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cis autodrag posted:I read them in publication order and was pretty happy with that. This is generally fine for most any lengthy series unless there is known publisher fuckery with releases (no examples are springing to mind but I'm sure some exist). 
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Mar 1, 2018 04:42
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A Proper Uppercut posted:I started reading/listening to Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. If you want to, please post as you go. It’s my favorite novel and I never regret a chance to bullshit about it.
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Mar 1, 2018 06:22
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andrew smash posted:If you want to, please post as you go. It’s my favorite novel and I never regret a chance to bullshit about it. I can do that. I'm I think almost at end of Mr. Norrell's part of the story. Christ what an unlikable boob. If there's any justice in this book he's gonna get screwed over by the fairy guy or Jonathan Strange, who I've only heard about in passing POVs. I do like how it does jump around to different POVs, it gives a lot of backstory to characters who you didn't think were going to be a big part of the story. I like the manservant, Stephen Black, kind feel bad that's he seems to have gotten sucked into this stuff, because if past experience with characters like the Lost Hope fairy guy when it comes to fantasy, anyone dealing with him is gonna get screwed.
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Mar 1, 2018 21:12
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A Proper Uppercut posted:I can do that. I enjoyed this post thoroughly and hope you keep speculating as you go.
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Mar 2, 2018 02:18
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Just stopped by to recommend Robert Heinlein's Number of the Beast in case you haven't read it yet for whatever reason
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Mar 2, 2018 06:13
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Bilirubin posted:Just stopped by to recommend Robert Heinlein's Number of the Beast in case you haven't read it yet for whatever reason Is that the one with the nipples going spung? Because once is enough for me, thanks.
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Mar 2, 2018 08:07
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Bilirubin posted:Just stopped by to recommend Robert Heinlein's Number of the Beast in case you haven't read it yet for whatever reason  
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Mar 2, 2018 09:43
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Bilirubin posted:Just stopped by to recommend Robert Heinlein's Number of the Beast in case you haven't read it yet for whatever reason
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Mar 2, 2018 10:35
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The rare triple woosh
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Mar 2, 2018 11:26
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Right?
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Mar 2, 2018 15:14
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Bilirubin posted:Just stopped by to recommend Robert Heinlein's Number of the Beast in case you haven't read it yet for whatever reason A hellish book for a hellish page, nice
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Mar 2, 2018 16:21
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Does anyone like Doris Piserchia. I just read Earth in Twilight and it was very goofy. Her writing style is really funny.
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Mar 2, 2018 16:37
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my bony fealty posted:Does anyone like Doris Piserchia. I just read Earth in Twilight and it was very goofy. Her writing style is really funny. "wikipedia posted:She has not published any work since 1983,[3] shortly before her adult daughter died suddenly, leaving her with a three-year-old granddaughter to raise.[1] 
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Mar 2, 2018 17:06
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Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go Do we ever actually get to see Hell itself in Bas-Lag? The ship in Ship of Fools is pretty fuckin creepy. Event Horizon can’t go unmentioned, though the camp factor is pretty high.
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Mar 2, 2018 17:08
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go http://unsongbook.com/interlude-%D7%99-the-broadcast/
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Mar 2, 2018 17:10
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go Night's Dawn, honestly.
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Mar 2, 2018 17:20
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go Agree that Mieville's hell/demons are great, even if we don't get to see them musch directly. To Reign in Hell? Almost definitely not For Love of Evil, despite it's 4.10 rating on Goodreads.
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Mar 2, 2018 17:43
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go That long-rear end internet story where Hell invades Earth and Earth invades Hell back and drops an atomic bomb on Satan. 
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Mar 2, 2018 17:49
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go I read a book called God’s Demon a few years ago. It’s fully illustrated by the author. The novel itself is, uh, odd but the art is extremely good. Edit: in terms of the actual characterization? Morgoth probably. Most “demonic” stuff in fantasy owes way more to Tolkien’s depictions of Morgoth and Sauron and Balrogs than the Bible’s depictions of Lucifer (or Milton’s, for that matter). andrew smash fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Mar 2, 2018 |
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Mar 2, 2018 17:49
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go DragonBall z.
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Mar 2, 2018 17:57
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andrew smash posted:
Debatable, I think Milton controls. Tolkien's descriptions are actually fairly vague (see, e.g., Balrog Wings). There was some lovely fantasy novel I read as a kid that involved an army re-conquering hell from the devils but I don't remember the title or enough details to even know if I'm remembering it correctly. edit: found the cover, here we are: https://www.amazon.com/Rebels-Hell-Janet-Morris/dp/0671655779 Paul Cornell's London Falling series has a pretty terrifying depiction of Hell at several points, it's problem is more "everyone else is also writing urban fantasy horror set in London and London only has so much room."
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Mar 2, 2018 18:18
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go Scar Night by Alan Campbell. Good stuff, very creepy and biological. Avoid the sequels though, they lose what made the first book good.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:19
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Seconding To Reign In Hell. It's a work of remarkable quality and imagination for a first novel. I consider it a must-read. e. Ornamented Death posted:This is generally fine for most any lengthy series unless there is known publisher fuckery with releases (no examples are springing to mind but I'm sure some exist). The Vorkosigan Saga was written out of chronological order. Cetaganda for example came out late in publication order, but takes place very early in chronological order. I recommend chronological order. mllaneza fucked around with this message at 18:36 on Mar 2, 2018 |
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Mar 2, 2018 18:26
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The way hell is depicted in the Faust series is pretty bleak. Especially considering no one has ever heard of anyone going to heaven. Least terrifying and more "Oh poo poo... We are all kinda hosed" feeling, though.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:34
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Debatable, I think Milton controls. Tolkien's descriptions are actually fairly vague (see, e.g., Balrog Wings Dude I know about balrog wings. Who cares? I think the the creatures of shadow and flame concept is Tolkien’s and dominates in fantasy. If you can give me examples of Miltonian fallen angels that aren’t also just balrogs, go ahead. The only ones that come immediately to mind for me are DC’s Lucifer and the white wolf Demon RPG.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:40
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andrew smash posted:Dude I know about balrog wings. Who cares? I think the the creatures of shadow and flame concept is Tolkien’s and dominates in fantasy. If you can give me examples of Miltonian fallen angels that aren’t also just balrogs, go ahead. The only ones that come immediately to mind for me are DC’s Lucifer and the white wolf Demon RPG. The Tanar'ri and Ba'atezu in D&D, the pact-making demons in Butcher's Dresden Files, etc. I mean it's not just Milton -- Milton systematized and put into a narrative format about a thousand year's worth of Christian and Gnostic esoterica -- but as long as we're talking books I think Milton predominates. Go to video games or films and I'll grant the Tolkien as prime influence.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:46
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General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go I mean is this even a discussion? Obviously the novelization of everyone's favorite WB supernatural drama, Supernatural.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:51
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The Tanar'ri and Ba'atezu in D&D Sorry, no way. Look at Blake’s illustrations of Paradise Lost and tell me D&D demons are more that than Tolkien.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:51
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mllaneza posted:
Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series is another weird one where it's better to read in chronological order. He wrote it wildly out of sequence but plotted the whole course of Sharpe's life out in detail first, then picked the single events that he thought would make the best novels and started there. Because the outline was prewritten though he included appropriate foreshadowing, references, etc., as if they had been written in chronological order.
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Mar 2, 2018 18:53
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StrixNebulosa posted:Scar Night by Alan Campbell. Good stuff, very creepy and biological. Avoid the sequels though, they lose what made the first book good. It is Alan Campbell, the downward spiral is obvious from the start. General Battuta posted:Best depictions of hell and Satan in SFF, go Dante? Or that is not SFF?
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Mar 2, 2018 18:55
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Cardiac posted:It is Alan Campbell, the downward spiral is obvious from the start. ...It is? I thought Scar Night was pretty good, but I'm not familiar with the rest of his works.
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Mar 2, 2018 19:00
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mllaneza posted:The Vorkosigan Saga was written out of chronological order. Cetaganda for example came out late in publication order, but takes place very early in chronological order. I recommend chronological order. For a first reading I prefer publication order. It's the only way you know that you have exactly the exposure the author was assuming.
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Mar 2, 2018 19:02
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Off topic question: Is there any sort of goon consensus on the last VanderMeer novel Borne? I quite enjoyed all of The Southern Reach if that helps.
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Mar 2, 2018 19:09
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SulphagneSocialist posted:That long-rear end internet story where Hell invades Earth and Earth invades Hell back and drops an atomic bomb on Satan.
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Mar 2, 2018 19:53
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And then they invaded heaven, and then the author didn't write the third part in the trilogy because someone posted the first parts on a torrent site and he was totally going to get it published. Baen have their free library thing, you'd think they'd understand about that sort of thing, but I guess even they weren't going to publish that.
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Mar 2, 2018 19:59
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StrixNebulosa posted:...It is? I thought Scar Night was pretty good, but I'm not familiar with the rest of his works. I agree with regards to Scar Night. His other series Gravedigger chronicles also start out good but rapidly decreases in quality in the same way as the Scar Night series.
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Mar 2, 2018 20:38
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Perhaps not consensus but I found Borne to be decent though underwhelming. It has a really odd ambience to the whole thing not quite unlike Southern Reach, but a lot more overtly strange. It dragged in bits and none of the characters save the titular one did much for me. I don't regret reading it but it didn't blow me away like Annihilation and to a lesser extent its sequels did.
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Mar 2, 2018 20:43
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apophenium posted:Perhaps not consensus but I found Borne to be decent though underwhelming. It has a really odd ambience to the whole thing not quite unlike Southern Reach, but a lot more overtly strange. It dragged in bits and none of the characters save the titular one did much for me. Borne is a fun/interesting read on its own, but yeah reading it directly after the southern reach series will be a huge let down. I originally had to stop reading it and wait almost a year after I had read southern reach before starting it again
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Mar 2, 2018 21:43
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It's been a while since reading Southern Reach, so I'm prob good on that front. I'm just finishing up The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and I'm really enjoying the "feel good" aspects of it. I read so much deeply depressing stuff that I was afraid I was gonna be turned off by it, but instead it felt pretty refreshing.
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Mar 2, 2018 22:19
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StrixNebulosa posted:I enjoyed this post thoroughly and hope you keep speculating as you go. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell stuff Now I don't know what to think. Norrell has taken in Strange as a pupil, and now I'm kinda swinging the other way on Norrell because once he met another magician he seemed to actually not be a shithead. But then he's still a shithead for what he did to Lady Poe (sorry if I get any spelling wrong, I'm primarily doing audio book). Strange's wife met with Lady Poe, and now I'm thinking this might be what may make Strange turn on Norrell if they somehow find out what Norrell did to her. Also hope Strange's wife doesn't get sucked into being in and out of Lost Hope.
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Mar 3, 2018 01:05
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