Most authors usually claim every book can be read as a stand-alone.
They don't always understand those of use who
need to read in order.
Though to be fair, there are many books that probably do read just fine as stand-alones when they are part of a characters-only connected series without overarching plotlines.
I have been trying to let that go to at least read books by my autobuy authors who contribute to multi-author series. But that's about as far as I've been able to retrain myself
