If you've ever read any of the authors that I am currently featuring here, then you already know what the term Saga means. Sagas start out as a single novel, usually with no indication that there is going to be a next novel. This also depends on the history of the author. Have they written trilogies before? Have they created an outline that can be continued into several more books? These are important things when writing stories that are going to be drawn out over a period of several novels, some of which are almost 1000 pages long.

It's not easy writing a novel, let alone several that link to each other intricately. I do however quite enjoy them. When you are reading a Saga you learn about the characters, you end up loving or hating them, but you always need to know more of the story, about what is going to happen to them next and are they going to save the world or will it all fall down and crumble around them?

There are a few Sagas I have read that started out as Trilogies. If you have read Raymond E. Feist, who a friend got me interested in many years ago, he started out with a simple orphan boy who ended up becoming a savior to a princess, then he became a slave, and after all of his trials became one of the most powerful magicians in the known worlds. This entire saga started with one book, called Magician Apprentice. I've read the book several times, I have all but a couple of books for the entire Saga, including the Kelewan based trilogy.

I love reading Sagas because you keep in touch with those characters you first meet. The world grows around them, they confront enemies who are trying to turn everything into chaos, they find allies in one of their enemies, loved ones die and new ones continue to defend the world they know and cherish.

The best thing about Sagas is that everything is based in the same world, or worlds in the case of Feists' Magician books, and there is always something going on that catches you, pulls you in and keeps you hungry for more.

You don't have to read fantasy in order to get a good Saga. You can get an excellent saga out of the Anita Blake and Merry Genty books by Laurell K. Hamilton as well. Nora Roberts wrote a trilogy, but I haven't finished reading it yet and I don't know if there are more books to it at this time. I also enjoy Catherine Coulter's FBI thriller books. Best to be read in order but they can stand on their own as well. These are the types of stories I love to read. Sagas keep you enthralled for years, watching characters grow, live, and die, then to watch their children to do the same.