|
Libluini posted:There are also the stealth ships the Mesan Alignment uses, those are assholishly effective. Which is why some scientist in one of the latest books successfully defects and the Manticorans will have this technology soon, too. It's been a while since I read those books but IIRC the defecting scientist knew about the 'spider' drive, but wasn't actually involved in developing it. The Manticorans will probably space magic their way into figuring it out anyway though. e: Beaten with a rubber hose 
WarLocke fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Feb 3, 2016 |
#
?
Feb 3, 2016 19:44
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 29, 2024 07:00 |
|
|
Darkrenown posted:The same massive serf army has also spent all year being retrained and officered by the Church Guard, who are pretty decent, and will probably get the first run of new rifles and artillery which should stop Charis from marching into Zion any time soon. Of course not - it's only book 8. He wants it to go to at least 10, remember? Again, in terms of time/pages spent on the subject, that thread has been effectively dropped. If he really meant for the social upheaval to be the primary driver of Charis' victory - which he literally stated in an earlier book - he needs to put more time into it. Instead, we've had 8 books not talking about it and instead jerking off how militarily Charis can't lose. Just because he hasn't explicitly in-text denied a particular statement doesn't mean we can't discuss it in the context of the rest of the work. WarLocke posted:e: Beaten with a rubber hose I feel like I need to preface all of my statements with "it's okay if you still like it, WarLocke, but *wall of criticism*"  Psion fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Feb 3, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 3, 2016 20:21
|
|
|
In good book news, I read Gentleman Jole and The Red Queen and I really enjoyed it, but I do have to say - most of Bujold's work can stand on her strengths of realizing fully developed characters, so you can "jump in" almost anywhere, but I'd say ever since Memory that's held less and less true despite her skills at characters being as good as ever. Gentleman Jole, though, is very definitely the book you should read last. If I had to summarize it in one word without spoilers, it'd be simple: closure. If I had to say more, I'd say I sympathize for the person who had to write the copy for the dustjacket, because ... well. Read it yourself, or I can put a block of spoilers in this or the sci-fi thread, where it'd probably be a better fit.
|
|
#
?
Feb 3, 2016 20:41
|
|
|
Psion posted:I feel like I need to preface all of my statements with "it's okay if you still like it, WarLocke, but *wall of criticism*" I can't help that I have lovely taste in books. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 3, 2016 20:46
|
|
|
Currently rereading the HH series and the Safehold series because I hate myself.
|
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2016 05:07
|
|
|
Space Monster posted:Currently rereading the HH series and the Safehold series because I hate myself. That's only mildly disliking yourself. Hate is that fuckin' vampire book.
|
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2016 17:37
|
|
|
Psion posted:That's only mildly disliking yourself. Hate is that fuckin' vampire book. I read somewhere that Out of the Black was based on an earlier short story, so now I imagine that the front 90% is just random filler Weber added to make it an actual book. Kind of like what he did with In Fury Born, only that book actually turned out pretty well (for what is is; the 'filler' actually felt appropriate and furthered the plot, but if you didn't like the original novella it was still more of the same).
|
|
#
?
Feb 4, 2016 19:33
|
|
|
Psion posted:That's only mildly disliking yourself. Hate is that fuckin' vampire book. Safehold's a fine light reading series, in my opinion. Don't hesitate to skip over the parts that bore you - every book after the first has at least half a dozen chapters you can skip without missing anything.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2016 04:14
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:Safehold's a fine light reading series, in my opinion. Don't hesitate to skip over the parts that bore you - every book after the first has at least half a dozen chapters you can skip without missing anything. God, do they. Every time we get another smug "meanwhile, back in Charis, some boring old fuckers talk about the weapon improvements they'll be using to slaughter hapless targets NEXT BOOK" my eyes glaze over.
|
|
#
?
Feb 5, 2016 09:26
|
|
|
Libluini posted:Perry Rhodan, the German SF-series I've grown up with, does this too. It's written by dozens of different (some good, some bad) authors over the time and the series has seen countless important characters come and go. Some were around for literally decades of publishing and thousands of in-series years, only to suddenly have reality catch up to them and murder their immortal asses. (Perry Rhodan and 1-2 over very important characters are the only ones still left from the 60s and that's only because the series would end with them dead.) I've heard about Perry Rhodan off-and-on for a long time and kinda half-heartedly wondered about getting into it. Unsure of the availability of the material stateside. That does sound entertainingly batshit, though.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 06:05
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/Haikasoru/status/696827153090895872
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 12:14
|
|
|
The third Red Rising book is out now.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 17:28
|
|
|
PupsOfWar posted:I've heard about Perry Rhodan off-and-on for a long time and kinda half-heartedly wondered about getting into it. I looked around and could only find the oldest stuff, it's caught in licensing hell afaik.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 21:09
|
|
|
Washout posted:I looked around and could only find the oldest stuff, it's caught in licensing hell afaik. Years ago I checked this and there was an American version at about the halfway-mark compared with the main series. What happened to that? Perry Rhodan-SF has basically no overlap with other SF, what kind of licensing trouble could they run into?
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 21:54
|
|
|
rafikki posted:The third Red Rising book is out now. I just finished binge reading it after starting as soon as I was back from work, not perfect but pretty drat good and definitely worth the wait.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 22:12
|
|
|
Libluini posted:Years ago I checked this and there was an American version at about the halfway-mark compared with the main series. What happened to that? Perry Rhodan-SF has basically no overlap with other SF, what kind of licensing trouble could they run into? The rights were sold to some company that sold it to someone else that went bankrupt etc. Wikipedia talks a lot about it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 9, 2016 23:54
|
|
|
Washout posted:The rights were sold to some company that sold it to someone else that went bankrupt etc. Wikipedia talks a lot about it. I've been reading the English article and wow, I didn't know George Lucas was inspired by Perry Rhodan. Not bad for a series which couldn't take root in the English speaking world. Also I knew about the Brazilian, Russian and Japanese versions, but I hadn't known the series also got Chinese, French and Dutch versions. My personal favourite are the people who secretly translated some issues into Hebrew, accidentally creating highly sought after collector's items in Israel. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 00:46
|
|
|
Khizan posted:These books are basically Aubrey and Maturin in spaaaaaaaaaace, if that's your kind of thing.  Leary and his hatefuck relationship with that noble chick, or how every other officer in his leet are utter nincompoops who need to be taught to do things like "use cover" and "use flanking maneuvers".I mean maybe if you just count words, there'd be enough repetition of the same boring poo poo to match the amount of detail in the A&M books, but no, no way, not at all, nuh-uh.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 01:07
|
|
|
coyo7e posted:No way, A&M novels never repeat themselves without a good reason, and they spend a hell of a lot of time on the minor details of shipboard life. Neither of those are demonstrated in anything involving Blackjack I think you're thinking of Geery, not Leary.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 01:40
|
|
|
Arbite posted:I think you're thinking of Geery, not Leary. Almost, but it's Geary, not "Geery".
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 14:03
|
|
|
coyo7e posted:No way, A&M novels never repeat themselves without a good reason, and they spend a hell of a lot of time on the minor details of shipboard life. Neither of those are demonstrated in anything involving Blackjack Are you sure you're not thinking of John G. Hemry's godawful Lost Fleet series, not David Drake's RCN?
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 16:35
|
|
|
Arbite posted:I think you're thinking of Geery, not Leary. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 20:12
|
|
|
The Campbell/Hemry books have no redeeming value? I am currently reading the short story collection 'Armored', and there is a story by him in it which was decent. I am on a Space Opera / Mil Sf reading kick right now, and was half thinking about picking one up.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 20:12
|
|
|
FoldOgey posted:The Campbell/Hemry books have no redeeming value? I am currently reading the short story collection 'Armored', and there is a story by him in it which was decent. I am on a Space Opera / Mil Sf reading kick right now, and was half thinking about picking one up. Geary's adventures in emasculating the evil Syndics and encountering strange aliens (and shooting them) aren't that bad. They're nice to read occasionally, but don't expect master pieces of SF. For Mil SF they're about standard. The later series with the aliens in it is a lot better then the first one, though.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 20:17
|
|
|
Just don't read more than one at a time, or the couple of bits he repeats in every book will drive you mad.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2016 22:41
|
|
|
chrisoya posted:Just don't read more than one at a time, or the couple of bits he repeats in every book will drive you mad. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2016 05:26
|
|
|
rafikki posted:The third Red Rising book is out now. Read the first book over xmas and enjoyed it, but without spoiling anything, does the scope expand in the sequels or does it remain a Hunger/Ender's Game(s) mish-mash?
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2016 12:18
|
|
|
Junkenstein posted:Read the first book over xmas and enjoyed it, but without spoiling anything, does the scope expand in the sequels or does it remain a Hunger/Ender's Game(s) mish-mash? Expands to encompass the solar system, but mostly stays on our side of the asteroid belt.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2016 19:38
|
|
|
Junkenstein posted:Read the first book over xmas and enjoyed it, but without spoiling anything, does the scope expand in the sequels or does it remain a Hunger/Ender's Game(s) mish-mash? Not to really spoil anything, there is a two year time skip between the first and second books with the main character's concerns and interests very much expanding in scope.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2016 21:38
|
|
|
The new Safehold book turned up in my local library and I'm chewing through it. So far I think it's better than the last couple: there's a sense of danger and challenge confronting the Imperial Army that there wasn't previously, and the really interesting stuff has come from a couple guns on the mantlepiece finally firing and adding some depth to the world's mythology and what happened in Safehold's early years. Also if you love Civil War-style land campaigns in extravagantly detailed winter/subarctic conditions, this book is for you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 00:34
|
|
|
Finished Hell's Foundations Quiver, the newest Safehold book. Less impressive than it sounds considering the size of the book: the first third or so of the book is pretty good Weber material, answering a lot of questions, firing some chekov's guns and laying more, and filling in Safehold's backstory nicely. The problem with the book is that this is only the first third or so. Once the snow melts in Haven and the book starts talking about HMS Dreadnought, you can safely put the book down. The rest of the book is some of the most transparent padding I've ever seen. Stuff happens, sure, but it's completely inconsequential stuff that didn't need half the attention devoted to it that Weber gives. Nothing happens that didn't begin earlier in the book or even in the last one, and the Empire suffers a defeat - a defeat the book assures us is a very big deal before immediately going on to make it irrelevant. You'd think more time would be spent on interesting things mentioned only in passing like the Desnairian Empire dropping out of the war and deciding it didn't like the Church much anyway - and no, the Desnairian naval commanders who defected to Charis two or three books ago haven't reappeared - or continuing the interesting discoveries about Aivah and the suggestion that she might be in love with Merlin, but nope. One of the main reasons I follow the series is because despite how oh-so-perfect they are, I actually do like and have become attached to characters like Cayleb and Nahrman and Merlin. Unfortunately, Merlin is one of the few characters who has any real presence in this book: Merlin, Dunkyn Yairley (now Baron Sarmouth because of course he is), Earl Thirsk, Allayn Maigwair, and Zhaspar Clyntahn are the only real personalities in this book who aren't introduced and ultimately killed off in this same book. On the whole, I'm frustrated with Weber and am glad I checked it out from the library rather than bought it. The first third or so of the book is pretty good for a Safehold book. Then Weber realized he'd advanced the plot sufficiently for one book and decided to keep writing anyway.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 12:19
|
|
|
Thank you for, after temporarily toying with my hopes in that first post, strongly renewing my decision to not give anything Weber writes my time and money anymore
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 12:49
|
|
|
I say again: the first third of the book is pretty good. The Empire is winning, sure, but there's a pretty good atmosphere of this being their last chance to make and keep solid gains before the Temple gets the Harchongese Army into the field with weapons on par with - if not better than - the Imperial Army, which forces Eastshare and Green Valley into taking major risks and overextending themselves. The Imperial Navy likewise is starting to suffer real losses, particularly from the Dohlarans. Aivah/Nynian also gets her big reveal of what's really going on with her and her organization, and it's less cliche than I was expecting while also toning down the "She's just TOO good at everything" thoughts I had about her. It also adds a lot more to Safehold's backstory. I can even buy the suggestion that she's in love with Merlin, given the circumstances. Again, though, that's all confined to the first third of the book. At any rate, here's what happens for anyone who doesn't want to slog through the book themselves: 1. The Imperial Army has pushed the Army of God almost completely out of Siddarmark during the winter, liberating many of the concentration camps, but the Harchongese Army is coming and it has better rifles than the Imperials, excellent leadership and organization, rocket artillery that the Imperials don't, and otherwise comparable weapons with far greater numbers. 2. Rebellion is brewing in Chisholm by an alliance of nobles determined to unseat Sharleyan. 3. Desnair has completely dropped out of the war and is said to be in a state of military collapse. The Desnairians apparently were never fond of the Church, and between their own losses and the Empire demonstrating that the Church isn't invincible, Desnair has effectively turned neutral. 4. Dohlar is also seriously considering changing sides due to the Inquisition's extremism. The book ends with Merlin and Nimue saving Earl Thirsk's family from the Inquisition and then paying Thirsk a personal visit. 5. The Group of Four is breaking down. Nynian's organization is now actively supported by Merlin and company, and has left a couple sizable craters in Zion. Maigwair may or may not be considering a military coup against the Inquisition, but Clyntahn is preparing an Inquisition coup against the army. 6. Seijin Kohdy, a recurring joke character of a mythical seijin, turns out to have been quite real: he was a Terran Federation marine brainwashed by Langhorne and friends, and given high-tech equipment to hunt the rebels during the War Against the Fallen, which gets substantially expanded on. Kohdy's real memories ended up resurfacing, at which point Langhorne and friends murdered him and expunged him from church records. 7. But they missed a few. Aivah/Nynian turns out to be one of the leaders of a secretive monastic order in the mainland who preserve the truth of Seijin Kohdy and from his journal know bits and pieces of the truth of Safehold. They're Aivah's real power base and how she figured out Merlin. She and the other leader of her order are brought into the Inner Circle, and Aivah is strongly suggested to be in love with Merlin. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 16:19 on Feb 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 12:56
|
|
|
chrisoya posted:Just don't read more than one at a time, or the couple of bits he repeats in every book will drive you mad. Oh come on, I love hearing about how battlecruisers have the firepower of battleships and the speed of cruisers, but sacrifice armor to get those two capabilities!
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 21:02
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:Events Yeah, but that middle 2/3rds where nothing is happening is, at a guess, 500+ paperback pages? I'd think about checking back in if i could find it in a library or something, but i'm absolutely sick of Gurm-esq PoV characters that exist to soak up pages by standing around during important events before they die off for pathos in the same book they were introduced in. So, uh, thank you for reading it so i don't have to.
|
|
#
?
Feb 12, 2016 23:21
|
|
|
Ceebees posted:Yeah, but that middle 2/3rds where nothing is happening is, at a guess, 500+ paperback pages? I'd think about checking back in if i could find it in a library or something, but i'm absolutely sick of Gurm-esq PoV characters that exist to soak up pages by standing around during important events before they die off for pathos in the same book they were introduced in. The meat of the book is political maneuvering between Maigwair and Clyntahn in Zion, and a big, drawn-out naval adventure that ends in an Imperial fleet getting sunk and the survivors being put into prison ships for transfer to Zion until Merlin and Nimue rescue them. One little thing I did like was a bunch of the enemy naval commanders from Off Armageddon Reef showing up in this book as Imperial naval officers - the guys in charge of the Chisholm, Tarot, and Emerald fleets in previous books all crop up as captains or admirals of the Imperial Navy in this one and Admiral Tartarian from Corisande is intending to join the Imperial Navy once the Corisandian military integrates into the Empire. Chisholm is getting set up for a rebellion, and I'll be surprised if Weber doesn't intend to have Corisandian!Imperial troops be the ones to fight it for drama purposes.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2016 00:26
|
|
|
Your point that all the good stuff - or at least, events worth noting - happens at the start is what got me with that book. I read the preview chapters and was like "hey. Hey. There's potential here! fuckin' finally" and then I got to the rest of the book the preview chapters didn't cover. I swear he did it on purpose.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2016 01:51
|
|
|
coyo7e posted:This is incredibly true, he repeats himself so often that I had to stop listening to the audio version of one of the geary books, I think I forced myself through 3 or 4 before I just hated it so much i can't go back. Yeah, my personal rating for dumb space battle series is probably something like: 1. RCN stuff by David Drake. Yeah sure the protagonist is some sort of savant as a commander and his sidekick can just magic problems away because she's such a computer wiz, but damnit, I just enjoy the supporting cast and the setting, okay? There are several small touches in the setting that I really enjoy, like the idea that non-commissioned spacers are kind of mercenary because if you're on a space ship, you kinda want that ship to survive, even if you got pressganged into it initially. Which is played with when the protagonist nation ends up basically imprisoning spacers between deployments to make sure they don't sign up with a merchant ship or something else less dangerous. 2. Lost Fleet stuff. Every book is the same! The space battles are enjoyable enough and I enjoy the setting conceit except none of the lessons Geary brings from the past ever stick and so every book is the same again. The protagonist is always right because he is always presented with the same loving problem. Somehow this is a different type of writing problem than the one that makes Honor always succeed. Decent enough page-turners by themselves, they're really annoying to read in series. Moderately decent supporting cast. Seriously feels like he just repeats setting information to pad his word count. 3. Honor Harrington God, I still want all that time back reading those. The protagonist is perfect, the supporting cast is completely forgettable (I hate that) and eventually the space battles just get loving boring, samey numberfests. When Leary got to take part in a larger fleet action, it was an exception in the series. In Weber's series, thousands of people die every book. It's ridiculous. At least the Republic/Alliance war in Drake's books seems sufficiently slow paced, and both nations large enough, that I don't have to wonder about the public perception of all this loving loss of life. It's desensitizing. I can forgive a lot in a series if at least the protagonist gets an interesting cast to bounce off of. Psykmoe fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Feb 13, 2016 |
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2016 20:36
|
|
|
You know, I didn't even think of this. Both Manticore and Haven have lost multiple millions of people in their stupid wars against each other and in the case of Haven it ended with destabilizing their government bad enough for two loving revolutions in a row. But the far smaller Star Kingdom of Manticore not only lost a lot of people too, they're now in a war against the largest star nation ever and that war started with a giant battle killing again boatloads of people even on Manticore's side. I swear, if it weren't for the real life example of that one weird South American country fighting until most of their male population was dead, this would be really hard to swallow. Then I remember the Solarian League is apparently going to split apart in go down in civil war because of the losses caused by fighting the Manticoran Alliance (+stealthy shenannigans in the background), while the MA just shrugs off the destruction of their industry and starts rebuilding immediately. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2016 12:04
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 29, 2024 07:00 |
|
|
There's are billions of people on each planet, to be fair. That means that Manticore has lost maybe 1% of its population, and gained far more by annexing neigbouring star systems.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2016 14:41
|
|