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Ruining a Good Book with a Series
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Guru wrote: I was so hoping that her daughter would play a more pivotal part in the series, but she might have well gotten a new pet rabbit for the amount of impact it had on the series. It became more like an encyclopedia than a story. lol, agreed. Pages and pages and pages of geography - I listened to most of it on my Kindle and it was sooooo boring. She should have written two novels and a text book instead of a series.
One that never lost it for me was Ellis Peter's Brother Cadfael books - 20 mysteries and a prequel, all more or less self-contained stories with just enough backplot and a few reappearances to make it very believeable. Surprisingly the TV series was also lovely. Proper comfort-blanket reading and watching.
Totally agree with the Jean Auel series last two books awful made me very sad because I waited so long for them to come out!Dance of Dragons by George R. R. Martin I still havn't finished because it drags so much!
Anita Blake.......i would be fine with all the sex if she could just get over all the sex, she turned way to whiny.
My favorite series's where I felt they stayed good through out
Jacqueline Carey Kushiel series
Jeaniene Frost - Nighthuntress
Richelle Mead - Storm Heir series and Succubus Series
I think there is a difference between books that should have just been the single book, but then the sequel(s) let down the book.And those series where the author just keeps putting out another book, and the quality has dropped off considerably (Anita Blake, prime example). In the case of the second, I have to wonder: is it the publishers who are pushing authors to put out yet another book - trying to milk the series/fans for all they are worth? Or is it authors not wanting to let go of their "baby"? ...I ask the second as LKH clearly is too connected to Anita Blake (from the things that she has said about her), but there also seems an element of milking the series and the current boom around urban fantasy.
I know it must be hard for authors to keep the series as fresh and interesting as the first book, but I wonder if outside pressures are playing more of a role in *making* them keep going.
I really enjoyed the first two books in Richelle Meade's Dark Swan series, and Eugenie was one of my favorite characters (she is a really strong female lead) ...but the last two books just ruined the whole series for me. The last 20% of book 4 was ridiculous and left me feeling so angry that I had wasted my time reading this series!
I've had it happen with a couple of series. Primarily the Sword of Truth books. Really liked the first couple, but they get very preachy about the authors political (conservative) and religious (against it) feelings. Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches series as well. I thought the first was brilliant, but they went horribly wrong after that. The Wheel of Time books are not so much a steady decline, as they are up and down, so I keep reading.
Julie wrote: "I really enjoyed the first two books in Richelle Meade's Dark Swan series, and Eugenie was one of my favorite characters (she is a really strong female lead) ...but the last two books just ruined t..."I have to agree! at the end of the 4th book I wished I could reach through and slap some sense into the main character!
I loved the Poison Study books, Opal, well she wasn't my favorite but it wasn't horrible either. She came out with a new series Touch of Power. And fantastic first book I hope the series keeps up.I've read most of the terry Goodkind and the middle really did fall through for me. But I've picked up the end, just finished the Omen Machine.
And the whole Outlander thing, yep same for me. I liked the first, ehh the second, read the rest but really liked the later couple of books that she's brought out.
My problem is if I get mad at a character I put the book down for years before I get the courage up to try to read it again. I do the same to TV shows as well.
David wrote: "Amber wrote: "Ender's Game. One book should have been it. Period."Except for Ender's Shadow. That was great. And then Speaker for the Dead is nearly a stand alone, anyway, so that doesn't reall..."
I completely agree. I loved all three of those books, but found the others to be unnecessary and possibly motivated by a desire to continue cashing in on the series... perhaps for future movie-making purposes? Whatever the reason, Card definitely should have stopped after the first three books... which are in my top 25 books ever, btw, so he had some big shoes to fill. (Yes, even though they were his shoes to start out with.)
Another agreement on the Outlander series. It just became so tedious and long-winded. I don't usually give up on series because I just have to know what happens to the characters in the end, but I just totally lost interest in Outlander.On the other hand, while Wheel of Time made me very frustrated in the past (I stopped after #9), I am planning on going back and reading the last few books - once it is all finished.
As for consistently good series, I agree with Susan about Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel Series, both the first and second trilogies. However, the third trilogy, the Naamah trilogy, is a little disappointing. I would also add Anne Bishop's Dark Jewels trilogy. The side novels aren't so great, but the main three books are very good.
I generally like to read a series of books if I like the character/characters in them and/or the world created by the author. I enjoy immersing myself in their world and really getting to know them. I have read a lot of good (and a lot of bad), but some authors are just more successful incorporating their world into a series of novels that are individually and collectively entertaining. For instance, I personally still enjoy reading the Dresden series very much and look forward to the next (although I realize this opinion is not shared by all). On the other hand, I would just as soon have stopped after book two in Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan series. I really do hate it when I love a book and then start to love a series, only to have it morph into something so disappointing.In the VF vein of things, I do not feel as if romance novels are necessarily the best genre to keep a series going. If they use the same characters in each book it just loses a very essential element for me. Part of the draw of romance novels is watching the characters as they are learning about each other and falling in love. Not that I have anything against falling in love and getting married and living happily ever after in the literary world. I just feel this sort of relationship is much better utilized in books that are not Romance specific, such as the Amelia Peabody series.
On the other hand, if the author chooses to make a series using the same world but different characters (usually ones that are all introduced in the first book, or at least one of the previous books) after a while it can feel very formulaic. A really good illustration of this is the Christine Feehan Carpathain series. I really enjoyed the first few, but after a while I just lost interest and moved on. There are always exceptions to the rule, though.
One thing I HATE HATE HATE (I really don't like it LOL) in any series is UST that goes on WAY too long. It is aggravating beyond belief (which would be my one big irritation with the Dresden series). Some UST can be fun, but after a while you just feel like saying "oh just DO it already". I would rather have no romance or sex than UST ad nauseam (Hello Rachel and Ivy).
I have completeness issues. If I have enjoyed the first book or so in a series, I feel compelled to continue with it to the bitter end. I'm working on getting over that but... J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood series for instance.... I really enjoyed the first few books. After that the amount of angst and the way her men are all completely messed up in the head just started to become distasteful. Yet somehow I read 7 books before I finally figured out they weren't going to get any better. It would have been nice to come across just one well-adjusted man who stayed that way. Messing with John Mathew the way she did. Not right!I have thought about this quite a lot, in an attempt to understand my thing about reading the entire series. A really good sequel has to have enough in common with the previous ones that, as a reader, I can see the connections between characters and so that the world remains consistent. At the same time, the characters I have met before (especially if they are the same lead characters) have to continue to grow and more needs to be revealed about the world. I also need to feel some sense of hope for the future of those characters and that world (another beef I have with the Black Dagger books - more gloom and doom coming right up).
To do that well is very hard for most authors to pull off consistently, in my experience. Nalini Singh has done that very well so far with herr Guild Hunter series. Elena and Raphael continue to change and learn throughout the three books they lead in, and it was good to see them continue to do so through Dmitri's story. I think she has been a bit more formulaic with her Psy-Changleling series, though I still enjoy them.
And for some author's the other thing that can blow the whole deal for me is when they fall so in love with their characters that they either go off in ridiculous directions (as in Twilight, I should never have read books two or three and have actually managed not to touch book four) or they run out of interesting stories for them, but keep going anyway (which is my problem with Anita Blake). I sympathise though. As a wannabe author, the temptation is awfully hard to resist.
Perhaps an additional rating system is needed for readers, an individual book rating for each story and then an additional rating for the series. So Dark Lover gets a 4 star from me, but the series up to book 7 only gets a 2 star. And as for the other series, Covet etc. I'm not going anywhere near them because I hate where the first series went.
I don't know that I've actually read a book that was supposed to be standalone that "got" a sequel or series added on after the fact.I have read many series where the early books were fabulous and then the quality dropped off as the quantity added up. Many have already been listed here: Sookie Stackhouse, Anita Blake, etc. I also found the last Mercy Thompson book to be "blah" compared to the rest of the series. I'm hoping it's a fluke and not a sign of things to come.
I think all of us have hit that book in a series where the magic is gone and you know that it's all downhill from there.
As someone up thread pointed out, I agree that I think there become a point when it's less about the series and more about milking one more book out of the cash cow. Usually you can tell when that starts to happen.
I honestly would rather see an author put the characters/series to bed and start something new. Give me a spin off into the same world or start something completely new.
Brandi wrote: "Amber wrote: "Ender's Game. One book should have been it. Period."I emphatically agree, Amber."
And I agree so much that I have absolutely, categorically refused to read the rest, because I don't want to trivialize how powerful that book is.
Most of the anger and disappointment I feel after a bad book is magically locked away in my brain. But reading one of the posts here I remember something very fresh:Mockingjay.
I didn't hate the book, but that ending? That "everything is so messed up it won't ever be fixed." thing? My depression post-book ending had no bounds after that one.
I loved the first book, the ending was kind of everything I wanted... then came all the mindfuck in books 2 and 3... *sigh*
I couldn't agree more about the ending of Mockingjay! I am still upset about that one!!
Samantha wrote: "I couldn't agree more about the ending of Mockingjay! I am still upset about that one!!"Tell me about it! I felt a bit off with Katniss' love thing. I mean, I can understand her survivor instincts and all the crappy things she went in her life, but I ended up thinking "does she really love him? Or did she just choose him because he calms her?"
And I won't even start with poor Peeta...
So, yeah, Mockingjay...
I think the problems are two fold and interrelated. If the story is more of the same no matter how good it might be people get tired of that but if the characters change or die it becomes how dare you do that to my favorites!!!A side note is this is the problem with television series.
Robert wrote: "I think the problems are two fold and interrelated. If the story is more of the same no matter how good it might be people get tired of that but if the characters change or die it becomes how dare ..."This reminds me of the bizarre feeling I have once two characters who had this long history of UST suddenly/finally get together. Things go from hot to blend then meh very quickly if not worked properly.
✿◕‿◕✿Paola wrote: "hands down for me Sookie stackhouse series..after 7th book in the series it has been a steady downhill in content. The last two books were total waste of trees imho lol... I'm not even gonna bother..."Really? For me, I started with True Blood, so when my friends were all like "oh, I can't believe they did that here! Or they didn't do this... I wonder when..." and they'd be all vague, but obviously they'd read the books (this was while watching season three, after only seeing the last ep of season 2 and the very first ep)... I knew I had to read the books to see what the differences were.
Knowing that there were already at least 8 novels, I decided to at least read the first 4 to give them a chance... And this is how it went for me... First book... "Meh, not bad, not great." Second book "Meh" again. The third book was soo terribly written (the final battle not even described, instead all this smoke to avoid writing it), and had way less plot than the show... so I almost jumped ship then... but I had to stick with it because I'd already gotten in this far of what I felt were mediocre books... and then I read book 4... with Eric's amnesia. O.O And then I was totally into it and hooked, and the series has become my crack ever since. Some books are better than others... I feel that Charlaine Harris' writing has improved (slightly), and she has really interesting ideas and some great characters... but often her plot is on the thinner side, and I still feel like she kind of makes up the ending when she gets there (the Sophie-Ann Leclerq bracelet thing). I need to read it to know what happens next, and to stay AHEAD of TrueBlood... And because I REALLY enjoy the physical scenes with Eric Northman... and am just way too into Eric as a character. For me, it's fun to see the differences between the books and TV series.
Not so much ruining as series as trashing a universe, but Jacqueline Carey's Naamah trilogy (Naamah's Kiss, Naamah's Curse and Naamah's Blessing) was such a disappointment after the Kushiel's Legacy series.I adored the world she built in those six books, yes, even Imriel and his crushing angst, and then she followed it with Moirin and all her super special sparkly powers. Just, no.
Managed to struggle through the first one but I think I'll leave it from now on!
Vagrant wrote: "Most of the anger and disappointment I feel after a bad book is magically locked away in my brain. But reading one of the posts here I remember something very fresh:Mockingjay.
This is so interesting, because almost everyone I've met feels this way. With the exception of the ending (which I'll get to in a second), Mockingjay was my FAVORITE of the whole trilogy. I actually really like that the book doesn't do the readers any favors in terms of happy endings...or even settled endings. War is like that, and I like the fact that a young adult book isn't afraid to leave things snarled up for younger readers.
Having said that, I agree with everyone who is mentioning the romance aspect of the third book. That's what Collins uses to carry the series, and I think she certainly shortchanges readers in that respect. It wouldn't have hurt her to include another thirty pages at the end that looks at how Katniss and Peeta rebuild their relationship. And let's not even speak about the epilogue. It's literally the stupidest thing I've ever, ever read. To me, the epilogue of Mockingjay doesn't exist.
Ashley wrote: It wouldn't have hurt her to include another thirty pages at the end that looks at how Katniss and Peeta rebuild their relationship. And let's not even speak about the epilogue. It's literally the stupidest thing I've ever, ever read. To me, the epilogue of Mockingjay doesn't exist.Yes! Those are my problems with Mockingjay. I found it amazing to see how each character saw and handled war. How Johanna was so messed up she would not even take a bath or even Katniss issues with being the face of everything took the best of her.
But I missed explanations or at least something assuring me that she did found love or that she had someone inside her heart. Anything, really, that pointed to Peeta making his way in. (and what's up with strangling her even now and then? Couldn't they do a detox on the poor boy with all those advanced sci-fi-y tech they had??
I'm not saying it's unrealistic for someone to choose not out of love, but out of what's best/what will be of more advantage to them, but it made me cringe when I saw that maybe Gale was right and Katniss would be that cold.
I like to headcanon it as being clear and set in stone. Like a lost last chapter with those 30 pages you mentioned.
Oh yeah, and that prologue? *sigh* I won't even go there.
I have to agree with the people who didn't like Mockingjay.The real turning point for me was when Finnick died. Everything just went downhill for me. I already wasn't feeling the 3rd book to begin with.
Then Prim died and Katniss just rolls over and "dies". She kills the District 13 President which was fine. But there is no reckoning with Gale - no one can convince me that last bombing wasn't his idea. It was a snare. And he wasn't afraid to kill people to "win" the war. I don't know that he knew Prim was going to be there but then maybe he did.
She just sort of goes with Peeta. He just wins be default? After everything, her mom just abandons her?
I like Katniss because she was such a strong character. I felt like she was much weaker in the third book and by the end, she was just pathetic.
Mayetra wrote: "I have to agree with the people who didn't like Mockingjay.The real turning point for me was when Finnick died. Everything just went downhill for me. I already wasn't feeling the 3rd book to beg..."
Gale may or may not know about Prim, but the District 13 President knew and even accepted Prim's offer to join the nurses even tho' she was not of age. It was the best way to psychologically explode Katniss imho and that President had it with Katniss being Katniss.
I felt that Gale went away being a hero when Katniss should have confronted him, shot him, dunno, anything, but she was just tired of everything, strained from the war. She wasn't weak, she was beat up by everything that happened before. Including Gale messing up for good for the sake of victory.
And her mother? Geez! I was almost forgetting about that! That woman was just not fit to have a family. Your daughter is f*cked up, after giving her all to save your damn ass and you just go "oh, sorry, it's too much for me, I'm going to live over there, k? Call me, bye." WTF?
Gale may or may not know about Prim, but the District 13 President knew and even accepted Prim's offer to join the nurses even tho' she was not of age. It was the best way to psychologically explode Katniss imho and that President had it with Katniss being Katniss.I lean more towards Gale didn't knew Prim was going to be there. I think he knew that the "snare" would kill nurses from the rebels. I think he was willing to kill a few of his "own" to win the war. However, I don't think he was overly sorry Prim was killed. It felt more like, "Prim died? Bummer, I guess that ruins my chances with Kat." That was sort of the perception I was left with.
I think the District 13 Pres saw the Mockingjay as a means to an end. Once that end was achievable, the Mockingjay was a liability. I don't think it would have mattered if it was Peeta or Katniss who was the poster child, the result would have been the same. Once they outlived their usefulness she would have found a way to make them disappear.
I get that bad things happen in a war. The whole end of the book just felt rushed. Like Vagrant said, Gale walks away a hero. Katniss' mom gets to skip off and live a nice new life now that she's free of those pesky kids of hers.
I wanted a better ending. Let Katniss explode with Prim's death. But I wanted more than the President 13th's death. I just really felt completely unsatisfied with the end. I wanted the time I spent invested into the series back.
Speaking of crap epilogues: Harry Potter. I know it's not Vaginal Fantasy, but it totally pissed me off. Actually, I'm still pretty angry about it. Damn you, JK.
Molly wrote: "Speaking of crap epilogues: Harry Potter. I know it's not Vaginal Fantasy, but it totally pissed me off. Actually, I'm still pretty angry about it. Damn you, JK."It was kinda like a bad fanfic: ".....then everyone married everyone and had many children and they all had strange names".
Mayetra wrote: "I get that bad things happen in a war. The whole end of the book just felt rushed. Like Vagrant said, Gale walks away a hero. Katniss' mom gets to skip off and live a nice new life now that she's free of those pesky kids of hers."I hear you on the end of the book. It definitely seems rushed, and I'm actually surprised her editor didn't send it back and make her flesh that out more. Surely the editor foresaw the issues it created for her readership.
I think it's fascinating how incompetent Katniss' mother is throughout the series. Katniss' hero is clearly her father, but Collins basically eviscerates Katniss' mother every time she enters a scene. Even when she's "doctoring," she's still a pretty incapable parent. Makes me think Collins might have some mommy issues, or at least a tortured relationship with contemporary expectations of motherhood. I mean, I sort of feel that our own readings of the character are a little unfair. I mean, who are we to tell the woman how to cope with her losses and tragedies?
(Clearly I think she's a terrible mother. But maybe that's the question Collins is asking. Personally, I think it's more a case of the autobiographical blues.)
However, I categorically disagree with the idea that Gale walks away a hero. I think Collins is very, very direct in the way that she separates reader experience from textual experience in this section. Of course the rebels will find Gale heroic; he singlehandedly hamstrings the opposition with his silver parachutes. But he ISN'T a hero for the reader. We see--and hopefully, understand--that the means he uses to push the rebellion forward is cutthroat; perhaps necessary, but Collins is pretty clear that Gale's means-to-an-end tactic is not ethical. This is, of course, dramatic irony at its finest.
Molly wrote: "Speaking of crap epilogues: Harry Potter. I know it's not Vaginal Fantasy, but it totally pissed me off. Actually, I'm still pretty angry about it. Damn you, JK."YES. SO DUMB.
I loved the first few Anita Blake novels, then they just stopped working for me. Many of the novels just felt like chapters in one long book. The latter novels were very simplistic stories with lots of sex thrown in as filler. I'm all for the sexy scenes, but they stopped moving the story along and actually began to hinder the advancement of the novels' plots. I guess I keep reading them because I hope the old Anita will make a comeback. I also read a lot of mystery novels and the Patricia Cornwell series began to lose my interest.
I loved the first couple of Wheel of Time. Then felt like the others here that he was just extending the story to have more books to come out. Ugh! And agree about Anita Blake too - loved her in the first say 5 books and then it was too much for awhile. Still reading them though - just know what I'm getting now. :D
Michelle wrote: "I loved the first few Anita Blake novels, then they just stopped working for me. Many of the novels just felt like chapters in one long book. The latter novels were very simplistic stories with lot..."You are much stronger than I am, LOL. I basically gave up. She had some really cool ideas as far as Vampire politics and things. I think if she had devoted more time to fleshing out those ideas instead of having Anita sleep with everyone, the books would have been fabulous. The early books held such promise.
I forget which book but I remember she takes the little submissive cat-shifter with her to work. And she accepts a job but the whole scene was basically to justify office sex with said shifter. The book ended and I remember she did very little if anything with the case. I thought maybe it was a hook for a plot that would surface in the next book - nope never mentioned again. With all the stuff she did to solve the lame main plot of the book, she never had time to actually work the little case.
I remember thinking, doesn't anyone notice that she's not actually working. Then the thought hit me, does Hamilton think that her readers are so dazzled by the sexy time that we wouldn't notice she completely drops a plot thread.
I was pretty much done at that point. I kept reading one or two after but they kept getting worse so I finally just stopped.
Courtney wrote: "Stop slut-shaming, and then go have GOOD sex." That's my vote for the Vaginal Fantasy Hangout motto.
Vagrant wrote: "Molly wrote: "Speaking of crap epilogues: Harry Potter. I know it's not Vaginal Fantasy, but it totally pissed me off. Actually, I'm still pretty angry about it. Damn you, JK."It was kinda li..."
I'm telling you, the publishers had an intern who didn't speak English as a first language knock out book 7. Either that, or the latter Potter books will forever be held up as an example of why you shouldn't force an author to fulfill a multi-book contract when she's obviously fed up with it. Why? Because she'll give you The Deathly Hallows, that's why.
Does anyone else find that it's not only a case of a sequel not being as good as the original, but it often feels like they should have been grafted together into one brilliant stand-alone but were instead split? Its one thing to read a cliffhanger ending and but I keep feeling like they've published 30 chapter segments as separate books to generate extra income.
Virginia wrote: "I felt this way about the Parasol Protectorate series. I LOVED Soulless, but was completely turned off by Changeless, and sort of eh about book 3, I have not yet been able to make myself read book..."I know! Soulless was so good: I could not put it down. Then I saw Changeless in the bookstore and almost squeed with happiness. It is still siting on my shelf with a bookmark about a third of the way in - I just can't get into it.
Another series that ended up disappointing me was Anita Blake (shocking I know) I read it almost religiously through book eight - I loved the characterizations and the plot and Anita's struggles between what she wants/needs, what others expect of her, and her religious background and then Anita going "fuck it, I do what I want". I didn't mind the addition of sex into the series - I hardily approved.
Then book nine came along and it was about twice as long as any of the other books in the series and it was basically, "sex, sex, sex, ANGST, sex, sex, oh my Episcopalian guilt, sex, sex, sex, plot, sex, angst, angst, SEX" and I was like WTF? Did I accidentally pick up bad Anita Blake fan fiction and not notice?
Long story short -
Anita Blake before book nine: engaging plots and interesting characters sprinkled with steamy sex.
Anita Blake after book nine: Lots of sex, even more sex, "oh wait, I forgot the plot *tosses in some plot*", ALL OF THE SEX, the end.
I'm sure I've had this issue with several books, but the one series that jumps to mind is the Emberverse series by S.M. Stirling. I really enjoyed Dies the Fire, but I just couldn't get into the second book. It's possible the series picked back up... I didn't bother continuing reading to find out. At least for me, the trouble was that in the first book a lot of what made it interesting was seeing people learn to cope with a radical change in the world. By the second book there was a guy in Portland doing the whole medieval tyrant thing... but they still pretty much had their shit figured out so it was just kinda... meh.
I absolutely loved Wizard's First Rule, but the series started to sharply devolve after that. Same thing with the first three Wheel of Time books - I haven't finished either series, and I don't really intend to. But I think Wizard's First Rule is great; and I often recommend that people read the first three Wheel of Time books, and pretend the bad guy who gets killed at the end of the third book is the Big Bad and nothing interesting happens after (because, really, it doesn't). The opposite thing happened with the Dresden Files - I read the first few books, and thought they were rather brain candy - fluffy detective stories. But the writing has been getting better and the story has gotten more complex with each book. It's a wonderful progression to go from 'okay' to 'fantastic'.
The Stephanie Plum series by Janet Evanovich. I don't even remember how many I read before I gave up.
DJ Enigma wrote: "For me, Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles jumped the shark after Queen of the Damned.This. It turned me off her stuff entirely. It started out so well and then just went to ickytown.
I also felt like the Pern series started to feel a bit watered-down and desperate, particularly when AIVAS came along.
Vaginal Fantasy Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
Dies the Fire (other topics)Dark Lover (other topics)
Covet (other topics)
Twilight (other topics)
Changeless (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
J.R. Ward (other topics)Nalini Singh (other topics)
Didn't like the second book, but love the third again.
I reread part 1, 3 and 4 but never 2.