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90s Cringe Rock posted:Don't skip the YA stuff, it owns. Tiffany Aching is how you write a strong girl protagonist.
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Mar 25, 2022 23:02
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Watched the 1976 BBC miniseries I CLAUDIUS after rereading Peter Graves I Claudius/Claudius the God books earlier this week. The BBC I Claudius miniseries holds up pretty strongly, and from scene 1 gets across the point that Claudius wasn't the most stable Claudian ruler or as reliable a narrator that he thought he was. Patrick Stewart wearing a William Shatner style toupee was jarring. John Hurt in the Caligula role looked 70 yrs old, and was creepy as hell. The only person who would have made a more creepy and offsetting Caligula than John Hurt managed is probably Jimmy Savile. sten book series chat from a few days back: I re-read the Sten series last month and posted my thoughts on the books in this thread around then. Want to say Sten was around 16 in the first half of Sten book 1 (before he gets drafted into the army), and is around 30-ish when the series ends in book 8. The most developed character in the Sten series ironically isn't Sten the main character, instead it's the Eternal Emperor who gets the bulk of all character development over the 8 book series. Other than that, the main things that stand out about the Sten series versus other mil-scifi is that the scope changes each book and the harder than normal mil-scifi wish fullfilment by the two authors (dudes that flunked out of the US Army Rangers & the CIA respectively). quantumfoam fucked around with this message at 23:19 on Mar 25, 2022 |
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Mar 25, 2022 23:15
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Kestral posted:I'd certainly be curious! Also quite looking forward to the book she announced today, The Night-Bird's Feather. She says she hasn't read it, but it's on her list at the bookshop. I think The Night-Bird's Feather is extremely good and I will definitely push everybody here to read it when it's out.
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Mar 25, 2022 23:23
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quantumfoam posted:Watched the 1976 BBC miniseries I CLAUDIUS after rereading Peter Graves I Claudius/Claudius the God books earlier this week. The BBC I Claudius miniseries holds up pretty strongly, and from scene 1 gets across the point that Claudius wasn't the most stable Claudian ruler or as reliable a narrator that he thought he was. Patrick Stewart wearing a William Shatner style toupee was jarring. John Hurt in the Caligula role looked 70 yrs old, and was creepy as hell. The only person who would have made a more creepy and offsetting Caligula than John Hurt managed is probably Jimmy Savile. Yeah I Claudius is awesome! The ways it's dated are stuff you get used to very quick. I think there's a large overlap between fans of SFF and fans of historical fiction. It's all about plausible characters in other worlds than ours, after all.
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Mar 25, 2022 23:42
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I used to read voraciously, but have hardly read anything in the last few years. I feel like it's hard to find books worth trying ever since the switch to electronic books, or maybe it's living in a city with a dire library. What's good from the last five years? I've already read and enjoyed The Martian and Project Hail Mary. Personal favorites include Interstellar Patrol by Christopher Anvil (golden age of sci-fi competence porn) The Thief's Gamble by Juliet E. McKenna (female protagonist with interesting magic) and anything by David Drake (hypercompetent characters who still showcase why war sucks). I enjoy Dresden even though the books are very formulaic and Rivers of London. Aside from Drake's books, I prefer main characters who are basically trying to do the right thing. Reading is my funtime relaxing activity and reading about successful monsters is rarely fun.
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Mar 25, 2022 23:57
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Cradle kickstarter just finished: $760,326; 6,020 backers; $126.30 average per backer. A lot of money for
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Mar 26, 2022 00:29
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I feel like we just had a round up of "recent good things" from a similar question but I can't find it after skimming the last ~20 pages of the thread so, thinking about thread favorites among the Sci Fi realm that I'd vouch for: - Teixcalaan duology by Arkady Martine - space opera about colonialism from the perspective of an ambassador living within the oppressive empire - Imperial Radch Trilogy by Anne Leckie - divisive within the thread but generally positive, definitely. A sentient warship whose cognition is segmented out into various living human(?) hosts is destroyed, and the only surviving host is on a mission to get justice for its lost crew. Other stuff about imperialism/colonialism and then a fair bit of space station administration follows. - Becky Chambers hopepunk stuff (Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, etc) - definitely fits the remit of "main characters doing the right thing." tbh honest I'd like to re-read these, as I didn't quite *get* what she was trying to do when I read the first book initially. - Murderbot Diaries - series of novellas (and now novels) about an assassin robot reconciling its nascent sense of morality with its programming (I feel like that's a fair synopsis?). It's not as grimdark as it sounds. - Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky - humanity hops onto generation ships in search of a replacement for Earth after loving it all up with nuclear war/global warming, and also terraforming goes horribly wrong... or does it??? Hope you're okay with spiders. - Tamsyn Muir's ongoing increasingly poorly named Locked Tomb Trilogy - space necromancers working with ominous necrodad lichking to prevent monsters unleashed by aforementioned space necromancy from threatening life in the solar system. Book one is fairly straightforward, with lots of hints and clues dropped as to what's really going on, book two seemingly twists and re-arranges a lot, book three is out in September. Possible violation of your request for not reading about successful monsters, but I would say there are "good" people amongst the protagonists. will someone have mentioned Piranesi before I finish this reply? Let's see! edit: a few of these may be more than 5 years old, oops
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Mar 26, 2022 00:44
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I'm reading the second Rivers of London and it is good but it appears to be asking me to take vagina dentata seriously and I'm not sure I am capable of this The first book with people being turned into grotesque meat puppets was appropriately creepy. That's the way to do it! Strategic Tea fucked around with this message at 01:28 on Mar 26, 2022 |
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Mar 26, 2022 01:25
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Strategic Tea posted:I'm reading the second Rivers of London and it is good but it appears to be asking me to take vagina dentata seriously and I'm not sure I am capable of this The series tends to get worse as it goes on, and does not improve in its handling of female characters IMO.
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Mar 26, 2022 01:34
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Opopanax posted:Thanks all, figured there would be some solid guides. I read at least the first two, possibly three years and years ago and don’t remember much, but I do remember liking them so I may just restart and do it in order. If you read the first two and liked them there's no reason not to read the whole series chronologically. The reason people have various recommended starting points other than The Colour of Magic is because the first few books are a bit rough and don't really resemble what the series turns into, which can potentially put people off which is a shame, but if you liked the first two then you'll definitely like all of what's to come. I also think there's a small benefit in reading the whole series in publication order rather than various "arcs" at a time in that you get to see characters from different arcs popping up as cameos in other books.
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Mar 26, 2022 03:19
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Strategic Tea posted:I'm reading the second Rivers of London and it is good but it appears to be asking me to take vagina dentata seriously and I'm not sure I am capable of this Would be a significant human rights advance imo
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Mar 26, 2022 04:29
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freebooter posted:If you read the first two and liked them there's no reason not to read the whole series chronologically. The reason people have various recommended starting points other than The Colour of Magic is because the first few books are a bit rough and don't really resemble what the series turns into, which can potentially put people off which is a shame, but if you liked the first two then you'll definitely like all of what's to come. IMO the best three to start with are probably Small Gods, Guards Guards and Wyrd Sisters. Then I’d probably go publication order forward and only dip back into the ones earlier than those if interested. I think if you bounce off any or all of those that’ll probably help convince you if you want to keep going or not. Blamestorm fucked around with this message at 06:37 on Mar 26, 2022 |
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Mar 26, 2022 06:16
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I read em all in publication order. There's a few I wasn't a big fan of, but overall whatever order is generally fine except for minor spoilers in the later books.
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Mar 26, 2022 08:50
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The only ones (in my years-long re-read since his death so far) that I think are not very good are Sourcery, Eric and Soul Music, though even then they're only bad in comparison with the rest of the series; Discworld is never bad bad, at the very worst you're getting a silly romp that you'll breeze through in a day or two.
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Mar 26, 2022 08:53
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Yea, with me it was the wee free men books because holy gently caress I can't read when people type in accents. It's a personal thing I guess. The only other ones I kinda didn't dig that much was Sourcery as well were the ones centered on granny weatherwax and the witches. The rest are decent to damned good. Those I'd mark down as just "meh", and even that is because I felt Pratchett could have done them better, he had the talent, and they just didn't really click with me. Can't really blame the dude when he has 41 books and I'm not fond of like 5 tops, though. It's definitely a me thing vs a "oh we all agree majority opinion" thing. I'll straight up cut a bitch if they don't like Hogfather though 
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Mar 26, 2022 09:06
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soul music is one of my favorites and i hate hate hated the witches books. beware my baleful gaze
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Mar 26, 2022 09:09
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When I was growing up my favorites were the Rincewind novels and its funny to me how he just stopped writing them after Last Hero or something. Also shout out to the Last Continent for being an extremely correct depiction of Australian Culture.
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Mar 26, 2022 09:15
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:Yea, with me it was the wee free men books because holy gently caress I can't read when people type in accents. It's a personal thing I guess. Oh, but the audiobooks are gorgeously funny with that accent.
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Mar 26, 2022 12:17
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The Cosgrove Hall animation of Soul Music is worth a watch. Not gorgeous, but charming.
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Mar 26, 2022 12:34
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Tried Kings of the Wyld on a rec from a friend and I think I'm going to abandon it after 10 chapters. It's painfully boring, the characters are dull, the fantasy setting is the most generic imaginable, it's unfunny, and is the most "someone's D&D party" novel I've ever read. I doubt it gets any better in the 400 remaining pages. Uh, can someone recommend me a fantasy novel that's got some originality to it as a palette cleanser.
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Mar 26, 2022 17:43
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my bony fealty posted:Tried Kings of the Wyld on a rec from a friend and I think I'm going to abandon it after 10 chapters. It's painfully boring, the characters are dull, the fantasy setting is the most generic imaginable, it's unfunny, and is the most "someone's D&D party" novel I've ever read. I doubt it gets any better in the 400 remaining pages. It doesn't get better. You made a fine choice. Unfortunately I haven't read any good fantasy lately to suggest.
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Mar 26, 2022 17:44
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Orconomics is also a D&D party but it’s a really good novel regardless, and it’s certainly got a unique take on fantasy.
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Mar 26, 2022 18:16
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my bony fealty posted:
Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman is probably the best fantasy novel I've read that was published in the past few years. Historical fantasy and very well executed. His book "The Blacktongue Thief" is also very well done "my d&D character as a novel" fiction.
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Mar 26, 2022 18:24
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freebooter posted:The only ones (in my years-long re-read since his death so far) that I think are not very good are Sourcery, Eric and Soul Music, though even then they're only bad in comparison with the rest of the series; Discworld is never bad bad, at the very worst you're getting a silly romp that you'll breeze through in a day or two. Yeah, Pratchett didn't write doorstoppers, and was extremely readable. I concur that Small Gods and Guards! Guards! are good introductions, I never got around to reading the Witches plotline and should probably do that. my bony fealty posted:Uh, can someone recommend me a fantasy novel that's got some originality to it as a palette cleanser. I've been activated as a sockpuppet. If you want something extremely original and admittedly obtuse, see if your interest is piqued by the OP on this thread. I'd also recommend NK Jemisin's Broken Earth series. Or hell, her Inheritence trilogy. Stupid sexy Nahadoth. Unique/original fantasy is a bit harder to find than unique sci-fi, but maybe that's just my reference pools and I've missed a bunch of fascinating settings for fantasy. habeasdorkus fucked around with this message at 20:17 on Mar 26, 2022 |
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Mar 26, 2022 18:24
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Starship Troopers by Robert A Heinlein - $1.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004EYTK2C/
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Mar 26, 2022 19:10
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my bony fealty posted:Tried Kings of the Wyld on a rec from a friend and I think I'm going to abandon it after 10 chapters. It's painfully boring, the characters are dull, the fantasy setting is the most generic imaginable, it's unfunny, and is the most "someone's D&D party" novel I've ever read. I doubt it gets any better in the 400 remaining pages. I liked The Vorrh but I could see the prose style being a huge turnoff for some people. Oh, I will take this moment to evangelise for Starbook by Ben Okri.
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Mar 26, 2022 19:25
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I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting.
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Mar 26, 2022 19:35
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General Battuta posted:I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting. Might be my favorite book of the COVID era - it follows through all the way to the end. Arguably I’d say it asks and does a decent job of trying to answer the existential horror question of “why bother trying”. Which, especially during COVID and climate change and everything else, is maybe more important than ever.
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Mar 26, 2022 19:42
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Is Downbelow Station good? I bounced off the ones about the diplomat so figured I’d try a different setting. my bony fealty posted:Tried Kings of the Wyld on a rec from a friend and I think I'm going to abandon it after 10 chapters. It's painfully boring, the characters are dull, the fantasy setting is the most generic imaginable, it's unfunny, and is the most "someone's D&D party" novel I've ever read. I doubt it gets any better in the 400 remaining pages. The Broken Earth trilogy? Definitely more than the average. Piranesi for sure, but its setting is so odd it doesn’t really fit into the normal fantasy novel mold at all. Most stuff by China Miéville I think, tho it’s been a minute since I read those.
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Mar 26, 2022 20:09
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tildes posted:Is Downbelow Station good? I bounced off the ones about the diplomat so figured I’d try a different setting. I like it a lot but my favourite Cherryh books are Finity's End and.. Merchanter's Luck, I think is the one I'm thinking of, the one with the young man who's the only survivor of his family, flying a ship solo at the raw edge of capability. I like spaceships.
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Mar 26, 2022 20:13
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General Battuta posted:I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting. It's intense. I haven't read a lot of King, but it reminds me of that without King's specific problems.
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Mar 26, 2022 22:03
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Thanks for the recommendations. I started Piranesi right after writing that post and am loving it so far.
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Mar 27, 2022 00:33
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General Battuta posted:I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting. I am a little bit further in and goddamn this is one fine book so far. Been a minute since a book has grabbed me like this.
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Mar 27, 2022 01:26
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tildes posted:Is Downbelow Station good? I bounced off the ones about the diplomat so figured I’d try a different setting. It's one of the most boring SF books I've ever read. The aliens are really cringy noble savage native american tropes. Also, despite having aliens and stuff, I didnt feel that there were any interesting SF concepts being explored--it's all entirely superficial.
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Mar 27, 2022 02:50
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I love Downbelow  I thought it must've been an influence on the BSG reboot.
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Mar 27, 2022 03:40
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General Battuta posted:I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting. Can someone give me a spoiler free digest of what kind of horror it is? I'm super into his books but horror is not my jam at all
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Mar 27, 2022 03:42
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my bony fealty posted:Tried Kings of the Wyld on a rec from a friend and I think I'm going to abandon it after 10 chapters. It's painfully boring, the characters are dull, the fantasy setting is the most generic imaginable, it's unfunny, and is the most "someone's D&D party" novel I've ever read. I doubt it gets any better in the 400 remaining pages. Yeah I also abandoned it. I was expecting better after a lot of Joe Abercrombie fans seemed to like it. I’m rereading KJ Parker’s Savages so I think that book is pretty good.
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Mar 27, 2022 03:51
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General Battuta posted:I'm starting HIGHWAY KIND - god drat it, LAST EXIT - and I was lucky enough to read this book way back when it was still called THE HIGHWAY KIND. It's come a long-rear end way since then and while I'm only a few pages in it feels like it grew up from 'elevated urban fantasy' to some proper Americana-horror. Hope it keeps hitting. Max Gladstone's latest has some strong Americana-horror vibes
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Mar 27, 2022 05:11
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Kesper North posted:Max Gladstone's latest has some strong Americana-horror vibes For Americana-horror I really like Robert Jackson Bennet's American Elsewhere.
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Mar 27, 2022 11:01
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HopperUK posted:I liked The Vorrh but I could see the prose style being a huge turnoff for some people. I read the first and it was dense. I felt like I barely got a handle on any of the plotlines. Have you read the sequels?
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Mar 27, 2022 11:47
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