How do y’all feel about continuing a series after an author dies? To me, I think one last book can be written to end it, but the series should rest with the author, just my thoughts though. I’m in the middle of a series right now and some random lady is “finishing” it, but she has written like 7 books that show no end. I’m not mad, but I just want to feel the satisfaction of completing a series and having the whole collection.
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Totally up to the literary estate, if they want to see their relative’s work keep going then whose to say they’re wrong. Sometimes it doesn’t work but at the end of the day posthumous works have no bearing on the original texts so it’s all good. Every year there’s a bunch of Sherlock Holmes or Dracula books but it doesn’t affect the quality or reception of the original works.
I think it’s something that has to be judged in each individual case.
Sanderson completing Jordon’s Wheel of Time series was planned by Jordon before his passing and appeared to be judged well by the fans.
Christopher Tolkien going through his father’s notes and publishing more Middle Earth writings were also well received.
The Salmon of Doubt was published unfinished by Douglas Adams estate after his passing along with some other writings and I liked that. However fans haven’t been as welcoming towards Eoin Colfer’s continuation of the Hitchhiker’s series with And Another Thing.
I personally hated Go Fetch a Watchmen, a book Harper Lee did not want published, but was released anyway after her death.
Honestly people should have given …And Another Thing more of a chance. It was actually quite good and Douglas Adams would have loved it. It left the series in a place much more in line with where Adams would have liked, with a more upbeat ending.
Sanderson completing Jordon’s Wheel of Time series was planned by Jordon before his passing and appeared to be judged well by the fans.
False, and false again.
You seem very certain there. You aren’t completely wrong but…
So you are right that Jordan didn’t plan for Sanderson to finish his work. He did however plan for someone to finish. He dedicated a lot of his remaining time to getting it fleshed out with written and audio notes so that someone could finish his work.
It was his wife (and editor) who chose Sanderson following Jordan’s passing.
The second point is certainly wrong (when applied to the wider fanbase) and I am unsure why you are so certain about it.
There have of course been complaints about Sanderson’s novels. His writing style differs and some of his characters feel different to their appearances in the previous works. However, even with those complaints people have been appreciative of the books overall and grateful to get an ending. The overall reaction has definitely been favourable despite any complaints.
Possibly you just find yourself within a small echo chamber of miserable fans?
I personally hated Go Fetch a Watchmen, a book Harper Lee did not want published, but was released anyway after her death.
I read it. And I’m mad that they released it.
To be fair, Go Set a Watchman was actually an early draft of what became To Kill a Mockingbird, and not a sequel. Watchman was definitely inferior, and truly benefited from Harper Lee’s editor’s advice.
Harper Lee was still alive (though maybe not aware) when GSaW came out.
Looking it up, it was published almost a year before her death and there had already been reporting that whomever it was that owned the publishing rights were taking advantage of her estate.
I can’t stand it! For a publisher/writer to continue a series/novels after an authors passing is just greed! They have a legacy of sorts, why tarnish it!
Sometimes the setting or world is the legacy and the continued use of it is showing respect for that legacy. As a writer myself, I would be thrilled to think that, one day, readers might feel it necessary to continue writing about my world and characters. Similarly, I’d be thrilled to hear during my life of people writing fanfiction.
Which boook are u reading pls tell
Sometimes it work, depending on the series. Some authors create a fictional world so complex one can’t imagine anybody else writing in that space. But as long as it doesn’t end up like a V.C. Andrews situation where you have some author continuing to write books under her name. That’s always felt weird to me.
It’s up to their estate. And if they fumble it I don’t have to keep reading.
I honestly think this is how the Song of Ice and Fire series is going to finish. George is going to get out maybe one more book before dying and someone else is going to pick up his notes and write 1-2 more books to finish it out.
If George gets pre-warning of his death the way Robert Jordan did I can see him perhaps arranging for Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck to finish the series for him. They are protégés and friends of his and accomplished authors together as James SA Corey and individually. I don’t see either be willing to do it though posthumously unless George already approved it.
Some authors plan books series out for years and even plan for when they die and have notes on what should happen
It can be very possible this author had planned all these books and wanted the series to continue and probably had notes on how the plot should continue if this is true
Only if it’s the express wish of the author (or possibly their family if the author passed suddenly) that their work be finished by someone else, then I’m generally against it.
I feel a good middle ground could be having the authors’ notes on how the series was intended to proceed/end released and allow fan fiction writers to create their own versions for fellow fans.
When I was young while reading the Boxcar Children I found out that the original author only wrote 19, when I started the 20th and the kids got younger I stopped. There are so many written now and while there are probably really good ones, don’t understand why they’re all over the place time wise.
Also don’t understand how Bourne turned into such an extended universe, I read the trilogy and stopped. That dude suffered enough, not sure how many more used him, if none did then maybe they’d be worth trying, he was used and abused let him retire in peace.
I did enjoy the second Millennium trilogy, felt there was a few avenues unexplored at the end of the original trilogy and that the new guy did a decent job. No real desire to read book 7, but I bought it in case I change my mind.
probably wise to have stopped there (bourne). i like spy thrillers and i’m a masochist so i’ve read them all. overall, it’s not like they’re terrible, but the new guy was somewhat messy, not attentive to character detail, and rather rote about coming up with some random woman of the moment for bourne to fall in love with, it got kinda ridiculous and unbelievable.
they moved on from him and the new guy has been basically sequeling the movies instead of the books.
Agree one or two incomplete works are fine to finish, but whole series and new works are taking the piss a bit.
Dune.
I loved those books, and was so excited when they found that stash of Frank Herbert’s notes and his son Brian took over.
Now I wish I could erase those books from my memory so the series still finished at Chapterhouse.
Depends on how they handle it. For example the guy who took over for Vince Flynn was meticulous in his preparation, re-reading the original books and taking notes on how Flynn wrote and chose words. He also got a primer, with Flynn having already partially written the next book in the series that shows how he was going to continue with the character. This kind of effort I can get behind.
Tom Clancy is the opposite…he or his estate has licensed the use of his name and tons of stuff has his name all over it that he really had nothing to do with. I wouldn’t trust anything written after his death to be a “Tom Clancy book”. Not to say they are going to be bad books, just nothing like what Clan y produced while alive.
Kyle Mills has done an amazing job continuing the Mitch Rapp books for Vince Flynn. I gave up on the series when Flynn died but eventually decided I’d try one of the new ones and was really surprised to find that they feel just like the ones Flynn wrote. I expect this is the exception rather than the rule, but it has softened my stance on this issue quite a bit.
This awkward guy I knew was tapped to continue the Godfather books. Was cringe.
They usually suck. The continuation of Herbert’s “Dune” and the prequels to Roger Zelazny’s “Amber” series are particularly bad examples. Ace Atkins does seem to have Robert Parker’s voice for posthumous Spenser books.