|
Grey Area posted:People have talked about Carver's Expanse series (Leviathan Wakes etc.) a lot and I enjoyed the first one. Apparently the series is now being turned into a TV show. They better, cause that's the best parts of the first book. Book 2 is ok and book 3 is just meh and goes into the normal scifi-fallacies. S.A. Corey is in reality Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, the last one who is in some way affiliated with GRRM, which explains the TV-show.
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2013 10:15
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 14:12 |
|
|
Grey Area posted:People have talked about Carver's Expanse series (Leviathan Wakes etc.) a lot and I enjoyed the first one. Apparently the series is now being turned into a TV show. Who is Carver?
|
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2013 10:16
|
|
|
Cardiac posted:
Isn't Ty Franck GRRM's unhygienic manservant?
|
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2013 10:31
|
|
|
Cardiac posted:Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, the last one who is in some way affiliated with GRRM, which explains the TV-show.
|
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2013 13:38
|
|
|
mcustic posted:Isn't Ty Franck GRRM's unhygienic manservant? Yes, Ty is his live-in slave.
|
|
#
?
Sep 25, 2013 23:17
|
|
|
sebmojo posted:I will loving fight you CJ Cherryh's space cats are best space cats.. It is like a feline Traveller campaign.
|
|
#
?
Sep 26, 2013 22:31
|
|
|
coyo7e posted:Covers like this are pretty much why I avoid most women sci-fi/fantasy authors out of habit - somewhere in my subconscious I just assume that it's going to end up being My Little Pony or something, since the few women fantasy authors I checked out as a kid, seemed to mostly be about misunderstood young tomboys who really liked to brush their horse/dragon's mane. This is horrifyingly funny to anyone who's at all familiar with CJ Cherryh's work because it's basically way the hell over the event horizon from that stereotype.
|
|
#
?
Sep 27, 2013 05:50
|
|
|
Groke posted:This is horrifyingly funny to anyone who's at all familiar with CJ Cherryh's work because it's basically way the hell over the event horizon from that stereotype. coyo7e fucked around with this message at 21:38 on Sep 27, 2013 |
|
#
?
Sep 27, 2013 21:17
|
|
|
snooman posted:Comedy suggestion: Thomas DePrima's A Galaxy Unknown series. Use e-lending from your local library if you're inclined towards self punishment. This one is similar in nature to the Hornblower/Harrington series but far, far worse. An abysmal series of books that i have bought religiously since i found them, my tiny brain automatically skips over the really cringeworthy bits (of which there are many).  Handy for reading on nightshift workbreaks only.
|
|
#
?
Sep 28, 2013 08:53
|
|
|
The Saddest Robot posted:I picked up a couple of these books used. I enjoy them as kind of trashy sci-fi but they all feel similar to one another in a formulaic way, especially in the way that every book I read has an emotional climax with Seafort attempting some sort of hail mary/suicide play, but getting denied his sweet sweet suicide as someone else does the hail mary suicide play instead. True, but at least he's more Hornblower perfect than Honor/Black Jack perfect. And he does somewhat have an arc where he grows and matures and finds some sort of happiness (even if he's still very rigid).
|
|
#
?
Sep 29, 2013 18:19
|
|
|
coyo7e posted:Covers like this are pretty much why I avoid most women sci-fi/fantasy authors out of habit - somewhere in my subconscious I just assume that it's going to end up being My Little Pony or something, since the few women fantasy authors I checked out as a kid, seemed to mostly be about misunderstood young tomboys who really liked to brush their horse/dragon's mane. You should overcome your biases! Cherryh is not only one of the original hard SF authors but was one of the first to do "gritty realism" and do it well, and the Chanur series is one of her better efforts.
|
|
#
?
Sep 29, 2013 21:08
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:How bad/good/goodbad/badgood is Drake? If David Weber's Honor Harrington is a 1 and Patrick O'Brian is a 10, and if reading about "Rob S. Pierre" gave me a physical headache, should I read Drake? I'm reading this series now and to answer my own question at about five books in I'd say it's "goodbad," i.e., good popcorn space pulp. Everything's a fun read, the characters have *just* enough complexity to make you forget how cardboard they are, the space battles have just enough detail and complexity to be fun reads if you don't think about them very hard. The only real problem is that half the space battles are "Lt. Leary flies around, then Sidekick Mundy waves her techno-wands and makes the opposing ship detonate itself. The end." It really is hilarious how transparently they're "Aubrey and Maturin -- IN SPACE! And Maturin's a girl!", though.
|
|
#
?
Sep 30, 2013 15:53
|
|
|
Well, yeah. Basically this is Drake's answer to Weber's "Space Horatio Hornblower" (and, in fact, Drake originally got the idea when doing an Aubrey/Maturin pastiche set in Weber's universe.) You're right that the end battle always seems to turn out as "We win because we're Daniel Leary and Adele Mundy".
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2013 04:32
|
|
|
So I've been reading the Culture series. I'm up to Use of Weapons but I read The State of the Art because I saw someone suggest it because of Diziet Sma. Did anyone find the beginning of Use of Weapons hard to get through? I don't know wtf is going on half of the time (maybe because I'm not a native english speaker) and I just eventually fall asleep after reading some pages because I just don't see any motivation for anyone. I know he loves to describe scenes in which we don't know anyone, but it's kind of ridiculous that I don't even know what the dialogues are about most of the time. Should I just go through with it and it picks up soon or won't I know what's going on most of the time? Or am I just a dumb gently caress and should start over reading with even more attention?
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2013 12:03
|
|
|
orange sky posted:So I've been reading the Culture series. I'm up to Use of Weapons but I read The State of the Art because I saw someone suggest it because of Diziet Sma. Did anyone find the beginning of Use of Weapons hard to get through? I don't know wtf is going on half of the time (maybe because I'm not a native english speaker) and I just eventually fall asleep after reading some pages because I just don't see any motivation for anyone. I know he loves to describe scenes in which we don't know anyone, but it's kind of ridiculous that I don't even know what the dialogues are about most of the time. What might be messing you up if you didn't know about it, is that there are two narrative threads in the book. One progresses normally in time and one goes backwards in time with each chapter. I can't imagine how confusing that might be in your non-native language. I'm pretty sure they alternate, and I think the chapter numbers also go forward and backward.
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2013 13:19
|
|
|
rafikki posted:What might be messing you up if you didn't know about it, is that there are two narrative threads in the book. One progresses normally in time and one goes backwards in time with each chapter. I can't imagine how confusing that might be in your non-native language. I'm pretty sure they alternate, and I think the chapter numbers also go forward and backward. Oh. That explains it. drat, how am I supposed to process that haha. Thanks!
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2013 13:22
|
|
|
It might be helpful to read more of the other Culture books first, they're not really sequential or chronological in that you'd need them to understand what's going on in Use of Weapons, but it might help you adjust to reading Banks's prose and that'd be one less obstacle to understanding what's going on. If it's any consolation, I struggled with Use of Weapons at first and I'm bilingual and I knew what the deal was (two narrative threads progressing in chronologically opposite directions).
|
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2013 08:06
|
|
|
Has anyone read Seeds of Earth by Michael Cobley? It's the Kindle daily deal on Amazon. The premise sounds interesting, but the reviews are all over the place. Some are saying it's in the vein of Iain Banks, Larry Niven, and Stephen Baxter, others are saying it's basically just modern Orson Scott Card, politics included. If it's decent (or even middling) I'll be willing to give it a shot, but if it's entirely derivative, piss-poor, and/or just an excuse for OSC-type conservative politicking, I'll pass.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2013 14:46
|
|
|
Use of Weapons is one of those books that's at it best the second time you read it, I think.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2013 16:10
|
|
|
Chairman Capone posted:Has anyone read Seeds of Earth by Michael Cobley? It's the Kindle daily deal on Amazon. The premise sounds interesting, but the reviews are all over the place. Some are saying it's in the vein of Iain Banks, Larry Niven, and Stephen Baxter, others are saying it's basically just modern Orson Scott Card, politics included. I definitely didn't get any kind of conservative vibe from it. In fact it seemed more leftist to me. I haven't gotten around to any of the sequels yet though. Here's my Goodreads review: Me on Goodreads posted:Really fun, engaging space opera which packs EVERYTHING into one story: machines vs organics, alien races both good and evil (and neutral), human resistance, space chases/battles, ancient alien ruins, sentient forests, politics, AI/droid characters with tons of personality, and more. It's a lot like Mass Effect, entirely in good ways. Cobley has created a living universe with lots of action and intrigue.
|
|
#
?
Oct 8, 2013 23:58
|
|
|
Miss-Bomarc posted:Well, yeah. Basically this is Drake's answer to Weber's "Space Horatio Hornblower" (and, in fact, Drake originally got the idea when doing an Aubrey/Maturin pastiche set in Weber's universe.) A lot of the reason that I find Leary/Mundy more palatable than the Harrington books is that at least Leary and Mundy have their advantages because they're actually good at what they do, and so Leary wins fights by doing poo poo like launching missiles on weird parabolic courses and luring the enemy into their path half an hour later, when the enemy's not tracking them because they wrote them off as misses. They're always going to win because they're Leary/Mundy, but at least they actually have to work for it. Outside of like, the first book, the main advantage Harrington has is Capitalism and how much better it is than Socialism and Welfare and how that lets her have superweapons.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2013 00:24
|
|
|
Hedrigall posted:I definitely didn't get any kind of conservative vibe from it. In fact it seemed more leftist to me. I haven't gotten around to any of the sequels yet though. Here's my Goodreads review: Awesome. That sounds like just the sort of thing I'm looking for. I'll definitely get it, thanks for the info.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2013 02:45
|
|
|
Chairman Capone posted:Awesome. That sounds like just the sort of thing I'm looking for. I'll definitely get it, thanks for the info. I enjoyed that series too, but thought it suffered a bit from simply having too much stuff shoved in there. Would have been well served by a tighter focus.
|
|
#
?
Oct 9, 2013 05:44
|
|
|
Just FYI, the second book of the lost fleet saga that tells the story of the syndic planet came out today. Not yet gone for it as i've got too much to read as it is! The Lost Stars - Perilous Shield
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2013 18:03
|
|
|
Vanilla posted:Just FYI, the second book of the lost fleet saga that tells the story of the syndic planet came out today. Not yet gone for it as i've got too much to read as it is! If you liked the first one, you'll like this one, but (much like the rest of the lost fleet saga) it's a wee bit repetitive.
|
|
#
?
Oct 11, 2013 22:32
|
|
|
Humbug Scoolbus posted:...and then get vaporized by a fusion drive and be unknowingly bred for domesticity... Sometimes you get the monkey and sometimes the monkey gets you.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2013 05:31
|
|
|
orange sky posted:Oh. That explains it. drat, how am I supposed to process that haha. Thanks! Pay closer attention to the chapter numbers. You'll see one counting up and one counting down. That hosed me up too when I read it for the first time until I realized that.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2013 05:12
|
|
|
To be fair there were some decent Honor Harrington books in the middle of the series, like the one set on the Q-ship, or the two-book series when Honor and the favourite crew get captured by Obama's SS. Those ones were resolved by the skin of their teeth, the characters were in danger! There was tension! Ships rip each other to shreds and the victor was the only one with working lifeboats. People escape through trickery and cleverness and the enemy's neglect. Funnily enough I stopped reading after Weber moved on from liberal strawmen to randian strawmen, maybe I should continue.
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2013 06:14
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:How bad/good/goodbad/badgood is Drake? If David Weber's Honor Harrington is a 1 and Patrick O'Brian is a 10, and if reading about "Rob S. Pierre" gave me a physical headache, should I read Drake? Drake is a competent writer, and isn't a conservative nutjob like Weber and Ringo. I cant remember too much of what he's written except for the Seas of Venus stories, but those were pretty loving awesome.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 04:46
|
|
|
What is the consensus on Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall? I'm about half way through The Praxis, and while it's not bad so far, I can tell it's not going to be as good as, say, any of Bank's novels. Hoping to not get let down too much; bought the books a while back and have been trying to find time to tear through them.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 09:21
|
|
|
BadOptics posted:What is the consensus on Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall? I'm about half way through The Praxis, and while it's not bad so far, I can tell it's not going to be as good as, say, any of Bank's novels. Hoping to not get let down too much; bought the books a while back and have been trying to find time to tear through them. I've had this on my wishlist for a while but there's no UK ebook version on amazon yet. Keep us updated!
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 14:43
|
|
|
I just started writing a space opera novel about a ship that returns to the solar system after being missing for 75 years. The crew is dead, but the bodies are still warm. The ship's computer starts a data dump that lasts for weeks about where it's been. Shadowy shipping conglomerates, a grey market salvage and "recovery" specialist, a major crimes agent with a score to settle, and a Lieutenant proving himself in a Navy that ceased to be useful 50 years ago all come together to solve the mystery of the Astraeus and her crew. The implications could wipe out humanity forever- or bring it to it's next phase of evolution. That blurb was better than the 12 pages I wrote last night  If anyone is interested in reading some of the early rough drafts, PM me? You guys know what good space opera looks like.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 15:06
|
|
|
I can take a look at it, I'm pretty decent at SF (cred: fiction in Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, Analog, Asimov's Online, blah blah so on) and might have a few tips for you. I've got to warn you, though, sometimes writing just comes down to 'read and write more'. sethjosephdickinson at gmail
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 15:18
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:I'm reading this series now and to answer my own question at about five books in I'd say it's "goodbad," i.e., good popcorn space pulp. Everything's a fun read, the characters have *just* enough complexity to make you forget how cardboard they are, the space battles have just enough detail and complexity to be fun reads if you don't think about them very hard. Oh and Aubrey is the one who's a naturalist and FemMaturin is the one who has trouble interacting with people. Yeah, I just finished the most recent book in that series. I'll give Drake credit that, while the end of each book tends to come down to the same thing with the same solution (Mundy does improbable things to give Leary tons of info, Leary uses that info and his super astrogation skills to gently caress up an Alliance/Enemy of the Book ship.) the setup and main story of each is different. In this one they're on a safari, on that one infiltrating a rebellion, that other one delivering a VIP. Along the way they stumble into trouble and mayhem ensues. The series as a whole has more variety than, say, the Lost Fleet books and the main characters aren't Mary Sues as they each have their own problems to go along with their one superhuman attribute. On the other hand it really is Aubrey/Maturin in space, right down to the mechanisms of the Royal Navy in Napoleonic times (half pay when not in a war, hanging around Navy House hoping for a posting, etc.) It's not bad...I did shotgun all the books in a couple of weeks, after all...but it's not great either. Some of the adjustments to translate the age of sail into space are a little clumsy. (Sailing through hyperspace? With actual sails and riggers crawling around on the outside of your ship in space? Really?) Overall you could do a lot worse, and if you're a fan of space opera you almost certainly have. They won't rock your world or anything, but as a light space opera-ish diversion? By all means, read the Leary books.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 16:52
|
|
|
BadOptics posted:What is the consensus on Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall? the solution to all the battles is "invent new tactics instead of just re-using the ones you've used for the last four thousand years". The third book forgets that it's supposed to be a space opera, and divides its time between a murder mystery and a freedom-fighter-guerilla story.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2013 23:39
|
|
|
Thanks for the info! Figured that if I could get through Zahn's Conqueror's trilogy with it's annoying rear end characters (all the human ones at least), than this one wouldn't be a problem.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2013 05:15
|
|
|
BadOptics posted:What is the consensus on Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall? I'm about half way through The Praxis, and while it's not bad so far, I can tell it's not going to be as good as, say, any of Bank's novels. Hoping to not get let down too much; bought the books a while back and have been trying to find time to tear through them. You mentioned the Conquerors Legacy series as one you struggled through. I would say Dread Empire is somewhat the inverse. The characters in Dread Empire are imperfect and interesting, but the setting drains any drama or tension away. As flawed as the protagonists are, everyone else is profoundly stupid and incapable of independent thoughts, so the outcome is foregone. Zahn tends to have iffy character depth, but good ploting. I bailed on Dread Empire after book two and a brief skimming of book three, when it became guerrilla warfare against idiots.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2013 16:35
|
|
|
That's actually a good way to describe it. For Dread Empire, it's like if you put the first two books together (cutting a big chunk of the second) you'd have a good Book One, and the third book would be a good Book Two.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2013 23:51
|
|
|
The problem I had with Dread Empire is that book 1 is mostly about the male protagonist and establishing his character. Book 2 is mostly about the female protagonist and establishing her character, but it gets built on the foundation of the character being incredibly stupid and essentially force-fed to the reader. The third book ends up being where the author decides the female character got the short shift so all development of the male character has to be completely reversed while continually elevating the female character to new and new heights out of nowhere.
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2013 18:55
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 14:12 |
|
|
It's also kind of weird to read the author's blog posts, where he talks about how incredibly scary his female character is and how she's this unbelievably awful person, just a totally vicious bitch, and how she's like the worst character he's ever written. (Bear in mind that this author wrote another book where the heroes come up with a plan to suicide-bomb the cure for AIDS so that a child molester can take over the world.)
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2013 02:48
|
|