Our club split 6-5 over reading the sequel right after book one, and I'm still not sure we picked right
At our meeting in Denver last month, half of us wanted to jump straight into the sequel while the other half wanted a palate cleanser book in between so the first one could sink in. We voted 6-5 to go straight to the sequel, and honestly two of us showed up to the next meeting cranky and confused while the rest loved staying in that world. Has your club ever regretted reading books back to back, or did the momentum actually help you catch stuff you would have missed?
Six to five is basically a coin flip, so I get why it felt messy. My club in Portland tried the back to back thing once with a two book series and by page 80 of book two I was skimming because the world had stopped feeling new. Waiting a month or two between books gave me time to actually miss the characters, and I caught way more on the reread anyway. Momentum sounds nice but a palate cleanser is not wasted time, it just lets the first book breathe.