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fordan posted:I liked them, haven't picked up the latest yet. I started reading her October Daye and her Incryptid series after seeing her at Jordancon this year; before that I'd only read the Newsflesh series done under her Mira Grant pen name initially because it was nominated for the Hugo (and it's also good, although the "zombie post-apocalypse and bloggers are our news media" premise had me initially skeptical going in). I just finished Feed tonight actually. I was really impressed, as I too was skeptical of the blogger/zombie thing. I figured it'd be self-referential, but it is treated in a pretty mature manner.
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Sep 5, 2013 06:20
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I've been reading through dresden files non-stop in the past couple of weeks (Just finished summer knight and waiting for my death masks library hold to go through) and I'm surprised by how much I'm enjoying it. It really reminds me of the -watch (Nightwatch/Daywatch/etc) series by Sergei Lukyanenko, have anyone here read that? It's a great read as well, I really enjoy the setting in it Just one question. Does it become even better from here? I'm surprised by how consistently good that was (Fool moon felt a little weaker than others but that might be just me)
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Sep 5, 2013 06:28
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If you've liked it this far, then yes, it'd get even better.
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Sep 5, 2013 07:10
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superstepa posted:I've been reading through dresden files non-stop in the past couple of weeks (Just finished summer knight and waiting for my death masks library hold to go through) and I'm surprised by how much I'm enjoying it. Fool moon is generally regarded as the worst book - it's a rehash of Storm Front's structure and kinda loses momentum a few times.
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Sep 5, 2013 07:34
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superstepa posted:It really reminds me of the -watch (Nightwatch/Daywatch/etc) series by Sergei Lukyanenko, have anyone here read that? It's a great read as well, I really enjoy the setting in it These books own, if anyone's up for reading something that does the same plot points as Dresden with a completely different feel.
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Sep 5, 2013 07:49
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I think the -watch series is generally overall better. Anton does the "kind of dorky but normal guy" thing really well and the way it handles magic powers honestly feels a lot more believable to me than Dresden. It has some problems, especially as it advances, but I enjoyed it a lot. They are remarkably Russian but that isn't really a bad thing.
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Sep 5, 2013 10:13
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For Nightwatch/Daywatch, it's a pretty different formula, everyone is dancing on the strings of the puppetmasters, whatever they are doing. Makes it hard to keep things straight sometimes.
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Sep 5, 2013 10:25
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And since it's a Russian author, each character has like 5 names. It was hard to follow in the first book but got better in the later ones for me.
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Sep 5, 2013 11:09
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Grabbing the audiobook really helps with keeping names straight. It's much easier with different voices. Any way you decide to do it, read those books. I was really surprised to find the Spanish version in a bookstore in Peru while on vacation; tastes are different in other countries, obviously, but they were featured prominently in very limited shelf space right beside bookstore big names like King and GrrM and standard airport fiction.
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Sep 5, 2013 13:16
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After finishing Chosen i think it's a nice read and it's filled in a lot of backstory, definately looking forward to the next one.  At the end of the ebook it advertised Fade to black by Francis Knight; anyone had any experience of her work?
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Sep 5, 2013 14:50
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Dzurlord posted:How does the thread feel about Seanan McGuire's October Daye series? Started reading them waiting for one of the Dresden books at some point, ended up really enjoying them. October Daye is one of my favorite urban fantasy series other than Dresden. The second one is imo a bit weaker (like Fool Moon), but after that they keep getting better.
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Sep 5, 2013 16:56
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Dienes posted:I thoroughly enjoyed it, mainly for the magic system. Its a cool feeling to have a narrator go "I took a copy of a Heinlein novel with me" and feel a little giddy over what you know they are going to pull out of it. I'm not a huge fan of Lena, either, but I'm hoping the later books explore that more and build her as a character rather than a 1-dimensional sex piece. In other Groan Inducing Nerdbait Stereotype news, I finished off Wise Man's Fear a little while ago. Overall a step down from the first book I thought. I liked that Rothfuss tried to expose us to more of the world, but the plot was loose and kind of ran out of steam. I probably should have saw the whole Kvothe: Cockmaster of the Arcane thing coming since the character is incapable of not being completely over the top at anything. It was still really jarring, and I felt like it really made the plot run out of steam in the second half. 95% of the Felurian interlude and about 1/3 of the Lethani chapters could have been done away with and not affected anything. Ok, well, I wouldn't have had my nose forcibly rubbed in the fact that Kvothe totally got laid a lot for 250 pages, which would have been a really nice thing.
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Sep 5, 2013 18:35
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Just Another Lurker posted:After finishing Chosen i think it's a nice read and it's filled in a lot of backstory, definately looking forward to the next one. Agreed, I liked the additional backstory and loved the ambiguity. Read this short thing by him about that: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2013/08/27/the-big-idea-benedict-jacka/ Also, he's fully caught up on the books he's already written, having written the first 3 and half of Chosen before the first book was released. He's going to slow down the pace now.
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Sep 6, 2013 01:46
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fermun posted:Also, he's fully caught up on the books he's already written, having written the first 3 and half of Chosen before the first book was released. He's going to slow down the pace now. With the way the last book ended, this is bad news. I really need to start waiting for book series to be finished before I start reading them.
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Sep 6, 2013 19:32
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onefish posted:October Daye is one of my favorite urban fantasy series other than Dresden. The second one is imo a bit weaker (like Fool Moon), but after that they keep getting better. Just binged through Chimes last night. Towards the end, I was wondering if she was wrapping up the series, as she was tying up a ton of plot points from previous books. She left enough loose ends to keep going though. Definitely my favorite urban fantasy after Dresden, although I really liked the last Alex Versus book.
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Sep 6, 2013 22:59
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I just finished The Rook (audiobook) and I wasn't really impressed. It seemed too "by the book" so to say. Kinda robotic and lifeless.
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Sep 7, 2013 21:34
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gninjagnome posted:Just binged through Chimes last night. Towards the end, I was wondering if she was wrapping up the series, as she was tying up a ton of plot points from previous books. She left enough loose ends to keep going though. Definitely my favorite urban fantasy after Dresden, although I really liked the last Alex Versus book. For one of her series, can't remember if October Daye or Incryptid, Seanan has a deal with the two little old ladies that are her publisher that if sales drop to the point where continuing the series doesn't make sense, she'll get one more book to wrap up the series.
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Sep 7, 2013 23:46
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I hate you guys for giving me so much drat reading material. I read Libriomancer in one long sitting the other day (great magic system, loved how it allowed the author to geek/pop-culture out, liked what he was -trying- to do with Lena but wish it wasn't done so hamhandedly) and started The Atrocity Archive today (I think I've actually read this before though, the Fred from Accounting scene with worms in his eyes is really drat familiar, I bet it ends up in them going to a Nazi-Cthulhu pocket dimension type thing eh?) and am currently trying to find a copy of The Rook. And I still want more Drsden, damnit!  e: Actually, I'm pretty sure for the longest time I was conflating The Atrocity Archive with John Ringo's Princess of Wands. I have no freaking idea how I managed that, though. But since I just brought it up, Princess of Wands might qualify for the thread - the protagonist is a soccer mom who inadvertently gets tangled in some occult stuff, but her (Christian) faith is so strong that she basically channels God to get out of the situation, and is then recruited by a group that basically keeps all the Cthulhu stuff out of our reality. So you have this prim and proper soccer mom, avatar of the White God having to work alongside druids and norse god worshippers and stuff, it's pretty unique. It's only one book and it's not really a full-length novel, there's like 3 separate stories in it. Oh and Ringo's typical sexism/rapey stuff is nowhere to be found. WarLocke fucked around with this message at 03:30 on Sep 8, 2013 |
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Sep 8, 2013 03:21
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Verloc posted:The author tries way too hard to make A Deep And Serious Point About The Evils Of Intolerance with Lena and forgets to actually develop her character beyond the stereotype he needs to make his argument. She actually gets some good depth and development in Codex Born, which is probably overall a better book than the first. It still doesn't rise terribly far above the Iron Druid level of 'horribly cheesy but fun' urban fantasy, but I'd say it's an improvement over the first. I found the first one ok, with some problems, and liked the second quite a bit more. Yeah, he makes his point about Lena clumsily and with a mallet over the head, but at least he tries to write something opposite to what Rothfuss does with women and sex. Urban Fantasy isn't a genre with a terribly high standard anyway, and I'd say the second Libromancer book at least manages to fall comfortably in the "not bad" category inside the genre. Butcher did worse with his second Dresden book at least.  Of course, if someone can't stand pop culture/nerd culture references every so often you will hate the books, but then, you probably can't stand Dresden either.
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Sep 8, 2013 17:27
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Decius posted:Of course, if someone can't stand pop culture/nerd culture references every so often you will hate the books, but then, you probably can't stand Dresden either. I am not ashamed to say that I marked the gently caress out at the end when he pulled Woundhealer out of a copy of the Complete Book of Swords. The whole drat book, I was like "This would be my goto book, but there's no way it's unlocked, not with Farslayer in there." Also, I'm still rooting for a crossover with Mistborn, even though I'm pretty sure Lerasium would get it locked in an instant.
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Sep 8, 2013 17:59
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The Libriomancer stuff is possibly the only way to get even goonier than Dresden. What's better than a goony urban wizard? One that's a huge SF fanboy and can literally pull a slow-shield out of Dune.
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Sep 8, 2013 18:41
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I'm tempted to read libromancer just to see what books are locked, but I'm also terrified of it's premise.
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Sep 8, 2013 22:34
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WarLocke posted:The Libriomancer stuff is possibly the only way to get even goonier than Dresden. What's better than a goony urban wizard? One that's a huge SF fanboy and can literally pull a slow-shield out of Dune. Yeah I tried again to continue reading it, but I just couldn't. I don't want to read a guy waxing lyrical about his favourite dumb sci-fi fantasy poo poo for an entire book.
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Sep 8, 2013 22:43
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Carrier posted:Yeah I tried again to continue reading it, but I just couldn't. I don't want to read a guy waxing lyrical about his favourite dumb sci-fi fantasy poo poo for an entire book. That's part of the charm for me though! I'm also about two-thirds of the way through the second book now and it is a real step up from the first. The fact that each chapter starts with a little monologue/diary excer[t from Lena's point of view really helps it - she is a much more fleshed-out character in this book.
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Sep 9, 2013 00:31
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NinjaDebugger posted:I am not ashamed to say that I marked the gently caress out at the end when he pulled Woundhealer out of a copy of the Complete Book of Swords. The whole drat book, I was like "This would be my goto book, but there's no way it's unlocked, not with Farslayer in there." That's hardly the nastiest trick you could pull with The Swords of Power. Shieldbreaker and Soulcutter together kill everyone but their bearer for a mile around, or just pull Doomgiver and laugh as every thing you opponent tries gets turned back on him. That's why I don't like the Libriomancer books. Even with the locked books there's just far to many way to break the hell out of any situation. If the thing you're building your series around requires your main character to be an absolute dumbass to keep any tension going whatsoever, then you need to go back to the drawing board.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:04
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Stroth posted:That's hardly the nastiest trick you could pull with The Swords of Power. Shieldbreaker and Soulcutter together kill everyone but their bearer for a mile around, or just pull Doomgiver and laugh as every thing you opponent tries gets turned back on him. Don't forget stuff has to also 'fit' through the book. And Isaac mostly carries around paperbacks, that eliminates a LOT of possible stuff right there.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:15
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WarLocke posted:And Isaac mostly carries around paperbacks, that eliminates a LOT of possible stuff right there. No where near enough though. And carrying paperbacks is a personal choice. There's nothing stopping him from getting a book strap and hauling around large print editions.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:22
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Stroth posted:No where near enough though. And carrying paperbacks is a personal choice. There's nothing stopping him from getting a book strap and hauling around large print editions. Yes there is. The copy he's using has to have sufficient cumulative weight behind it, or there's not enough power there for him to pull it. It's tied to specific editions.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:31
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NinjaDebugger posted:Yes there is. The copy he's using has to have sufficient cumulative weight behind it, or there's not enough power there for him to pull it. It's tied to specific editions. Ok, forgot that. Still. It's far to easy to break the plot over your knee for any decently well read scifi/fantasy fan.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:36
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Stroth posted:Oh yeah, forgot that. Still. It's far to easy to break the plot over your knee for any decently well read scifi/fantasy fan. I kind of feel like this is missing the forest for the trees. Yeah, okay, I get what you're saying here, but that's a thing with all books - the only reason Dresden doesn't blow the big baddie up immediately each book is because Butcher specifically writes the book/plot the way he does. It's kind of a meta-worry in the sense that it will never come into play because if it did you would have A Bad Book. Meanwhile the really interesting stuff for me is everything else that Hines hints at... Why does Gutenberg look like he's made up of layers upon layers of text in that one scene or what is up with the real rules of libriomancy? Stuff like that are the real hooks if you ask me.
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Sep 9, 2013 02:41
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Stroth posted:Ok, forgot that. Still. It's far to easy to break the plot over your knee for any decently well read scifi/fantasy fan. If something would break the plot, it's either in a locked book, or it won't fit through the book, or the book doesn't have enough belief behind it for libriomancy to work, or involves a number of other complications we haven't heard about yet. Gutenberg has pretty obviously done a heap of stuff that nobody knows about, and it seems like the rules of magic aren't really well known by anyone. I'm not far into the second book, but it starts with magic from e-readers, which they didn't think was possible, but here's someone doing it.
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Sep 9, 2013 05:59
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AlphaDog posted:If something would break the plot, it's either in a locked book, or it won't fit through the book, or the book doesn't have enough belief behind it for libriomancy to work, or involves a number of other complications we haven't heard about yet. Gutenberg has pretty obviously done a heap of stuff that nobody knows about, and it seems like the rules of magic aren't really well known by anyone. I'm not far into the second book, but it starts with magic from e-readers, which they didn't think was possible, but here's someone doing it. It's already been pointed out that The Book of Swords is unlocked. Here's the wiki link for the Twelve Swords of Power. Look up Woundhealer, that's the one that was used in the book. Imagine what you could do with that. Then look at some of the others. Specifically, look at Farslayer, Shieldbreaker, Soulcutter, Mindsword and Doombringer. Now try to imagine a situation that you couldn't solve using them.
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Sep 9, 2013 07:34
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Stroth posted:It's already been pointed out that The Book of Swords is unlocked. No it isn't, Gutenberg revealed he can unlock books just to pull specific things out. Pretty sure he locked it back up again afterwards.
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Sep 9, 2013 11:50
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NinjaDebugger posted:No it isn't, Gutenberg revealed he can unlock books just to pull specific things out. Pretty sure he locked it back up again afterwards. Nope, it's mentioned in a earlier scene that he can draw from it. The bit where he goes into why they keep magic a secret when they're leaving the bookstore. Mercedes Lackey's books are mentioned in the same scene, referencing the sword Need, which gives any woman who holds it nearly complete immunity to hostile magic, supernatural good luck, a magical healing factor and the skills of a master swordsman. Imagine what Lena could do with it. Edit: No, sorry, you're right actually. The bit where he's trying to figure out the locking spells uses the Swords of Power as the first one he examines. It mentions specifically that it was locked because of Farslayer. I feel my point still stands though. There's a lot of unlocked books that could easaly turn the plot into a farce. The Xanth books are mentioned as a throw away gag, but that's thousands of magical items for just about any situation imaginable right there. including several things that would let you track someone from across the planet if you needed to. Stroth fucked around with this message at 13:56 on Sep 9, 2013 |
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Sep 9, 2013 13:15
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Wanted to give Libriomancer a go, e-book on UK Amazon for £8.54..... over £1.50 more than paperback(i only buy e-books nowadays) hahaha are they loving serious?
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Sep 9, 2013 14:00
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Stroth posted:I feel my point still stands though. There's a lot of unlocked books that could easaly turn the plot into a farce. The Xanth books are mentioned as a throw away gag, but that's thousands of magical items for just about any situation imaginable right there. including several things that would let you track someone from across the planet if you needed to. Yes, but that would require a full collection of Xanth and nigh-encyclopedic knowledge of it. Some things just aren't worth it.
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Sep 9, 2013 14:24
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Has anyone here read the skulduggery pleasant series? Yes. They're YA books but they're on par with much of the stuff in this thread. Also, they are great fun. There's something very appealing to me in the concept of a dapper skeleton detective and his young sidekick. (Sharp dialogue too).
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Sep 9, 2013 14:31
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404GoonNotFound posted:Yes, but that would require a full collection of Xanth and nigh-encyclopedic knowledge of it. ... I concede the point.
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Sep 9, 2013 14:35
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Stroth posted:It's already been pointed out that The Book of Swords is unlocked. Here's the wiki link for the Twelve Swords of Power. Look up Woundhealer, that's the one that was used in the book. Imagine what you could do with that. Then look at some of the others. Specifically, look at Farslayer, Shieldbreaker, Soulcutter, Mindsword and Doombringer. Now try to imagine a situation that you couldn't solve using them. So why didn't the first person who thought to grab a spikard end up ruling the world?
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Sep 9, 2013 15:24
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Tunicate posted:So why didn't the first person who thought to grab a spikard end up ruling the world? I haven't read Libriomancer but yeah, "'sup Gollum, nice ring you got there" would seem to be the obvious go-to. Hell, go for the elven rings for safety if you're a gigantic wussy. Or hell. Aladdin's lamp (or for that matter Aladdin's ring). What about an AD&D Dungeon Master's Guide? It has a list of magical items in it . .. Ring of Wishes, Rod of Resurrection . .. Can you just write your own book then pull poo poo from it?
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Sep 9, 2013 16:00
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