because I know that I'll read them quicker than he'll write them! Read the first two now. Normally though, I'll take a larger break from series, have to try finish off a few now that I think about it, but usually forget which book I'm on which makes it a pain to know where to start. I have books 9+10 of WoT, but not sure if I've read neither, both or just 9!

stylie

Branoic wrote: »

When I first started reading Fiest he was up as far as Rise of a Merchant Prince, so I read those 11 books from Magician to there all in one go. Once I caught up with them I just read them as they're published. Up to number 28 now.

*Groan*, is it that many now? havent bought the latest one yet but I have all his others, though I think he has gone seriously down hill in the last half dozen or so books.

Anachrony

Usually either one of two things happens: Either it's very engrossing, and I simply can't wait to read the next in the series (if available), or it's not that compelling and I choose to read something else first. If that happens I'll probably never find the motivation to get back to reading it. Whatever my intentions at the time, very rarely do I go back to a long series if it wasn't captivating enough to make me want to read it all right away. Of course in many cases these series aren't done yet, so the breaks are unavoidable.

Dan_Solo

stylie wrote: »

*Groan*, is it that many now? havent bought the latest one yet but I have all his others, though I think he has gone seriously down hill in the last half dozen or so books.

Considering I found A Darkness At Sethanon just about bearable I think I'll give the rest of his stuff a wide berth.