A serial follower of series

Last week I mentioned how much I was enjoying the Netflix series A Series of Unfortunate Events. While I was in town at the weekend hunting in charity shops and the library for the first book (no luck; I'm going to have to buy it from a regular bookshop) I realised series are a bit of a theme in my life.

As a toddler I always asked for Postman Pat books for bedtime stories (and at any other time during the day), so much so that mum says she still has the words locked away in her memory and could probably tell them again without the book. My Little Pony was also a favourite of mine - the ponies are all still at my parents house waiting for the day my children want to play with them.

At primary school I read every Nancy Drew book I could get my hands on, and would buy collections that featured a story I hadn't read, even if I had read the other two in the book (and was disappointed a few years ago when I discovered that 'Carolyn Keene' was actually a collective of ghostwriters, rather than one individual; had I realised how long the series had been going - since 1930 - that might have been obvious). This phase was rapidly followed by The Babysitters Club; I read them all as fast as they came out, and in my head the characters really were my friends and their adventures were mine. I did eventually grow out of them, but only finally got rid of the physical copies last summer when I spent a week at my parents (and even then I did keep a few). The Chronicles of Narnia definitely featured in there too, as did Harry Potter, even though I was already in my late teens when I read the first one.

In my teenage years my series of choice was the television show Dawson's Creek, and has since included House and How I Met Your Mother (I almost started re-watching that a couple of weeks ago, but realised before I hit start on the first episode that I would want to watch the whole nine series, and took a step back), and currently it's A Series of Unfortunate Events. You might by now have noticed a theme: the series I love are easy reading and easy viewing. Other people's lives that I can immerse myself in; I think there must be a critical mass of characters; not just one, but not too many. I have watched all of Game of Thrones, but not engaged in the story to the same extent as my favourites: there are too many characters and then I struggle to relate to any of them.

I'm really hoping that when I get my hands on the first of the Series of Unfortunate Events books that it is the start of another series that I can't stop reading. Escapism is definitely something I enjoy.

What are you favourite series? Are there any you would recommend?