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Kalman posted:So I finished Perhaps the Stars tonight and I’m incredibly impressed with how well Palmer brought the story to a close. Yes, it’s definitely written by a prof with serious interest in Renaissance literature and all that, but after (what I felt was a somewhat weak) Will to Battle I wasn’t convinced she had an end in mind. She definitely did, and it’s satisfying closure and incredibly well written. Is space colonization involved?
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Nov 27, 2021 14:34
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One of the better things about the John Carter/Princess of Mars story series is that John Carter almost always deliberately makes himself less deadly by fighting with swords against his enemies on Barsoom vs using his superior Earth-ian strength and speed to punch and grapple his Barsoomian enemies. It also makes for a very amusing visual during the book fight scenes when you remember John Carter is 6 feet plus a few inches tall while Green Martians are all at least 15 feet tall. Green Martian kneecaps and shins getting demolished Fist of the North Star style or worse if John Carter really cut loose. Finally Dejah Thoris is technically a Disney Princess (TM) via licensing rights. quantumfoam fucked around with this message at 19:01 on Nov 27, 2021 |
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Nov 27, 2021 16:40
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The only good thing about Disney owning all the stories is all the new princesses we have
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Nov 27, 2021 17:15
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I didn't like The Pariah. I think I got about 20-30% into it, and it's just pretty boring. For what it's worth I did enjoy blood song. I'd try the sample and if it's something you like, grab it. If not, it apparently doesn't change much in tone.
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Nov 27, 2021 18:40
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The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07DDGX4KY/
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Nov 28, 2021 19:49
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Just finished Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters (he also wrote the Last Policeman trilogy which is regularly on the discounted posts here and which I highly, highly recommend) and it was pretty good. Alternate history in which slavery has survived to the present day in a hardcore handful of Southern states which he makes much more plausible than it sounds, main character is an escaped slave forced into working for the US Marshals hunting down other escaped slaves, who stumbles upon a case where there's more than meets the eye and his bosses are particularly concerned about it, etc. Good readable thriller which takes a very unlikely premise and makes it seem real. What I also found very interesting, though, was its publication date (2016) and how that brushes against different prevailing opinions in writing/publishing. Maybe I'm wrong and it's just because Winters was already a very successful author, but I feel like he slid this one right in before the deadline where the mood shifted. I have trouble imagining a publishing house taking a risk today on any kind of book in which a white author is writing from a black POV, let alone one in which a fundamentally black experience like slavery is front and centre of the narrative. (And if they did there'd be a huge social media backlash.) Blamestorm posted:On Alistair Reynolds I just went through a phase of reading nearly all his books (after bouncing off Redemption Space years ago then finding and really enjoying House of Suns) and frankly I think he’s always been a bit scattershot, both between and within his novels. I thought Inhibitor Space started out strong and ended up disappointing. But on the flip side I enjoyed his recent Prefect two books and parts of the Revenger ones. The biggest issue I have with his books is people acting cartoonishly stupidly over some obsessive/compulsive cause or point of ostensible principle, which ruined Pushing Ice for me and almost made me ditch the third Revenger book. But it’s scattered all over his work and I had thought he’d moved mostly past it with the Prefect ones - until inhibitor space. I'm currently going back to the Revelation Space trilogy after reading (only) the first book years ago, then reading some of his better later novels, then thinking "hey I actually like this guy I should finish the RS trilogy." And I agree those issues have always been there. He just has trouble writing characters and/or understanding how human beings actually interact with each other (which, tbf, is hardly an uncommon problem in sci-fi.) Pushing Ice is probably the best example of this because all the pieces are there for a legitimately well-founded blood feud over a cause/principle that would go on for decades: a person/faction making a choice which condemned everyone else on that vessel to an interstellar voyage they'll never be able to return from, which they never signed up for. But something about it just falls apart in the execution. It feels more like he's making his characters do things because that's what's written under "MOTIVATION" on their notes sheet, rather than because he can make you really feel "yeah this person is justified in their anger." In fact this was also present in Chasm City, which I just finished, which is ostensibly a revenge tale and in which the protagonist does talk quite a lot about how he driven he is rather than actually feeling like a driven man as opposed to a chess piece.
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Nov 29, 2021 00:14
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Admittedly, I only half-remember Underground Airlines at this point. I think I read it during 2020 (thanks COVID depression brain I guess), but I felt like the final act of the book did not hang together well at all, but iirc it was for issues with me suspending disbelief, not for the author's prose. Interesting, if horrifying, premise though.
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Nov 29, 2021 03:39
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underground airlines and golden state didn't work for me - the starting premises should have made for drastically different worlds
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Nov 29, 2021 03:46
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FPyat posted:Is space colonization involved? ... sort of? It's of incredible importance to the plot, but is also not actually part of the plot.
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Nov 29, 2021 04:42
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Bayham Badger posted:I felt like the final act of the book did not hang together well at all, but iirc it was for issues with me suspending disbelief, not for the author's prose. Agreed, it gets a bit deux ex machiny. Still good though. shrike82 posted:underground airlines and golden state didn't work for me - the starting premises should have made for drastically different worlds Also agreed - there's no way that butterfly-flaps-its-wings scenario couldn't have resulted in far more unfathomable change - but I think you have to just sort of accept that as an unavoidable part of the premise
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Nov 29, 2021 12:12
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https://twitter.com/lilithsaintcrow/status/1465370664962076672?s=21
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Nov 29, 2021 18:36
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The Fifth Season (Broken Earth #1) by NK Jemisin - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00H25FCSQ/ The Book of Koli (Rampart #1) by MR Carey - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07W54MPDZ/ New Spring (Wheel of Time) by Robert Jordan - $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003K15PBK/ Eden by Stanislaw Lem - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008533D44/
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Nov 29, 2021 19:34
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pradmer posted:The Fifth Season (Broken Earth #1) by NK Jemisin - $2.99 Fifth Season has some pretty clear WoT influences so this is an interesting pair. I assume most have read Fifth Season but if not it's definitely worth it. NS is not a good entry point to the WoT series even though it's chronologically first, but it's an action-packed yarn and pretty fun. I wonder if anyone's ever read it as a standalone.
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Nov 29, 2021 20:04
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Started Adrian T.'s Shards of Earth on Saturday evening and finished it last night at 12:30am...which made for a rough slapping of the alarm four hours later.  Been a fan of this author for years, since Children of Time, but it really feels like with every new title he's just getting further into his groove, like a steam engine which hasn't hit max RPM yet. loving awesome More complexity, more imaginative, plot twists that even a jaded reader doesn't see coming. Worlds which feel fresh and compelling after decades of reading this genre. poo poo is good, it's been a long LONG time since I have been unable to put a book down basically from start to finish. I mean, it certainly recycles some fairly common genre tropes but in a very fresh-rear end way and most importantly (after the dreck of Inhibitor Phase ) the characters actually have character. Good poo poo, good poo poo, "unputdownable", extremely recommended. Adrian T is possibly the best Space Opera author going, these days.
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Nov 29, 2021 21:53
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Loved Children of Time, found Cage of Souls overlong and ultimately tedious so I wasn't planning on reading him again, but the elevator pitch for Shards of Earth is catnip to me (ironically enough, because of the kinds of things I like about Reynolds) so I'm definitely going to give that a go.
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Nov 29, 2021 23:02
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freebooter posted:
Yes, this is pretty much how I feel. In Pushing Ice it was the span of time that particularly got to me. Holding grudges over decades during so much generational change may or may not be realistic (i found it somewhat unbelievable), but it certainly hurt my ability to empathise with the relevant characters. Obsession is such a recurring theme of his books (including many of his best ones, where he's done it well) that I wonder whether its linked to his scientific background - he might very much have in mind people who he has known who were willing to dedicate decades of time to solving scientific questions, at personal cost, and he is just pushing that out a few steps? But perhaps the consequence is it seems so natural to him for people to be obsessive over both things like scientific discovery but also points of principle that he doesn't lay the groundwork sufficiently in the books. I think some of his short stories this works a lot better because he can paint with fairly broad strokes and you don't have to live with the characters for hundreds of pages. Chasm City I think it bothered me less as well as it was fairly breezy and the protagonist was having memory problems. I thought Redemption Ark probably had one of the better dynamics because Clavain was portrayed as far more pragmatic and idealist, with Skade/others filling that obsessive role and the whole thing just worked a lot better. I was hoping for a repeat of that dynamic in Inhibitor Space, but, well, for those who have read it...didn't quite end up that way. It's super irritating with Reynolds because I feel it wouldn't take much to address a lot of these issues and he'd maybe be one of the best sci fi authors of all time. He does so much other stuff well! I'm happy to keep giving his new books a go because there are certainly lots of ideas and moments in his books that are really good. House of Suns is probably his best book that I've read (although hardly flawless) so I'm willing to keep trying him out in the hope of getting another one I enjoy as much. Blamestorm fucked around with this message at 00:19 on Nov 30, 2021 |
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Nov 30, 2021 00:14
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Just finished The gods themselves by Asimov. It has what you could expect, great sci fi ideas and so so characters. The final lines are a bit icky though. Reminded me of 3 Body problem with some of Moon harsh mistress thrown in. The main issue could easily map to either global warming or nuclear warfare, so it's oddly relevant.
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Nov 30, 2021 03:42
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I'm always surprised Blue Remembered Earth by Alaister Reynolds never gets any love. Perhaps it was good audiobook narration, but I geniunely liked the family dynamics of the characters and found the simple mystery really engaging. Probably the most unique and optimistic one of his books, I loved it. E. I didn't love that his Kenyan characters read like British bluebloods, without a ton of uniquely Kenyan parts to them, but that felt minor. Famethrowa fucked around with this message at 07:03 on Nov 30, 2021 |
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Nov 30, 2021 06:59
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Rime posted:Started Adrian T.'s Shards of Earth on Saturday evening and finished it last night at 12:30am...which made for a rough slapping of the alarm four hours later. He's got a new novel(ette?) out and it's good a fantasy/sf combo, which is one of my favorites ever since I first read "heroes die"
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Nov 30, 2021 09:45
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Famethrowa posted:I'm always surprised Blue Remembered Earth by Alaister Reynolds never gets any love. Perhaps it was good audiobook narration, but I geniunely liked the family dynamics of the characters and found the simple mystery really engaging. Probably the most unique and optimistic one of his books, I loved it. I haven't read it yet! I'll grab it now and give it a go.
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Nov 30, 2021 10:42
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buffalo all day posted:I assume most have read Fifth Season but if not it's definitely worth it. I read the first book and dropped the series about halfway into the sequel. I don't understand the hype. The series was a bore.
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Nov 30, 2021 16:03
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The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke - $1.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002UM5BUU/ The Drowned Cities (Ship Breaker #2) by Paolo Bacigalupi - $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005SCR2ZG/
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Nov 30, 2021 23:43
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Doctor Jeep posted:He's got a new novel(ette?) out and it's good Possibly the best twist on the featured trope I have ever read, honestly. Brilliant piece of writing. I do not understand how he maintains this degree of quality with such a ferocious output, it's insane.
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Dec 1, 2021 01:59
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Well, first you write a million words about your bug-people based D&D campaign. Then, with all the bad words out of your system, just write good words from then on.
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Dec 1, 2021 02:02
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Ceebees posted:Well, first you write a million words about your bug-people based D&D campaign. Then, with all the bad words out of your system, just write good words from then on.
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Dec 1, 2021 15:57
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Ceebees posted:Well, first you write a million words about your bug-people based D&D campaign. Then, with all the bad words out of your system, just write good words from then on.
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Dec 1, 2021 16:02
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DACK FAYDEN posted:I take it I should skip those, then. I just knew I liked his other stuff... Depends. They're schlocky but fun. I've read a lot of things that were a lot worse.
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Dec 1, 2021 16:48
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I think I would have enjoyed them a lot if each book was like, half the size. As it is I just got kind of bored with them halfway through.
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Dec 1, 2021 18:25
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anilEhilated posted:It's actually not a bad series if you're in the mood for generic epic fantasy. Oh, i read all of them. I had a job with 12-hour shifts and i needed cheap paperbacks big enough to stun a horse. They're fine, it just makes me laugh to see Tchaikovsky praised now for high-concept sci-fi when to me, he will always be about a weeb-rear end Mantis-kin and Cheerwell Maker's amazing ability to fall in love with the dumbest possible target at every venture.
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Dec 1, 2021 19:02
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i liked the books about bugs and squids and such but Doors of Eden was so, so bad I haven't picked anything up from him in a while.
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Dec 1, 2021 19:09
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I posted about it before, but I read Children of time, and then Doors of Eden. It was such a huge drop in quality that I’ve never read anything else by him. The thread consensus was that he rose above his level with Children of.
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Dec 1, 2021 20:14
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Shards of Earth is getting great reviews, but I wish those reviews would say a little more about what differentiates it. The blurb on Amazon/Goodreads sounds like something generated by an algorithm to be as generically sci-fi as possible, and given Tchaikovsky's earlier work I feel certain that's doing it disservice.
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Dec 1, 2021 21:13
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Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GD46PQZ/ A number of Ben H Winters books, 2 Last Policeman series, and 2 standalone The Last Policeman (#1) - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0076Q1GW2/ World of Trouble (#3) - $2.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HXYHVNU/ Underground Airlines - $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017RQP41O/ Golden State - $3.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07CWPLJ61/
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Dec 1, 2021 23:12
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Kestral posted:Shards of Earth is getting great reviews, but I wish those reviews would say a little more about what differentiates it. The blurb on Amazon/Goodreads sounds like something generated by an algorithm to be as generically sci-fi as possible, and given Tchaikovsky's earlier work I feel certain that's doing it disservice. It is a bit closer to the broader set of sci fi stories that are out there right now (ragtag band of plucky adventurers take down an existential threat from deep in unknown space) but it totally lacks the snarky whedonesque dialogue that's so popular and still has an edge of the Tchaikovsky weirdness to it.
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Dec 1, 2021 23:18
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eke out posted:i liked the books about bugs and squids and such but Doors of Eden was so, so bad I haven't picked anything up from him in a while. Mr. Nemo posted:I posted about it before, but I read Children of time, and then Doors of Eden. It was such a huge drop in quality that I’ve never read anything else by him. That was my exact experience as well.
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Dec 1, 2021 23:55
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branedotorg posted:you might like Christian (Miles) Cameron's new book Artifact Space, it's about a huge ship that travels between a series of worlds trading alien technology on a fixed cycle, i guess loosely based on the galleon loops in the pacific. I was going through a backlog of samples for books that sounded only OK to me but hadn't touched yet and I enjoyed Artifact Space pretty well. It's a reasonably engaging read. Nothing incredible but reasonably solid.
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Dec 2, 2021 00:24
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Huh I didn’t realize when I bought Between Two Fires on Amazon that I was technically buying a self published work. Really glad it’s finding its audience, it’s fantastic. https://mobile.twitter.com/Buehlmeister/status/1465910566061580290
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Dec 2, 2021 01:35
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I'm rather tempted to read the sequels to The Three-Body Problem, but does the rest of the series continue to have a really uncomfortable hard-on for China's worst authoritarian impulses? I can endure flat prose in the name of interesting ideas - I made it through Foundation, barely - but flat prose and... Well, everything else that novel was when it wasn't being Big Ideas SF, isn't something I can take two more books of.
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Dec 2, 2021 02:47
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Kestral posted:I'm rather tempted to read the sequels to The Three-Body Problem, but does the rest of the series continue to have a really uncomfortable hard-on for China's worst authoritarian impulses yes
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Dec 2, 2021 02:48
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I am one of the rare people who really enjoyed the entire bug people series, apparently.
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Dec 2, 2021 02:56
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