Joy wrote:
> Yes, BONE ORCHARD reads like a book in the middle of
a series, with
> lots of
> unexplained references to past events, and POISONED
ROSE is a prequel.
and Gary, agreeing with her, gave us a link to his review of
the two, which begins: "There are two possibilities for
readers of this series. Readers could read this book and then
the previously released THE BONE ORCHARD, which
chronologically takes place after this novel, THE POISONED
ROSE. The second possibility is better: play the game with
the author, for he is creating literature in an uncharted
sea. He is writing his series backwards."
Gary, I have a question about this. I haven't seen that
June/July Mystery News, so am unable to look it up myself.
Was that bit about writing the series backwards something
that came up in the interview? I'm curious, because I'd read
on a different list that he'd actually written ROSE first but
couldn't sell it, then wrote ORCHARD, sold it to Bantam as
part of a two-book deal, and they used ROSE as the second of
the two books. I'd already read ORCHARD when I heard that,
and actually, that was the only reason I bought the second
book (although I still haven't read it yet). I think you
liked the first one a lot more than I did. I don't mind an
occasional mention of something that happened in a
character's past that we don't know about, but the continual
references in ORCHARD to what I gather is the story covered
in ROSE were something that I found very annoying. Hearing
that the books were published out of order was what made me
decide to give the author a second chance. But now it seems
that may not have been accurate.
Thanks for any insight on this,
Jan
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