Question:
Do they exist? I mean, did it ever happen that the publisher decided
that, say, the Book Of Wrobich The White, made up of four volumes,
wasn't selling any, so that volume Four never saw the light? Or do they
once committed go on publishing to the bitter end?
There's a minor squabble about this in an Italian newsgroup and I
thought to check here. Does anybody remember a series that was cut off?
Answer:
-Series get cut off all the time. P C Hodgell's =Godstalk= series was cut
by the original publisher after two volume. Rosemary Edghill's 12
Treasures series only lasted 3 or 4 volumes iirc.
Bantam stupidly cut off Katharine Kerr's Deverry series at the
next-to-last volume, then pretended the penultimate book was the last.
- We're not counting series where the author died, right?
The classic example of a truncated series is Panshin's
Villiers series: _Star Well_ (1968), _The Thurb Revolution_ (1968)
and Masque World_ (1969). The final, concluding, answers to all the
frickin' questions book, _The Universal Pantograph_, never came out.
It wouldn't surprise me if Gilliland's _End of the Empire_
was intended to be part one of a trilogy and the next time I see him,
I hope I think of a polite way to ask.
Harlan Ellison's third book in the Dangerous Visions series
is somewhat delayed.
