The Long Earth

The Long Earth has a terrific what-if premise - What if there were multiple universes, an infinite number of universes, and people suddenly could travel among these other universes at will. It's an adventure story of the exploration of the Long Earth, that is, the infinite number of versions of the Earth, each just a step away from the next. Unfortunately, Pratchett never really develops a plot. There is no build-up. No climax. The book stops just as malcontents unexpectedly destroy Madison Wisconsin on the home Earth with a small nuclear bomb.

So, to my chagrin, I realized that The Long Earth is simply the preamble to a Long Series, the second book of which had not yet been published. (Since my reading, The Long War, second in the series has been published.) I tend to eschew series, and probably would not have chosen to read The Good Earth had I known. With an infinite number of Earths to explore, this series may be endless.