Great Series Read Update: A Look at 2020

At the end of 2018, I set myself an on-going project. I wanted to make a real effort to read entire series from start to finish. Thus was born the Great Series Read Project. The plan was simple. Pick a series. Every month, read one book from that series until the series is finished. Pick a new series. Repeat. 2019 had progress in fits and starts. I DNF’d the first series I attempted, and mostly just kept progress on “active” series (series with books currently releasing). Which is still a victory, but not the main aim of what I’d been hoping to achieve, which was to start AND finish series in my backlist, instead of perennially starting book one and never getting to the other books.

So it’s no surprise that the category I’m most proud of is this first one, the series I started and finished in 2020. It’s my hope that this list will be even longer next year, but we’ll see how things go! I should also note that last year I made a list of series I wanted to read in 2020 and I got to…exactly one of them. So no lists this year, let’s just see where the reading winds take us!

If you’re curious for more thoughts on these series, titles link to the review to the first book in the series (or in a few circumstances, the first book in the series I reviewed on my site)!

Series Started & Finished in 2020

    

This is the elite category. This is the one that proves the Great Series Read Project works. Because I started AND FINISHED these series in a single calendar year. Tiiiny caveat that both THE BAND and VALKYRIE COLLECTIONS are probably going to have sequels at some point, but they aren’t dated and so I’m calling these series finished for now.

THE NEVERNIGHT CHRONICLE by Jay Kristoff
VALKYRIE COLLECTIONS by Brian T. McClellan
THE BAND by Nicholas Eames

Series Finished/Caught Up in 2020

     

This category owes a LOT of thanks to the ARCs I’ve been able to receive from publishers. Keeping up with reviews is a great motivator, and having them delivered straight to my Kindle (or doorstep) takes a lot of the hemming and hawing over budgets out of the equation. I have NEVER had so many “active” series that I’m caught up on, and I got to complete four series that finaled this year! With the other series, “caught up” means that I’ve read everything that’s been released, with further books in the series already confirmed. The one exception here is THE STORMLIGHT ARCHIVES. I haven’t yet read DAWNSHARD or THE RHYTHM OF WAR, but I did succeed in finishing OATHBRINGER before book four’s release, so I’m choosing to celebrate that success!

FINISHED
SHADOW OF THE FOX by Julie Kagawa
THE DIABOLIC by S.J. Kincaid
THE POPPY WAR by R. F. Kuang
THE STORM CROW by Kaylyn Josephson

CAUGHT UP
THE FOUNDERS TRILOGY by Robert Jackson Bennett
THE MURDERBOT DIARIES by Martha Wells
MERCY THOMPSON by Patricia Briggs
THE STORMLIGHT ARCHIVES by Brandon Sanderson
A CHORUS OF DRAGONS by Jenn Lyons
THE PROTECTORATE by Megan E. O’Keefe
THE LOCKED TOMB by Tamsyn Muir
SERPENT & DOVE by Shelby Mahurin
THE WAYFARERS by Becky Chamber
THE DRESDEN FILES by Jim Butcher (okay, I’m still behind, but this book didn’t fit in another category).

Series Begun in 2020

      

This category goes to book series that I started in 2020 AND that I plan to continue reading. I’ve been trying to not continue series simply because I started them, but because I genuinely enjoyed them. As a result, many book ones haven’t made the cut, but series that I really want to keep up with go here! Special shout out to SPELLSLINGER, where I’ve read 3 out of 6 so far and should easily finish in 2021.

SPELLSLINGER by Sebastien de Castell
THE SILENT GODS by Justin Travis Call
THE BOOKS OF AMBHA by Tasha Suri
THE TAROT SEQUENCE by K.D. Edwards
THE HEROES OF SPIRA by Dorian Hart
THE REBORN EMPIRE by Devin Madson
BURNINGBLADE & SILVEREYE by Django Wexler
AMRA THETYS by Michael McClung
BETWEEN EARTH & SKY by Rebecca Roanhorse

Series Projects Still in Progress

    

Lastly, these are the series that I started in 2019, the first year of the Great Series Read Project, that for some reason I just haven’t gotten around to finishing. Two of these have just one book left, so I think I’m making the mental decision that if I don’t make any progress on these series in the first half of 2021, it’ll be time to mark them as DNF for the foreseeable future. After all, the whole goal of the project is to actually make progress, not let things linger, so if I’m not feeling a series, then I’m not feeling it!

THE BOOK OF THE ANCESTOR by Mark Lawrence
BINTI by Nnedi Okorafor
THE THOUSANDTH FLOOR by Katharine McGee