|
Amberskin posted:The insights into chinese culture are nice. And, by the way, if the author were a westerner that hilarious computer construction project, solved simply adding more chinese people into the fray would be very close to a bad taste ethnical joke. Oh no! A bad taste joke! Should I add him to my blacklist?!!?
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 01:35
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 13, 2024 17:30 |
|
|
Darth Walrus posted:Interesting that Low Town/The Straight Razor Cure is getting this much buzz - Ferretbrain and Strange Horizons didn't like it at all. Those reviews seem to dislike it most because it isn't epic fantasyish enough with a meticulously laid out magic system or expansive worldbuilding and battles, which seems sorta silly to me when they're reviewing what's a noir story set in a fantasy slum-city and is told exclusively through a first person limited POV(who also isn't a magic user). Oh, also, one of the reviewers seems to have a hate-bias towards it based primarily on being offended by it's portrayal of fictional fantasy races.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 01:35
|
|
|
General Battuta posted:It's literally about souls coming back from the 'beyond' (which is an afterlife with a sort of Star Trek soft science justification, not a religious construct) and possessing people. Honestly as a ludicrous space opera conceit I think it's pretty cool, but I haven't read it since I was a teenager. It was not. I read it a couple of years ago and I thought it was stupid and terrible, and the characters were stupid and terrible people. And that's before Al Capone came back from the dead and started taking over the known universe.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 01:45
|
|
|
savinhill posted:Those reviews seem to dislike it most because it isn't epic fantasyish enough with a meticulously laid out magic system or expansive worldbuilding and battles, which seems sorta silly to me when they're reviewing what's a noir story set in a fantasy slum-city and is told exclusively through a first person limited POV(who also isn't a magic user). Oh, also, one of the reviewers seems to have a hate-bias towards it based primarily on being offended by it's portrayal of fictional fantasy races. You're stupid and wrong. XBenedict posted:Non-fiction doesn't belong in the Sci-Fi thread. The idea that knowledge can ever be pure and objective is just a fantasy.  to you too.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 01:46
|
|
|
General Battuta posted:It's literally about souls coming back from the 'beyond' (which is an afterlife with a sort of Star Trek soft science justification, not a religious construct) and possessing people. Honestly as a ludicrous space opera conceit I think it's pretty cool, but I haven't read it since I was a teenager. I guess it is not for me. I'll give it one more try but I'm not optimistic.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 01:50
|
|
|
House Louse posted:You're stupid and wrong. Hmm, I've considered this in depth counter analysis, but have to disagree and say: no, you
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 02:38
|
|
|
Kesper North posted:It was not. I read it a couple of years ago and I thought it was stupid and terrible, and the characters were stupid and terrible people. And that's before Al Capone came back from the dead and started taking over the known universe. Yeah, it's bad. Cut your losses now, don't sink another 2000 pages into it. Next up are the resurrected space hippies driving around in their van, how wacky and cool!
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 03:21
|
|
|
Ulta posted:I started reading "The Reality Dsyfunction" by Peter Hamilton. It started great. Then I felt something was off when the space commie atheists, the edenist, started explaining how logical it was that they didn't believe in God in the way no atheist ever does. Then the book sets up the Adamist as the conflicting side as the space Christians. I've set the book down because I'm at the point now where it's been revealed that the convict indentured servant/slave is literally a space satanist there to prey on the space Christians. I caught a glimpse in the Wikipedia about souls from hell coming back, like Al Capone, and being the main villians. Did I pick up some Left Behind bullshit or does it actually get not dumb quickly, or is it space hell the whole way down Well, the correct answer is welcome to Hamiltons writing. If you were expecting something serious and thought provoking, this is not the series. But if you are just along for the ride, it is a pretty eventful one. Hamiltons writes pretty good action sequences covering high-tech infantry and space battles and that made the series pretty enjoyable to me. Sometimes I get this feeling that people takes reading way too seriously and expect too much of their literature (looks at my old collection of Forgotten Realms, Battletech and Dragonlance as well as the shining glory, the novel for Baldurs Gate 2). Regarding Lynch and the Locke Lamora books, the first book is pretty great and then the two remaining books consist of neat ideas and Locke being treated like Rocky. Somehow I think the series would have been better if every scene didn't have to be more fantastic than the previous one. There are also some cool episodes that deserved more detail, like the scene in Red Seas where they go along a river guarded by some mysterious being, which only gets a few pages. I remember that part more than I remember the rest of the book. Something with the Evolvarium in Reynolds Poseidons Wake.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 07:50
|
|
|
Ulta posted:I started reading "The Reality Dsyfunction" by Peter Hamilton. It started great. Then I felt something was off when the space commie atheists, the edenist, started explaining how logical it was that they didn't believe in God in the way no atheist ever does. Then the book sets up the Adamist as the conflicting side as the space Christians. I've set the book down because I'm at the point now where it's been revealed that the convict indentured servant/slave is literally a space satanist there to prey on the space Christians. I caught a glimpse in the Wikipedia about souls from hell coming back, like Al Capone, and being the main villians. Did I pick up some Left Behind bullshit or does it actually get not dumb quickly, or is it space hell the whole way down It's a series about Al Capone becoming the emperor from Star Wars, whether that sounds dumb terrible or dumb awesome is up to you. This being Hamilton the entire plot is resolved in a deus ex machina in the last ten pages though.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 08:01
|
|
|
Neurosis posted:Oh no! A bad taste joke! Should I add him to my blacklist?!!? Oh, gently caress me, my choice of words was stupid. Before you put me in that PC fanatic field, I'll try to clarify it. Jokes about solving a problem throwing a bazillion of chinese into it are commonplace where I live. Some people takes the anti-racism stuff to the extreme and thinks even that light humor is intolerable, and I was trying to refer to that kind of people. And, returning to the book in question and that specific part, I wonder if that particular stunt has been tried somewhere, obviously scaled down. A man-powered digital circuit would be a thing to be seen!
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 08:19
|
|
|
E: I'm really clumsy today.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 08:20
|
|
|
thehomemaster posted:So? I'm failing to see a problem beyond reactionary hand-wringing. d-drat! what a badass. he's buying a book after hearing someone may have been offended by it... just to show he doesn't give a gently caress!
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 08:56
|
|
|
I'm just happy someone acknowledged it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 09:11
|
|
|
What the gently caress is up with the hypersensitive babies in this thread who think 'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' is some kind of raid by the Cultural Marxists?
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 12:57
|
|
|
Cultural Maoists.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 13:08
|
|
|
Peel posted:What the gently caress is up with the hypersensitive babies in this thread who think 'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' is some kind of raid by the Cultural Marxists? #GaimanGate
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 13:09
|
|
|
Peel posted:What the gently caress is up with the hypersensitive babies in this thread who think 'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' is some kind of raid by the Cultural Marxists? What the gently caress! What the gently caress! Can someone tell me just what the gently caress is up with this!
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 13:10
|
|
|
Maybe it's because I'm in school and studying the rhetorical power of narrative, but I do think that stories have the capability to influence how we feel about important subjects, even sci fi. Based on that, I think criticizing a book for its social implications is valid.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 14:59
|
|
|
Peel posted:What the gently caress is up with the hypersensitive babies in this thread who think 'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' is some kind of raid by the Cultural Marxists? Because that's how the forums were for a long, long time.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 15:32
|
|
|
fritz posted:#GaimanGate Awesome.  I'm about to finish Trigger Warning and I definitely didn't like it as much as his other short story collections.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 15:35
|
|
|
blue squares posted:Maybe it's because I'm in school and studying the rhetorical power of narrative, but I do think that stories have the capability to influence how we feel about important subjects, even sci fi. Based on that, I think criticizing a book for its social implications is valid. There's a series that I think you'd really like, it's Wildcards, edited by George R R Martin. And, yeah, 'currently studying' something in school certainly helps one take ideas to their reactionary extreme.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 16:03
|
|
|
Drifter posted:There's a series that I think you'd really like, it's Wildcards, edited by George R R Martin. And, yeah, 'currently studying' something in school certainly helps one take ideas to their reactionary extreme. I didn't mean to sound extremist. I'm not taking to Twitter to demand the author apologize, just saying why I think it's valid to consider stuff like this, that's all.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 16:50
|
|
|
fritz posted:#GaimanGate Actually, it's about ethics in alternate universe sci-fi novels.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 17:03
|
|
|
Oh boy, just wait until uni/college!
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 19:31
|
|
|
Are any of the books in the new Humble Bundle Sci-Fi pack any good? I'm only familiar with Kevin J Anderson through his Dune novels which I didn't really enjoy that much, but I'm not sure if that's him or if it's Herbert Jr's influence, or the combination of the two of them trying to ape Frank Herbert's style.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 20:00
|
|
|
Nah, Kevin J. Anderson is all sorts of terrible on his own.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 20:44
|
|
|
Drifter posted:There's a series that I think you'd really like, it's Wildcards, edited by George R R Martin. It even has its own thread. Venture here at your peril.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 21:47
|
|
|
Ishiguro's The Buried Giant is pretty average. Too meandering and filled with stilted (and sometimes pretty laughable) dialogue, although the ending is really strong. Funny the amount of critics who have defended its literary quality "despite" it being fantasy literature, when in reality its much less interesting than a good chunk of the genre fiction by less celebrated authors.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 22:18
|
|
|
Jedit posted:It even has its own thread. Venture here at your peril. Hey, he said he wanted social commentary.  
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 22:27
|
|
|
quote:Veiled Alliances: A Prequel Novella to the Epic Space Opera The Saga of Seven Suns Yeesh.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 22:37
|
|
|
Clark Nova posted:Nah, Kevin J. Anderson is all sorts of terrible on his own. He can be kind of hilarious in his over the top-ness however.
|
|
#
?
Apr 1, 2015 23:59
|
|
|
Peel posted:What the gently caress is up with the hypersensitive babies in this thread who think 'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' is some kind of raid by the Cultural Marxists? It's not just this thread: https://bradrtorgersen.wordpress.com/2015/02/04/sad-puppies-3-the-unraveling-of-an-unreliable-field/
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 01:19
|
|
|
That article is ignorant, and also not the point.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 01:39
|
|
|
That article is terrible, holy poo poo.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 01:53
|
|
|
Amberskin posted:And, by the way, if the author were a westerner that hilarious computer construction project, solved simply adding more chinese people into the fray would be very close to a bad taste ethnical joke. Peel posted:'haha, that would have been a bad taste joke in another context' Totally the same thing, bro. I mean, after you reworded it of course. Currently reading Shogun and the Japanese characters are marvelling at the size of the Dutch man's penis. The author is a white man. I'm triggered and trembling. Should I boycott it y/n?
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 02:05
|
|
|
The most accidentally interesting thing about that article is the author's argument that SF/F readers basically want the same story over and over and over again. Which, going by the eternal success of formula romance novels, isn't...entirely wrong? Some of the backlash against feminism/postcolonialism/what have you must be about confounding it with postmodern literature, abstract experimental art, and books in which everyone is an rear end in a top hat and nothing matters. Anyway! Let's talk about books instead of talking about talking about books. Arguing about whether we have too much feminism or not enough is pointless. The issue is really touchy right now, I can't imagine anyone will change anyone else's mind. I just finished City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett and liked it a good bit. I stumbled around the opening a while, waiting for it to stop being a light murder mystery and start using the interestingly grotesque post-God setting for something. The ending was also little pat, with a magical showdown that felt too weightless. But all in all I liked it quite a bit, mostly on the strength of the book's mid/late section. I loved all the intelligence work and Great Game realpolitik — 'we have to be assholes because if we aren't much bigger assholes will take over' is a satisfying, honest motive for the big players in this world, and when we get to see the really ugly religious fundamentalists who want to be in power it's almost a motive the reader can root for (the book must've been written before ISIS exploded, but it's just as chilling to imagine Salafists or Scientologists or whoever else armed with the possibility their god is actually real and might step into the world to act). The religious history and ontology of the setting was pretty cool to uncover. The book also did a lot of work with the social role of faith, and the possibility of a genuinely healthy, prosocial religion, although it felt maybe a little didactic on that count. Shara and the rest of the main cast took a little while to grow on me, but when she struggles to reconcile her patriotism, her intellectual hunger, and her own moral compass she's pretty compelling. While I wish the book had spent a little more time on its strengths (the creepy, creative, broken setting) and a little less time on its weaknesses (one-dimensional villains and a lot of fighting and magic without much bite), I'm curious where the next one will go. I am reading My Work Is Not Yet Done by Ligotti and Get in Trouble by Kelly Link. Kelly Link is awesome and probably everyone should read her. She's also a really easy author to give as a gift, since her stories are easy to read but weird and thought-provoking.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 02:17
|
|
|
I liked City of Stairs a lot and I have seen it mentioned fairly often in this thread. A related book that people might like is Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone - it's got an uncannily similar setting (at least on paper), but the two books read very differently. I thought Three Parts Dead was pretty lighthearted and read very quickly, whereas City of Stairs was relatively slower going, and felt a bit more "literary". If you like it (I did!) the author has written two other books in the same universe, but with different characters. I haven't seen Three Parts Dead mentioned in this thread - has anyone else read it or its sequels?
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 10:41
|
|
|
Ani posted:I liked City of Stairs a lot and I have seen it mentioned fairly often in this thread. A related book that people might like is Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone - it's got an uncannily similar setting (at least on paper), but the two books read very differently. I thought Three Parts Dead was pretty lighthearted and read very quickly, whereas City of Stairs was relatively slower going, and felt a bit more "literary". If you like it (I did!) the author has written two other books in the same universe, but with different characters. I've been plugging it here fairly frequently. I really enjoyed the first two books and the text adventure. I bounced off the third book - read like 40% of the book and still didn't really care about either protagonist or saw what the overall story was.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 10:48
|
|
|
Ani posted:I liked City of Stairs a lot and I have seen it mentioned fairly often in this thread. A related book that people might like is Three Parts Dead by Max Gladstone - it's got an uncannily similar setting (at least on paper), but the two books read very differently. I thought Three Parts Dead was pretty lighthearted and read very quickly, whereas City of Stairs was relatively slower going, and felt a bit more "literary". If you like it (I did!) the author has written two other books in the same universe, but with different characters. I actually read City of Stairs and Three Parts Dead back to back a few weeks ago. You're right that both have similar settings on paper, but they're still really different books. I mean, like Battuta brought up from that review, yeah, sometimes stories or plotlines or settings can repeat themselves, but this is a great example of how you can derive a completely different experience from a superficially similar premise ("an expert in an esoteric field arrives to a metropolis whose guardian deity has died and there's a big mystery related to the death that they need to solve using their expertise and wits"). I wouldn't draw enough of an equivalence between the two to recommend you one if you liked the other, except that both are good books so you should read them on that basis. Genre classifications are a funny old thing, both are fantasy novels set in cities but I wouldn't call either "urban fantasy" unless at gunpoint. Also while magic is an everyday part of everything in Three Parts Dead, it's more of a powerful and scary thing even in minor phenomena in City of Stairs.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 10:51
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 13, 2024 17:30 |
|
|
Megazver posted:I've been plugging it here fairly frequently. I really enjoyed the first two books and the text adventure. I bounced off the third book - read like 40% of the book and still didn't really care about either protagonist or saw what the overall story was. I felt the same way about it at first, but I'd say try again if you feel like it. The payoff afterwards was worth it for me. Do you remember where you stopped? I'm guessing it was a little before things got going, and started really tying into the other two books.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2015 11:48
|
|
