Deciding What to Read Next

When I finished reading the Three Investigators German books in late September, I had to decide what to read next.  I spent approximately four months reading through the original series, the Crimebusters books, and the German books.  I was not at a loss as to what to read next, unlike when I finished reading through all of the Nancy Drew books.  I knew exactly what I would read next.

I first tackled some young adult novels,  I read the conclusion to Tracey Ward's two zombie apocalypse series, and then I read the follow-up book to Christine Kersey's Parallel Trilogy.  Finally, I read The Infinite Sea by Rick Yancey, which I did not enjoy as much as I should have.  Parts of the plot of this series parallel some current world events a bit too much.  

After I finished The Infinite Sea, I still had two other young adult dystopian series that I needed to revisit so that I could read the recently released titles.  I always skim or reread the previous books in a series to refresh my memory before purchasing the new book.  I tried reading one book again and was not interested at all.  This was a book that I really enjoyed last year and had been looking forward to the conclusion, but I found that I didn't care at all.  I thought about trying another book that I read last year, but the idea of reading it was too unappealing.  I finally decided that now is not the time to read any additional young adult dystopian novels.  I don't have it in me.

I normally love these books, but I'm having trouble enjoying them right now.  The problem is that current world events are quite unsettling, and reading about the destruction of the world in a dystopian novel is not that enjoyable to me right now.  Furthermore, I have been under a bit of stress since the middle of summer.  Right now, I need to read books that serve as a complete escape from current events, which means that I need to stick to vintage series books.  Reading the Three Investigators series was a necessary escape, and I need something like that again.

As I've stated, I don't like boys' series books that much.  However, with very little thought, I knew exactly what I wanted to read.  I wanted to read some books that I hadn't read before, so I decided to read the Rick Brant series.  This decision was actually a bit bizarre since I have never had the slightest desire to read the Rick Brant books.

I had most of Rick Brant #1-21 on hand.  I started #1 and decided after a few chapters that I definitely wanted to move forward with reading Rick Brant regardless of how much I ended up liking the first book.  This was even more bizarre since I don't usually make such a rash decision, especially regarding a boys' series.  Inexplicably, I knew I wanted to read them and would enjoy them, despite how I normally feel about boys' series.

I purchased a few missing volumes to complete my run of #1-21.  Purchasing #22-24 was not a consideration, since I was not willing to pay $350 or more per book.  I quickly found PDF files of #22 and 23 online, so that gave me copies of all stories except for #24.  A few days later I was able to acquire a PDF of #24, so I had all of the books in some format.

After I finish Rick Brant, I will probably choose to read another series that I have never read before.  The top candidates are Biff Brewster and Cherry Ames since I own complete sets of both series.  When I tried reading Biff Brewster before, I only made it through the first book and half of the second book.  Since I am in the middle of reading boys' books, I might be more accepting of Biff Brewster this time.  I am also considering reading Ken Holt again to see how it compares to Rick Brant, and reading the Hardy Boys series again is still something I wish to accomplish in the next year.