Series And Sequences

Operation Luna is the sequel to Operation Chaos which is a collection of "Operation Afreet," "Operation Salamander," "Operation Incubus" and "Operation Changeling." Thus, there are six "Operation" titles but five "Operation" works and two Operation volumes. These volumes are also connected, though less directly, to two novels that do not have the word Operation... in their titles. In an earlier post, I discussed how these four volumes are connected both to each other and to two short stories which, I argue, could form the basis of a further collection.

Sometimes, three or four works by Poul Anderson form a linear series, a trilogy or tetralogy. In other cases, as with this "Old Phoenix Sequence" or the Maurai histories, there is a looser sequence of connected works. Each of these series or sequences deserves to be republished in uniform editions with covers indicating the optimal reading order.

In most cases, we wish that there had been more but, if Anderson had written more of any one series or sequence, he would necessarily have written less of another.