SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
In a rare moment of sanity in the literary world, the manager of the late Sir Terry Pratchett's estate has followed the beloved author's wishes and destroyed the hard drive of the computer containing his unfinished works by crushing it with a steamroller. As many as ten unfinished works were on the drive, which, after being unsuccessfully steamrolled several times, was finally securely destroyed by being put through a rock crusher.
The pieces will be displayed at the Salisbury Museum as part of a Pratchett exhibition.
While I do, personally and professionally, mourn the loss of Sir Terry's remaining work; as a librarian navigating a publishing world increasingly dominated by the likes of James Patterson's literary mill, I applaud the Pratchett estate's willingness to defend him from a legacy of eternal "new releases" based on random back-of-a-napkin jottings and used-bubble-gum-wrapper sketches, as seems to be the industry norm these days.
Now, all they have to do is resist the no-doubt-considerable monetary lure of officially-licensed Terry Pratchett's Discworld (TM) novels.
That being said, what posthumous releases or ghostwritten literary sequels have you read and enjoyed? Also, do you consider any of those be considered worthy sequels or additions to the originals?
(Score: 3, Informative) by ledow on Saturday September 09 2017, @06:47PM (1 child)
Tolkien's history series was interesting, but because it had nothing to do with the books and is totally "unfilmable". They weren't pushing it out to get eyes, they were pushing it out to show all the stuff left unfinished (which was a shed-load). And his son spent his life doing that and I don't imagine it ever sold enough to live on.
Outside of that, the only one that come close for me was Night of the Triffids, which seemed to put up the right style and continue with it in a not-stupendous manner. It wasn't utterly fantastic, but it was good enough to forget that it wasn't the original author.
Everything else? Tripe and money-grabbing. Hell, I don't even buy sequels if they are just rubbish. Who cares if they have the franchise name on, and you absolutely adored the first book/movie? Just buy up to the point you like them, and then stop and forget the rest ever existed. I've done it for any number of things (ironically, Pratchett is one - the later Discworlds are just story books and he lost the pizzazz, but that's hardly his fault, but I swear I can see the point where his illness started to take effect in his writing).
The problem is that people STILL KEEP BUYING THEM. Stop it. The latest movie in a series is shit? Stop watching it (give the first movie a try, sure, but then don't buy it on DVD or go see the further sequels). Or literally wait until it's so cheap they make no money from it or it's showing on Amazon Prime or something. Because every penny you give them is a pat on the back of "Good job, we want more, do that again". Make them learn, and reinvent it, or try another tack, or give up entirely. By NOT GIVING THEM MONEY.
Still haven't even properly watched anything Aliens past Alien 3, and I love Aliens. Alien Resurrection was just the point where I went "Oh, god, they've lost it". The vs Predator shite was the start and it's been downhill from there.
(Score: 3, Informative) by ledow on Saturday September 09 2017, @06:52PM
And I'm reminded of the Richard Bachman novels.
Stephen King writes books under a pen-name, nobody buys them.
It's revealed to be Stephen King, suddenly they all sell.