I’m not going to call it a “challenge” or anything, it’s just something I’m going to do, someday. Having finally caught up and read ALL the Michael Connelly books – for years my favorite genre author – I immediately fell off again, when he published The Fifth Witness. I have yet to read it. I’m content knowing it’s out there, and I’ll get around to it. For that matter, it will be out in paperback soon, all the better. I have a new genre man, and his name is Lee Child.
photo credit: his website
Which brings up another point. Do you read series in order? I have a number of patrons who are paralyzed by the need to read series in order. If a certain book is checked out or unavailable, it halts their reading. I’ve never been one of those people. I read all the Connelly novels, and there’s a good chance, nary a one in the order intended. And that was fine with me. I haven’t been paying any attention to order with the Lee Child books, either, although I’m happy to know and all things being equal, will aim for chronological correctness. I just don’t feel strongly enough to go well out of my way, though. I find the character development over a series to be equally fascinating when viewed out of sequence. That way, I’m viewing the author’s artistry, as well as the fictional character’s growth. As a point of interest, you might notice that Child recommends that his books be read in the sequence in which they were written, which actually puts their timeline out of order. In other words, the 8th book he wrote in the Jack Reacher series is set well before the first. Interesting.
I’m in no hurry, I’m setting no timeline, and I’m not firm on the sequence; but I do know I want to read ALL these books. (It doesn’t hurt that the Husband enjoys these books, too!) Maybe next year it will be someone different – maybe a nonfiction author like Janet Malcolm or Erik Larson. Who knows? There are so many good authors out there, and we don’t always get around to reading a whole lot or all of their work as we might mean to when we first discover their talents. Sort of like Amy’s comment about taking Agatha Christie for granted. I know you can sympathize with me here! Who have you always wanted to read more of?
And what Lee Child will cross my desk next??
pagesofjulia 
I sometimes get obsessive about reading every book in a series, or seeing every movie by a director, but I don’t worry about the order. For one thing, series often get better as the author learns more and develops the characters, so you could give up on something before it really takes off. I’d hate to judge the Nero Wolfe and Ellery Queen series by the first books.
I stopped the Millenium Trilogy after the first one, because the writing was so bad (though there were a lot of things I liked about the story, as I’ve talked about on my blog), but someone just told me that the third book was the best of the three, so I may try that.
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[…] I am working my way through the entire Jack Reacher series by Lee Child, slowly but very surely. And I’m having to start taking notes on which one included which action, because there are so many and I was out of order. Here they are in the order Child recommends: […]