I've had a lot of time to listen to books on the road.  I'm on the fourth book of a set of books called The Heritage series by Charles Sheffield.  Normally series books don't appeal to me, because after the first few they get a droning quality, at least it seems that way to me.  This is supposedly the last book in the series though, and it is definitely leading somewhere.  I guess that's the problem with a lot of other series, there seems to be no end, and it's just different situations in an alternative setting.   Seems, now that I think about it, that I'm more comfortable with books that end with some type of resolution.  Of course, that doesn't explain why I like Stephen King so much, especially the Dark Tower novels.  Everyone is anxiously waiting on book 7... well, everyone that's into the series is waiting on it.  There's that, and the fact that he's trying to tie ALL his novels together in some fashion.  It doesn't matter, the ideas behind each story are good and stand alone, whereas in some series the idea behind the story becomes the basis for a whole series of books, and the plots of the individual books become run of the mill stories. 

Anyway, I'm getting away from my purpose, which is to drone on about the latest books I've been through.  The author of these books promises it will be the last, the fourth book will be the last that is.  It is leading to a definite conclusion, a big plus.  It's a good story too... well, a good idea.  It seems hard to write a really good story when the plot takes the characters all over the galaxy.  It seems to be too much for a story.  That seems at odds with what I said about series books though.  He is trying to explain events that span the history of the galaxy with events that, in the book, span just a few years.  Not that I could do it.

Before that, actually during those books, is when I finished Banner of Heaven.  After looking back and trying to figure if I've left anything out, I've discovered that the author of the Heritage books has written another.  After reading the review on Amazon, I don't think I'll read it.  I think he's going to bring things to a close with this fourth book, and another is just an attempt to capitalize on the popularity on the first four.