Like many readers I love to read books in a series. Good ones allow me to get to know the main characters, see them grow and work their way through a string of ever changing difficulties. I start to think of them as friends. I like books where all of the specific issues, problems or conflicts brought up in the book are wrapped up by its end. I go away with a satisfied feeling that I read a complete story. Sure, there may be other things lurking in the background that will lead to the next book in the series, but the stuff that was the focus of this book has been resolved. But, and here’s where it goes wrong for me, lately I’ve run into books in a series that end on a cliff-hanger. The main characters are left in dire straits and the only way to find out what happened is to buy the next book. That’s just a cheap publishing trick and that’s when I stop reading that series. When I encounter such an ending it makes me feel like I bought only part of the story and I go away feeling cheated. If I was reading that series to begin with it was because the prior books in the series did not stoop to such tricks. The writing was so good, the characters so compelling that I wanted to buy the next book to read the next adventure. I didn’t need to be coerced in such a blatantly unethical manner. Anyway, just a pet peeve of mine and one thing I will not do in any book I write. What do others think?
