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Selachian posted:I'm actually a bit curious about Floating Worlds. Cecelia Holland was a bestselling historical novelist; Floating Worlds was her only attempt at writing SF. Having read Hellspark but not the other one I don’t see any possible parallels. There are def no cat people.
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Sep 8, 2019 05:45
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Selachian posted:I'm actually a bit curious about Floating Worlds. Cecelia Holland was a bestselling historical novelist; Floating Worlds was her only attempt at writing SF. Just grabbed it on Kindle - I read her Attila book years ago
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Sep 8, 2019 09:31
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Thanks for the Murderbot rec. I'm through the first 2 books and I'm sure I'll finish the series before the week is up. For some reason, I hadn't read anything in a while and it was good to find something compelling and short. This Kindle Paperwhite is about perfect for me and I'm really digging it. I'll likely do Bridge of Birds when I'm done. Down the road, I think I wanna read some more techy sci-fi like Murderbot with its cool explanations of security fuckery or something like the Bobiverse with all the fabrication bootstrapping and space dynamics - even into really crunchy orbital dynamics stuff like what comes up in The Expanse. Any recs there?
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Sep 9, 2019 19:55
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Did anyone out there read Vita Nostra by Dyachenko? Cause it might be helpful for me to talk through that ending a bit.
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Sep 9, 2019 20:56
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My friend bought me Murderbot! It is extremely charming so far and I'm probably gonna finish it tonight. To explain why I love the titular character, have this: Murderbot: so I don't care about humans I'm mostly apathetic and I just want to watch tv shows all the time also Murderbot: no one is touching my humans or so help me god
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Sep 9, 2019 23:26
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Can anyone point me in the direction of worthwhile books by Clifford D. Simak? I just read Destiny Doll, which was a fairly enjoyable adventure/quest type narrative about a team of explorers on a strange abandoned planet.
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Sep 10, 2019 03:02
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Crescent Wrench posted:Can anyone point me in the direction of worthwhile books by Clifford D. Simak? I just read Destiny Doll, which was a fairly enjoyable adventure/quest type narrative about a team of explorers on a strange abandoned planet. The Big Front Yard is one of his neater shorts. If you like that kind of Golden Age SF, I'd strongly suggest getting the "Science Fiction Hall of Fame" anthologies. I think Big Front Yard is in Vol II A or II B. StrixNebulosa posted:My friend bought me Murderbot! It is extremely charming so far and I'm probably gonna finish it tonight. I'm a sucker for well-drawn character-driven fiction but even so Murderbot is one of the best things in SF lately. Just hugely empathic without being cliche or cloying or melodramatic or predictable. Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 03:13 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 03:09
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Finished Murderbot, turned around and bought the second one instead of more Dorohedoro like I'd planned. I like how it wasn't just the central gimmick - I thought it would be comedy and wacky observations on humans, but no! Murderbot is tired and bored but cares when plot happens and it was played mostly straight. Instead of Hitchhiker I got, uh. Something good! Insert obligatory complaint about the price here, I'm gonna get robbed buying the rest of them but oh well. It's worth it just to share my enjoyment of this robot with my friend. e: My one complaint is that I didn't like how it ended but sigh okay, it fits. Murderbot gotta Murderbot. StrixNebulosa fucked around with this message at 03:43 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 03:40
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How cone I never saw anyone describe The Gone World as “True Detective with space ships”? This book is so my jam that I can tell I’m going to be disappointed when I finish it.
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Sep 10, 2019 03:45
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I think folks here largely already know this but prices are set by the publisher so complaining to the author on Twitter or whatever just makes them sad. I agree Murderbot was a bit stiff but I’ve read it at least twice already so there’s that.
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Sep 10, 2019 03:45
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Yea, the pricing was straight hosed up on murderbot. Hoping that when the official "book" comes out it's priced like a normal book and not like 49.99 for an ebook that's 300 pages long. It's a good story, but god drat the pricing was just heinous.
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Sep 10, 2019 04:18
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I'm aware I'm a socialist parasite, but libraries exist. Some places.
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Sep 10, 2019 04:28
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I finished the third book in Ian McDonald's Luna trilogy and kinda felt like it ran out of steam? The first two were fantastic, some of the best sci-fi I've read in years, but this one was just a kind of dull slog with nothing much happening. edit - also I know he's Scottish and he's trying his best, but no Australian would ever directly address a group of people as "mates" or preface the noun "bogan" with the very chavvy English adjective "proper." Nor would a Western Australian mining magnate name a cocktail of his design a "1788." freebooter fucked around with this message at 04:32 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 04:29
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Finished Ash today. There is a lot I loved in this book though my enthusiasm peaked very early, probably around the time the first golem appeared, and the translator professor Langoning the Copenhagen interpretation was like nails on a black board to me. I think part of it was that I felt more invested in historical Burgundy, France and the HRE than the alternate version where everything outside the border was basically dead, but somehow still functioning as political entites?. I loved the Ferdinand subplot and everything up to and includingCarthago. I felt the later parts dragged a bit and the resolution wasn't super satisfying, but I'd still recommend it warmly.
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Sep 10, 2019 07:22
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I'm a sucker for well-drawn character-driven fiction but even so Murderbot is one of the best things in SF lately. Just hugely empathic without being cliche or cloying or melodramatic or predictable. Speaking of character driven, I just finished Becky Chamber's latest, To Be Taught, If Fortunate. It's a novella that feels more like a long short story than a short novel. In the future, crowdfunded space exploration has advanced to the point of STL interstellar exploration. The four characters on the mission explore a few different alien planets and geek out over weird alien biology. Then Earth goes silent and the characters are faced with a choice: Go home and try and rekindle the drive for space exploration, or to continue the mission by using the last of their fuel to explore a second star system. They send the final report on their discoveries home with a question: come home or go onwards. The story ends with the message sent and the characters going into hibernation to await an answer. I'm a serious space exploration geek. Stuff like this honestly makes me tear up, I'm doing it again just summarizing the story this baldly. I know we're loving up our one planet, but the stars are calling. Let's go. https://www.hodderscape.co.uk/becky-chambers-to-be-taught/ genericnick posted:Finished Ash today. Lately I find myself reaching for my iPad and then feeling sad because I'm not still reading Ash. That book can get under your skin. mllaneza fucked around with this message at 08:55 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 08:42
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mllaneza posted:I know we're loving up our one planet, but the stars are calling. Let's go. lmao no, the stars aren't calling, take your meds instead of spending gajillions of dollars to fart around the universe, spend them to fix this pile poo poo we're living in
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Sep 10, 2019 11:14
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Doctor Jeep posted:lmao no, the stars aren't calling, take your meds Nah
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Sep 10, 2019 11:42
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:Yea, the pricing was straight hosed up on murderbot. Hoping that when the official "book" comes out it's priced like a normal book and not like 49.99 for an ebook that's 300 pages long. You realize as long as people keep buying it, the lesson the publisher is learning is "this pricing is perfect"
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Sep 10, 2019 13:47
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pseudanonymous posted:You realize as long as people keep buying it, the lesson the publisher is learning is "this pricing is perfect" There is no ethical consumption under capitalism. It gets worse: my friend bought me Murderbot 1 new from amazon, so it's crimes all the way down. And yet this all ties in perfectly with Murderbot's themes and critique of megacorps so at least I'm being thematically consistent.
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Sep 10, 2019 16:11
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Could someone help me with part of Traitor Baru? The red-headed guy from the steering council meets her ~3 years after she crashes the fiat currency and tells her that Parliament hates her, and says basically "she knows what must be done", she seems to agree but it went way over my head what she should be doing. Did I actually miss something or is this RAFO?
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Sep 10, 2019 16:23
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mllaneza posted:
Which Ash book are you talking about here?
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Sep 10, 2019 16:44
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orange sky posted:Which Ash book are you talking about here? Mary Gentle's Ash: A Secret History, which is apparently all of them. I spent so long in her head and her world that I got comfortable there.
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Sep 10, 2019 16:54
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I didn't notice the Murderbot pricing because I got them from the library. 
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Sep 10, 2019 16:57
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mewse posted:Could someone help me with part of Traitor Baru? there have definitely been indications thus far of what this means, but it has not been explained openly. More indications will come soon, it imho is not meant to be a ~twist as such. Overall, I say read & find out PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 17:11 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 17:07
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PupsOfWar posted:there have definitely been indications thus far of what this means, but it has not been explained openly. More indications will come soon, it imho is not meant to be a ~twist as such. Thanks, makes me feel less dumb
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Sep 10, 2019 17:30
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Slogging through the third Wheel of Time book. So... turns out the Aielmen are literally just Fremen.
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Sep 10, 2019 18:12
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I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: - Published in the past five years - The author's debut novel - Not YA I'm trying to hit those three specifics since I write adult fantasy I'm trying to sell, and the best way to sell is to know the market. I've tried searching around using those criteria but it's very hard to hit all three of those criteria when lists of debut fantasy novels lean heavily YA, lists of current best-sellers lean heavily towards established authors, and lists of best novels in the genre lean towards stuff that's more than five years old. Anybody got any recommendations for books that hit all three, or at least a resource where I can search with all those parameters? So far, I've gone through Jade War, Kings of the Wyld, and Library at Mount Char (my fav of the three). Any recommendations or advice beyond that would be a huge help.
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Sep 10, 2019 19:48
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Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: Gideon the Ninth, Gideon the Ninth, Gideon the Ninth. It's SO GOOD, and it's by Tamsyn Muir!
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Sep 10, 2019 20:04
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Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: I just finished Evan Winter's Rage of Dragons which is kind of a revenge power-fantasy thing with an African mythical theme rather than European. It didn't knock my socks off but it was serviceable, it was the author's first novel, and it was not YA. Under the Pendulum Sky also meets your criteria but is so far off from what is usually billed as 'fantasy' that I'm not sure it's useful. I still liked it anyway. I also recently got Last Song Before Night in trade and it just barely falls into the last five years, I haven't read it yet but I am interested in doing so.
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Sep 10, 2019 20:26
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Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: City of Stairs series by Robert Jackson Bennett Powder Mage series by Brian Mclellan
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Sep 10, 2019 20:36
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Cardiac posted:City of Stairs series by Robert Jackson Bennett It's worth noting, for Nae's criteria, that while it's pretty much his first fantasy novel, City of Stairs is by no means RJB's debut novel. He had three or four horror novels he published before the Divine Cities books.
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Sep 10, 2019 20:40
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Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: I think the Max Gladstone Craft Sequence novels count. Casandra Khaw's Rupert Wong stuff, probably. Crescent City series by Bryan Camp. I'm not 100% positive Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly is Fantasy, but it's sort of marketed as such. I'm lower than most on Strange Practice by Vivian Shaw, but she got a trilogy off it, so it sells. Natasha Pulley's Watchmaker of Filigree Street likewise got sequels (that weren't as good as the first). The Girl With Ghost Eyes by MH Boronson. Uh, I don't know, that's just sort of a glimpse over the list of what I've read in the last couple years that fits.
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Sep 10, 2019 20:42
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MockingQuantum posted:It's worth noting, for Nae's criteria, that while it's pretty much his first fantasy novel, City of Stairs is by no means RJB's debut novel. He had three or four horror novels he published before the Divine Cities books. Also I've read it! It was very good, but yes, it not being a debut novel knocks out of the running for what I'm looking for, which is basically: "who's getting published out of the slush pile?"
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Sep 10, 2019 20:43
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MockingQuantum posted:It's worth noting, for Nae's criteria, that while it's pretty much his first fantasy novel, City of Stairs is by no means RJB's debut novel. He had three or four horror novels he published before the Divine Cities books. Any good? Also which horror genre?
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Sep 10, 2019 20:47
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Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: Well, there's The Traitor Baru Cormorant. Also Ken Liu's The Grace of Kings.
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Sep 10, 2019 20:49
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 Just let Japan make all the book covers
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Sep 10, 2019 20:49
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Cardiac posted:Any good? I've only ready one, American Elsewhere, which is a real doorstopper and kind of modern cosmic horror. I remember really liking it when I read it the first time, but that was a while ago. I was going to re-read it pretty soon here, I'd be happy to post my thoughts once I do. The other two I can think of are The Troupe and Mr. Shivers but I haven't read either. It's possible I dreamed this and it's not at all true, but I'd swear that RJB was a goon once upon a time and got ruthlessly mocked in FYAD after he posted an excerpt from The Troupe somewhere on the forums, so that tells you something, I suppose, but I'd be hard pressed to say what it tells you
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Sep 10, 2019 20:53
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I'm just wrapping up Traitor Baru and it's really good, makes me feel smart and dumb at the same time.Nae! posted:I'm in the process of trying to get back into reading more fantasy, and I'm looking for some good fantasy novels that fit the following criteria: edit: also, looking at just recent author debut novels seems excessively narrow to me. What if you looked at recent series that have debuted successfully within the last 5 years? Cicero fucked around with this message at 20:56 on Sep 10, 2019 |
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Sep 10, 2019 20:54
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Selachian posted:Well, there's The Traitor Baru Cormorant. Also Ken Liu's The Grace of Kings. I did read Baru! I actually didnt think that was within the last five years, but I am poo poo at tracking time so maybe it was. I've downloaded Grace of Kings and Gideon the Ninth, though I'm a little leery of that one since I just read an interview of it that describes it as 'appealing to people who love memes', which is...not a ringing endorsement in my eyes? I don't know, but I'm not going to rule it out when it's appealing to people enough to get published. Maybe it's a sign that I need to embrace meme culture more. In the meantime, I'll check out some of the other recommendations people have posted as well.
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Sep 10, 2019 20:54
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http://mark---lawrence.blogspot.com/2017/08/the-biggest-fantasy-debuts-in-past.html
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Sep 10, 2019 21:00
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