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Comrade Koba posted:I liked it, wasn't great but good enough to make me feel a little bit exicted about the upcoming TV series. I know I just said there's no middle ground with Simmons but this might be it. It's the same gimmick as terror or drood but executed poorly. Mileage may vary Depending on how much you enjoy mountain climbing stories. I read it at a time I was on a big Everest kick so I enjoyed it, but it's the weakest of his good novels and the twist is kind of groan worthy.
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Aug 18, 2017 13:05
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Spc. Jones knows what's up. 
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Aug 18, 2017 14:32
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Ambitious Spider posted:I know I just said there's no middle ground with Simmons but this might be it. It's the same gimmick as terror or drood but executed poorly. Mileage may vary Depending on how much you enjoy mountain climbing stories. I read it at a time I was on a big Everest kick so I enjoyed it, but it's the weakest of his good novels and the twist is kind of groan worthy. Cool. Just recently reread Into Thin Air, so I'll probably give it a try. 
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Aug 18, 2017 14:55
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Having caught up with this thread, I hope it's kosher to ask an RPO question: Instead of becoming hypernerds "studying" all the poo poo this guy watched/read/listened to... couldn't they just look it up on Wikipedia as and when it comes up?
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Aug 20, 2017 21:40
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gschmidl posted:Having caught up with this thread, I hope it's kosher to ask an RPO question: I'm not defending that lovely book, but nerd culture is so built with self referential gatekeeping that a wiki wouldn't necessarily give you the awareness of a reference having double or triple meaning. In general, wiki is good for reference and introduction but not so great about understanding, making connections, and expanding the extant knowledge base.
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Aug 20, 2017 21:58
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Yeah, pretty much everything Parzival does is built on a fathomless capacity for free association.
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Aug 20, 2017 22:03
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PJOmega posted:I'm not defending that lovely book, but nerd culture is so built with self referential gatekeeping that a wiki wouldn't necessarily give you the awareness of a reference having double or triple meaning. In general, wiki is good for reference and introduction but not so great about understanding, making connections, and expanding the extant knowledge base. 
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Aug 20, 2017 22:06
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It'd need to be like 1d4chan, a less-than-professional wiki that gets across the general fan consensus along with the thing itself.
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Aug 20, 2017 22:08
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PJOmega posted:I'm not defending that lovely book, but nerd culture is so built with self referential gatekeeping that a wiki wouldn't necessarily give you the awareness of a reference having double or triple meaning. In general, wiki is good for reference and introduction but not so great about understanding, making connections, and expanding the extant knowledge base. I don't think he ever has to do any of those things. One challenge is just playing Joust, and another is acting out scenes from a movie. Wikipedia can't help with those, but he's hardly decoding deep multi-level connections.
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Aug 20, 2017 22:44
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PJOmega posted:I'm not defending that lovely book, but nerd culture is so built with self referential gatekeeping that a wiki wouldn't necessarily give you the awareness of a reference having double or triple meaning. In general, wiki is good for reference and introduction but not so great about understanding, making connections, and expanding the extant knowledge base. That sounds much more interesting than what the book is about
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Aug 20, 2017 22:48
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Don Gato posted:That sounds much more interesting than what the book is about At some point we should tally up how many better books are buried within the premise of RPO.
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Aug 20, 2017 23:14
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Kavak posted:It'd need to be like 1d4chan, a less-than-professional wiki that gets across the general fan consensus along with the thing itself. 1d4chan is the only thing that makes 40k tolerable.
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Aug 21, 2017 01:05
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Arcsquad12 posted:1d4chan is the only thing that makes 40k tolerable. That and "If the Emperor had a TTS Device".
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Aug 21, 2017 02:07
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there wolf posted:At some point we should tally up how many better books are buried within the premise of RPO. I'd read that anthology.
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Aug 21, 2017 03:38
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there wolf posted:At some point we should tally up how many better books are buried within the premise of RPO. You can't tally an infinite.
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Aug 21, 2017 04:40
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there wolf posted:At some point we should tally up how many better books are buried within the premise of RPO. Every property RPO references are better than RPO
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Aug 21, 2017 05:18
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I can't stop loving laughing at Shartball. Even worse, I'm in work and couldn't even begin to explain what has me tickled. As an aside from Shartball (Iol) I've been catching up with the "I don't even own a television" podcast, picking through some classique episodes. Listening to the "Night of the Crabs" one, which was wonderful, but the lads there were saying how Guy Smith was "writing like a movie" or something to that extent. Like they could see the scene as if it were a movie. Is that such a bad thing? I've yet to read any of the Crabs books, does Guy just go into way too much detail or something? I read every book and picture it like a movie to be fair.
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Aug 21, 2017 12:22
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Drunken Baker posted:I read every book and picture it like a movie to be fair. For reasons I cannot explain, reading Dreamcatcher played out as a surrealist anime in my head, with extreme amounts of contrast, bloom, and super harsh palettes of white, violet, and blues No other book ended up doing quite that for me
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Aug 22, 2017 02:19
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Drunken Baker posted:I can't stop loving laughing at Shartball. Even worse, I'm in work and couldn't even begin to explain what has me tickled. I always take that to mean that it's written in a way that would adapt very easily into a screenplay. Or at least that you're given detailed descriptions of everything so there isn't much for you to have to come up with yourself when visualizing it.
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Aug 22, 2017 15:31
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goodreads recommended me libromancer, which the blurb claims is a lighthearted book about a guy whose magic is he can pull stuff out of books. 1/10 of the way through the book his love interest shows up, who is a dryad sex slave with a compulsion to pick a partner because she came out of a gor novel. Please Don't Include Rape In Popcorn Novels e: forgot to mention that her personality is influenced by her current partner, and they specifically mention she might start liking dr who. l m a o
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Aug 22, 2017 20:52
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i shall never play a game
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Aug 22, 2017 22:52
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Stexils posted:goodreads recommended me libromancer, which the blurb claims is a lighthearted book about a guy whose magic is he can pull stuff out of books. 1/10 of the way through the book his love interest shows up, who is a dryad sex slave with a compulsion to pick a partner because she came out of a gor novel. Isn't one of the main premises of Gor that women need to constantly learn and relearn that their place in life is subservient to a man in all ways? I think like most immature misogynists who see women's purpose as an easy source of validation, emotional support, and sex, the libromancer pulled his nympho bride from a Xanth novel and just said it was Gor because he didn't want people realizing his sexual fantasy comes from children's books.
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Aug 23, 2017 00:36
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Drunken Baker posted:As an aside from Shartball (Iol) I've been catching up with the "I don't even own a television" podcast, picking through some classique episodes. Listening to the "Night of the Crabs" one, which was wonderful, but the lads there were saying how Guy Smith was "writing like a movie" or something to that extent. Like they could see the scene as if it were a movie. Is that such a bad thing? I've yet to read any of the Crabs books, does Guy just go into way too much detail or something? I read every book and picture it like a movie to be fair. Well, there's being able to visualize the action in a book as you read it (which is a good thing, because it means the author has successfully engaged you in the action), and there's being able to tell that the author was mentally checking off a list of "cool movie scenes/plot points" and giving himself a high-five every time he included one in his book. I read a book like that once, and it was dreadful: Amusement Park, which I may have mentioned waaaaay back at the beginning of the thread. It was originally published in 1980, which means the author was probably writing it around the time that 70's disaster movies were a big thing. The whole time I was reading, it was like I could imagine him thinking who he would cast for each role in the inevitable movie that was sure to be made from his Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius. It was a bad, bad book, I guess is what I'm saying.
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Aug 23, 2017 01:22
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Stexils posted:goodreads recommended me libromancer, which the blurb claims is a lighthearted book about a guy whose magic is he can pull stuff out of books. 1/10 of the way through the book his love interest shows up, who is a dryad sex slave with a compulsion to pick a partner because she came out of a gor novel. For what its worth, she has an arc through the series and becomes more than a sex fantasy nymph.
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Aug 23, 2017 01:41
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Ah, there we go. It's clicked for me. Thanks.
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Aug 23, 2017 09:22
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In the Faust series, his girlfriend is a literal succubus/demon from hell, but holy poo poo she's god damned terrifying and through the series basically just becomes slightly less terrifying, but with a decent story arc. I don't think save for the introduction she's ever played for just the TNA scenery. I haven't read the Libromancer novels, but sometimes authors can take tropes and run with em in directions you don't expect. It's not often, but it's a nice surprise.
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Aug 23, 2017 13:19
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Black August posted:For reasons I cannot explain, reading Dreamcatcher played out as a surrealist anime in my head, with extreme amounts of contrast, bloom, and super harsh palettes of white, violet, and blues 
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Aug 23, 2017 13:54
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Yeah. The actual book is notably orange for the infestations.
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Aug 23, 2017 13:56
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I tend to avoid books with the word "-mancer" in the title, as it's usually an indicator that the book will be horrid. Except for Neuromancer, of course. Neuromancer is awesome.
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Aug 23, 2017 15:02
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One series of YA novels which I remember being touted as challengers to Harry Potter (see also: Series of Unfortunate Events, Edge Chronicles, Mortal Engiens etc.) was the Shadowmancer series. Set in England in the 18th century, it's all about this team of young heroes trying to prevent the destruction of the world at the hands of a demon called Pyratheon and his servants. The author, G. P. Taylor, is a former roadie for punk bands in the 70s who reportedly got into witchcraft and later became an Anglican vicar. The series is a Christian allegory like Narnia, written as a reaction to Harry Potter becoming popular, because the author was convinced Harry Potter was all about promoting paganism.
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Aug 23, 2017 15:29
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Wheat Loaf posted:One series of YA novels which I remember being touted as challengers to Harry Potter (see also: Series of Unfortunate Events, Edge Chronicles, Mortal Engiens etc.) 
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Aug 23, 2017 18:43
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Sham bam bamina! posted:The Edge Chronicles beats the poo poo out of Harry Potter. The Bartemius Trilogy beats Harry Potter because it shows how snotty and horrid an upper-class of magic users would be in our world. Why did every book after Azkaban have to be so long and why did all the cool poo poo involve everyone but Harry?
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Aug 23, 2017 18:53
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A better-than-Harry-Potter discussion that doesn't mention The Magicians? Good, let's keep it that way.
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Aug 23, 2017 20:53
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Was A Series of Unfortunate Events ever meant to be the next Harry Potter? As I recall it ended prior to HP ending or right around the same time. Plus it's a very different style of book.
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Aug 23, 2017 20:55
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Sham bam bamina! posted:The Edge Chronicles beats the poo poo out of Harry Potter. Best thing about Edge Chronicles is the Chris Riddell art.  It creates a really fun fantasy world with some cool characters but story-wise, I think the first one (Beyond the Deepwoods) is the only one that's really outstanding, because it goes in deep exploring all the weird flora and fauna of the Deepwoods. After that, it becomes more of a standard YA fantasy adventure (which certainly isn't bad by any stretch - and you can't really sustain interest in Twig wandering around this killer forest for five books - but not as interesting as the first one). OldTennisCourt posted:Was A Series of Unfortunate Events ever meant to be the next Harry Potter? As I recall it ended prior to HP ending or right around the same time. Plus it's a very different style of book. It started in 1999 (two years after Harry Potter) then ended in 2006 (a year before Harry Potter). I don't think it was meant to be the next Harry Potter but I distinctly remember reading it because it, like the Edge Chronicles, Shadowmancer and others, were all in the "if you love Harry Potter, why not try this" section of the local branch of Waterstones. I feel like the movie with Jim Carrey from about 10 years ago is what makes it feel like it was just one of the many YA properties getting adapted to try and cash in on the popularity of Harry Potter, like how Hollywood is littered with the corpses of abortive franchises adapted from YA novels after Harry Potter and Twilight ended (e.g. Mortal Instruments, Beautiful Creatures, Ender's Game, Vampire Academy, Divergent etc. I think the only successful ones were the aforementioned Twilight and, er, Maze Runner, apparently).
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Aug 23, 2017 21:33
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OldTennisCourt posted:Was A Series of Unfortunate Events ever meant to be the next Harry Potter? As I recall it ended prior to HP ending or right around the same time. Plus it's a very different style of book. I don't think so. The books are much shorter and are written incredibly differently. It would be like saying the next Halo is DreadOut.
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Aug 23, 2017 21:34
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OldTennisCourt posted:Was A Series of Unfortunate Events ever meant to be the next Harry Potter? As I recall it ended prior to HP ending or right around the same time. Plus it's a very different style of book. I wouldn't be surprised if it got picked up with that in mind, being another very British children's book in the tradition of very British children's books and coming out when Potter was just starting to blow up, but it's not a clone like a lot of other series were. There's a fun question: worst Harry Potter wannabe, deliberate parodies and Asylum-like clones excluded.
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Aug 23, 2017 21:40
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there wolf posted:I wouldn't be surprised if it got picked up with that in mind, being another very British children's book in the tradition of very British children's books and coming out when Potter was just starting to blow up, but it's not a clone like a lot of other series were. Though written by an American, I was surprised to learn.
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Aug 23, 2017 21:41
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I had to put down Libromancer because the protagonist, a cataloger for a public library, did his job by standing at the front desk zapping ISBNs. Dude, really, you couldn't have just shadowed or interviewed an actual cataloger or other back-of-house staffer to find out what they actually do?
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Aug 23, 2017 21:53
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there wolf posted:There's a fun question: worst Harry Potter wannabe, deliberate parodies and Asylum-like clones excluded. As far as ones that managed to sell well and sustain an audience go, Eragon? On the lesser-known end of the scale, I remember thinking Awful End, the first book in the little-remembered Eddie Dickens trilogy, was pretty poor.
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Aug 23, 2017 22:04
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