Eventually this page will have a flow chart. Because who doesn’t love flow charts?
Originally, the Cas Russell series (formerly the Russell’s Attic series, but nobody likes my math puns except me) consisted of these books, with more on the way:
- Novels:
- Zero Sum Game (book 1)
- Half Life (book 2)
- Root of Unity (book 3)
- Plastic Smile (book 4)
- Companion Short Stories:
- Rio Adopts a Puppy
- Ladies’ Day Out
Then Tor picked it up for a re-release! Yay! Therefore, what’s available and upcoming right now is:
- Novels:
- Zero Sum Game (book 1)
- Null Set (book 2)
- This is a rewrite of what was originally Plastic Smile (book 4) in the self-published series.
- Critical Point (book 3) — BRAND NEW!
- (more to come)
- Companion Short Stories:
If you’ve read none of the self-published versions, just read the Tor editions as they come out and you’ll be fine.
If you’ve read some number of the self-published versions, you’ll notice that the series is not just being edited, but reordered, with the old book 4 being released as book 2 — and what I wrote as book 5 will now be book 3 (the old books 2&3 will come out later). To keep things simple, here’s what you should read next if you don’t want to reread anything:
- If you’ve read Zero Sum Game only -> Read Null Set next.
- If you’ve read Zero Sum Game and Half Life -> Read Null Set next.
- If you’ve read Zero Sum Game, Half Life, and Root of Unity -> Read Null Set next.
- If you’ve read all of the self-published novels, Zero Sum Game, Half Life, Root of Unity, and Plastic Smile -> Read Critical Point next.
Of course, you are more than welcome to reread the new editions as they come out, even if you read the self-published versions! There are a lot of edits, and personally, I think they kick significantly more ass now. But for readers who don’t want to, I’ve worked hard to try to make sure you won’t be lost if you skip from the old to the new ones.
Have more questions? I’ve tried to answer the ones I get most frequently in the FAQ.