Book series

I am waiting at the edge of my seat at the airport as I finish rereading the first two novels in a trilogy that is going to release the final installment while I am on vacation. I’ve already preordered it so it will be waiting in my kindle for me to read on my return flight. I am not one to be patient with books. I am a slow reader - probably with some level of undiagnosed dyslexia (thanks school for never noticing because I was an otherwise good student) so rereading books in general is something usually only saved for my all time favorites (The Phantom Tollbooth, Einstein's Dreams, Princess Bride, Harry Potter*) but when I have to wait long periods I need to catch back up.

Which leads to me usually not reading anything in  a series until they are all released. *Harry Potter being the exception. I was the magical generation who had to wait for each book release to find out what happened next. And I spent an entire summer wondering and worrying what it might mean if Harry was indeed a horcrux. I feel like I’ve put my time in waiting wise.

Still I picked this one up as an Amazon First read without realizing it was a trilogy until I was 75% through it and thoroughly involved in the world. When I hit ‘the end’ in the second installment I nearly threw my kindle. It was a rather dirty (IMO - not explicit just mean) cliffhanger to leave us waiting another 13 months on. Now I am there again, but with the promise that my wait is only a week this time. It makes me wonder though if this is the reason why I only write stand-alone pieces.

It’s a see-saw between, why don't I just do it better (not knocking what I'm reading, besides the cliffhanger) and why bother if that’s not what I like? Are you a re-reader? Do you love serials or stand-alones? Reading them? Writing them? I know it's popular, but is it only popular because it's popular? I guess I just have to wait for the final installment and see if the payoff was worth the wait.