I was going through my TBR pile the other day and I realized that I am a book hoarder. I don't mean in the sense that I have too many books, although some may argue to that effect. What nonsense--there is no such as too many books.....well, maybe there are too many books out there that I have not met yet. :) I am a hoarder in the sense that I find a series that I want to read and then I just have to find them all or at least a good number of them before I even start reading that series. So I have the first 3 Lara Adrian's Breed series here....brand new and have not even cracked the covers open yet. I also have the first 5 of JR Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood series....same thing, not even looked at them. Angela Knight's Mageverse series...ditto. I wanted to get back into historicals so I have almost all of the Cynster series by Stephanie Laurens--haven't started them yet either. Does anyone else have this problem?

I think anyone who loves to read has this problem. I love series they are my favorite reads.

I've done that before with some of my favorite authors.  I'm trying to teach myself to judge the book and not the author and not buy a book that doesn't sound interesting just because it's written by someone I like to read.

I'm the same way.  I have 1-5 of C. Feehan's Game series waiting TBR and I plan to buy #6 when it's released next week, though I've not yet cracked #1.  Am also working on getting A. Knight's Mageverse series before I start with the ones I have.  There are about 4 other series that I am doing the same thing with.  

Shari, let me encourage you to start the Black Daggger Brotherhood series.  Though I was not happy with the last one, the others are fantastic, and are ones that I have already re-read a couple times!

I was that way with the Outlander series.  I read the first two and then ran out and got all the rest and read them one after another.   I also did that with Christine Feehan's Game series and I even went so far as to order the 3rd book in Robyn Carr's Virgin River series because I couldn't find it locally.

Sherri

I confess I'm a book hoarder too.  And I realized I have little social life left except for reading.  My books are my best friends.  I think it's becoming an illness of some sort.  Is there a support group for us?  Perhaps we should start one--"Book Sluts Anonymous"?

I do that Shari.  I generally get a whole series lined up before I start it.  I wait until all the books have come out and then I don't have to wait for months or years between books.  It just astounds my husband who says "But what if you don't like the first book but  you've already bought all of them?"  That doesn't happen very often and no waiting is way better than worrying about getting a few books I don't like.  I'm glad I can point out to him that I'm not unique in this, just behaving like a regular book person, LOL.

The only series I have to read as soon as I get my hands on them are the Temeraire series, Carrie Vaughn's Kitty Norville series, C. L. Wilson's books, and Marianne Stillings.

I have J.R. Ward and Nalini Singh and others lined up waiting for the last one to come out and then I'll read them.  I've got Dark Fever and Blood Fever just sitting there.  It's going to be at least three years till that series is finished.

It's so much easier when all the books are out and you just have to gather them up.

Nope, not a series fan.  I sometimes think an author continues with a series because they don't have the creativity to go on and create a whole new cast of characters.  Sorry!!  Don't be mad at me!

As for the other point of hoarding books and living in a book world............I was sitting in a 5 star restaurant with 2 other couples on Saturday night and the food and drink were flowing and you couldn't get any better than the chef's that were in the kitchen preparing our meals and the atmosphere was perfect and the company divine.  Where was my mind?........on the unfinished book that was sitting on my bedside table :)

I don't want a support group if it's to keep me from books!

I think we're a pretty good enabling group right here.

I don't collect series I haven't started, but I do have huge stashes of authors I've never read but got really good deals on in the Bazaar or picked up at library sales.  I will feel a little dumb if it turns out I hate them.. but on the other hand, if I love them, my glom is nicely underway. ;-)

I'm actually thinking of staying away from the library for awhile so I can catch up on some of my TBR pile, it's getting past the point of humor!

except for authors i've already read and enjoyed, i generally read at least the first book before getting any of the others.  i also don't usually like to read more than 3 books in a row from the same series - i'll just read something else about every 3 books if i'm reading (or re-reading) a whole series.

but what i've been doing lately is choosing the books to read based on what i've already read that month, and what i think i can get done.  i keep a book journal, and one of the things i put in there is when the last time i read the author was.  now, i could go through and just look for that author in past entries for a while, but when i started volume 3 of my journal a while ago, i had to make indexes in the back of the first two volumes.  and some of those lines were getting awfully long - like angela knight 1/07 2/07 3/07 5/07 ...   so i've been grouping authors.  if i'm reading an anthology with 3 authors, i'll also try to read the books by those authors in the same month.  or if i've got 2 books by the same author, i'll try to read both.    the unfortunate side-effect is that since i probably can't read 3 Lynsay Sands books this month along with the others already set aside, i haven't read 'An Accidental Vampire' yet, and things like that.  also picking a book at the end of the month can get annoying.

for book by authors i've already read, i may wait for a whole series, but probably not if it's more than a trilogy.

I had been away from reading romance for so long, when I finally started reading them again, there were already a gazillion out there I didn't know about.  Of course at the time, I didn't know who was good and who wasn't, so what I was buying was based on reviews I found online.  Not all of those necessarily say a book is part of this or that series, or some of them had been out so long I had to get books used, when & where I could find them.  Which can be kinda tough sometimes.  Many times I'd either be in the middle of, or finishing something good, and go "What?!  This is part of a series?!?!".  And it drives me nuts to finish one book in a series and not be able to go right into the next one.  I got paranoid about it after that, and now I unfortunately am one of those people who collects all of a series, or whatever is available, before I start them.  Which bites me in the backside from time to time.  Things like Edith Layton's The Cad series.  I didn't like them, but by the time I figured this out, I had all of them:P

I've got and the Macomber house # sereis, and the Mitford Series, and Catherine Anderson's whole back list I think. And Ihaven't read one yet.  I guess because when I start the first one of an 6,8,9 or 10 series, I'm committed to read only that author for a while (well that many may take a week and a half if I really like 'em! LOL)

And I'm even a worse series hoarder in that if I really like one book in a series by an author, I find them all, read them (and some of them were not great ;-P) and then keep them in my basement collection.  Why? I ask myself. Not sure so I'm slowly (very slowly) going through and getting rid of the series that I really don't love.

But don't even ask me about the hundreds of regencies down there. Hey, they don't make those anymore! I can't give those away, right!

I am a series reader, but I made the mistake of ordering two whole series that I really wasn't interested in. 

Now I read the first book of the series before I order the others unless I get a good deal on the whole series. 

I used to be really particular about reading the series in order, but lately, it doesn't bother me as much to read them out of order in some cases.  I know two people are going to end up together because it is mentioned in the second book, but I find I can still enjoy reading their story in the first book.   Of course, I only do this if I happen to have one of the books in a series that isn't the first in the series.  I really like to test one book before ordering the others.  It saves me time and credits.