Top Ten Tuesday is an original meme from the awesome team at The Broke and The Bookish.
This week’s theme: “Ten Finished Series I Have YET to Finish”. I seem to have a tendency to leave series unfinished…!
1.The Wheel of Time / Robert Jordan – This fantasy classic spans 14 MASSIVE books, plus a prequel and a companion book. I must confess, I have only read the first two. I don’t know if I’ll manage to get back into the series – there are a lot of characters, and I would probably have to start from the beginning just to get caught up again.
2. Legend / Marie Lu – I used to work with teenagers quite a bit, so I made an effort to introduce more YA lit into my life. I was curious about this futuristic dystopia trilogy, in which a boy and a girl must save the world from the machinations of the mean old grown-ups, because the author worked in the video game industry (and I’m a bit of a gamer). I actually enjoyed the first book in the trilogy, but not enough to make me want to pick up the second two. It was a bit of a case of “been there, read that”.
3. Divergent / Veronica Roth – Yet another dystopia – come on, teens, lighten up already! Didn’t like the characters, wasn’t impressed by the world building, couldn’t be bothered to finish the trilogy.
4.Chronicles of the Black Company / Glen Cook – I really loved the first book in this dark fantasy series – the adventures of a band of mercenaries who get swept up in a terrible battle in which the lines between good and evil are blurred beyond recognition. The second and third books were OK too. As I progressed through the series, though, the magic began to wear off, and it began to feel as though the author was losing interest in the world he created. I never finished this series, and with so many exciting books on my to-read list, I doubt I will.
5.Inheritance Cycle / Christopher Paolini – I actually enjoyed Eragon, and I probably will try to finish this series, but with so many books on my bookshelf waiting to be read, I still haven’t got around to it yet!
6.Time Quintet / Madeleine L’Engle – OK, so I’ll be honest – I didn’t realize this was a series. I remember reading A Wrinkle In Time as a student and not enjoying it, largely because of the tedious extension activities that were thrust upon us by my English teacher. I haven’t picked it up again since, which is a shame, because I have enjoyed other works by L’Engle.
7.The Foundation Novels – Isaac Asimov – As a teenager I read a lot of science fiction. I really enjoyed Asimov’s Robot series, so I decided to give Foundation a try. I finished the first novel through sheer force of will alone, and was too confused to be interested in picking up another title in the series.
8. Sword of Shannara Trilogy / Terry Brooks – I know this is a classic fantasy series, but I found it painfully formulaic and unbearably predictable. I managed to finish the first book, but I have no interest whatsoever in finishing the series. Note – I actually met Terry Brooks, and he actually seems like a very nice person, but I still didn’t enjoy this series 😦 .
9. The Malazan Book of the Fallen / Steven Erikson – Wow, there’s a surprising amount of fantasy in this list! I didn’t really get into this series, which I found reminiscent of The Black Company. I don’t mind dark fantasy, but this series just didn’t grab me.
10.Dune – Frank Herbert. I wanted to love this series because it’s such a classic of the genre, but for some reason I never got around to finishing it. I think that’s a bit of trend in this list – some series I didn’t bother finishing because I didn’t enjoy them, but others I just seem to have forgotten – I didn’t hate them, but I wasn’t compelled to seek out the remaining books.
Well, that’s that! Who knows, perhaps I’ll finish some of these series yet! Let me know in the comments if you’ve finished any of these series, or if there are any other series that you recommend trying!
Raincity Librarian 