Is there likely to be an 'omnibus' book released when OOTS is done?

[Spoomeister]

I'm a good 3 books behind in collecting now that book 6 is out. I'm hazarding a guess that we're only going to see one or two more books' worth of material. So I'm pondering just holding off on getting the individual books for now and just picking up an all-inclusive omnibus if such is made after the series is complete.

[brian 333]

Which is why such a book, if planned, won't be announced until after sales on book 7 begin to decline.

[monkeyslinger]

I'm inclined to guess no simply because of the sheer size such a book would have. It would probably be difficult to bind that many pages in such a way that the book will stay together.

[Reboot]

I'm inclined to guess no simply because of the sheer size such a book would have. It would probably be difficult to bind that many pages in such a way that the book will stay together.

Could probably do it in three volumes (books 1-4, 5-7, the rest).

Bigger problem is what brian 333 said - nothing is going to be even hinted at until book 7 has been on sale for a while, because Rich isn't going to want to cannibalise sales of the standard books, and would probably require a Kickstarter or similar.

It certainly isn't a given that it would ever happen.

[ti'esar]

I'm inclined to guess no simply because of the sheer size such a book would have. It would probably be difficult to bind that many pages in such a way that the book will stay together.

Eh, you know what they say: it's not a real fantasy epic until you can potentially use it as a lethal bludgeon.

[Schroeswald]

One whole book would only be (quick math adding up all the books+web exclusives), more than 2179 pages, and then the next book will probably be another 400 pages, so 2579, let’s round up for any extra stuff stuffed in and to allow for B7 being longer, 2600 pages! I probably wouldn’t even die if I got hit by it! And for fun let’s figure out the size, NCFtPB was 1/2 inch and 244 pages, the whole thing is a bit more than 5 inches, that’s a reasonable number!

Let’s look at three books, 1-4 is 964, 5-7 is 1125 and extras are 503 and bonus rounding up is spread throughout.

[Spoomeister]

One whole book would only be (quick math adding up all the books+web exclusives), more than 2179 pages, and then the next book will probably be another 400 pages, so 2579, let’s round up for any extra stuff stuffed in and to allow for B7 being longer, 2600 pages! I probably wouldn’t even die if I got hit by it! And for fun let’s figure out the size, NCFtPB was 1/2 inch and 244 pages, the whole thing is a bit more than 5 inches, that’s a reasonable number!

Let’s look at three books, 1-4 is 964, 5-7 is 1125 and extras are 503 and bonus rounding up is spread throughout.

Hm, for comparison's sake I pulled out my copy of Jeff Smith's Bone and it's a bit over 1300 pages. So yeah, perhaps 2 omnibuses, just about splitting the story down the middle, would be as close as one gets.

[Morgana]

With the amount of times the Giant has gotten burned by trying to sell a new type of product or trying to get it funded, I highly doubt he'd go for it to be honest

[NerdyKris]

The shipping would be enormous, and the audience much smaller since most people aren't going to buy a second copy of a book they already have. I also can't imagine what would be gained bundling them all together that isn't already served by the individual books.

Anything that could be said about the series as a whole could just as easily be material for book seven.

He would need a LOT of extra material to justify an omnibus, and I don't think there's anywhere near that much that we haven't seen.

edit- also, given that the last two books both took five years to complete, you're talking about at least five plus years to account for book seven at the very least, plus how ever long it takes to sell out of the individual copies first.

[Gallowglass]

I'm a good 3 books behind in collecting now that book 6 is out. I'm hazarding a guess that we're only going to see one or two more books' worth of material. So I'm pondering just holding off on getting the individual books for now and just picking up an all-inclusive omnibus if such is made after the series is complete.

The Giant is not a publishing house. He is not Marvel or DC or Simon and Shuster.

He has one product line (OOtS) and, I'm quite certain, his profit line is razor thin. He has to front the cost of any product and hope to recoup and profit above the cost after selling it. If he was Marvel or DC or Simon and Shuster then he would have bottomless pockets of cash to use to front that new product from his other hundred(s) of product lines and could risk losing on a few product lines that don't recoup+.

All that to say, it would be financially incredibly expensive to make an ominibus edition. And he would have to hope to offset that cost by getting the people who are now buying individual editions to buy the omnibus as well plus a new audience.

Its very unlikely.

Most of the time when you see Omnibus editions, they are made by publishing houses who know how to cut down production costs razor thin already and have a product line that is sitting there underused.

I would say that the OOtS is not being underused. I think he's probably already maximizing his return of profit with the books he's doing now.

If there ever is an omnibus edition it will come long after the series is completed, the first edition books have sold out and someone comes along and decided to underwrite it for nostalia's sake.

[AchtungNight]

My advice- get the PDF editions. It's what I'm doing.

[Kish]

Not a chance in the Nine Hells. It would be literally bigger than any book ever published. By comparison to comic books that have omnibus editions, the five published books are already equal to or larger than standard omnibus editions in size.

[CriticalFailure]

Eh, you know what they say: it's not a real fantasy epic until you can potentially use it as a lethal bludgeon.

The best improvised weapon I have in case of a home intruder is probably the complete illustrated edition of Earthsea.

"Only in dying life!" WAP

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff: This is the kind of thing that only The Giant can answer, so poster speculation isn't particularly helpful. It also inevitably leads to posters claiming to know the answer or telling Rich how to run his business - neither of which conducive to discussion.