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savinhill posted:The golem as a supernatural creature never really interested me before, so I was worried going in that I wouldn't enjoy those parts as much, but the author's managed to set that up in a cool & intriguing way. Read Seventy-Two Letters by Ted Chiang (golemry as genetics), Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett (golems as a fantasy stand-in for A.I.), and Iron Council by China Miéville (golems as a fantasy weapon, made of anything from real materials like earth and flesh, to abstract things like sound and time). Golems are amazing.
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Apr 8, 2015 01:51
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Drifter posted:What you say sounds bad and I want to disagree, but I've only ever read the four you've said were good. The whole Fault Lines trilogy (Last Call, Expiration Date, Earthquake Weather) is wonderful, as is the Drawing of the Dark. Three Days to Never is great.
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Apr 8, 2015 01:53
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pseudorandom name posted:Nah, about half of Tim Powers' output is crap. It's been a while since I've seen a troll as good as this.
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Apr 8, 2015 02:18
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Goons, help me find a book that I want to re-read! This is going to be awful since I only remember some vague things from it because I read it years ago but anyway. I remember there was some 'rift' hyperspace thing that space travelers used to go between stars, and that ships were going missing. I also remember that there was an admiral or captain stationed at one of these posts and he was going senile/insane and that was fun to read about. I think I also remember that a bunch of characters were traveling together on some frigate type craft and one of the characters was an assassin/thief getting up to mischief at every port of call. Mostly I recall the tone which I can't really describe except it was fun/funny. That is all I remember! I thought it might be January's Dancer by Michael Flynn because it was similar in story and in tone. But I read it, remembered i'd already read it and while it was enjoyable it was not that book! Now I know how much nostalgia must have distorted the book by now but if that sort of thing I described rings any bells I will jump on it - since I believe it was a pretty decent science fiction/space opera'y story. This is driving me insane (I've been looking on and off for a few weeks now) and I'm pretty sure goons suggested the book so I have a good feeling that this will be enough for one of you to give me a name/author. [edit] It's also not that Charles Stross book with the secret agent man (Iron Sunrise?)
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Apr 8, 2015 06:24
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Effectronica posted:It's been a while since I've seen a troll as good as this. I'm completely serious. He writes books that are basically entirely the magic equivalent of TNG technobabble, except while technobabble was mostly an excuse to drive the real plot, his stuff is just people doing meaningless babble because of meaningless babble that they learned through meaningless babble but it doesn't work due to meaningless babble. All of his output since 1990 has been terrible, with the notable exception of the best thing he's written (Declare). pseudorandom name fucked around with this message at 07:01 on Apr 8, 2015 |
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Apr 8, 2015 06:58
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Technically Iron Sunrise is about a secret agent woman.
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Apr 8, 2015 07:06
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pseudorandom name posted:I'm completely serious. I disagree with this analysis of his work--the magic tends to rely on linked thematic symbolism, but Powers doesn't spend a huge amount of time explaining it, just sort of points in the direction of why it's happening and lets you kind of work it out. Plus it's magic, it's not always supposed to be clear-cut and easily measured. Instead of a bunch of long-winded expository dialogue he just gets back to doing stuff in the plot, which is more interesting to me anyway. A while back I guess there was some debate about Brandon Sanderson's series with the metals--I haven't read it--but some folks felt like him laying out all the magic stuff in a long infodump was like 'reading a D&D manual' or something, that it kind of killed the pacing or left little to the imagination. Powers might be the opposite end of that debate, where magic works in mysterious ways and is not always clear in its design. occamsnailfile fucked around with this message at 15:16 on Apr 8, 2015 |
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Apr 8, 2015 15:11
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To be fair, apparently part of Sanderson's process is basically "Hand my magic system to a bunch of gamers to break" so reading like a D&D manual may in fact be intentional. But man I tried reading Alloy of Law and there was -so much magic exposition.- And yet I retain more about how to gently caress with ghosts from the Fault Lines trilogy.
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Apr 8, 2015 15:22
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occamsnailfile posted:I disagree with this analysis of his work--the magic tends to rely on linked thematic symbolism, but Powers doesn't spend a huge amount of time explaining it, just sort of points in the direction of why it's happening and lets you kind of work it out. Plus it's magic, it's not always supposed to be clear-cut and easily measured. Instead of a bunch of long-winded expository dialogue he just gets back to doing stuff in the plot, which is more interesting to me anyway. The problem isn't that his magic system is opaque, the problem is that there's no reasonable explanation as to how any of his characters know any of this stuff. Declare works because there's a covert military intelligence organization that's studied and maintained this knowledge for centuries and shaped the protagonist's entire life from his early childhood. The Stress of Her Regard works because the protagonist (who got involved late and entirely by accident) ended up being good friends with Byron and Shelley, who have dealt with their extended family for their entire lives. The Anubis Gates follows a protagonist that's as naive and confused about his situation and puzzles it out along with the reader. Most of Powers' recent work presents a bunch of nonsense without any plausible story as to how his characters acquired this information. His secret histories are so secret that not even they know how they learned these things. Hide Me Among the Graves is particularly egregious, its just a never-ending stream of folk remedies and hedge magic that practically everybody in London is deeply experienced with for no discernible reason. And this is irritating because I don't think any author can top Powers' portrayal of the abhuman wrongness of magic. pseudorandom name fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Apr 8, 2015 |
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Apr 8, 2015 18:36
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Dzhay posted:That said, why are the Ancillary books so (seemingly) popular? They're not bad, but they're not especially well-written, novel or exciting. I am not normally a sci-fi reader, but I picked up Ancillary Justice based on the fact that it won so many awards. I came away with the same impression - it wasn't bad, but it wasn't amazing. The most recent sci fi I really loved was Embassytown, and this couldn't even come close to that. I will say that what struck me as a someone who doesn't go for sci fi books normally, was that Ancillary Justice was very accessible. The most complicated part of it was the non-gender language and it's explained pretty explicitly right at the beginning. As I was reading, I could easily picture everything as a movie or TV series. The whole thing was just really ... straightforward without too much  I dunno if that's the reason it was more widely popular, but it's definitely something that stood out to me. Even if I didn't think it was the greatest of literature I still found it an entertaining read even though I'm not normally all that into spaceships and aliens and all that.
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Apr 8, 2015 18:48
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I got through it, but only because I was "Welp, only a 100 pages left, might as well finish it." Did not care for Ancillary Justice at all personally.
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Apr 8, 2015 20:12
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Entertainment was certainly ancillary.
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Apr 8, 2015 20:40
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Tim Powers is the platinum standard. He's actually a pretty cool guy in person too. He was guest of honor one year at a con I help run, illogiCon.
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Apr 8, 2015 21:33
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pseudorandom name posted:The problem isn't that his magic system is opaque, the problem is that there's no reasonable explanation as to how any of his characters know any of this stuff. Are you really asking why ordinary people would know and believe in folk magic?
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Apr 8, 2015 21:35
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Just a heads up for the airport fiction loving sci fi people, apparently the new Joe Ledger book came out this week. Called Predator-One. Supposed to be about drones or AI or something. Considering the last book was about aliens this is not a stretch. Off to get my read on 
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Apr 8, 2015 22:17
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Effectronica posted:Are you really asking why ordinary people would know and believe in folk magic? I'm asking how their knowledge could possibly be widespread, accurate and effectual given the in the world Powers' presents, magic is generally unknown and treated as distasteful and to be avoided by those actually in the know.
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Apr 8, 2015 23:35
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pseudorandom name posted:I'm asking how their knowledge could possibly be widespread, accurate and effectual given the in the world Powers' presents, magic is generally unknown and treated as distasteful and to be avoided by those actually in the know. Because that's not a universal condition of his novels, and, for example, the Fault Lines books are largely about the subcultures that lie underneath mainstream American society. It's mainly a condition in Declare, which has multiple reasons for that worldview, and The Anubis Gates, which then refutes that position with the ending of the novel. People tend to sum them up this way because they're very tilted towards the horrific and grotesque, but it's not a particularly accurate worldview of his.
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Apr 8, 2015 23:41
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Also "Previously ignorant person falls into hidden occult world" is specifically, like, Kootie's whole narrative in Expiration Date. And everyone else has reasons for their knowledge. Also really if any city is going to have a secret sub-culture built around earning longevity by eating ghosts it would be Hollywood.
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Apr 9, 2015 00:45
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Mars4523 posted:Technically Iron Sunrise is about a secret agent woman. A lot of people thought Iron Sunrise was a good Stross book but I thought aside from the concept of the Eschaton it was all pretty bland and forgettable. Aside from the secret agent woman getting naked and jerking a guy off to defuse a bomb and the 16 year old female character sleeping with some 60 year old guy I remember that.
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Apr 9, 2015 11:00
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I've almost finished KJ Parker's first Engineer book, Devices and Desires. Good recommendation, thread. I'm really enjoying it, the world is there without exposition that feels forced. I'm a fan of the Monte Cristo+++ vengeance plot and seeming lack of actual magic, too. However, the local library doesn't have the second book. Is it reasonable to just read the third or should I track down a copy of the second?
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Apr 9, 2015 11:24
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Neurosis posted:Aside from the secret agent woman getting naked and jerking a guy off to defuse a bomb and the 16 year old female character sleeping with some 60 year old guy I remember that. wait, what You're sure you're not remembering some Heinlein book instead?
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Apr 9, 2015 16:43
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GTD Aquitaine posted:wait, what No, that's in there, though she doesn't actually jack the guy off (it's a ploy to get close to him to grab the deadmans switch on a nuke) and Wednesday is older than 16 - she's 16 when they leave the station in the prologue, the story starts a few years later (and the 60 year old has had rejuvenation treatment so biologically he's in his 30s; said secret agent is pushing 300 and is married to a guy in his early 100s as I recall) I more remember to book for having plausible super weapons and the fact that there isn't really a "bad guy" so much as a bunch of factions who are all ethically bad but working at cross purposes towards a good-ish end. I liked it, but I understand why he isn't going back to that series, given the ending there isn't much more that can happen beyond "gods go to war, we run like ants" on causality violating steroids.
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Apr 9, 2015 18:40
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I'm 21 now, and I just finished re-reading His Dark Materials. I read them when I was 12 and ever since have said they are my favourite books, and after re-reading them I can say that is definitely the case. The emotions and the wonder I felt at 12 was just as much now. When I put down the Amber Spyglass I lay on my bed inconsolable for half an hour at the heartache and the ambition in the story. I've heard Pullman is meant to be publishing Book of Dust next year and that will be nice to read. I think the HDM trilogy might be the first time I've finished a series of books and accepted that they're over. There could not be a fourth book directly tacked on to the trilogy because the story is so complete. I really love them.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:14
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I still really like Northern Lights but those books do get progressively worse. I feel he's really bit more than he can chew with the third one especially.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:16
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LemonyTang posted:I'm 21 now, and I just finished re-reading His Dark Materials. I read them when I was 12 and ever since have said they are my favourite books, and after re-reading them I can say that is definitely the case. The emotions and the wonder I felt at 12 was just as much now. When I put down the Amber Spyglass I lay on my bed inconsolable for half an hour at the heartache and the ambition in the story. I read the trilogy as an adult and really enjoyed it as well, I was pretty sad with how badly they hosed up the movie.
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Apr 9, 2015 19:34
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anilEhilated posted:I still really like Northern Lights but those books do get progressively worse. I feel he's really bit more than he can chew with the third one especially. I'm with you on this to an extent but for me it's only the last that fell apart. A bit like Narnia, really... I finally finished the Fencer trilogy and I'm not sure how I feel about it. Thematically the ending seemed note perfect but the lack of real closure and cast almost entirely being killed off screen, apparently makes it hard to say I liked it. It was worth finishing, one started I would say.
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Apr 9, 2015 20:07
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rchandra posted:I've almost finished KJ Parker's first Engineer book, Devices and Desires. Good recommendation, thread. I'm really enjoying it, the world is there without exposition that feels forced. I'm a fan of the Monte Cristo+++ vengeance plot and seeming lack of actual magic, too. However, the local library doesn't have the second book. Is it reasonable to just read the third or should I track down a copy of the second? You definitely need to read the second book--the third book is perhaps readable on its own but it will be confusing, as new characters and sub plots show up and the second book continues to advance the plot. I've definitely read trilogies where the second book felt padded but Engineer was not one of them. See if inter-library loan can help you out.
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Apr 9, 2015 20:36
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I finished the second book in the Agent Cormac series (The Line of Polity). Finally I've decided to keep reading the Cormac series before going for the Spatterjay books (and, in any case, I could ever jump to those ones as the history line is different). My general impression is good. The book is enjoyable, decently fast paced and the Polity Universe shows quite good potential, being something close to a may-be Culture in the making. The good things: Cormac is not James Bond in space, and the technology serves the plot quite well. Some of the subplots are interesting as well. The not-so-good things: the bad guys are quite cartoonish. The first book has the same problem, although in this one is a little bit worse, since the motivations of the main badass are never clear. The religious zealots are also absolutely common place, and behave just like is expected from... religious zealots. The "storytelling" at the beginning of each chapter is a little bit tiresome, and the "surprise" that tries to justify it at the end of the book is, well, bland. The main characters are also quite flat (perhaps the more interesting one is Stanton), and it is difficult to empathyze with any of them. I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good space opera story with good world building.
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Apr 9, 2015 20:52
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GTD Aquitaine posted:wait, what Nope, and it's better than that because the guy has deliberately infected himself with syphilis as part of a performance art piece to make himself the living reincarnation of Idi Amin.
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Apr 9, 2015 21:19
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LemonyTang posted:I'm 21 now, and I just finished re-reading His Dark Materials. I read them when I was 12 and ever since have said they are my favourite books, and after re-reading them I can say that is definitely the case. The emotions and the wonder I felt at 12 was just as much now. When I put down the Amber Spyglass I lay on my bed inconsolable for half an hour at the heartache and the ambition in the story. There's an ebook (short?) called The Collectors. If you liked HDM (like I did, read them 2 or 3 times and just bought a GORGEOUS adult HB edition that contains all three) you might like the Chaos Walking series as a good follow-up. About the only YA trilogy in recent years that even comes close to HDM.
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Apr 9, 2015 21:35
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Jedit posted:Nope, and it's better than that because the guy has deliberately infected himself with syphilis as part of a performance art piece to make himself the living reincarnation of Idi Amin. What book is this? It sounds extremely crazy, but in a way that makes me wanna check it out.
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Apr 9, 2015 21:43
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Iron Sunrise by Charles Stross. It's a loose sequel to Singularity Sky. So you might want to read that first, fortunately that's also worth reading.
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Apr 9, 2015 22:28
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Ahh Yes posted:Goons, help me find a book that I want to re-read! Sounds like Adam Christopher's The Burning Dark.
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Apr 9, 2015 23:05
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occamsnailfile posted:You definitely need to read the second book--the third book is perhaps readable on its own but it will be confusing, as new characters and sub plots show up and the second book continues to advance the plot. I've definitely read trilogies where the second book felt padded but Engineer was not one of them. See if inter-library loan can help you out. Thanks. Inter-library loan is actually how I got the first/third; I'll check bookstores.
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Apr 10, 2015 01:22
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Can anyone recommend some Clive Barker for me? I've read The Great and Secret Show (purchased the sequel, can't wait until it gets here), Weaveworld, and the Hellbound Heart. I disliked the Damnation Game enough to drop it down the return slot of the local library along with a couple of others.
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Apr 10, 2015 16:09
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Rough Lobster posted:Can anyone recommend some Clive Barker for me? I've read The Great and Secret Show (purchased the sequel, can't wait until it gets here), Weaveworld, and the Hellbound Heart. I disliked the Damnation Game enough to drop it down the return slot of the local library along with a couple of others. Oh man, if you haven't read his short stories, you're in for a treat http://www.amazon.com/Books-Blood-Vols-Clive-Barker/dp/0425165582
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Apr 10, 2015 16:12
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Just as long as you're aware that they're closer to Damnation Game than the long-winded pseudomysticbabble he likes so much now. But yeah, they're probably his best work.
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Apr 10, 2015 16:23
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All of Clive Barker's short story collections are pretty excellent, I would also recommend The Inhuman Condition in addition to the Books of Blood.
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Apr 10, 2015 19:02
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I quite like the Books of Blood because the first story is about the ghost-hunting department of my old university.
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Apr 10, 2015 19:39
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Rough Lobster posted:Can anyone recommend some Clive Barker for me? I've read The Great and Secret Show (purchased the sequel, can't wait until it gets here), Weaveworld, and the Hellbound Heart. I disliked the Damnation Game enough to drop it down the return slot of the local library along with a couple of others. Imajica sorts the Barker fan wheat from the chaff
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Apr 10, 2015 19:41
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