More about Series

So last time I wound up focusing mostly on trilogies.  I figured that this time, I'd focus more on series books, and things to think about or look at.

I feel like there's really two kinds of series books.  There are the stand-alone series, and the metaplot/contained series.  The former are books that follow a certain character with continually changing circumstances.  Each book is self-contained, and while it may build upon things that happen in previous books, the changes in character or...