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Nettle Soup posted:10: The Iron Teeth - yet another story told in the "this this happened he was bored then that happened he did the thing" style, I don't know what it's called but I don't like it. It has all the same issues as the rest of them, within the first few paragraphs. I actually like this one because it's like the western version of Kumoko. Probably why I like Taint too. I get what you're saying about the writing style, but I just shrugged it off because the protagonist is non-human and explicitly lower-than-human intelligence at the start, and the story is told from his POV. A bit of an unreliable narrator too, a lot of the humor comes from reading between the lines of the character's explicit interpretations. It gets better once he "upgrades" to a human-level intelligence but still from a non-human perspective.
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Apr 17, 2017 06:57
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Just read all of unsong and it's my favorite for sure. It's genuinely funny as hell and dark too. The chapters where he just analyzes verses I generally skim. But they're not bad. And the man can actually write.
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Apr 17, 2017 08:28
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DarciisFyer posted:I actually like this one because it's like the western version of Kumoko. Probably why I like Taint too. I get what you're saying about the writing style, but I just shrugged it off because the protagonist is non-human and explicitly lower-than-human intelligence at the start, and the story is told from his POV. A bit of an unreliable narrator too, a lot of the humor comes from reading between the lines of the character's explicit interpretations. It gets better once he "upgrades" to a human-level intelligence but still from a non-human perspective. I've been reading The Iron Teeth on and off for a while and I have mixed feelings about it. The humor can be pretty great and the non-human perspective is interesting and fairly well done I think. But it feels like the author just keeps writing himself into a corner and being like 'gently caress it' and tossing the etch-a-sketch down and starting everything over for no reason. Feels like the main character just keeps going through the same motions over and over and it culminates in a big fight every time and then things just sort of 'reset' - at least Kumoko was constantly growing. The side stories don't seem to tie back to the main story meaningfully ever - they're just for world building I guess? But it's off-putting especially when the first chapter is a long interlude with little relation to anything else in the story.
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Apr 17, 2017 09:22
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Unsong's kabbalistic wankery chapters are like watching advanced equilibristics: sure, it's technically impressive that you can ride a unicycle over a tightrope, but ultimately, it's a whole lot of effort for something that isn't all that entertaining to watch. I skimmed most of them. Thankfully the bulk of them is in the beginning and the story mostly moves on to much more interesting poo poo. I recommend it.
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Apr 17, 2017 12:04
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Megazver posted:Unsong's kabbalistic wankery chapters are like watching advanced equilibristics: sure, it's technically impressive that you can ride a unicycle over a tightrope, but ultimately, it's a whole lot of effort for something that isn't all that entertaining to watch. I skimmed most of them. I agree. And it's not even that annoying. Skim the kabbalistic bits if you want. As long as you don't miss the point of the chapter then you're fine. It's usually interspersed with regular talking people and events. Some of it is even very cool.
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Apr 17, 2017 17:31
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sunken fleet posted:I've been reading The Iron Teeth on and off for a while and I have mixed feelings about it. The humor can be pretty great and the non-human perspective is interesting and fairly well done I think. But it feels like the author just keeps writing himself into a corner and being like 'gently caress it' and tossing the etch-a-sketch down and starting everything over for no reason. Feels like the main character just keeps going through the same motions over and over and it culminates in a big fight every time and then things just sort of 'reset' - at least Kumoko was constantly growing. The side stories don't seem to tie back to the main story meaningfully ever - they're just for world building I guess? But it's off-putting especially when the first chapter is a long interlude with little relation to anything else in the story. It does get repetitive in the middle, but from being fully caught up to current chapters, the prologue chapter is basically a flash-forward tied directly to the main plot. After the events in the prologue happen, there's no more resetting (yet). Side stories are world building in an oblique way, yep. The main character hears an offhand mention of a City-Killer monster and the next interlude is about a mutated unstoppable drake rampaging through a city.
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Apr 17, 2017 17:51
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I like Unsong's side chapters, mostly. They remind me of Illuminatus!, or Stand on Zanzibar- that same sort of frenetic energy and dancing between perspectives to layer all these interdependent threads into the narrative. Unsong's actual plot is a little thing. If you stripped out all the context building chapters there wouldn't be a whole lot to the story. And it doesn't help that the protagonist is pretty much a Neal Stephenson protagonist with hardcore word association skills. Not even the Lawrence type, just a Randy. Author can really write, though. Unsong is easily #3 on my list of active webnovels* * This is a thing I have now, I guess?
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Apr 17, 2017 20:59
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Autonomous Monster posted:I like Unsong's side chapters, mostly. They remind me of Illuminatus!, or Stand on Zanzibar- that same sort of frenetic energy and dancing between perspectives to layer all these interdependent threads into the narrative. You can't say that and not give the rest of your list
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Apr 17, 2017 22:23
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Nettle Soup posted:There, I finished The Gods are Bastards, it was pretty good, but not as good as Mother of Learning, much easier to make an rss feed for though Did you ever figure out how to make an rss feed for mother of learning?
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Apr 17, 2017 23:07
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The comicrocket one seems to be the closest I could find. Fictionpress offers search-filters for categories, which would limit it down to two stories to sub to, but then only lets you rss subscribe to the whole category, thousands of terrible <1000 word stories, thanks very much. It doesn't have it's own community or reddit thing. You can subscribe to the fp author page but that doesn't update when they update their stories, only when they post a brand new one, which is insane. Combined with the other little quirks it adds in, it's a stupidly awful website in general. Maybe subbing to the whole fantasy category and then filtering in your rss reader would work, but the free version of feedly I've been playing with doesn't allow you to do that, would mean setting up ttrss or something. On another note, I started working my way down the list again, clicked Twisted Cogs and haven't looked at any of the others since, this one is good, and complete I think! Nettle Soup fucked around with this message at 01:47 on Apr 18, 2017 |
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Apr 18, 2017 01:38
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I just made a FictionPress account and subscribed to it so I can get email notifications.
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Apr 18, 2017 02:41
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I use the author feed: https://www.fictionpress.com/atom/u/804592/feed It doesn't add entries like a normal feed, but still gives notification when it updates. Helps that Mother of Learning is the only work under this author.
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Apr 18, 2017 04:21
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Sampatrick posted:You can't say that and not give the rest of your list Well, alright. Keep in mind, this isn't based on anything more rigorous or objective than how much I enjoy seeing a new update, so. #1: Ze Tian Ji - It isn't even a contest. #2: Taint - This probably shouldn't be as high as it is, but it is, and we're just going to have to live with that. I do so enjoy The Continuing Adventures of Befuddled Murder Wolf Girl. #3: Unsong - As mentioned. #4: Ascendance of a Bookworm - You do good work, blastron. #5: Absolute Choice - Superlative achievements in crab dancing. #6: My Disciple Died Yet Again - This isn't as hot as it used to be, but it's still good. #7: A Practical Guide to Evil - Probably? Nothing I disliked about it has changed, but I am enjoying it more now that I've settled into it. #8: The Gods are Bastards - This one's on the way down. I am long past the point of wishing this arc would wrap up already. #9: I'm a Spider, So What?! - A courtesy placement, as it's my avatar. It's on hiatus and this last section has been a hash but I'm still looking forward to seeing where it goes next. Bunch of stuff below that I enjoy reading but doesn't excite me so much.
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Apr 18, 2017 15:22
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The Gods are Bastards is getting good again. I haven't checked in on Twig or Practical Guide since 2016 though, since I like to binge them.
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Apr 21, 2017 00:44
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DarciisFyer posted:I use the author feed: https://www.fictionpress.com/atom/u/804592/feed There was an update yesterday, this feed showed nothing for me, but the comic rocket one worked great.
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Apr 21, 2017 10:30
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Nettle Soup posted:
I read all of the Super Powereds that was out at the time (considerably less than now, apparently) a few years ago when I was pretty bored - it's actually fairly good for a web novel, since almost all of the stuff on those top web novel/serial sites are just way too awkward and cringey to read. It's not Worm or anything, but as far as written superhero fiction goes it's the closest to second place I could find (since, like web novels, most superhero fiction is pretty godawful outside of comics). Despite this though, it's probably not worth recommending to anyone who didn't want a superhero fix. The title, while stupid sounding, does make sense in the context of the story, and the overly stiff and stilted dialogue at the start there was something deliberate for those two characters (not that the rest of the dialogue is amazing or anything), and like most serials it starts off awkward and becomes better over time. Wolpertinger fucked around with this message at 11:12 on Apr 21, 2017 |
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Apr 21, 2017 11:00
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Nettle Soup posted:There was an update yesterday, this feed showed nothing for me, but the comic rocket one worked great. Yeah, it updates in a weird way, so it doesn't work on all rss apps, probably because it's been deprecated for a long time. I use feedbro on chrome, it works there. I might switch to using comic rocket though, it has Order of the Stick and its feed has been troublesome for a while.
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Apr 21, 2017 17:25
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Finished Twisted Cogs, that was pretty good, even if it had a bit of a naff ending. Reminded me a lot of all the books I read when I was about 13.
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Apr 21, 2017 22:27
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I caught up on the new series Yoraikun is translating, Dragoon it's actually pretty good, a lot better than that last series he was translating. Also another reminder for people that Sevens is a good series and you should read it. Also Shalvation was joking about translating a new webnovel on his site. *joking about translating, the webnovel and novel is real. https://shalvationtranslations.wordpress.com/2017/04/20/fur-deutschland-zu-ubersetzen-ist-unsre-hochste-ehr/ Shalvation posted:– SYNOPSIS – So as you can see, webnovels have now peaked. It's all downhill from here folks.
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Apr 24, 2017 15:52
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ShinsoBEAM! posted:Also Shalvation was joking about translating a new webnovel on his site. *joking about translating, the webnovel and novel is real.
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Apr 25, 2017 05:29
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ShinsoBEAM! posted:I caught up on the new series Yoraikun is translating, Dragoon it's actually pretty good, a lot better than that last series he was translating. Also another reminder for people that Sevens is a good series and you should read it. 
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Apr 25, 2017 20:46
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Unsong has its final chapter this Sunday if anyone wanted to get caught up in time for the end.
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May 11, 2017 01:11
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quote:Chapter 1 – I’m Hitler!!??
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May 12, 2017 20:34
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I'm finally catching up on Twig after having last stopped around Arc 10, and it is very uncomfortable to read because everything just keeps going to poo poo in various ways. Probably my one gripe about Wildbow's writing, despite considering him probably the best of the web serial authors I've read, is that he has a bad tendency to always have things go wrong and stick characters in super bad situations. It can make things a bit predictable sometimes, because you can always rely on the expectation that a plan isn't going to work. This was also a problem with Worm. I would like it if he occasionally mixed in times that the Lambs/Sy were just completely successful and everything went perfectly. To its credit, though, Twig is much better than Worm in terms of the "constant escalation" problem the latter had.The story has managed to stay more or less down to Earth, and Sy has yet to travel very far from his city or encounter any grander plots involving the King or whatever. I found it an interesting decision to have his last mission technically "with the lambs" be with Mary. In recent chapters he had grown comparatively distant with Mary relative to some of the other Lambs, so it was neat to have her get so much focus for an entire arc.
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May 15, 2017 01:21
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Ytlaya posted:I'm finally catching up on Twig after having last stopped around Arc 10, and it is very uncomfortable to read because everything just keeps going to poo poo in various ways. Is he still doing that? That's what made me stop reading Pact. It's just exhausting to read about things going wrong over and over again. You need a victory sometimes and some room to breath. I don't know how bad it is in Twig, but in Pact I remember the level of intensity just staying high for basically the second half of the story. As for constant escalation... I don't actually consider that a flaw. It's certainly something the I know some people don't like, but I actually like how Worm turned out. I find escalation to be fun, and I think it works fine as long as you know where you're ending up. (The story needs to end sometime if you're escalating, because you really can't go back down.,) But, yeah, I think it's a preference thing.
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May 15, 2017 01:59
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That's primarily why I think The Gods are Bastards is overall a much better work than Worm, even if I think Wildbow is a slightly better writer than Webb. The "everything is bad, poo poo all over the protagonists, happy endings don't exist" trend that's been going for a while in fiction needs to die an awful death; Optimism is much more enjoyable to read.
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May 15, 2017 04:49
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Unsong finished. Apparently some people had parties to celebrate. It ended on a pun, as you'd expect. I'm not sure why I kept reading it, but I guess now I can completely ignore Scott Alexander again.
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May 15, 2017 10:13
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Vateke posted:Is he still doing that? That's what made me stop reading Pact. It's just exhausting to read about things going wrong over and over again. Yep.
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May 15, 2017 11:10
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The Shortest Path posted:That's primarily why I think The Gods are Bastards is overall a much better work than Worm, even if I think Wildbow is a slightly better writer than Webb. The "everything is bad, poo poo all over the protagonists, happy endings don't exist" trend that's been going for a while in fiction needs to die an awful death; Optimism is much more enjoyable to read. Yup. This is exactly why I just can't get into Game of Thrones.
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May 15, 2017 22:46
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To be fair to ASoIaF, it was what pretty much started that phase and can't be blamed for other works also doing it. I guess.
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May 16, 2017 00:06
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I find it interesting how (Twig Arc 11 spoilers) thanks to having Jamie #2 with him Sy actually recovered really fast and became happier than I've ever seen him within a short time of escaping the Academy. I was expecting him to be all depressed over Lilian and what have you, but it was nice to instead see how happy freedom made Sy, and it's also nice to get more characterization from Jamie #2. Knowing how things "could have been" kind of rubs some salt in the wound given that things will inevitably become worse for him later (Jamie is definitely not gonna survive, for one).
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May 16, 2017 03:16
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Worm had plenty of happy moments in it, though. The victory over the Slaughterhouse, her getting together with Brian, the actual ending to it, taking out the ABB, killing Coil, etc. The idea that Worm is some grimdark work where everything was always miserable doesn't really reflect the actual text. There was a cost attached to most of her victories but that doesn't invalidate that they were victories. I'm also not really convinced that 'optimistic' works are better than 'pessimistic' works (I'm also not convinced that there's a good definition of either of those). An optimistic work (if we choose to define this as a work where the main character, in general, succeeds at whatever they set out to do without incurring significant costs in the process) seems like it would very easily fall into having a Mary Sue protagonist or the challenges that the protagonist must overcome could seem relatively trivial. Imposing a significant cost to significant victories (which I guess is what a pessimistic work is) makes those victories feel that much more impactful. Obviously there are also pitfalls associated with this type of writing but I don't think it's really worse than the alternative.
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May 16, 2017 04:49
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Sampatrick posted:Worm had plenty of happy moments in it, though. The victory over the Slaughterhouse, her getting together with Brian, the actual ending to it, taking out the ABB, killing Coil, etc. The idea that Worm is some grimdark work where everything was always miserable doesn't really reflect the actual text. There was a cost attached to most of her victories but that doesn't invalidate that they were victories. A lot of those weren't really portrayed as happy victories, though. If I recall correctly, Brian was ruined with PTSD either before or shortly after she got together with him (I don't recall her ever getting to enjoy the relationship much), and killing Coil was definitely not portrayed as a good thing (heck, it was pretty much the big "Taylor has completely lost her innocence" event). The characters succeed at things, but in general the plot heads in an increasingly depressing direction post-Leviation (before Leviathan I think it had a good balance of good to bad). I feel like Taylor becoming a hero was a missed opportunity to have her regain some of her "humanity" (for lack of a better word), and it always bugged me how she never really made a genuine attempt to get to know her fellow heroes, despite spending far more time with them than she did the Undersiders. I mean, it's kind of consistent with her character, but still. I mean, I agree it isn't grimdark in the sense of everything being 100% bad, but the tone is definitely pretty negative and many of the victories are pyrrhic in nature. All this being said, that doesn't really bother me at all and I don't think Worm is overly negative. My only significant gripe about Worm (and Wildbow's writing in general) is the repeated "super tense how is Taylor going to get out of this almost inescapable dilemma?!?!?" situations. Like, you can always expect things to go to poo poo and for some solution to be found. edit: As another Twig comment, I really wish that I had more time to get to know Gordon. He was a really interesting character, and I think Sy was correct when he said he probably would have left the Academy with him and Jamie #2. Jamie #2 is also a really interesting guy. In general I feel like one of Twig's biggest improvements over Worm is that the core characters are a lot more interesting. In Worm, most of the Undersiders weren't that interesting, aside from maybe Tattletale. edit2: Oh, I have a question. Where in the US do the Twig characters live? Is it the equivalent of California or something? Also, how old are the kids by the Arc 11 (where I currently am)? Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 05:56 on May 16, 2017 |
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May 16, 2017 05:22
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Sampatrick posted:Worm had plenty of happy moments in it, though. The victory over the Slaughterhouse, her getting together with Brian, the actual ending to it, taking out the ABB, killing Coil, etc. The idea that Worm is some grimdark work where everything was always miserable doesn't really reflect the actual text. There was a cost attached to most of her victories but that doesn't invalidate that they were victories. I think it's less along the lines of better/worse and more just a matter of preference e.g. if you had a hard time reading Worm and Pact because of the mood, Twig would not be a good recommendation. Twig/Pact stuff (and Wheel of Time spoilers) I sort of feel that Sy's descent into his current state is still more optimistic than the latter half of Pact where Blake got poo poo on over and over, as Sy is still being successful in most of his schemes instead of just surviving. It reminds me of Wheel of Time where Rand is absurdly insane for a good 3/4ths of the books but still gets stuff done.
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May 16, 2017 05:38
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Sampatrick posted:Worm had plenty of happy moments in it, though. The victory over the Slaughterhouse, her getting together with Brian, the actual ending to it, taking out the ABB, killing Coil, etc. The idea that Worm is some grimdark work where everything was always miserable doesn't really reflect the actual text. There was a cost attached to most of her victories but that doesn't invalidate that they were victories. I read Worm recently and I have to say I strongly disagree. Her 'victory' over the Slaughterhouse Nine felt more or less completely invalidated by the fact they escaped to apparently end the world, there was legit like one chapter of the Taylor/Brian relationship where they did cute 'romance' type things out of however many millions of words Worm is not to mention how that ended up ...both immediately after they got together and at the very end. Pretty much every win in the series is like that - immediately marred by some new always more, always worse coming out of left field and it never really pauses to let you appreciate a win. The sequence with Coil was cool, the big reveal of the plan coming together to beat this objectively bad guy was very cool - felt like a win - but then instantly the Travellers go rogue and start trying to kill everyone and it just continues to escalate from there forever until the literal end of the world without stopping for breath. The victories exist here and there in Worm but they just get buried under the constant unrelenting land-slide of bad poo poo that is always a chapter away throughout the entire story and it really does invalidate them as 'victories'. Like you take down a mob-boss and in doing so a hell-beast is unleashed on the world, it just makes the mob-boss seem trivial in hindsight and takes the joy out of triumphing over him.
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May 16, 2017 07:16
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I don't remember anything good about the Brian/Taylor relationship at all. It felt like he wasn't really into it but Taylor was the stronger personality and made it happen.
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May 16, 2017 14:47
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Neurosis posted:I don't remember anything good about the Brian/Taylor relationship at all. It felt like he wasn't really into it but Taylor was the stronger personality and made it happen. Yeah I felt like Brian's interest in Taylor wasn't really sold well. I forget, did he get with her before or after he got PTSD? I want to say the latter, and I always got the impression he went along with the Taylor relationship just because she was closest to him and he was in a bad place emotionally.
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May 16, 2017 19:12
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Ytlaya posted:Yeah I felt like Brian's interest in Taylor wasn't really sold well. That's literally what happened, he was super badly traumatized and she just kinda made it happen. And then abandoned them all, because there are 0 characters with agency.
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May 16, 2017 20:53
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NinjaDebugger posted:That's literally what happened, he was super badly traumatized and she just kinda made it happen. And then abandoned them all, because there are 0 characters with agency. Hey, at least "woman taking advantage of a man's emotional trauma in the interests of romance" is an interesting inversion of the more common situation with genders reversed! I'm willing to overlook most of Taylor's actions, since it is made explicit through her own regret that she actually had a choice and wasn't forced into doing the various morally ambiguous things she does. Most other stories would implicitly condone her various actions, if not outright portray them as being good in some "badass" sense.
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May 17, 2017 00:44
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Sampatrick posted:Worm had plenty of happy moments in it, though. The victory over the Slaughterhouse, her getting together with Brian, the actual ending to it, taking out the ABB, killing Coil, etc. The idea that Worm is some grimdark work where everything was always miserable doesn't really reflect the actual text. There was a cost attached to most of her victories but that doesn't invalidate that they were victories. Personally, I wasn't talking about Worm. Worm mostly worked. Pact was the problem. Also, I don't really mean "happy" moments as much as "peaceful moments". Things don't need to be optimistic, you just need time to breath. On a basic level, you get tense while reading a story. You can't just keep up that intensity for 20 chapters. It's emotionally exhausting. You need a break where the threat relents a bit, and things are going better at least relatively speaking. Otherwise the emotional shocks start to dull.
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May 17, 2017 01:54
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