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Thanks for all the suggestions! And now for comething completely different:Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:Sci fi style, you have the Breach series by Patrick Lee. There's only 3? books in it, but all of em are pretty good. The last one is a bit of a mindfuck though. Basic premise is weird poo poo falls out of a hole in the universe, and bad things happen while a group of people try to stop them from happening while not knowing what the gently caress the breach actually is. It's one of those good, rare series where the government isn't this all knowing all encompassing badass and the good guys have unlimited funding and everything works great HOOAH. It's more like "We dunno wtf is going on, so it's kinda hard to request budgeting when we have a room of self replicating paper that weighs 4 tons per sheet, so what the gently caress would YOU put on the requisition form?" kind of levels of "Government has some sort of control on what's going on but don't expect there to be any answers to any questions cause there's a hole in the universe and basically we are all playing it by ear".  The POV character spends maybe three pages per book actually interacting with the organisation (which does indeed have unlimited funding) and doesn't sign a single requisition form. Does anyone have any recommendations for the SCP-meets-The-Laundry flavour this book promised but left undelivered?
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Feb 5, 2017 22:04
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fritz posted:For reasons I don't fully understand I decided to give the first of the 'Witcher' books a try and: it's super gross, don't read it. I genuinely cannot recall which story you might be referring to.
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Feb 6, 2017 03:38
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GreyjoyBastard posted:I genuinely cannot recall which story you might be referring to. The Beauty-and-the-Beast one.
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Feb 6, 2017 03:50
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fritz posted:The Beauty-and-the-Beast one. I disagree with your assessment, not least because part of the implicit point is that he is fundamentally a lot like other shitbag nobles who are more visually usual. If Geralt is gonna shank every shitbag noble he is made aware of, that is outside of his job description, a big job, and a suicide mission. (And so he doesn't)
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Feb 6, 2017 04:04
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darkgray posted:Dawn of Wonder is super Christian, so your enjoyment might be relative to how religious you are. I made it through the entire thing, but felt almost offended by how the author decided to wrap up the tedious trauma issue, after making it such a vital part of the protagonist. Mostly it's just sad to watch the kid act like a complete idiot throughout the entire novel, while everyone around him praises his supreme genius. I can't think of a single worse plot element I've ever read than the whole trauma thing. From the "Oh it only happens in this very specific scenario which is why it hasn't happened before" to "complete instant impact" and finally landing on dues ex machina resolution. Hardly the books only problem but man that one issue was so grating.
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Feb 6, 2017 04:35
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Apraxin posted:Reaching back a few pages, but I got this based on the thread recommendations and have been really enjoying it so far. BUT... I'm about a third through now, at the section where Aedan's at the preliminary marshal school exam in Castath and suddenly out of nowhere we meet this cardboard cut-out of an ivory tower liberal professor who is literally introduced with 'he loved questionable cultures and hated intolerance', gets irrationally mad at Aedan for not being tolerant of the slaving, blood-sacrificing Lekrans, and then tries to fail him on the exam but is overruled by the other faculty, who tell him 'sir, your love of tolerance goes too far!'. That won't happen until the next book though. Also FWIW, I never noticed the "super-christian" overtones which another posted mentioned. If I had I would probably have been more annoyed - since I was a protestant who was forced to go a through catholic high school... Also everything darkgray recommended, I literally included in my rundown of why i thought the book was pretty fun if sticking to well-known tropes, and I literally name-dropped every book he recommended, in the post that he quotedin lieu of the Dawn of Wonder series.. I'm not saying it's amazing, but if your best argument against is "it's way jesusy" with no backup, followed by listing everything I already mentioned - welp  darkgray posted:Thanks, but I've already made it through those, and Farseer, and Vorkosigan, and Locke Lamora. Even Harry Potter. Bhodi posted:I'm partway through the third book and so far it's a lot more like the first than the second, but things haven't gotten really bad yet, that stuff in the second book was a bit much for me as well, but I like the writing enough that I'm going to continue and so far the third book is OK. The latter books are also brutal but they are a lot headier. I need to go back through 3 and 4 again because it was so loving complex I'm pretty sure I muddled a lot of what happened - and why. But it deffo reached levels of wild that eclipsed Heinlein and began to threaten R . A. Wilson by the end of that series holy gently caress what a great ride!  nessin posted:I can't think of a single worse plot element I've ever read than the whole trauma thing. From the "Oh it only happens in this very specific scenario which is why it hasn't happened before" to "complete instant impact" and finally landing on dues ex machina resolution. Hardly the books only problem but man that one issue was so grating.  glad to have you join the conversation! We can't forget the armchair-general MRAs out there and their insecure feelings who still feel that PTSD only happens to soldiers in active combat situations
coyo7e fucked around with this message at 06:18 on Feb 6, 2017 |
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Feb 6, 2017 06:13
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Huh.
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Feb 6, 2017 06:53
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coyo7e posted:The second book WAS entirely loving brutal (keep in mind the author suffered a pretty close parity of Caine's injuries - before he wrote it, and was actively recovering IRL while he was writing that book.. Which would be amazingly frustrating for a martial-artist). is about loving right, I'm really glad someone here got me to keep going after the 2nd-- the reviews sort of made me feel like it might be better to stop at 2 (which I read in about a day and a half, which, you know how big that book is?) and not drag things down. But nah, it took going all the way to the end for me to formulate some thoughts about the purpose of the story and the ways in which it both succeeded and didn't helped me look at something I was doing creatively at the time, and feel a lot better about both what it was and how I was doing it.Bonus: going the whole way helped me get really mad at reviews that are wholly and entirely focused on what a badass the character is (and disappointment that he does things like 'have emotions') because wooooowie if that's your takeaway from that series.
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Feb 6, 2017 08:43
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What's wrong with not liking something that "way Jesusy"? It's drat near top of my list of reasons to can something.
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Feb 6, 2017 08:49
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GreyjoyBastard posted:I disagree with your assessment, not least because part of the implicit point is that he is fundamentally a lot like other shitbag nobles who are more visually usual. Yeah I thought that story was fine too coyo7e posted:I'm not sure yet, the instructor you mention (the "limp-wristed enemy-appeaser cultural professor" is how I took that guy, but between the protagonist's own inherently racist/nationalist/personal grudges about the culture in question I think it's gonna be fairly interesting because the protagonist is going to have to travel to the nation he despises and in which he continually refused to learn the details and history and military strategies of the culture he wants to pretty much literally nuke into glass, to actually get anything useful done. Are you ok?
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Feb 6, 2017 09:01
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coyo7e posted:Congratulations on reaching a 5th-grade level of reading. Do you have anything productive or you just wanna keep trolling? Er, I was just pre-empting a slew of "try this" by mentioning similar series I've already enjoyed. And I know you mentioned the earlier titles, since it's how I found Red Rising in the first place. I just wanted to dissuade the poster from avoiding them if he didn't like Dawn of Wonder. Not sure how this came across as trolling.
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Feb 6, 2017 11:43
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Rocksicles posted:What's wrong with not liking something that "way Jesusy"? I'm an atheist but I actually really like it when SFF books engage in thoughtful discussions of how faith would interact with their fantastic premises--real faiths or made-up ones, it's just kind of interesting. Of course, 'thoughtful' is not often the method employed, and you end up with OSC rewriting the Book of Mormon with god as an ailing supercomputer and go downhill from there.
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Feb 6, 2017 18:19
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Yeah i have a good detector for preaching. I can handle theology if it's got a point to a story.
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Feb 7, 2017 05:36
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occamsnailfile posted:I'm an atheist but I actually really like it when SFF books engage in thoughtful discussions of how faith would interact with their fantastic premises--real faiths or made-up ones, it's just kind of interesting. Same, plus I have a bit of a hobbyist interest in the history of religion (as part of history in general). Interesting when done well; depressingly often done not so well.
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Feb 7, 2017 10:20
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https://twitter.com/hradzka/status/829011283508879361
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Feb 7, 2017 18:06
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Ringo is still awfull his only saving grace seems to be he acknowledge his terribleness. In contrast Kratman is uncle rico except replace highschool football qb with being an officer in the army and thinking he is a strategic genius who could have won the war on terror.
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Feb 9, 2017 02:08
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"Oh ho ho it sure is awful that I wrote a pedophilic rape fantasy. What a funny joke. Oh no I wrote four sequels with progressively more detailed child rape scenes. How hilarious it is that I did this awful thing." - John Ringo, human scum
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Feb 9, 2017 04:44
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Internet Wizard posted:"Oh ho ho it sure is awful that I wrote a pedophilic rape fantasy. What a funny joke. Oh no I wrote four sequels with progressively more detailed child rape scenes. How hilarious it is that I did this awful thing." - John Ringo, human scum Did you read them all?
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Feb 9, 2017 15:42
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Chairchucker posted:Did you read them all? I haven't read any of them, but I have read Cyrano4747's Let's Read thread about them down in TFR, and they're even more terrible than they sound.
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Feb 9, 2017 16:42
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Does anyone read any actual new authors anymore? I get weekly-ish emails from Tor with half a dozen authors I've never heard of, and see John Scalzi's Big Idea posts every week, but I never notice or remember any of these authors. Nor do I see them mentioned here or anywhere else. Are there dozens of new published authors just vanishing without a trace or am I stuck in the wrong book bubbles?
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Feb 9, 2017 22:53
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Number Ten Cocks posted:Are there dozens of new published authors just vanishing without a trace I think so. Marketing books is a hard, unsolved problem, and if your first book doesn't happen to get marketed properly by $publisher, your otherwise excellent novel (and career) may be completely sunk. See: Peter Watts and Blindsight, narrowly saved by self-publishing at the end. I don't think Tor does a good job of marketing writers who don't do a good job of marketing themselves (Scalzi, Gladstone, Stross, Hurley and other regular guest columnists come to mind.)
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Feb 10, 2017 00:34
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Number Ten Cocks posted:Does anyone read any actual new authors anymore? I get weekly-ish emails from Tor with half a dozen authors I've never heard of, and see John Scalzi's Big Idea posts every week, but I never notice or remember any of these authors. Nor do I see them mentioned here or anywhere else. Are there dozens of new published authors just vanishing without a trace or am I stuck in the wrong book bubbles? I get what you're saying, but... Right there in the second sentence of your post you illustrate two ways in which you're being exposed to new authors. Marketing can only take things so far, ultimately you have to take a chance on one of these new people being featured in the Tor emails or on Scalzi's blog. Further, goons are kind of slow to catch on to new talent. For example, I was praising Sebastian de Castell very shortly after his first book was released in the UK, and only in the last year or so have more than one or two people been talking about him in this thread. Similarly, I brought up John Gwynne a long time ago and the only thing anyone here wants to talk about are his fat dead dogs. Ultimately it's a lot more fun to dump on Martin and Rothfuss than it is to risk a few bucks on a new guy.
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Feb 10, 2017 02:36
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Ornamented Death posted:Ultimately it's a lot more fun to dump on Martin and Rothfuss than it is to risk a few bucks on a new guy. Do...people not use libraries? You get the new guys a little slower, but that way I don't have to risk money on books without knowing for certain that I want a given book in my home. That said, where do folks find new books? Is there a good centralized blog for new sci-fi releases, or am I stuck with tor.com or whatever?
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Feb 10, 2017 02:48
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StrixNebulosa posted:That said, where do folks find new books? Is there a good centralized blog for new sci-fi releases, or am I stuck with tor.com or whatever? 
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Feb 10, 2017 02:56
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StrixNebulosa posted:Do...people not use libraries? You get the new guys a little slower, but that way I don't have to risk money on books without knowing for certain that I want a given book in my home. To your first question, sadly, no. Or not nearly enough. To your second question, you can sign up for newsletters from the various publishers, though that invites spam. IO9 does an article each month on the sci-fi and fantasy releases for that month; ignoring generally-accepted wisdom, be sure to look through the comments because people post titles that weren't included on the list. I also use Amazon's "Customers also bought" feature - I'll look up a book I either have read and liked, or is coming out soon and I'm pretty sure I'll like, then just go through looking for titles that sound interesting and clicking to see if the blurb is also interesting. That's how I discovered Brian McClellan and Django Wexler.
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Feb 10, 2017 02:57
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Ornamented Death posted:To your first question, sadly, no. Or not nearly enough. Yeah, that amazon thing is typically how I find new books, but...hrm. It's disheartening that there isn't some kind of centralized book blog or something, and you have to go through the publishers instead. (It's also disheartening that I keep finding books with cool covers and they're romance or have boring blurbs.  I'd be less bummed about the romance thing if they weren't almost universally poorly written.)Still, thank you - I didn't know about the io9 thing, I'll check it out!
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Feb 10, 2017 03:06
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StrixNebulosa posted:Yeah, that amazon thing is typically how I find new books, but...hrm. It's disheartening that there isn't some kind of centralized book blog or something, and you have to go through the publishers instead. (It's also disheartening that I keep finding books with cool covers and they're romance or have boring blurbs. The tor blog is actually pretty good for new releases from all publishers, not just them, see for example: http://www.tor.com/2016/01/27/fiction-affliction-february-releases-in-fantasy-4/ There's also the Locus "Forthcoming Books" list: http://www.locusmag.com/Resources/ForthcomingBooks.html
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Feb 10, 2017 03:09
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fritz posted:There's also the Locus "Forthcoming Books" list: http://www.locusmag.com/Resources/ForthcomingBooks.html As a demonstration, here's what they list for next month: quote:Armstrong, Kelley • Lost Souls • (Subterranean Press, nvl-ya, hc) It's not at all exhaustive, but for major-ish authors it's great.
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Feb 10, 2017 03:11
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fritz posted:The tor blog is actually pretty good for new releases from all publishers, not just them, see for example: http://www.tor.com/2016/01/27/fiction-affliction-february-releases-in-fantasy-4/ Woah, I didn't know about that Locus list - I just did some googling on some of the titles and whoops, I may be reading lots of books right now but I can make room for a few more from the library... Thank you! (Luna: New Moon by Ian MacDonald seems worth a gander, basically!)
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Feb 10, 2017 03:24
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StrixNebulosa posted:Yeah, that amazon thing is typically how I find new books, but...hrm. It's disheartening that there isn't some kind of centralized book blog or something, and you have to go through the publishers instead. (It's also disheartening that I keep finding books with cool covers and they're romance or have boring blurbs. There's just too much coming out nowadays for any one centralized resource to track things, especially as you can't immediately discount self-published work anymore. Another avenue may be to find a review site that has covered books you like in the past and follow them. Again, though, there's so much coming out each month that being fully up-to-date is basically impossible. In the interest of being part of the solution rather than part of the problem, here are some authors I've discovered over the past few years that have had minimal or no discussion in this thread: Sebastian de Castell (The Greatcoats, start with Traitor's Blade) John Gwynne (The Faithful and the Fallen, start with Malice)* Luke Scull (The Grim Company, start with The Grim Company)* Peter Newman (The Vagrant, start with The Vagrant and for the love of god ignore the Amazon ratings, people are just bitching about the original hosed up ebook pricing) Jeff Salyards (Bloodsounder's Arc, start with Scourge of the Betrayer)* Chris Evans (The Iron Elves trilogy, start with A Darkness Forged in Fire)* * denotes a completed series
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Feb 10, 2017 03:31
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You could also read stuff like Clarke's World, as a lot of authors that show up there with regularity will usually get a novel deal down the line. Then when you hear about their novel coming out, you've usually read 5+ of their shorts already and know if you'll be into it or not.
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Feb 10, 2017 04:37
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Ornamented Death posted:
Word of warning about Vagrant, the sequel completely changes the formula and goes back to a more traditional plot with an effectively all new cast. Really soured me on it although I expect it's still a good book. First book was great though.
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Feb 10, 2017 06:30
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Ornamented Death posted:There's just too much coming out nowadays for any one centralized resource to track things, especially as you can't immediately discount self-published work anymore. Another avenue may be to find a review site that has covered books you like in the past and follow them. Again, though, there's so much coming out each month that being fully up-to-date is basically impossible. Another way I find new authors is when I find a reviewer whose tastes seem to fall in line with my own I'll try to follow them . This happened with Mark Lawrence, I still haven't gotten around to reading the books he's himself written, but I noticed that he had the top Goodreads review on a few books I really liked from new/unknown authors, so I checked out some other new people he was really high on. Which leads to my second point, Lawrence's blog is a good place to find some of the good self published genre authors. He's been promoting a self-published "best of the best" type tournament that's been running the past couple of years on his blog, and I find checking out the titles from that leads me to some genre authors I might not have found otherwise.
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Feb 10, 2017 09:36
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http://www.tor.com/tag/fiction-affliction/ https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/author/john-denardo/ ([month]'s Must-Read) http://www.theverge.com/new-adventures http://gizmodo.com/tag/bookshelf-injection You ignorant gits.  Investigate the ones that look interesting on Amazon and check their also-boughts. Megazver fucked around with this message at 10:30 on Feb 10, 2017 |
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Feb 10, 2017 10:24
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I watched the first season of The Expanse and loved it. What caveats should I be aware of if I start reading the books? How different is the plot, background, characterization? The third book is the bad one, right? Which book will start to outpace/spoil events in the second season?
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Feb 10, 2017 15:21
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Number Ten Cocks posted:I watched the first season of The Expanse and loved it. What caveats should I be aware of if I start reading the books? How different is the plot, background, characterization? The third book is the bad one, right? Which book will start to outpace/spoil events in the second season? Book one will both go further than Season 1, but also not include stuff that's in the show. They kind of collapsed/telescoped a lot of characters and stuff in the series, but both authors are involved in the production and said this is how they would have done it in the books ideally. It's not like GoT where the seasons hew pretty close to 1:1 with the books. The only caveat I would give is that honestly the series has lost a lot of steam over the last two books for me personally, as well as a decent amount of other goon readers if the thread is to be trusted.
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Feb 10, 2017 15:56
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Inspector_666 posted:Book one will both go further than Season 1, but also not include stuff that's in the show. They kind of collapsed/telescoped a lot of characters and stuff in the series, but both authors are involved in the production and said this is how they would have done it in the books ideally. It's not like GoT where the seasons hew pretty close to 1:1 with the books. I avoided this by just skipping books 3 and 4. I've enjoyed books 1, 2 and 5. Haven't got my hands on 6 yet. I know skipping books in a series is hardly orthodox, but it's worked out for me.
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Feb 10, 2017 16:09
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Number Ten Cocks posted:I watched the first season of The Expanse and loved it. What caveats should I be aware of if I start reading the books? How different is the plot, background, characterization? The third book is the bad one, right? Which book will start to outpace/spoil events in the second season? Show is a mish-mash of book 1 and book 2 at the moment. Holden's crew and Millar's story is just past the half way mark of book one as of the end of season 1. Meanwhile, you have Avasarala appearing in Season 1 but she doesn't appear in the books till book 2. So basically, once you're done book 1, you've spoiled a good part of season 2. The plotting and characterization of the show is far better than the books. The books do a better job, obviously, of fleshing out the setting and background. That said, the show has some of the best environmental storytelling I've ever seen in a TV show.
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Feb 10, 2017 17:08
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Ornamented Death posted:For example, I was praising Sebastian de Castell very shortly after his first book was released in the UK, and only in the last year or so have more than one or two people been talking about him in this thread. De Castell's books are mediocre at their very best and verging on "outright bad", though. There's a reason nobody really talks about them.
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Feb 10, 2017 17:56
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Khizan posted:De Castell's books are mediocre at their very best and verging on "outright bad", though. There's a reason nobody really talks about them. Have you ever considered that you're wrong? This is another reason you don't see a lot of discussion of new authors: goons are waiting in the wings to tell you that you have bad tastes  .
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Feb 10, 2017 18:35
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