Story Order

[scribblemyname]

This entry is part 4 of 4 in the series Am Reading

I had wanted to read Octavia Butler's Wild Seed for so long that I picked it up the moment I thought I could spend that much on a book (and that Veronica Roth didn't have anything new for me to inhale). The book fascinated me, I loved it, and when I saw it was part of a series, I bought the whole thing.

:cue dirge here:

Wild Seed was written fourth. You know what that means? Even though chronologically, in story-time it was the first book, it was not meant to be read first and shouldn't have been. The book redeemed Doro and then I read the second book chronologically and Butler killed him.

End of series for me.

But the second book was written almost first and the characters were all good and the ideas were wonderful. If I had read it first, then I would have loved probably the whole series.

Let this be a lesson to the scribbler (me): think about your story order and your publication order, especially when you put together omnibuses. Do not assume chronological is best. It probably isn't.

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Originally published at Liana Mir. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[scribblemyname]

It was actually pretty common to her era of writers to take the whole generational thing, loss included. I always hated that and due to it being a single omnibus, I neglected to look for spoilers before reading book two.

[thecatisacritic.livejournal.com]

Oh, I see. Generational fic. There is a reason I hate that and avoid it and its authors.