[Rob B]

How do you people read your fantasy series?

Do you wait until the series is complete before reading?

Do you read it as its published?

For me, I am somewhere in the middle. The Dark Tower, The Tawny Man WOT and aSoIF are being read as they are published.

Sometimes I will wait until all the series is available. For example, I enjoyed Thomas Harlan's Shadow of Ararat but part of me wants to wait until it is completely published before continuing the series.

I did kind of a weird thing on my first read of WOT: I interspersed different books between each volume of the series.

Anyway, lets hear it folks.

[saintjon]

Well, when I first started reading series of novels most of the things I was reading were already complete.
I think Wheel of Time was the first big series I got into which wasn't complete yet. Since then I seem to leap about from series to series and I'm always glad to come across one which is already done because then you don't have to wait. It's getting a bit bothersome remembering all those Jordan characters and what they're all up to but I have a good idea to deal with that. Some people advise re-reading and have done so. Well I'm gonna wait until the last one is in writing and read the whole damn series then. When the last book comes out the whole story will be fresh in my memory and I'll be better able to appreciate the ending. Come to think of it, I might end up doing the same thing for George Martin depending on how quickly he writes. Crown of Stars could use a good re-read also....
Oh bother.

[elpa]

I try to stay away from incomplete series until they are finished.

There are a few series that are still in production though: aSoIaF, WOT, and soon to be Tawny Man(I like Fitz too damn much to wait).

For everything else I think I will wait until it's complete, although I don't know how much longer I can put off the Malazan books. http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Warewolf]

I used to read books as they came out. However, due to the agonizingly long wait between books and the huge casts of characters, I've stopped reading Jordan, Martin, Wurts, etc. I will wait until all the books are out--this includes any and all series by other authors with the exceptions of King's Dark Tower and Goodkind's SoT. The reason I can handle these is the fact that the casts are so small, that it's relatively easy to remember them all and what they've done in previous books.

[DarthV]

I used to read them as books came out... but it just starts to get too frustrating... ended up re-reading WoT books 4 or 5 times every 2 years... not that they aren't worth re-reading, but I'd rather have a complete story dammit!

My current philosophy is to wait until a series is finished and then devour it whole. Then again I get mighty tempted to dip into the Martin/Stover/Jones/Elliott/Erikson/Wurts/Barclay stuff in the pile. Reading one book of each wouldn't hurt, would it ??

http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/smile.gif

[dendol]

i have learnt from the mistake of reading GRRM's asoiaf before the series was complete and now im paying for it through the torment of waiting for the rest of the books to come out!

this has lead me to stick to a policy of never starting a series that isnt complete. Therefore i have book 1 of many series on my shelf, waiting to be read.. it hurts so much hearing people say how good erikson is and not being able to read it!! so many times i have almost given in to temptation... arrghh!

[Gooch]

I've got no rhyme or reason really.

I spend so much time digging in the used book stores, that i'll come across a good mix.

I found ASOIAF in the used bin, finished the first book just as the second was coming out in paperback, then had to wait or ASOS.

Others, like the Black Company I got hooked on through here, and others like Riftwar, I found yet again through my used bookstore hunts.

[Lani]

I usually, read the series as they come out, though I do find it a blessing when it's possible to get the whole series immediately rather than waiting for them to be published.

[Qin]

With some fava beans and a nice chianti.

[Cygnus]

Since I've only been reading fantasy for five years most of the series I've come upon have been completed. Only now am I starting to get stuck waiting for the next book.

I just can't wait for the entire series to be finished in most cases, but I should. I have awful long-term memory and by the time the next book comes out I've totally forgotten what happened in the previous books. I just started The Tawny Man and there seem to be some major details that I've blanked out on. The really sad thing is that I just read the Assassin books last year!

I should probably wait for a complete series, but I have yet to be able to!