Series I Need to Finish

 Happy Thursday! Or as a local radio host says, Happy Little Friday! 

As we reach the end of July and I've been trying to stymie a book slump, once again, and I wanted to give myself a little bit of less stress about getting a review ready. I thought about trying to squeeze in a novella or something short. However, I realized I haven't done a "book tag" or something similar this month, so now is the time! 

I have a google doc going that lists series I've started. There is a grand total of 212 series on the list. This doesn't count series where I've read all that's been released but it's not over. There are also a few series when I created it that I left out because I'm not interested in continuing. I can't list out all 212 here, so I wrote a list of ones I want to get to soon. Low and behold I got it down to 44. However, this doesn't include new series to me that I recently started (like Underworld by Sophie Lark). I decided to narrow it down further to 15. Most of these are series I started in the mid to late 2010s that I never got back too. It's a mix of I was caught up and then never picked up the new releases and  I just stopped reading because I needed a change. I'll list the 15 I've choses below in alphabetical order of authors.

📒 When I was in college, my local library started a recommendation program. You filled out a short questionnaire about what kind of recs you want and books that you liked that were similar. One of the recommendations for me was The Others series by Anne Bishop. This is a super slow burn (over several books) that is more young/new adult urban fantasy with romantic elements. I was really intrigued by the world and gave the first few books 5-stars. There are 2 more books in the series now (and a 3rd to be published in 2022), although it looks like from the blurbs that it switches who we follow as main characters. That's a little disappointing since I vaguely remember the two main characters not getting together officially yet. I don't know, maybe I need to reread the last book I read. I definitely want to get caught up. Although I have noticed the newer books are listed in separately as well as The World of the Others series. 

📒 A fantasy series set around fairy tale retellings is the Blood Prince series by Jennifer Blackstream. I really enjoyed this series and loved the unique takes on fairy tales. Jennifer also didn't pair fairy tales up how you usually expect. For example, the first book Before Midnight is based around the werewolf area. Usually you see Beauty and the Beast retellings for werewolves, but Cinderella is the fairy tale retold. It's very unique and have been on my wish-list for a while now, eventually I'll own paper copies of them. There are 3 more books I have to read, but I know that book 7 is a retelling of The Christmas Carol set around the couple from book 2. It's only 62 pages though so I think it's supposed to be more of a 6.5. There's also a spin off series called The Blood Realm that does other retellings, but doesn't fit in the same overarching plot. It does take place in the same universe.

📒 For sports romance, I was really into Jaci Burton's Play by Play series a few years ago. What's unique about this one is that it's connected by family members and friend groups and just keeps expanding. Because it spreads like this, this series doesn't focus on just one sport. We have football, hockey, baseball, sports car driving and even rodeo! There might be sports I'm missing, but I loved how the relationships shift between books and that you can still get the same great writing but switch sports without starting a new series. I've read the first 7 books, leaving 7 more as well as a couple novellas.

📒 I always love to support Colorado based authors. One is Pamela Clare. I have a couple of her series to finish, but the main one I want to get to is her Colorado High Country series. It's based in a mountain town and finds heas for the local search and rescue team. We also have adjacent main characters like fire-fighters and police officers/rangers. In a recent newsletter of Pamela's she announced the 9th book in the series due out August of 2021. I have read the first 4 leaving 4 to read, soon to be 5. I really enjoyed the series and small town feel. Plus it's set in Colorado which I always enjoy!

📒 Another series I need to finish and chatted about recently is Olivia Dade's Lovestruck Librarians. I went on a binge of this series a couple years ago and then just never got to the last two books. I gave most of the series so far 4-stars and they are great fluffy feel good books.

📒 A series that's a few years old but making a comeback (thanks to tiktok) is Ruby Dixon's Ice Planet Barbarians. This is one the first sci-fi romances that I've read since highschool and binged the first 14 books a couple summers ago. These are great and while not every book was 4 or 5-stars for me, I still love the series overall. It's officially ended at 20 books, but I do know that there are a couple spin-off series.

📒 Sticking with sci-fi romance, another alien romance series I need to finish is the Kelderan Runic Warriors by Jessie Donovan. I actually have a couple of her series to finish, but this is my priority. I really enjoyed the unique species and different powers they had. It was such an interesting series and I don't know why I never read the last three books. I really want to and making this list is making me excited to get back to this one in particular.

📒 Another sci-fi and alien romance series I need to finish is Zoey Draven's Horde Kings of Dakkar. When I found this series last year it was touted as an alien take on the Dothraki Warriors from Game of Thrones. I was super intrigued and immediately tried it out. It was certainly inspired by the Drothraki, but I like that it's still so very different. I had read the first two books, but since then there have been two more released that I never saw.

📒 Now we'll do a double here. I am a big fan of Felicity Heaton and have finished a couple of her series. I've also started most of her others. One of my favorites is her Eternal Mates series. There's such a wide range of fantasy and paranormal creatures and such a ginormous and well built world in this series. I've read the the first 6 books and loved them all. I didn't end up continuing because book 7 wasn't downloading properly onto my kindle and I ended up switching series. I was very frustrated at the time, especially since the hero in Taken by the Dragon is a dragon shifter. Since it's been quite a while since I've read them, there are now 18 published and her recent newsletter mentioned that book 19 was with her editor and beta reader. I have some serious catching up to do.

📒 The other Felicity Heaton series I need to finish is her Cougar Creek Mates series. I've read the first two books in this four book series. I think I ended up switching genres and just never got back to it. Felicity recently started releasing the spin-off series Black Ridge Bears so I need to get caught up to move on. I think bear shifters is one of my favorite shifters. She also mentioned that there's going to be a second spin-off after the bears that's about wolf shifters in the same area.

📒 Going back to sci-fi and alien romance, another series I didn't finish was Elsa Jade's Black Hole Brides trilogy. I have the third book left and this would be an easy completion for me. These are about three women that are found kidnapped and are rescued and brought to a planet by a black hole that they were going to be "sacrificed" to by the villain. It was a super intriguing plot and I enjoyed the first two. Plus this trilogy has a little bit of a historical feel because of the way ruling body is set up of the planet they ended up at. I do have a couple of her other series to finish up as well. I really enjoy Elsa's sci-fi romances.

📒 A fantasy romance series I need to finish is Lords of the Abyss by Michelle M Pillow. This is about a boat crash and some humans are saved and brought to the society at the bottom of the ocean known as Atlantis. This is merman/mermaid romances and was super interesting. It was originally released as a trilogy, that I read, but now there are 3 more books! They were published 6 years after the original trilogy. It's been a while since I read these though, so I might want to do a reread before getting to the new books. She has some other series I need to start and finish as well.

📒 Jill Shalvis is one of my favorite contemporary authors and I practically grew up on her Lucky Harbor series. I was so sad when it finished and was super happy when she started her Heartbreaker Bay series that has similar vibes. I haven't read Jill in a while, but own all of the Heartbreaker Bay books. I would preorder them, but the last few books in the series were more holiday themed so I just didn't pick them up since I wasn't in the mood. I have the last two books and the final two novellas left.

📒 Going back to fantasy, one of my favorite fantasy romance series of all time is Kerrelyn Spark's Embraced. I have reread the first few books so many times and every time there's a new release I of course reread the series. I still have not read the last book and I just don't want it to end. I do want to reread the series again and then read the final book. I just have to pump myself up since I don't want to be disappointed both in the book and that the series is over. As a side note, Kerrelyn switched publishers after the first three books so the last two have a different style of covers. I wish that the first 3 would be rereleased with matching covers, but maybe that's just me. I just love that style of cover so much!

📒 The final series I chose for this list is Christine Warren's Gargoyle series. This is such a unique take on paranormal romance and this was my first series set around gargoyle creatures where that are main characters. I stepped away from this series since it's a little more on the suspense side of romance and I wasn't in the mood for it at the time. When I stopped reading the series I only had one book left, but now there are three.

I tried not to be too rambley with my list, but it just kind of happened. I really want to get caught up and finish all of these series. I'm thinking of maybe separating them into spinner wheels by genre for when I'm not sure what I want to read next. Then as I finish those up I can add some from my middle list of 44 series. I'm not setting up any plans on when to finish them by, but I'm certainly excited that I have more to read in some these series and had forgot about them. I'm sure by the end of the year you'll see some reviews for some of these!

Do you have any series you need to get around to finishing?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎