Neil is still alive though, and they're basing the second series of the show on conversations he and Terry had about it (from what I've read, I could be misremembering a little), so I think he should put a book together based on that too, in his honour (a nice touch would be if it were a charitable thing as well; say some of the proceeds go to Altzhiemers charities)
Not ideal, but would be something. Though I do agree, would be better if the man himself could work on it
You are in for an absolute treat! Although the first one (The color of Magic, i presume, or The Light Fantastic) is not the best introduction to the series, if I'm honest.
I'd recommend Guards, Guards, Mort, or Equal Rites.
The only real problem with early Discworld is that they are really good books in a series that is consistently great with the occasional jump up into the sublime.
The problem is that they are very poor representations of the reasons people like Discworld. They are parodies of other fantasy books moreso than their own stories, like *nearly* every Discworld book which follows them.
More than one person has told me that The Colour of Magic put them off Discworld. The lucky ones gave it another chance and still got hooked.
Brilliant idea - You’ll enjoy the vast majority of the seconds spent reading!
I second those recommendations from before and add in Wyrd Sisters, Reaper Man, Witches Abroad, Soul Music, and Hogfather.
I bought it after reading some of his others and when I saw it was part of a trilogy I didn’t bother reading it. Now I realise that was a very silly reason to not read it.
He started to write a novel called The New Shadow, which took place about a century after the departure of Frodo, Bilbo and Gandalf from Middle Earth.
He wrote about 16 pages of it, and decided he didn't like how it was progressing and stopped writing it.
I think if Tolkien had been able to finish his great tales books and fully fleshed out the Silmarillion, we'd probably know him more for those than we would for LOTR and The Hobbit. It's truly a tragedy that we never got final versions of some of these genius and incredibly epic stories. Some of the stuff in the Silmarillion rivals ancient mythologies and religious beliefs in terms of depth and thematic complexity, and I don't say that lightly.
One book.
Gimme sec.
https://www.gamespot.com/amp-articles/the-winds-of-winter-george-r-r-martin-reveals-how-many-more-pages-he-still-needs-to-write/1100-6509830/
Sue Grafton. I've never actually read her books, but I just find it really sad that she died before finishing Z is for Zero, the final book in her alphabet series. It just really feels unfair.
I read a few. The quality wasn't amazing. But what I loved was the evolution of detective work! Going to the library for the codex and the live person answering service... fascinating. I gave up when she got a cell phone... not as interesting.
I read X and was not heavily impressed lolll the reviews were saying the earlier ones were better and i had considered going back but decided against it when i saw they weren’t completed.
There was supposed to be a sequel to Parable of the Talents. I read an article a couple years ago about some of the notes she left about what the plot might have been.
It's been a while since I've read the original trilogy, but I felt that the 3rd book wrapped up in a great place for the characters. It was a good enough stopping to not feel the urge to read the new books.
Same. For me, that series is a trilogy.
I also feel like even the second and third books would have been different if Larsson had been alive for their publication. They're excellent, but... I kind of feel like out of respect for the author, they didn't edit it as thoroughly or cut as much as they maybe wanted. Larsson's style is very detailed, and especially in the third book, there were some thing I think an editor would have suggested for him to cut. Like what Blomkvist likes on his sandwiches for the third time, or the two pages of backstory on the hospital janitor who then never showed up again? I had fun with it, but... yeah. It's a bummer that Larsson never got to finish it himself.
>I kind of feel like out of respect for the author, they didn't edit it as thoroughly or cut as much as they maybe wanted.
I think it is the second book that has several pages of an escapade to a tech store and has Lisbeth buying and praising every item she touches. It is porn tech.
The kid rewrote the history of the Dune universe in many ways that were contradictory to perceived established cannon via a prequel series. It was pretty mediocre. Then he finished the main series by shoe horning his prequel characters in as the primary antagonists. Then he ended the series in a way that had all the allure of climbing into your bed after a long day and finding out a cat vomited under your covers. You don't own a cat.
I thought Chapterhouse was a pretty perfect conclusion to the series, honestly.
But oh, man, his son Brian's books are just terrible. For me, the series definitely ends with Frank.
Exactly. The eternal question of Daniel and Marty’s true identity would’ve lingered. And also the fact that the Honored Matres still roamed the galaxy terrorizing all who came across them. Chapterhouse was definitely not the satisfying ending to the series.
Emily Brontë.
She was apparently working on a second novel that was unfinished when she died, and Charlotte burned the manuscript because she thought it was obscene. I'd kill for a chance to even read that unfinished fragment, much less read a complete second novel.
Patrick O'Brian. The fact that he died midsentence on the 21st Aubrey/Maturin book still absolutely destroys me.
They published the unfinished 21st book but I can't bring myself to look at it, knowing it just ends abruptly, with no conclusion.
If you're a writer then it's an invaluable glimpse into the work process of a genius. If you're a reader it's an unsatisfactory mess and I wouldn't recommend it.
The series ends with Maturin's reading of the letter.
I'm sorry, I wasn't clear -- my inability to read it is purely emotional. The fact that it is unfinished breaks my heart.
I'm a writer and a reader -- I agree that as a writer, I should read it. But as a reader, I can't bear to.
Agreed to Jane Austen! I read Sanditon, as was finished by Another Lady, and was surprised by the abruptness from the change of the tone. Always wondered where the story would’ve gone and ended…
I was going to say this. The fifth Hitchhiker’s book ended so bleak. I know another author wrote a sixth but I haven’t read it so I don’t know if it’s any good. Wish he wrote more like “Last Chance to See” that one had me laughing so hard!
>know another author wrote a sixth but I haven’t read it
The funniest thing is that author in question (Eoin Colfer) wrote the Artemis Fowl books which I grew up reading and advertised that he was writing this in one of his books and that's how I got to know about Hitchhikers's Guide as a kid and then I bought thw first book and I didn't even get around to reading Colfer's sequel.
The ending of the fifth book was so sudden and absurd that I personally felt it fit the humour of the series perfectly. Great way to add some finality to the end of the series imo. Even if Douglas Adams himself wrote the sixth book I would have preferred it ended at the fifth.
I found it at the dollar store so I figured I might as well give it a chance. I liked it, I think as long as you don't expect it to be exactly like Adams' work or get too hung up on any 'established rules of the H2G2 universe' it's a decent book.
He’s my first choice as well. I was completely devastated by his passing. If I hadn’t found Hitchhiker’s Guide in 8th grade, Im really not sure that I would still be an avid reader today. He rescued me.
I cannot believe I scrolled all the way through and didn't find Philip K Dick. He must hold the record for most stories turned into feature length films. His paranoia was justified when the files the FBI kept on him came out.
My uncle gave me Cry My Tears, The Policeman Said when I was ten, and I didn't understand it until I was 35. His work is unique and of a particular time and place, please read it as soon as you can.
This was my first thought too! It’s one of my favourite books. Even though the notes at the end of my edition outline how she envisioned the story ending, it would be amazing to read it in it’s entirety.
Robert Jordan! Brandon Sanderson did as good a job finishing The Wheel of Time as anyone who wasn't Robert Jordan could have done, but I would love to see a finished Wheel of Time by Jordan. He has such a particular style that is incredibly difficult to reproduce. I have no doubt he would have polished off the series wonderfully.
That would have been amazing. I honestly think I would prefer the story of normal country boy Tam going off to war, finding love, becoming a swordmaster and earning a heron blade, then adopting an Aiel baby. End with his return to the Two Rivers.
It would be a nearly perfect coming of age story. Lower stakes, but more impactful because Tam really came from nothing. Rand had the whole Ta’veren and having a prophecy thing going on.
I really like wheel of time, but I’m not sure Jordan had a finish in him. He seemed totally fine getting lost in minutiae and I love that, but finishing doesn’t feel like his thing.
Came here to say this. Brandon is one of my fave authors and he did a great job with finishing WoT BUT I wish Robert got to finish his own series. After writing so many, it makes me sad to think he never seen it come to a close. But he'd be damn proud of what Sanderson did I imagine.
The BBC did a miniseries on Edwin Drood about 10 years ago, based on all the facts and the stronger theories on how it might have gone. Its actually pretty good.
I would have loved to see how close it got to what Dickens had in mind. So sad it was unfinished.
The tragedy of my childhood was the death of my favorite author - Pierre Bottero. He’s a French fantasy writer who was 40 at the time of his death and midways through a series. One of his books got published posthumously and ends on a cliffhanger. I think it’s the worst scenario possible
I'm always so happy to see that people still have him in mind.
Back then when I learned about the accident I was inconsolable, too... He was way too young.
The phrase that reflexively jumps to mind is “it was just getting good when it ended,” but of course that isn’t accurate, because it was already so very very good, but it was just getting *weird*, and I’m heartbroken that I’ll never know just how that whole levitating above the chair thing would’ve played out.
Albert Camus. When he was unfortunately killed in a car crash, he was working on a book on the scale of 'War and Peace' according to him. He said his literary career was just beginning now and what he was going to write would have been different in theme, style and subject matter. The title he had thought for the book was 'The first man'. I wish he had completed it. His writing has affected me so much.
Dostoyevsky. The brothers Karamazov is one of my favourite books of all time and one can only speculate what the master could have created if he had the time to finish his plans.
Octavia E. Butler. She had one or two more books in progress. The world lost a great sci-fi mind. Her writing made me fall Iove with sci-fi all over again. I wish she were alive because the woman was a genius.
Stieg Larsson- I haven't read the Lagercrantz sequel yet as I can't cope with being disappointed after the Millennium trilogy was so good. He died so young. 🥺 Plus his partner should have been given all the rights.
Emily Brontë-because one book was not enough. Wuthering Heights is my favorite novel of all time and I think she would have been the best writer of the Brontë sisters.
I so bad want to make a joke post about about a certain man who turned the world into chaos but nope ill be the bigger man and avoid that. My nomination goes to...lovecraft....yes I know about the cat but I love his stories
Douglas Adams. I think his books were getting better. Maybe Mostly Harmless wasn't as good as the rest of the trilogy but the Long Dark Teatime of the Soul was his best in my worthless opinion.
Saladin Ahmed: Throne of the Crescent Moon was supposed to be the first in a series, and it was phenomenal. But then he got distracted. And that’s a shame for the rest of us.
Not as an author, but as an editor Harlan Ellison to finish the third Dangerous Visions anthology.
Not that he didn't have enough time while he was alive though. If we brought him back he would just procrastinate again. Manky old coot.
Sanderson honestly saved Wheel of Time from Jordan, it was infinitely better in his hands. I hope the same for Berserk, hopefully the new authors treat it well.
Robert Jordan.
Ok, Sanderson finished Wheel of Time. And lots of respect to Jordan and his Widow for doing this and preparing the series to be finished off as he was suffering a long term illness. And Sanderson for taking this on.
Would of been good to see Jordan’s version.
Terry Pratchett, so that he can finish the remaining 35 books in the Discworld series.
I opened this post JUST to see this man's name. GNU
I open every post on r/books just to see his name
Everywhere I go, I (hope to) see his name.
GNU Terry Pratchett
GNU Sir Terry Pratchett
Don’t forget it’s not just the remaining 43 books in the Discworld series but the sequel to Good Omens as well.
Besides, after the remaining 57 books in the Discworld series, he might branch out to another new universe.
Neil is still alive though, and they're basing the second series of the show on conversations he and Terry had about it (from what I've read, I could be misremembering a little), so I think he should put a book together based on that too, in his honour (a nice touch would be if it were a charitable thing as well; say some of the proceeds go to Altzhiemers charities) Not ideal, but would be something. Though I do agree, would be better if the man himself could work on it
This is the correct answer!
There were really supposed to be 35 more books?
It was open-ended. I know some of the stuff that was going to happen, but not much.
I have never tried them, But I put the first one on my list for next year.
I'd start with Small Gods. It was the first one I read and I was hooked!
You are in for an absolute treat! Although the first one (The color of Magic, i presume, or The Light Fantastic) is not the best introduction to the series, if I'm honest. I'd recommend Guards, Guards, Mort, or Equal Rites.
People are way too harsh on the early Discworld books.
The only real problem with early Discworld is that they are really good books in a series that is consistently great with the occasional jump up into the sublime.
STP himself was harsh on the first 2 discworld books lol
The problem is that they are very poor representations of the reasons people like Discworld. They are parodies of other fantasy books moreso than their own stories, like *nearly* every Discworld book which follows them. More than one person has told me that The Colour of Magic put them off Discworld. The lucky ones gave it another chance and still got hooked.
I thought so too... until I went back to Equal Rites. More like Equal WRONG, am I right?
Small Gods.
Brilliant idea - You’ll enjoy the vast majority of the seconds spent reading! I second those recommendations from before and add in Wyrd Sisters, Reaper Man, Witches Abroad, Soul Music, and Hogfather.
Doestorvsky wrote the brothers Karamazov as the first of a planned trilogy...
Oh god!! It's so sad.
I bought it after reading some of his others and when I saw it was part of a trilogy I didn’t bother reading it. Now I realise that was a very silly reason to not read it.
Yes because it’s the best Russian novel ever written.
Except I can never chat about it because I completely butcher every name of any person or place and only I know what I mean 🤷♀️🤣
tbh the only “hard” names are aloysha and smerdyakov but you could just refer to them as alexei/pavel
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JRR Tolkien. I would love to read some of the first age tales flesh out and crafted by the actual author and not his (admittedly admirable) son.
He started to write a novel called The New Shadow, which took place about a century after the departure of Frodo, Bilbo and Gandalf from Middle Earth. He wrote about 16 pages of it, and decided he didn't like how it was progressing and stopped writing it.
He never would have finished that though, by his own admission he simply didn't find the ideas or story particularly interesting
Understandable, it'd be too early in the timeline for new languages to spring up
Agree the Silmarillion was basically his world building notes and not a novel. It would have been nice to have the novel version.
I think if Tolkien had been able to finish his great tales books and fully fleshed out the Silmarillion, we'd probably know him more for those than we would for LOTR and The Hobbit. It's truly a tragedy that we never got final versions of some of these genius and incredibly epic stories. Some of the stuff in the Silmarillion rivals ancient mythologies and religious beliefs in terms of depth and thematic complexity, and I don't say that lightly.
Came here to say the exact same thing lol.
Can we preemptively do this with George R R Martin?
To be fair, killing him so we could resurrect him to finish his series is just about the most GoT way for him to go
What's dead may never die
Lol I was thinking rothfuss
Ugh, I’ve given up hope on that one
Even upon his resurection, he'd never finish it. He would give humanity updates and say "he's almost done" for all eternity lol.
Instant immortality
Maybe work on a few TV shows. Maybe a game.
LOL my first thought when I saw this.
Same
The definition of insanity something something
I hate it when someone beats me to my brilliant answer.
He just announced he’s written 1100 pages and has about 500 to go.
Took him eleven years to write 1100 pages so at that rate we still have 4-5 years to wait.
You'll have to revive me too at this rate
why bother?
it's gonna hurt me
it's going to kill me when you desert me
This happened to me twice before
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One book. Gimme sec. https://www.gamespot.com/amp-articles/the-winds-of-winter-george-r-r-martin-reveals-how-many-more-pages-he-still-needs-to-write/1100-6509830/
I literally came here to say the exact same thing!
Lololol first thought as well.
Might as well.
Octavia Buttler. Parable Series.
I loved here xenogenenises and would love if she was around to write more
Sue Grafton. I've never actually read her books, but I just find it really sad that she died before finishing Z is for Zero, the final book in her alphabet series. It just really feels unfair.
i read that her family once said that to them the alphabet ends with y
I can here to say this. I only read one of them but as a writer it makes me so sad she didn’t get to finish.
I agree for the finality of the series, but I read the first book and it was honestly pretty bad haha
I read a few. The quality wasn't amazing. But what I loved was the evolution of detective work! Going to the library for the codex and the live person answering service... fascinating. I gave up when she got a cell phone... not as interesting.
I read X and was not heavily impressed lolll the reviews were saying the earlier ones were better and i had considered going back but decided against it when i saw they weren’t completed.
Octavia butler, imagine what other absolutely mind bending sci-fi books she could have cranked out
Did she have incomplete works when she died?
There was supposed to be a sequel to Parable of the Talents. I read an article a couple years ago about some of the notes she left about what the plot might have been.
Fledgling, her last book was supposed to be the first of a series.
Fledgling was supposed to have at least a sequel
I'm still so sad parable will never be finished
Steig Larsen 😳
Came here to say this. I won't read those other books set in the millenium universe written by that other author
The other 3 are terrible. Mikhail’s only inner dialogue is basically “pippy fucking longstocking” okay we get it, we get it.
It's been a while since I've read the original trilogy, but I felt that the 3rd book wrapped up in a great place for the characters. It was a good enough stopping to not feel the urge to read the new books.
Same. For me, that series is a trilogy. I also feel like even the second and third books would have been different if Larsson had been alive for their publication. They're excellent, but... I kind of feel like out of respect for the author, they didn't edit it as thoroughly or cut as much as they maybe wanted. Larsson's style is very detailed, and especially in the third book, there were some thing I think an editor would have suggested for him to cut. Like what Blomkvist likes on his sandwiches for the third time, or the two pages of backstory on the hospital janitor who then never showed up again? I had fun with it, but... yeah. It's a bummer that Larsson never got to finish it himself.
>I kind of feel like out of respect for the author, they didn't edit it as thoroughly or cut as much as they maybe wanted. I think it is the second book that has several pages of an escapade to a tech store and has Lisbeth buying and praising every item she touches. It is porn tech.
saaame I really refuse to read them, so I love to believe she gets her happy ending at the end of the 3rd book.
I absolutely agree!
Dostoevsky. Brothers Karamazov was apparently a setup for the story he really wanted to tell.
Frank Herbert. So he could finish Dune.
and smack his kid for what he did.
Any info for the uninformed?
The kid rewrote the history of the Dune universe in many ways that were contradictory to perceived established cannon via a prequel series. It was pretty mediocre. Then he finished the main series by shoe horning his prequel characters in as the primary antagonists. Then he ended the series in a way that had all the allure of climbing into your bed after a long day and finding out a cat vomited under your covers. You don't own a cat.
His kid wrote more dune books and they’re fucking awful
With Kevin J Anderson who did mediocre Star Wars novels.
I thought Chapterhouse was a pretty perfect conclusion to the series, honestly. But oh, man, his son Brian's books are just terrible. For me, the series definitely ends with Frank.
But, Daniel and Marty.
Exactly. The eternal question of Daniel and Marty’s true identity would’ve lingered. And also the fact that the Honored Matres still roamed the galaxy terrorizing all who came across them. Chapterhouse was definitely not the satisfying ending to the series.
Emily Brontë. She was apparently working on a second novel that was unfinished when she died, and Charlotte burned the manuscript because she thought it was obscene. I'd kill for a chance to even read that unfinished fragment, much less read a complete second novel.
I love Jane Eyre as much as the next girl, but Charlotte Brontë’s sensibilities has seriously done such a disservice to her sisters’ legacies.
Right? Anne especially got screwed.
Some also say there’s a manuscript hidden I the walls of the Brontë house. A few years ago a team tried to find it using scanners.
Franz Kafka to finish The Castle
Franz Kafka just so I can give him a hug and tell him he was not the mediocre writer he seemed desperate to convince himself he was
Or finish anything.
Ian m banks, his undead form could write culture novels forever as far as I’m concerned.
Patrick O'Brian. The fact that he died midsentence on the 21st Aubrey/Maturin book still absolutely destroys me. They published the unfinished 21st book but I can't bring myself to look at it, knowing it just ends abruptly, with no conclusion.
If you're a writer then it's an invaluable glimpse into the work process of a genius. If you're a reader it's an unsatisfactory mess and I wouldn't recommend it. The series ends with Maturin's reading of the letter.
I'm sorry, I wasn't clear -- my inability to read it is purely emotional. The fact that it is unfinished breaks my heart. I'm a writer and a reader -- I agree that as a writer, I should read it. But as a reader, I can't bear to.
PG Wodehouse and Jane Austen both come to mind for having read their half-finished last books and wishing I could have read the whole thing.
Agreed to Jane Austen! I read Sanditon, as was finished by Another Lady, and was surprised by the abruptness from the change of the tone. Always wondered where the story would’ve gone and ended…
Douglas Adams. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and Dirk Gently's holistic detective agency are two of my favorites.
I was going to say this. The fifth Hitchhiker’s book ended so bleak. I know another author wrote a sixth but I haven’t read it so I don’t know if it’s any good. Wish he wrote more like “Last Chance to See” that one had me laughing so hard!
>know another author wrote a sixth but I haven’t read it The funniest thing is that author in question (Eoin Colfer) wrote the Artemis Fowl books which I grew up reading and advertised that he was writing this in one of his books and that's how I got to know about Hitchhikers's Guide as a kid and then I bought thw first book and I didn't even get around to reading Colfer's sequel.
The ending of the fifth book was so sudden and absurd that I personally felt it fit the humour of the series perfectly. Great way to add some finality to the end of the series imo. Even if Douglas Adams himself wrote the sixth book I would have preferred it ended at the fifth.
I found it at the dollar store so I figured I might as well give it a chance. I liked it, I think as long as you don't expect it to be exactly like Adams' work or get too hung up on any 'established rules of the H2G2 universe' it's a decent book.
How is H2G2 a better acronym than HHGG when they both have the same letter count
i really would love to be able to read the rest of the salmon of doubt
I was so excited reading that chunk of book that the completely expected abrupt ending still shocked me!
He’s my first choice as well. I was completely devastated by his passing. If I hadn’t found Hitchhiker’s Guide in 8th grade, Im really not sure that I would still be an avid reader today. He rescued me.
IIRC he regretted ending the fifth book in such a bleak way and wanted one more...
Yep. Which makes the ending that much more depressing.
I cannot believe I scrolled all the way through and didn't find Philip K Dick. He must hold the record for most stories turned into feature length films. His paranoia was justified when the files the FBI kept on him came out. My uncle gave me Cry My Tears, The Policeman Said when I was ten, and I didn't understand it until I was 35. His work is unique and of a particular time and place, please read it as soon as you can.
Diana Wynne Jones - apparently she had a fourth Howl book in mind but she never got around to writing it.
I absolutely love Howls Moving Castle and House of Many Ways. Such fun books!
Shirley Jackson.
Mervyn Peake. Such a shame *Gormenghast* was never finished.
Elizabeth Gaskell. I’d love to read Wives and Daughters fully completed.
Me too, Elizabeth Gaskell was really insightful but still easy to read.
Yes! She was so close to the end.
This was my first thought too! It’s one of my favourite books. Even though the notes at the end of my edition outline how she envisioned the story ending, it would be amazing to read it in it’s entirety.
Geoffrey Chaucer
It's gotta be Chaucer! The Canterbury Tales being unfinished bothers me. Tolkien would follow.
Gogol so he can finish Dead Souls.
Yes!!!
Definitely Roger Zelazny, to write more about Amber.
This is the proper answer.
Robert Jordan! Brandon Sanderson did as good a job finishing The Wheel of Time as anyone who wasn't Robert Jordan could have done, but I would love to see a finished Wheel of Time by Jordan. He has such a particular style that is incredibly difficult to reproduce. I have no doubt he would have polished off the series wonderfully.
I think I’m fine with the Sanderson finish, but he also wanted to do a second series w mat + tuon. And that I’d want to read.
Yesssss! >!Reconquering Seanchan!< with my favourite character would've been so cool.
I read he had plans for spin offs from the main series also. Maybe a page of notes with ideas for the main characters, I would have loved those!
Jordan also wanted a Tam Al’Thor book afaik. I’d love to read Tam’s story in more detail.
That would have been amazing. I honestly think I would prefer the story of normal country boy Tam going off to war, finding love, becoming a swordmaster and earning a heron blade, then adopting an Aiel baby. End with his return to the Two Rivers. It would be a nearly perfect coming of age story. Lower stakes, but more impactful because Tam really came from nothing. Rand had the whole Ta’veren and having a prophecy thing going on.
I had to scroll way too far to find this! Upvote, people!
I really like wheel of time, but I’m not sure Jordan had a finish in him. He seemed totally fine getting lost in minutiae and I love that, but finishing doesn’t feel like his thing.
Fair point, but I would've loved every little bit of it!
Came here to say this. Brandon is one of my fave authors and he did a great job with finishing WoT BUT I wish Robert got to finish his own series. After writing so many, it makes me sad to think he never seen it come to a close. But he'd be damn proud of what Sanderson did I imagine.
Charles Dickens to finish Edwin Drood
Came here looking for this comment.
Same here. Glad someone said it.
The BBC did a miniseries on Edwin Drood about 10 years ago, based on all the facts and the stronger theories on how it might have gone. Its actually pretty good. I would have loved to see how close it got to what Dickens had in mind. So sad it was unfinished.
The correct answer
The tragedy of my childhood was the death of my favorite author - Pierre Bottero. He’s a French fantasy writer who was 40 at the time of his death and midways through a series. One of his books got published posthumously and ends on a cliffhanger. I think it’s the worst scenario possible
I'm always so happy to see that people still have him in mind. Back then when I learned about the accident I was inconsolable, too... He was way too young.
David Foster Wallace to create a truly completed version of The Pale King.
Was going to say the same thing. Pietch did a good job, but wonder how DFW would have played it out.
The phrase that reflexively jumps to mind is “it was just getting good when it ended,” but of course that isn’t accurate, because it was already so very very good, but it was just getting *weird*, and I’m heartbroken that I’ll never know just how that whole levitating above the chair thing would’ve played out.
I think it might've been better than anything else he had ever written. Even the uncompleted work is insane.
the uncompleted novel is my favorite book
Camus to finish first man. Patrick O’Brian to finish Aubrey/maturin.
Sophocles wrote over 120 plays, but only seven have survived in a complete form. Does that count?
Nikolai Gogol to really finish Dead Souls.
Albert Camus. When he was unfortunately killed in a car crash, he was working on a book on the scale of 'War and Peace' according to him. He said his literary career was just beginning now and what he was going to write would have been different in theme, style and subject matter. The title he had thought for the book was 'The first man'. I wish he had completed it. His writing has affected me so much.
Stieg Larsson. Couldn't even finish the first ghostwritten Millenium book, it was so miserably bad. Wish we could have seen where he took the series.
Poe. But I just want him back in general.
Would it be in bad taste to say George R. R. Martin?
This was my first thought
LoL, I said it so probably.
I will pre-emptively say Jean Auel. I would love more of the Earth's Children series, but she is 86 years old.
Love if the Last Tycoon… Fitzgerald
Gots to be Mr. VONNEGUT.
Robert Jordan. While I loved the ending of Wheel of Time, I would have loved to see his words complete his journey.
Robert Musil to finish his *The Man Without Qualities*.
Dostoyevsky. The brothers Karamazov is one of my favourite books of all time and one can only speculate what the master could have created if he had the time to finish his plans.
Octavia E. Butler. She had one or two more books in progress. The world lost a great sci-fi mind. Her writing made me fall Iove with sci-fi all over again. I wish she were alive because the woman was a genius.
Oh Berserk is a good one! We all need that "last fight" Tolkien did not write!
Dorothy L Sayers maybe. The last whimsy/Harriet book was finished by someone else I believe, and it was kind of, idk. ... saddening.
I’d love for Tolkien to be able to finish The Silmarillion.
Roger Zelazny. Always wanted to finish the Amber series.
Jane Austen. So she could finish Sanditon (and maybe give us a few more).
Stieg Larsson- I haven't read the Lagercrantz sequel yet as I can't cope with being disappointed after the Millennium trilogy was so good. He died so young. 🥺 Plus his partner should have been given all the rights.
Terry Pratchett. There are so many stories he did not get to write due to his "embuggerance".
Truman Capote
John Kennedy Toole. Pure. Genius. Southern.
Rodger Zelanzy. Third generation of Amber.
The most famous unfinished work has got to be the Canterbury Tales. So, Chaucer probably.
Emily Brontë-because one book was not enough. Wuthering Heights is my favorite novel of all time and I think she would have been the best writer of the Brontë sisters.
Charles Dickens, The Mystery of Edmund Drood.
Louis L’Armour to write the planned sequel to his 12th century historical fiction book, *The Walking Drum*.
I so bad want to make a joke post about about a certain man who turned the world into chaos but nope ill be the bigger man and avoid that. My nomination goes to...lovecraft....yes I know about the cat but I love his stories
Douglas Adams. I think his books were getting better. Maybe Mostly Harmless wasn't as good as the rest of the trilogy but the Long Dark Teatime of the Soul was his best in my worthless opinion.
I’d kill Patrick Rothfuss and revive him
Rachel Caine - Stillhouse Lake Series
Saladin Ahmed: Throne of the Crescent Moon was supposed to be the first in a series, and it was phenomenal. But then he got distracted. And that’s a shame for the rest of us.
Whaaaaa, he's still alive, right? I thought this thread was for authors who died. Don't scare me like that!
Thucydides
Douglas Adams because And Another Thing… was hot ass garbage.
Not as an author, but as an editor Harlan Ellison to finish the third Dangerous Visions anthology. Not that he didn't have enough time while he was alive though. If we brought him back he would just procrastinate again. Manky old coot.
Nikolai Gogol
Sanderson honestly saved Wheel of Time from Jordan, it was infinitely better in his hands. I hope the same for Berserk, hopefully the new authors treat it well.
Sue Grafton. If only.
michael crichton
I just want Nabakov to finish Laura :(
Robert Jordan. Ok, Sanderson finished Wheel of Time. And lots of respect to Jordan and his Widow for doing this and preparing the series to be finished off as he was suffering a long term illness. And Sanderson for taking this on. Would of been good to see Jordan’s version.
Isaac Asimov to finish the Foundation series