Discussion Question: Do you read every book in a series?

[fashion_piranha]

Discussion Question: Do you always finish a book series once you've started it?

I've recently finished A Game of Thrones, the first novel in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice series. A more in-depth review will be coming, but for the sake of discussion I'll admit that I didn't exactly fall in love with the book. It's OK - entertaining

Comments

[ms_geekette]

Yeah, usually once I a read a few books in a series, I'll probably eventually finish, although there are several series that I'm behind on - not sure if it's a loss of enthusiasm with these series, or what, though.

And a note about Game of Thrones: the show is fine with hitting most of the major plot points of the books, but they've screwed up/"fixed" the characterization of some of the POV characters and beefed up some non-POV characters (thereby making some plot points a bit weird), and that annoys me. The female characters sort of get the short end of the stick on the adaptation, as well. The show is decent (no one can fault the production values that much, for sure), but the writing isn't quite as good, IMO (can you tell I don't really like the main writers/showrunners, heh?) The first two books were sort of slow, but the 3rd one, Storm of Swords, is probably considered the best book by most readers of the series. I was partial to the 4th book, though. The latest one....umm, let's say it was not my favorite. Martin could definitely use an editor with a firm hand - he sometimes gets side-tracked with world-building (or food descriptions, or talking about turtles XD), so I can see how the Song of Ice and Fire Series might not be for everyone.

I guess it's up to you whether you continue to read the series or just watch the show - are you a plot person, or do you like more in-depth characterization/world-building?

[fashion_piranha]

I'm definitely more of a world-building person - that was what got me through the Iron Fey series - lots of interesting ideas in the world, but it's populated by pretty so-so main characters.