Penric series renumbering puzzle
So...
I'm am about to drop what most people will construe as a prequel into the Penric & Desdemona series, and, for those vendors who require numbers, the question has come up whether to number it in publication order, in which case it would be #5, or number it in current-internal-chronology order, in which case it would be #3, and renumber the volumes following.
Whichever we choose will likely set the plan for future entries, although whenever a story occurs at the working face of the timeline, it would come out the same.
Any thoughts you all have as as readers or e-book buyers? Help yourselves to the comments section.
Later: I should add, decimal numbering has already been decided against. It has to be either chronological or publication, in integers.
Note we're working across 3 different vendor platforms, and the least flexible drives the whole.
Ta, L.
I'm am about to drop what most people will construe as a prequel into the Penric & Desdemona series, and, for those vendors who require numbers, the question has come up whether to number it in publication order, in which case it would be #5, or number it in current-internal-chronology order, in which case it would be #3, and renumber the volumes following.
Whichever we choose will likely set the plan for future entries, although whenever a story occurs at the working face of the timeline, it would come out the same.
Any thoughts you all have as as readers or e-book buyers? Help yourselves to the comments section.
Later: I should add, decimal numbering has already been decided against. It has to be either chronological or publication, in integers.
Note we're working across 3 different vendor platforms, and the least flexible drives the whole.
Ta, L.
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I prefer chronology but given the vote against decimals that would create an awful mess with possible prequels. So I would either create "arcs" (Book 1 of the XXX trilogy) or (unhappily) go with publication date.
For what it's worth, the numbering seems to make Not One Whit of difference on Barnes & Noble's Nook app for iPad. The novellas are all grouped under one icon, and when you click the icon, they're listed in what appears to be random order. (On the Kindle app, I only have Penric's Demon, so I don't know if the numbering makes any difference there.)
It's now kinda late, but here's my €0.02 (hey, I live in the EU €-zone): pub history. If there were to be no more Pen&Des I'd say internal order, but that's not the case, as has been demonstrated.I see that the Hornblowers have acquired internal order, but we're not going to see any new ones of those. I read them mostly in pub order, as I have all the vK series. I think the first vK I got out of order might have been Cetaganda but I bet there were others I didn't notice.
My suggestion is to make sure Wikipedia is up to date for your books, and have a listing for both chronological and publication order. Some would prefer to read the series one way, some the other. Whenever anyone asks on a forum the people in the know can quickly and easily link to the Wiki page, and it's easily discoverable with a Google search for those so inclined.
Ah, so it's possible that discussions might still go on even after a choice is made. Penric's story is pretty straightforward with the timeline. How much time has passed and his age is mentioned early on, so even if the numbers were off somehow, it can still be figured out.
Then again, those are one of the details I look for in a story. I like knowing the whens and I try to imagine what might have taken place in between to bring the character up to where they are now. But maybe I'm odd that way. ^^