Ok, many, MANY people annoy me, but in this case I am specifically referring to authors. And more specifically than that, I am referring to authors that leave a story wide open and then refuse to write a sequel. I think when you choose to entertain the public, you have responsibilty and it's just wrong to shirk. There are 4 cases that really flip my pancakes.
Number 4 is Jean M. Auel of Clan of the Cave Bear fame. She starts the series with a girl that is born homo erectus, but whose parents die tragically in an earthquake when she is a toddler. She is found and raised by the shamen and the medicine woman of a neanderthal tribe, where her life is hellish and she can't live to her full potential. Eventually she is forced to leave. In the next book, she goes to a nearby valley where she tames a horse and makes a lovely life alone until one day she rescues an injured and handsome homo erectus hottie. Throughout the course of the next gazillion or so books, she and he make their was across the continent to join his family. At the end of one of the books, they see his family in the distance! Hooray! The next book didn't come out for over TEN FRICKIN YEARS. But eventually it did. Some of us read the book, glad that the story would finally be wrapped up before the aging Auel kicked it. I eagerly plodded through the book, (because I don't enjoy these books nearly as well as I did when I was a teenager, and a book that's 2 inches thick is quite a bit of plodding when you're not having fun.) And then, after all the anticipation...the book ends. No really, it just ends, right in the middle of the story. No effort at wrap up of any kind. It's like she was writing a 4 inch book and the publisher were like, just give us the first two inches dammit, we'll publish the rest when you finish! That book came out in paperback in 2004. The next book is supposed to be released in the spring of next year. And if it's not the end of the damn series, I'm gonna write the ending myself.
Number 3: Witch and Wombat by Carolyn Cushman. Ok, this book isn't a magnificent feat of literature. But still, it's clearly supposed to be the beginning of a series. But Ms Cushman only wrote one book. Ever. In 1994. WTF? Surely it wasn't that bad! Did she get hit by a bus? Did she lose her typewriter? Nobody knows, because despite internet searches, I can find no information on dear Carolyn, other than the fact that she was a sci fi/fantasy book critic for a magazine. Maybe she decided that she should just write one book to show she could do it, I dunno.
Number 2: Robert Asprin. The Myth Series and the Phule Series are great punny fun. With interesting plots and light hearted goodness. Until...they aren't anymore. The dear sweet kid hero in the Myth Series turns into an alcoholic and becomes abusive to his friends. Phule turns from a light hearted but surprisingly adept and intelligent leader into an idiot who only scrapes by because his butler bails him out. Turns out that Mr Asprin hates writing. Like, seriously HATES it. It's like doing homework while getting a root canal as far as he's concerned. As soon as he got enough popularity and money, presumably, his books started being ghost written or "co-written," which seems to be code for "he gave someone permission to write it." And the people who are writing his books now really REALLY didn't get it. At all.
And Numero Uno, drum roll, please: Robin McKinley. As far as anyone I've ever talked to is concerned, some of her books are left wide open for a sequel. Sunshine being the most obvious example. Sunshine was written in 2003, and is really really not finished, but according to Madame McKinley's blog, she DOES NOT write sequels! And she likes the ending just fine, thank you very much. Hmph. She says if she ever is gifted with a sequel story springing from her head, so be it, but don't hold your breath. grumble grumble.
Of course, this list wouldn't be complete without The Cat Who Walks Through Walls and several other books by Heinlein, but he's dead, so I'm not really expecting much there.
And I would be derilict in my duties if I didn't mention some people who can't stop writing but really should: Orson Scott Card after writing Ender's Game, Frank Herbert after Dune, and of course, Terry Goodkind and Eric Van Lustbader before they even started.
