Blog/2024-07-16/Book Series

A Reddit post I saw today complaining about the books in a series not telling you where they land in the series reminded me of a funny event from my childhood.

We went to the local library to pick up a book and ended up getting The Two Towers by Tolkien. It was quite the exciting introduction to this world that started with some guy named Boromir blowing his horn and trying to fight off orcs. Very dramatic moment, but he was rapidly dispatched with. When I finished the book, I discovered that it was the second in the series, and went back to read about how the Gandalf who had "returned" in the first book I read fell into the chasm with the Balrog of Mordor. A nice early prequel experience :)

Another thing is that the only Martin Beck book that I haven't read is The Terrorists since it is the last in a series. I feel rather sad every time I complete the last book in a series that I will never return to. Until then the characters may still exist but the moment I read the last one, it's all over. Usually I cave, but for some reason this one I've stuck to.