We’ve all been there. A great new start to a brand new series — fresh ideas, fresh characters, intriguing new plot line. Then the perfect follow-up. Tension ratcheted up, new compelling characters introduced, new lands, stakes are raised. And then. Well, and then. An OK third novel. Maybe the the dreaded “bridge book.” And soon we’re slogging on through, wondering how we’d gotten off the path. Where did that great storyline go? All those cool new characters?

Zombie Horde by GenghisKrahn on deviantartWelcome to the tenth circle of Dante’s Hell: the endless fantasy series. Like the guest that just won’t take the hints and leave, but keeps getting yet another soda/beer and settling down once again on the couch — you swear you can see the cushions molding into the shape of his butt, the author just won’t finish the damn thing and go home. Instead it’s book after book after book, no advancement of story or character, just more piled atop more, shambling forward like an encroaching zombie horde. You can actually feel your brain being eaten.

So which series does it for you? What series have you read that you wished the author would have realized really ended two, three, five books earlier than it did? Tell us what series dragged on too long, where you would have ended it had you the power to go back in time and stop the author before he/she wrote again. And again. And again.

Art: Zombie Horde by ~GenghisKrahn on deviantART

Author

  • Bill Capossere

    BILL CAPOSSERE, who's been with us since June 2007, lives in Rochester NY, where he is an English adjunct by day and a writer by night. His essays and stories have appeared in Colorado Review, Rosebud, Alaska Quarterly, and other literary journals, along with a few anthologies, and been recognized in the "Notable Essays" section of Best American Essays. His children's work has appeared in several magazines, while his plays have been given stage readings at GEVA Theatre and Bristol Valley Playhouse. When he's not writing, reading, reviewing, or teaching, he can usually be found with his wife and son on the frisbee golf course or the ultimate frisbee field.