That’s not a unified vision, that’s Clancy pulling things out of his ass when he writes himself into a corner.
First one I thought of, too. They’re a bit corny — they were written in the 40’s, when men were men, and military budgets were unlimited — but they are indeed great fun.
Warning: I don’t know if they still do it, but when I bought them some decades ago, the publishers claimed that there was a seventh book in the series, called “Masters of the Vortex.” It’s a complete ripoff — it has next to nothing to do with the other books, and was so dull that I gave up after a hundred pages.
I’m the first to complain about the drastic downturn in quality that occurred after “Debt of Honor,” but Clancy really did have Ryan’s bio mapped out very early on. I remember a TV interview he did shortly after “Red October” was made famous by Reagan’s endorsement, where he was asked if we would see more books about Ryan, and he answered (approximately), “Oh yes, I have great plans for him.”
They’re good up to Executive Orders, though many Dopers won’t like the politics espoused therein. Rainbow 6 onwards is best avoided.
I agree. I loved these books, as did my son.
You are now my sworn deathly nemesis, and I will hunt you down and do unpleasant things to you with a cheese grater.
No mention of Asimov’s Foundation series? It started with a trilogy but got expanded to 5-6 books. Similarly the Robot series, though that my only have 4 books.
The Dresden Files
What about the Kent Family Chronicles by John Jakes? This series is one of my all time favorites, and I’ve re-read it several times over the years. 8 books in all, and a great story.
The LA Quartet by James Ellroy
Megan Whalen Turner’s Queen’s Thief series is amazing. It’s YA fantasy, but don’t let that scare you off. The first book is very, very good, but not quite as good as the nextl, though it did win the Newberry Honor award. The rest of them are tightly plotted, fascinating, full of unexpected and difficult things, don’t pull punches, alternate first person and third-person omniscient with perfect success – I could go on. And the prose is just lovely – every word she chooses is the one that should be chosen, and none of them are wasted.
There are four books published in the series so far, but there are two more due, with the next one later this year. I don’t know if she planned the rest of the books when she wrote the first one, but she did for the last five, and you don’t really need to read the first one to read the rest of the series.
The Lord of the Rings isn’t a series at all. It was written as a single novel. It’s split up into six sections and some appendices, but Tolkien never intended any of it to be separately published. When Allen and Unwin accepted it for publication, they were the ones who chose to publish it as three volumes. They didn’t give Tolkien any choice in this issue (except to take it to another publisher, of course).
I’m not sure what you mean, but there are five: Book of Three, Black Cauldron, Castle of Llyr, Taran Wanderer, High King. I think he added some extras later, but those were the five that were published in the original series.
Of course all five books probably amount to the same number of pages as two Harry Potter books.
For continuity, charactarization and simple reading pleasure I’d nominate John D. MacDonald’s Travis Mcgee series. “Classy trash”, as one reviewer remarked. Twenty-one of volumes written from 1964 - 1986, plus (maybe) the rumored never-published endpiece to the series which MacDonald is said to have had 95% finished when he died unexpectedly. They seem a bit dated now, but still a darn fine read…I’ve read all but one or two, and honored the series by naming my son Travis.
SS
I know that; I was wondering whether Alexander had originally planned it as such, and had an idea how the whole thing was supposed to look when he began, which was how I interpreted the OP’s requirement:
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3. Structure. Needs to have a clear, overarching narrative pathway across the series to produce a coherent story. So not anything like ‘The adventures of Sherlock Holmes’ say, no matter how brilliant.
I’m looking for something that really works as a feat of sustained writing / overall vision of the author. If there’s 6 books then there needs to have been 6. Not 5 and not 7, so no excessive verbiage or rambling prose. At no point does the reader think the author’s making it up as he goes along, there’s a sense that the author is in control of the series as a whole and knows where they’re going with it.
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On preview to SeldomSeen: I think that disqualifies the Travis McGee series, since it doesn’t have a “clear, overarching narrative pathway across the series.” It is indeed a well-written series, that maintains a consistently high quality throughout, but each volume is pretty much an unconnected episode, and they can be read in any order without much loss of continuity. And much the same can be said about the Nero Wolfe series.
Well, yeah, but the OP made number of volumes his criterion, not number of words/pages.
I like Lou’s McMaster Bujold’s Vorkosigan series, and I also like Susan Cooper’s Dark is Rising series.
That should say Lois McMaster Bujold! Also, the books I mentioned I found enjoyable. I would hate to say they were the best ever written.
Yeah, but the first volume of The Dark is Rising is nowhere near as good as the rest. I mean, it’s not bad, mind you - it would be good in any other company - but it doesn’t stand up with the rest.
How about Orson Scott Cards trilogies around Ender, and Alvin Maker?
TV series probably don’t count, but those can be just as literary as books, even when not adapted from books.
So, I nominate
Buffy the Vampire slayer (7 seasons)
The Sopranos (6 seasons)
The Wire (5 seasons).
And by the way, thanks for this thread (writes down stuff for her Kindle)
I suppose it’s stretching things a little, but Charles Dickens originally published his works chapter by chapter. As such, would they not qualify?