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RisqueBarber posted:Can anyone shed some light on whether or not to read The Fell Sword by Miles Cameron? The reviews seem vastly mixed. I loved the Red Knight but what I loved was the fast pace of it, and I hear The Fell Sword is very slow. I thought it was a pretty big letdown from the first book.
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May 15, 2014 21:37
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RisqueBarber posted:Can anyone shed some light on whether or not to read The Fell Sword by Miles Cameron? The reviews seem vastly mixed. I loved the Red Knight but what I loved was the fast pace of it, and I hear The Fell Sword is very slow. I actually just finished this today, after enjoying The Red Knight quite a bit. Definitely a bit disappointing; it felt like the pacing was horribly off. Not the worst book I've ever read, but, eh.
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May 15, 2014 22:05
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Yeah, the Red Knight's adventures in Not-Byzantium were mostly self-contained like the first book, and almost completely divorced from all the other plot threads, which taken together seemed like the first half or third of a much larger fantasy book. Maybe he bit off more that he could chew, or was pressured into shoeing in a big overarching epic plotline.
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May 15, 2014 22:47
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High Warlord Zog posted:On a scale of Freaky Friday to I Will Fear No Evil, how bad is he? You remember how in DBZ when the guy's scouter exploded because the other dude's power level was so high?
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May 16, 2014 05:51
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Has anyone read Retribution Falls or other stuff from the Ketty Jay series by Chris Wooding? I can't tell if this will be a fun adventure through the skies or a cringy cheesefest. I read the Broken Sky series as a kid and at the time I thought it was absolutely amazing, although I have my doubts it holds up as a fun children's sf series today. Having no knowledge of anime at the time probably helped. And being a kid that
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May 16, 2014 09:27
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Bolverkur posted:Has anyone read Retribution Falls or other stuff from the Ketty Jay series by Chris Wooding? I can't tell if this will be a fun adventure through the skies or a cringy cheesefest. I read the Broken Sky series as a kid and at the time I thought it was absolutely amazing, although I have my doubts it holds up as a fun children's sf series today. Having no knowledge of anime at the time probably helped. And being a kid that Ferretbrain, which is usually a pretty thorough review site, did not like it one bit. That said? It's supposed to be like Firefly. So maybe that's your thing?
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May 16, 2014 11:38
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Bolverkur posted:Has anyone read Retribution Falls or other stuff from the Ketty Jay series by Chris Wooding? I can't tell if this will be a fun adventure through the skies or a cringy cheesefest. I read the Broken Sky series as a kid and at the time I thought it was absolutely amazing, although I have my doubts it holds up as a fun children's sf series today. Having no knowledge of anime at the time probably helped. And being a kid that I read it a few months ago and really enjoyed it: my goodreads review posted:4.5 stars!
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May 16, 2014 13:08
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RisqueBarber posted:Can anyone shed some light on whether or not to read The Fell Sword by Miles Cameron? The reviews seem vastly mixed. I loved the Red Knight but what I loved was the fast pace of it, and I hear The Fell Sword is very slow. The douchebag knight is even douchier, and crazier, and he actually is really really badass as well. I had kind of been hoping up to a point that he'd turn out to be some muscle-brained idiot who didn't believe in monsters and ended up dying in vain to them, but he's so over the top I still enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to how the mythology is dovetailed into his character from here on.
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May 16, 2014 15:07
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So is there a thread for talking the business side if SFF? I want to discuss Orbit's decision not to include the novels in the Hugo voters packet.
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May 16, 2014 16:02
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Fried Chicken posted:So is there a thread for talking the business side if SFF? I want to discuss Orbit's decision not to include the novels in the Hugo voters packet. I think you're posting in it. Why'd Orbit do that?
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May 16, 2014 16:20
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fritz posted:I think you're posting in it. My understanding is that if they did that, they'd be giving away more of those books than they would sell hardcover in a year, at least in the UK (which is where they operate).
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May 16, 2014 16:34
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fritz posted:I think you're posting in it. Worldcon is in the UK and with the exception of Larry Correia's all the novels nominated are published in the UK by Orbit. Essentially they would be costing themselves sales.
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May 16, 2014 16:35
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Interesting that Wheel of Time was released then, but that's already sold most of the books it ever will. Since they have so many books involved the usual argument that the chance of victory helps publicity is muted. Even if one of them wins, the other two get no help, and the membership of this year's Worldcon is huge due to the Wheel of Time offer. From an economic perspective it makes a good deal of sense. From an ethical perspective I can't convince myself that they're obliged to provide the novels. I really hope the comments I'm seeing from some that they'll take it out on the novels in the voting don't pan out. I'm pretty curious which book will win this year though. Not because it's a great showdown of top-quality literature but because every entrant has some kind of associated drama. Correia crudely campaigned for his nomination and associated himself with a white supremacist, the Wheel of Time has a large fanbase, but is controversial in its presence and just plain bad for most of its length, and the three 'normal' books now aren't in the voter packet and are attracting an attendant backlash.
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May 16, 2014 18:12
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fritz posted:I think you're posting in it. Yep. The actual issue is that they're going against the tradition of the Hugo voiting packet extravaganza, but that was always a commercial decision too. I think it's a bit of a storm in a teacup. E: Peel posted:Interesting that Wheel of Time was released then, but that's already sold most of the books it ever will. I think (based on reading Charles Stross' blog) Orbit don't own the relevant rights, Tor does. In which light Orbit looks even worse due to Tor's generosity. Also the novel controversy may result in so many ballots being cast there and so few in other categories that the 5% limit is missed, leading to an automatic No Award. E2: Woah there's about 150% the usual number of members. Safety Biscuits fucked around with this message at 18:24 on May 16, 2014 |
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May 16, 2014 18:13
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House Louse posted:Yep. I actually think Scalzi's comments on the whole thing were pretty level headed, especially considering he was one of the people to get the voting package ball rolling in the first place: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014/05/13/notes-on-this-years-hugo-voters-packet/ It basically comes down to people suddenly feeling entitled and Orbit doing a cold calculation on how much they would gain by giving 3 of their published books for free and might reap one reward vs. earn some money on all three.
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May 16, 2014 19:22
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Hello, I have just finished reading "The old man's war" by John Scalzi. I have found it quite entertaining, but not really one of the best things I've read lately. I understand this is the first novel in a series, so the writer has used it to set up the Universe, the main characters and the global frame of the big story. I wonder if it gets better in the following books of the series. That universe is promising, but if it does not "take off" I don't think I will get the rest of the books. Does anyone think it is worth to continue reading the rest of the series?
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May 16, 2014 20:21
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Amberskin posted:Hello, For you, probably not.
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May 16, 2014 20:25
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I really dig Scalzi's humorous way of writing, and the characters/universe are very interesting to me. If you were like me, I'd recommend continuing the series. The rest maybe aren't as good as Old Man's War, but they're very similar. However, since you didn't seem to like OMW as much as I did, I wouldn't recommend continuing.
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May 16, 2014 20:54
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Fried Chicken posted:Worldcon is in the UK and with the exception of Larry Correia's all the novels nominated are published in the UK by Orbit. Essentially they would be costing themselves sales. Amberskin posted:Hello, edit: oh dang, I was looking at the audio version, Dust World came out in March. 
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May 16, 2014 20:55
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Amberskin posted:Hello, Eh. It's not like they are slow going. But no, I don't think they improve, writing wise. The Plot Thickens, and we discover that the human league, or whatever the gently caress they are called is up to some considerably shady poo poo. Our heroes continue to be dad-joke snarking everymen who just happen to be better at everything. The Human Division ends on an annoying (but very large and set-piece) cliff hanger, which was really annyoing if you were suckered into paying 99c a chapter or whatever it was, but apparently there will be a Human Division: The Divisioning that will continue our exciting tale.
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May 16, 2014 21:01
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I managed to get Jennifer Fallon's Second Sons Trilogy alongside some other books. I haven't read anything from her, is this trilogy any good? Seems politicky and grim which I like, but they are doorstoppers and I don't have the time to invest to check out if they're good or not. 
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May 16, 2014 21:35
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coyo7e posted:I'm kind of curious how you would consider any of Correia's work to be Hugo nominee-worthy material. Did he start writing groundbreaking and interesting new fiction? I thought he just wrote about werewolves and ex-Marine Texans with gun fetishes. You know that the nomination process is, in a lot of ways, nothing more than a glorified popularity contest, right? Correia spent a lot of time and effort on a troll campaign to get his book on the list.
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May 16, 2014 22:07
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Ornamented Death posted:You know that the nomination process is, in a lot of ways, nothing more than a glorified popularity contest, right? Correia spent a lot of time and effort on a troll campaign to get his book on the list. This is also how Vox Day and Seanan McGuire/Mira Grant got on the ballot. They just went out and asked people to do it. There are rumors that Vox Day bought memberships for people to do it, though. As per the Orbit thing: the only new readers a Hugo brings in are the people who vote for a Hugo, so giving the books away means they wouldn't really buy anything. And if you read the comments on Scalzi's blog, there's a lot of people saying they weren't going to buy these books of their own volition, anyway. Besides, they're going up against Memory of Light, which kind of makes campaigning pointless.
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May 16, 2014 22:23
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Amberskin posted:Hello, Probably not. I love Scalzi's writing style and thoroughly enjoyed the Old Man's War universe, but the books don't really "get better". They are all pretty consistent and pretty much "more of the same". This is obviously great if you enjoyed the first but not so much if you didn't.
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May 16, 2014 22:23
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Xik posted:Probably not. I love Scalzi's writing style and thoroughly enjoyed the Old Man's War universe, but the books don't really "get better". They are all pretty consistent and pretty much "more of the same". This is obviously great if you enjoyed the first but not so much if you didn't. They get a little bit better in that as the series progresses Scalzi does more to subvert the Heinleinesque HOO RAH MILITARY IS AWESOME genre trope. I mean, that's there in the first book, but there's more of it more overtly as the series progresses.
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May 16, 2014 22:32
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anathenema posted:Besides, they're going up against Memory of Light, which kind of makes campaigning pointless. Technically they're going up against the Wheel of Time as a whole. I'm holding out hope that new readers delving into the complete series and getting stuck in the quagmire of the later Jordan output will counterbalance the series fans.
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May 16, 2014 22:50
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:They get a little bit better in that as the series progresses Scalzi does more to subvert the Heinleinesque HOO RAH MILITARY IS AWESOME genre trope. I mean, that's there in the first book, but there's more of it more overtly as the series progresses. Well, I guess my english is not good enough to catch that in the first book. Even when the main character has his faith crisis after killing those lilliputian mini-men just stepping on them, his comrades easily dismiss it, apparently with success since the issue does not come back the rest of the book. My main complaint is I'm not really able to suspend my beliefs to accept the background development (the colonials being far too much independent from the Earth nations) and some of the details (would an army, as much elite and off-earth you want just dismiss the military experience of its recruits and put a damned colonel under the command of a publicist made lance corporal?). If the story is just "more of the same" and there is no justification for the very existence of the independent colonial union, I don't think I will get caught into the story. That said, the first book is a nice read, the pace is good, the action parts are well written and the humour is also refreshing. I'm still undecided.
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May 16, 2014 23:11
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Amberskin posted:Well, I guess my english is not good enough to catch that in the first book. Even when the main character has his faith crisis after killing those lilliputian mini-men just stepping on them, his comrades easily dismiss it, apparently with success since the issue does not come back the rest of the book. Well, the later books do address some of your concerns. As far as the military experience goes...says in the same page that previous military experience don't mean poo poo. Literally inapplicable. Even assuming a colonel had an uncommon grasp of small unit tactics, it would be for weak-rear end baseline humans, fighting against other weak-rear end baseline humans, so he'd be starting from roughly the same place as an ad-guy in terms of dealing with augmented humans against all the weirdness of the universe. And, at least in the initial books, we are dealing with very small squads very low on the strategic totem pole, with very high turnover rates in personnel, on account of the being eaten, so nobody much cares what you knew about soldering 40 years ago on Earth, don't get eaten for 10 years in the Galaxy, and we'll discuss your more relevant experience. The later books also do explore Earth's relationship with the Colonial Union, and it is kinda interesting. Though the mains continue to be smarter than everybody else.
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May 16, 2014 23:47
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Amberskin posted:Well, I guess my english is not good enough to catch that in the first book. Even when the main character has his faith crisis after killing those lilliputian mini-men just stepping on them, his comrades easily dismiss it, apparently with success since the issue does not come back the rest of the book. Yeah, things like the crisis of faith don't even happen in most military SF.
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May 17, 2014 01:01
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People should read TC McCarthy's The Subterrene War series if they wanna read well written military scifi that has a very large focus on the moral and ethical implications of war, with it taking a very heavy toll on the characters' psyches and lives.
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May 17, 2014 01:30
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The first seven books of The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher are today's Kindle Daily Deal at $1.99 each.
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May 17, 2014 12:04
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savinhill posted:People should read TC McCarthy's The Subterrene War series if they wanna read well written military scifi that has a very large focus on the moral and ethical implications of war, with it taking a very heavy toll on the characters' psyches and lives. I've just bought Germline. The summary of the plot seems interesting. Thanks for the suggestion.
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May 17, 2014 12:14
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coyo7e posted:I'm kind of curious how you would consider any of Correia's work to be Hugo nominee-worthy material. Did he start writing groundbreaking and interesting new fiction? I thought he just wrote about werewolves and ex-Marine Texans with gun fetishes. All he said was that it wasn't published by Orbit in the UK. quote:You might try Poor Man's Fight which is way more in the vein of Old Man's War, except it's about a kid who's too poor to pay for school so he's gotta join the space marines. Haha wow it's for real. Reminds me of when I was twelve writing about the "Black King" instead of the Dark Lord. E: There are some really interesting posts about current Chinese sf, written by sf writers, on Tor.com at the moment. This is the latest one. Safety Biscuits fucked around with this message at 13:37 on May 17, 2014 |
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May 17, 2014 13:02
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Anyone having issues with sending books to their free.kindle.com email? Can't seem to get it working today.
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May 17, 2014 18:58
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Fart of Presto posted:The first seven books of The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher are today's Kindle Daily Deal at $1.99 each. Does this series get a lot better? I just started book 5, and they're fun enough, but I like Iron Druid better for my pulpy urban fantasy.
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May 17, 2014 19:18
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Yea, I'd recommend em if you like the Iron Druid stuff. Dresden is a little less pop culture-ish but the overall story is a bit better. To be fair though, he's got something like 14 books where the Iron Druid guy is only up to book 4? I think. The first book was kinda igh, the second book SSSSUUUCCCKKKKEDDDD . but the ones after that were all pretty good. My favorite is still Dead Beat, but the one about the porn studio was pretty hilarious as well. I bought em brand spanking new at something like 6-8$, so for 2$ a pop that's a hell of a bargain.
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May 17, 2014 19:23
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I've actually been listening to the audible version. The narrator, James Marsters, is half the reason I've continued to listen. He's the perfect voice for what I imagine Dresden sounds like.
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May 17, 2014 20:03
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I think they switched John Glover? for one book because Marsters wasn't available because of scheduling conflicts.
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May 17, 2014 20:05
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LASER BEAM DREAM posted:Does this series get a lot better? I just started book 5, and they're fun enough, but I like Iron Druid better for my pulpy urban fantasy. Dresden is significantly better than Iron Druid
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May 17, 2014 20:09
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Fried Chicken posted:Dresden is significantly better than Iron Druid Yeah, it's not even a contest. Rivers of London series? Arguably better than Dresden. The Rook? It certainly has the potential, but you can't pass judgement after only one book. Ditto for London Falling. But the Iron Druid series? Hahahahaha no.
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May 17, 2014 20:35
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