[jbcohen]

Some sci-fi authors chose to write alone while others chose to work with other authors in a collaborative effort. I have often wondered what factor(s) go into a decision to write with other authors. Some factors that I have seen include: Giving a start to new and aspiring authors and some authors have become house names such as Don Pendelton and for quite a while Tom Clancy.

I have also thought a bit about what is often called door stoper novels in other words books that are so huge that they can quite often used to hold open a door at home. I used to be quite intimidated by these novels since they were so large I was intimidated by the shear size wondering if I could even hope to read something that big. Well with the increasing sucess of electronic book readers I am not as intimidated by those door stopper novels since I do not ever actually see the physical size of the novel.

In some ways a door stopper novel can be a great thing since the author has so many pages to developp the story line he/she can really develop the story line and the world around the character(s) so the reader gets a better thought out plot line then the smaller novels. Series novels also tend to be great this way giving the author more pages to develop the story line(s). I also like the ability to really get to know the characters that I am reading about in the door stopper novels and series novels. However I have heard some of my pals saying that they do not like the door stopper and series novels since the story line is more dragged out and not well thought out, "if it was well thought out the book would not be as long" one of my older pals have told me.