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Honestly Endymion/Rise of Endymion are perfectly decent sci-fi adventure stories, it's just that they are terrible sequels to Hyperion. Which is kind of a problem if you don't do what I did and read Rise of Endymion first.
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Feb 8, 2015 19:53
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Patrick Spens posted:Honestly Endymion/Rise of Endymion are perfectly decent sci-fi adventure stories, it's just that they are terrible sequels to Hyperion. Which is kind of a problem if you don't do what I did and read Rise of Endymion first. gently caress Hyperion.
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Feb 8, 2015 23:20
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Snuffman posted:There was that one cool scene where the Space Pope is going to die and the priests kill him again so they can get the Pope they want. That sounded dumb but I remember it being cool.
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Feb 9, 2015 01:17
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Bold Robot posted:Two questions: 1. What? No. It has kidney stones, man. Kidney stones. 2. I would say probably The Wizard Knight, as it's a bit less confusing than some of his other books, but the protagonist might seem like an irritatingly smitten Mary Sue. The Fifth Head of Cerberus is short and good. The Book of the New Sun is good and you can enjoy the surface before it gets really complicated. If you like Greek history maybe Soldier in the Mist, although that can be quite baffling at times. Don't start with Peace, which is very dense, or any other Sun Books. I'm not sure what to say about his newer books; I haven't read anything since Pirate Freedom.
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Feb 9, 2015 01:55
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regularizer posted:The fact that California Bones is included kind of ruins its credibility. Was The Mirror Empire that good though? I started it but didn't like the writing style or narration for the first few pages. I was considering reading California Bones.. is it that bad?
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Feb 9, 2015 02:44
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I'm reading The Rook and I'm not really feeling the book's way of exposition dumping by binder. I liked the initial "Hi, me, sorry you don't remember anything but here's the ropes" letters but I feel like I'm reading a Mass Effect codex page every other chapter and I'm not liking it. It doesn't help that old Myfanwy's exposition dump voice is pretty dull.
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Feb 9, 2015 05:41
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House Louse posted:I'm not sure what to say about his newer books; I haven't read anything since Pirate Freedom.
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Feb 9, 2015 12:04
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Patrick Spens posted:Honestly Endymion/Rise of Endymion are perfectly decent sci-fi adventure stories, it's just that they are terrible sequels to Hyperion. Which is kind of a problem if you don't do what I did and read Rise of Endymion first. I guess I'm the only one who liked them. True, they weren't as good as Hyperion, but they weren't as bad as some would have you believe.
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Feb 9, 2015 13:35
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Mister Kingdom posted:I guess I'm the only one who liked them. True, they weren't as good as Hyperion, but they weren't as bad as some would have you believe. I just hated how the story went and retroactively ruined a lot of the cool established aspects of the setting via unreliable narrator. I did like seeing the Hegemony post-collapse through a 
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Feb 9, 2015 15:09
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Huckleberry Finn bro  anilEhilated posted:I really liked Home Fires but I'm apparently the only one. It's a rather contrived take on some classic sci-fi tropes and dealing with identity. Not very complex compared to his older books so it might be a good starting point, most of his fanbase seems to hate it though. An Evil Guest apparently got shite reviews, and I have it lurking on a bookshelf somewhere.
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Feb 9, 2015 15:54
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Mars4523 posted:I'm reading The Rook and I'm not really feeling the book's way of exposition dumping by binder. I liked the initial "Hi, me, sorry you don't remember anything but here's the ropes" letters but I feel like I'm reading a Mass Effect codex page every other chapter and I'm not liking it. It doesn't help that old Myfanwy's exposition dump voice is pretty dull. I had the same experience. It doesn't seem to get any better.
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Feb 9, 2015 16:35
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I just read Proxima by Stephen Baxter. It had one of the worst endings I've ever read in a book. The book started okay and became worse and worse as it went on, but the ending brought the whole book down several levels.
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Feb 9, 2015 21:49
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Anything similar to the Walking Dead? Like, somewhat realistic zombie apocalypse. I pick up books that describe themselves as similar and they end up having robots or magic or some poo poo.
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Feb 9, 2015 22:14
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I just finished The Emperor's Blades by Brian Staveley after some talk about it in the thread and holy poo poo it really was the most predictable 480 pages ever. It had all the pieces for interesting storytelling but spent so much of its time broadcasting every surprise that nothing was surprising. The most frustrating thing is that since the second book just came out, I'm going to read it in hopes that something interesting will happen and make the time spent worth while. Here's hoping!
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Feb 9, 2015 22:18
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Campbell posted:The most frustrating thing is that since the second book just came out, I'm going to read it in hopes that something interesting will happen and make the time spent worth while. Here's hoping! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalation_of_commitment
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Feb 9, 2015 22:23
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Oh absolutely. I'm fully aware that I'm casting my free time and satisfaction into oblivion! 
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Feb 9, 2015 22:44
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Campbell posted:I just finished The Emperor's Blades by Brian Staveley after some talk about it in the thread and holy poo poo it really was the most predictable 480 pages ever. It had all the pieces for interesting storytelling but spent so much of its time broadcasting every surprise that nothing was surprising. The most frustrating thing is that since the second book just came out, I'm going to read it in hopes that something interesting will happen and make the time spent worth while. Here's hoping! Yeah after praise both in this thread and on blogs, I took a stab at both books and they're solidly "meh" to me.
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Feb 9, 2015 22:50
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ravenkult posted:Anything similar to the Walking Dead? Like, somewhat realistic zombie apocalypse. I pick up books that describe themselves as similar and they end up having robots or magic or some poo poo. The Day by Day Armageddon series is kinda like that, although it does venture off into weird poo poo in the later books. The first couple are standard zombie survival, no magic or robots or anything special. It only gets pretty weird in the last book, iirc. Outpost by Adam Baker is kinda cool. The zombies are infected by some kinda alien virus but there's no super weird poo poo going down like mechs or magicians or anything. The series is pretty good, but kinda fails to keep up the "Oh, neat!" factor of when they introduce something kinda new and cool. You can safely avoid Terminus though cause it's loving retarded.
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Feb 9, 2015 23:04
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Campbell posted:I just finished The Emperor's Blades by Brian Staveley after some talk about it in the thread and holy poo poo it really was the most predictable 480 pages ever. It had all the pieces for interesting storytelling but spent so much of its time broadcasting every surprise that nothing was surprising. The most frustrating thing is that since the second book just came out, I'm going to read it in hopes that something interesting will happen and make the time spent worth while. Here's hoping! I felt the same way about the first one, along with thinking that it got real sloppy towards the end but I'm liking the second one a lot better, it feels like he fixed some of the flaws.
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Feb 9, 2015 23:25
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:The Day by Day Armageddon series is kinda like that, although it does venture off into weird poo poo in the later books. The first couple are standard zombie survival, no magic or robots or anything special. It only gets pretty weird in the last book, iirc. I've read Outpost and it was okay. Didn't know it was a series, though if Terminus is worse than Outpost then it can't be that good.
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Feb 9, 2015 23:28
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:The Day by Day Armageddon series is kinda like that, although it does venture off into weird poo poo in the later books. The first couple are standard zombie survival, no magic or robots or anything special. It only gets pretty weird in the last book, iirc. Which one was Terminus again? I thought that the original Outpost and the prequel were kind of decent. The sequels (the one in the sewers and the one in the Mojave, when their plane got downed, I am horrible at remembering names...) were both incredibly retarded tho.
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Feb 9, 2015 23:56
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I don't understand why everyone thinks ''Hmmm, zombies are done to death, I'll just add some mechs to my book, that ought to go well.'' There's no ''classic'' zombie novel (I guess the Max Brooks one might count). Just write about some dudes trying to survive a zombie apocalypse, don't add crazy poo poo to it and don't set it in some wacky setting.
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Feb 10, 2015 00:09
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ravenkult posted:Anything similar to the Walking Dead? Like, somewhat realistic zombie apocalypse. I pick up books that describe themselves as similar and they end up having robots or magic or some poo poo. Have you read the actual Walking Dead novels? I think there are 3.
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Feb 10, 2015 00:13
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Lt. Lizard posted:Which one was Terminus again? I kinda dug the one in the desert. (Juggernaut was the first desert one. The new one, Impact also takes place in a desert.) Terminus was the one where they went to New York and got trapped in the subway tunnels that had collapsed and flooded. The literal only thing that was interesting in the novel was some kind of beacon/heat source in the city somewhere that was alien, and it wasn't ever mentioned again. Stupid_Sexy_Flander fucked around with this message at 00:24 on Feb 10, 2015 |
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Feb 10, 2015 00:21
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ravenkult posted:There's no ''classic'' zombie novel (I guess the Max Brooks one might count). Brian Keene would like to have a word with you. Also, zombie short stories tend to be a lot better than novels. Check out either of Christopher Golden's anthologies (The New Dead and 21st Century Dead) and/or the two The Living Dead anthologies from Night Shade.
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Feb 10, 2015 00:31
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ravenkult posted:Anything similar to the Walking Dead? Like, somewhat realistic zombie apocalypse. I pick up books that describe themselves as similar and they end up having robots or magic or some poo poo. World War Z gets mixed responses, but I found it pretty rad.
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Feb 10, 2015 00:37
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systran posted:I just read Proxima by Stephen Baxter. It had one of the worst endings I've ever read in a book. The book started okay and became worse and worse as it went on, but the ending brought the whole book down several levels. Edit: whoops these are spoilers for Ultima. Less Fat Luke fucked around with this message at 11:47 on Feb 11, 2015 |
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Feb 10, 2015 01:08
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Mars4523 posted:I'm reading The Rook and I'm not really feeling the book's way of exposition dumping by binder. I liked the initial "Hi, me, sorry you don't remember anything but here's the ropes" letters but I feel like I'm reading a Mass Effect codex page every other chapter and I'm not liking it. It doesn't help that old Myfanwy's exposition dump voice is pretty dull. I'm about a third of the way through it, and I'm basically just hate-reading the thing a few pages at a stretch now. It takes real talent to make a monster-hunting government agency of superheroes so tiresome.
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Feb 10, 2015 01:16
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ravenkult posted:Anything similar to the Walking Dead? Like, somewhat realistic zombie apocalypse. I pick up books that describe themselves as similar and they end up having robots or magic or some poo poo. Some guy on Goodreads posted this:  Which should give you a sense of what you'd be getting into.
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Feb 10, 2015 01:54
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Blitter posted:I kinda enjoyed Mira Grant's Feed - Book #1 of the NewsFlesh Trilogy; I liked the world building mostly. I was going to post this as well. Fascinating world, and a little more realistic in the fact that the military isn't completely bumfuck useless and there's more than a handful of survivors. Although, for some reason I thought Feed was the entire trilogy. Guess I've got something new to read! Mira Grant also writes Urban Fantasy under Seanan Mcguire. I loved her InCryptid novels (haven't read the short stories yet) but couldn't get into her older October Daye series.
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Feb 10, 2015 04:12
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Apparently someone quietly made and aired a pilot for a TV show of Wheel of Time. http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/9/8008387/wheel-of-time-pilot-fxx
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Feb 10, 2015 14:18
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Onean posted:I was going to post this as well. Fascinating world, and a little more realistic in the fact that the military isn't completely bumfuck useless and there's more than a handful of survivors. Although, for some reason I thought Feed was the entire trilogy. Guess I've got something new to read! I just couldn't take her seriously as an author (or someone who I'd want to give money to in any way) after she went mental about some award show where she thought the host was going to make fun of her being fat. NO ONE, and I repeat, NO ONE said anything about her weight, she just saw the guy doing the awards show as a comedian and immediately went into "OH GOD I'M GOING TO GET MADE FUN OF CAUSE I'M A FATTY" and caused a big stir and the host guy just said "gently caress it, I'm out". It was retarded as hell. Dude was Peter something. Was in Guardians of the Galaxy as the "What a bunch of A-holes" guy.
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Feb 10, 2015 14:45
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:I just couldn't take her seriously as an author (or someone who I'd want to give money to in any way) after she went mental about some award show where she thought the host was going to make fun of her being fat. It was Jonathan Ross. He's a British talk show guy. You're thinking of Peter Serafinowicz who I'm pretty sure had nothing to do with it. And yeah it was dumb and what I've read of the first InCryptid novel was terrible, sorry.
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Feb 10, 2015 14:52
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Chairchucker posted:Apparently someone quietly made and aired a pilot for a TV show of Wheel of Time. The word is it was shat out to keep hold of the rights. I saw the intro and the intro CGI looked about as good as the first season of Babylon 5... Second half of The Leviathan Wakes kind of fell through for me with the introduction of the main antagonist space zombies. An outside threat is cool and all but come on... They are called puke zombies. I'd be interested to see the race that created them but zombies are everywhere so it's a bit played out... Do they play a major part in the follow up novels in the same way they did in this one? Or is it more of the political and economic intrigue and dirty stations?.
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Feb 10, 2015 14:58
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:I just couldn't take her seriously as an author (or someone who I'd want to give money to in any way) after she went mental about some award show where she thought the host was going to make fun of her being fat. I guess you could say she weighed in on that debate 
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Feb 10, 2015 15:03
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Chairchucker posted:Apparently someone quietly made and aired a pilot for a TV show of Wheel of Time. I'm currently re-reading the whole thing and I don't mind admitting in this thread that I am a big fan. If a decent WoT series can't be made on the back of the success of GoT then it never will. (So far this looks terrible).
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Feb 10, 2015 15:41
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Chairchucker posted:Apparently someone quietly made and aired a pilot for a TV show of Wheel of Time. I find it weird that I am really enjoying this.
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Feb 10, 2015 15:45
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I'm about halfway into Madness of Angels, which I picked up after half remembering reading it's name in this thread. It's pretty neat!
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Feb 10, 2015 15:46
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Dysgenesis posted:I'm currently re-reading the whole thing and I don't mind admitting in this thread that I am a big fan. If a decent WoT series can't be made on the back of the success of GoT then it never will. It *could* be done as an anime. The budget wouldn't be prohibitive, the length would be . . . manageable, and most of the tropes are present.
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Feb 10, 2015 15:50
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Chairchucker posted:Apparently someone quietly made and aired a pilot for a TV show of Wheel of Time. I assume they were planning on airing it later but someone noticed their contract runs out tomorrow and they had to rush it to maintain the tv rights
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Feb 10, 2015 15:54
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