Whimpulsive: Confessions of a Serial Reader – The Ones With The Extra Stuff

By extra stuff I mean the short stories or novellas or the related but not technically part of the series stuff.

Do you read them?

For me the answer to that depends on both the series and the format. I think ebooks have made the related short stories more accessible. I don’t have o buy an anthology of stories that only has one I really want to read. I can often get the short story for free or a reasonable price. Even without an ereader I’m much more willing to read a short story online or on my phone than a full book.

I have also used the extra short stories as a way to give an author or series a trial run to find out if I want to bother reading the books. Again availability as an ebook makes this a nice option.

These are a few of my series with extra stuff and my thoughts.

JD Robb’s Eve Dallas series has many short stories an novellas that have been published in various anthologies over the course of the series. I haven’t read any of them and don’t really have any desire to do so. I like the books but am quite content to do without the extras.

Alexander McCall Smith has some childrens books featuring a younger school age Precious Ramotswe from his No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series. I seriously doubt I’ll ever read these. There is also a collection of short stories with one featuring Precious Ramotswe that I’ll probably skip too.

Louise Penny did a novella featuring Inspector Armand Gamache and some of the recurring characters from her Three Pines series. This was a simply written story aimed at adult readers as part of a literacy program in Canada. I was able to get a copy of The Hangman from my library and enjoyed the story despite not being truly the target audience.

I read a short story by Joseph Finder that introduced me to Nick Heller. I liked Plan B enough to put the series on my TBR list.

Charlaine Harris has a collection of short stories related to her Sookie Stackhouse series. I got A Touch of Dead from the library and liked them well enough. One contained a major piece of the ongoing story that explained why I felt a little lost at the beginning of Definitely Dead. I liked the rest of them well enough but was glad I got the book from the library rather than buying it.

I have several other short stories related to my current series on my nook and computer. I also have at least one related series on my TBR list that I haven’t started yet. Harlan Coben has a young adult series featuring the nephew of Myron Bolitar. I’ve heard good things about the first book in that series and hope to read it myself soon

What about you? Do you read the extra stuff? Have you read a short story that prompted you to read a series? Does a new series with a bit of a connection to familiar characters interest you?

My Rating Scale

4 comments:

Beth F, 7/30/2012 7:46 AM: Some of the off-series extras are fun. I think the people who like the Stephanie Plum books like the "off the numbers" (or whatever their called) books.

That Charlaine Harris collection was worth reading for the one story line (I too was confused). I liked the other short stories but they weren't necessary.

I like the idea of a short story for eReaders (for free or a reasonable price) to fill in the time until the next book is available.
Beth F, 7/30/2012 8:19 AM: They're called. Sigh. Ugh.
Literary Feline, 7/30/2012 10:23 AM: I used to buy entire anthologies just to get that one story by a favorite author whose series I follow. I don't do that so much anymore. I do like that you can now buy them individually one line occasionally as that makes it so much more convenient.

And like you, I often use short stories as a taste test to determine if I want to dip further into an author's work.

Great discussion!
Howard Sherman, 7/31/2012 4:15 PM: I read all the extra stuff because there can be so many hidden gems that really enchance the story or the characters in the story.