Yay! my library has purchased the series! after a quick check at the first 2 volumes i read, i saw there were 2 'books' in each volumes. so that places me at book 5 as my starting point. great series - i laughed; i cried. the ending was as satisfying as it could be: many explainations for the plague are offered but none are confirmed as the truth; the expected love story takes a turn for the worst but delivers an even better outcome (for a short while anyhow, and then the ensuing tragedy is felt deep enough to produce tears), the themes of who we are in the face of expectations/namesakes/cloning are explored, and we get to fast forward 60 years, stopping at spots along the way to see the various story threads coming to a end. and we are there for beloved ampersand's death and it's more touching than the lover's ending.
yes, a very satisfying series indeed