dead writers don’t cheat on you

When I was a youth (ten minutes ago), I loved Beverly Cleary’s Ramona books: Beezus and Ramona, Ramona the Pest, etc.  I read them all, until I came to the last, Ramona Forever, published in 1984.  That was the last one, as it makes sense to have been, with a title like that.  I had finished the Ramona canon and moved on to Judy Blume and eventually – in my late 20s – to JK Rowling (I stay high brow at all times).

Recently I saw that 15 years after Ramona Forever, Beverly Cleary went on to publish Ramona’s World.  And I have to say, I felt a litte betrayed.  Really?  Another Ramona book?  And you didn’t even give me a call, Beverly?

I then discovered that there were sequels to Louis Sachar’s Sideways Stories from Wayside School (four sequels, in fact!).  Again, betrayed.  I was supposed to be master of a canon.

Maybe these days are limited.  We can now set Google Alerts to let us know if Ramona Quimby ever comes back to light.

And then again, I did move on from Ramona to Blubber, so now I see I’m just a literarily promiscuous dude complaining about my like-minded (but less) literarily promiscuous author partners.  Let it go, man.  Let it go.