Do you have a fictional world that you can always come back to? Something that no matter what, you can re-read, or know that the next book set there will be comforting and like coming home, at the very least.

That’s what the Shannara books are to me. I’ve re-read the first few trilogies several times, and I keep picking up more when I hit the bookstore. I wait to read until I have a complete trilogy or quartet, because when I get going, I don’t want to stop until I’ve digested the whole story.

Believe you me, Terry Brooks is prolific enough for me to be able to do that without worrying if it’ll stop the next one from coming out.

But, Skippy, you might say, the first book is awful! Well, dear reader, I’d be hard pressed to argue with you on that one. Though, in my teenage years, when I was devouring R. A. Salvatore and Isaac Asimov and Anne McCaffrey and Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman novels, each in a matter of days, I didn’t even notice. And the second series of books hooked me forever. The first ones may have anchored me into the world, but the second ones spoke to me.

Those are the ones that made the Four Lands feel like home.

I’m on pause now. Don’t give me the side-eye, I’m looking for two more to finish out the quartet. And then, dear reader, AND THEN? I’ll make a trip back to this world and devour that story, and I will be happy.

Where’s your fictional home away from home?