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Quinton posted:I'll second that. Just finished Gideon the Ninth and it was an immensely fun read. I suspect people will either absolutely love the rude, snarky, sarcastic POV character or intensely dislike her (what's wrong with you?). The book itself mixes sci-fi, fantasy, horror, locked-in-a-mansion-murder-mystery, etc -- got your undead/undying space emperor, nine houses of different types of necromancers, ancient seat-of-the-empire planet, etc. Gideon's hate/hate relationship with Harrowhark, the heir of her house, powerful necromancer, and sort of horrific younger sister figure is quality fun too. I bought this yesterday and ended up reading until 2 AM. If you're wavering on whether or not you want to read a rude, snarky, sarcastic POV, the POV character isn't just an edgelord or whatever. I really enjoyed it.
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Sep 12, 2019 18:45
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Any more recommends about like, survival against the elements/space colonies/expeditions/exploration books that are SF&F?
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Sep 12, 2019 18:53
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Thanks for the suggestions everyone, my "to read" list just got a lot longer.Walh Hara posted:Borges is exactly who you're looking for. Very similar style. Both are among my favourite writers, not sure whose better. Do you have a recommended translation?
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Sep 12, 2019 18:55
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ravenkult posted:Any more recommends about like, survival against the elements/space colonies/expeditions/exploration books that are SF&F? Lem’s Fiasco is amazing. KSR’s Aurora too. Both are unexpected and original takes on space exploration themes. Take the plunge! Okay! fucked around with this message at 19:13 on Sep 12, 2019 |
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Sep 12, 2019 19:11
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bowser posted:I asked this in the recommendation thread but didn't get any responses so I'm hoping you guys will be able to help. One thing I really like about Ted Chiang is his ability to take outlandish ideas and flesh them out into fully functional worlds - I'm thinking particularly of his stories "Hell is the Absence of God", in which miraculous visitations by angels are a common occurrence and "Omphalos", in which there's ample evidence that the Young Earth creation story is correct. "The Gone-Away World" and, to a lesser degree, "Gnomon" by Nick Harkaway come to mind. Borges was an acknowledged influence on the latter. "The City & The City" by China Mieville also. Kesper North fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Sep 12, 2019 |
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Sep 12, 2019 20:31
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:Lem’s Fiasco is amazing. KSR’s Aurora too. Both are unexpected and original takes on space exploration themes. Also KSR's Red Mars trilogy
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Sep 12, 2019 20:37
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bowser posted:I asked this in the recommendation thread but didn't get any responses so I'm hoping you guys will be able to help. One thing I really like about Ted Chiang is his ability to take outlandish ideas and flesh them out into fully functional worlds - I'm thinking particularly of his stories "Hell is the Absence of God", in which miraculous visitations by angels are a common occurrence and "Omphalos", in which there's ample evidence that the Young Earth creation story is correct. James Morrow’s Towing Jehovah trilogy, maybe.
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Sep 12, 2019 20:51
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Quinton posted:(Gideon the Ninth spoilers) don't forget the whole survived-lethal-gas child-of-unknown-origin thing I'm thinking gideon is gonna get revived eventually
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Sep 12, 2019 21:09
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:What's the actual thing I'm interested in, you ask? I found something which is sort-of along those lines purely by accident - something which caught my eye in a used bookstore. It's not actually that close a match, since it's in the Fantasy sub-genre and what seems like magic is, in fact, magic, and the setting is the standard medieval fantasy level of technology, but the setting has some interesting elements, and some of them are somewhat relevant to the book I'm working on. It's Jennifer Fallon's Hythrun Chronicles series (Medalon, Treason Keep, Harshini). One of the most interesting things about the setting is that the titular country Medalon is a secular matriarchy. It's in fact fanatically secular. It's ruled by the Sisterhood of the Iron Blade, the best bureaucrats in the world (yes, the title is strange). They came to power through a purging of all the heathen culture which previously lived there. Being ruled by bureaucrats, it's a very law-abiding society. The Defenders (the armed forces) are all male (or at least it seems so, otherwise the female protagonist R'shiel would have joined them), and they swear an oath of fealty to the First Sister and have a policy of staying out of the internal politics of the Sisterhood, no matter how much they might personally disagree with the woman in charge. Even the coup which deposes one First Sister so an ambitious one can take her place is done strictly by the rules, which means the military leader's hands are tied so he just stands by and does nothing. I am enjoying the story, although I'm a little less enthusiastic about it after a certain plot point. The Goddess of Love decides to meddle and magics deserted soldier Tarja to kiss R'shiel mid-argument even though he otherwise wouldn't have at that time and possibly meddles with his head so that he'll only love R'shiel from that point on. That's kinda a bit deus ex machina for my preference And also at that point it had only been about a year at most since they learned that they were not actually blood related, so it's even more complicated (understatement). EDIT: ...After reading a bit more, I suppose the interference ultimately amounted only to a nudge. Also a little while later there's another deus ex machina: Tarja is captured and tortured (a few broken fingers, a few loose teeth), and the Goddess of Love gets the God of Healing to intervene and heal him. I guess that will probably come into play later to make his unnatural recovery used to slander him as a demon or something. EDIT: It somewhat comes into play because his apparent lack of injuries makes it easier to believe he betrayed the rebels. Stabbey_the_Clown fucked around with this message at 02:19 on Sep 13, 2019 |
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Sep 12, 2019 22:02
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Doctor Jeep posted:don't forget the whole survived-lethal-gas child-of-unknown-origin thing I personally hope so. It's been a long time since I've had so much fun and been so utterly heartbroken at the end of a novel. I looked at this book based on the silly blurb when it popped up in my Amazon suggestions because "that has got to be sooo bad", and then I read the reviews. Pre-ordered it based on those and I am supremely happy that I did. I've suggested it to a few friends with "If you like books about swordplay and ridiculous violence, spells and mysteries, bitter rivalries and friendships, hatred, heartbreak, and hard-headed smart-asses, I genuinely recommend it. Oh, and lots of skeletons." Riot Carol Danvers fucked around with this message at 22:38 on Sep 12, 2019 |
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Sep 12, 2019 22:36
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bowser posted:Thanks for the suggestions everyone, my "to read" list just got a lot longer. Sorry, I read a Dutch translation...
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Sep 12, 2019 22:44
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Spite posted:I liked American Elsewhere a lot. RJB used to write for the front page but it was like 07-08 timeframe maybe? I don't recall his screen name. I'm vaguely remembering this from way back when and I think I first saw him in this or a similar thread and that his user name was his own name... bowser posted:Another example of what I'm looking for would be the show The Leftovers. The show starts with a wacky premise and then delves into how different groups would react to it - the preachers, the scientists, the government, the grifters, etc. Check out Daryl Gregory, specifically Pandemonium or The Devil's Alphabet - everyone is a human (or at least ish) and they take place on Earth in the present enough day. My favorite book of his is actually Afterparty but I feel you could put that one more solidly in the science fiction pile whereas the label speculative fiction seems to me a better fit for the rest of his books. He's also written a great novella, We Are All Completely Fine, about a support group for people who have survived the equivalent of a Saw movie or a Hills Have Eyes scenario but that is decidedly horror (altho I'm a wimp so ymmv). ETA: Thanks to everyone who brought up Gideon the Ninth - I'm about half way through and its the most fun I've had with a book in a while. Rain Brain fucked around with this message at 23:41 on Sep 12, 2019 |
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Sep 12, 2019 23:38
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ravenkult posted:Any more recommends about like, survival against the elements/space colonies/expeditions/exploration books that are SF&F? Jonathan Strahan's Infinity Project anthologies are largely about these kinds of things--various sorts of expansion/exploration/colonizing and technology as it changes us through various phases of solar expansion, then galactic and beyond. Also both Old Mars and Old Venus have a lot of what I'll call 'classic space colonization' stories about people struggling on the edge. I'm having trouble thinking of novels on the topic even though I know they exist, and that I've read some. Oh, James Alan Gardener's Expendables and sequels fits a lot of that bill. Also Alan Dean Foster's Sentenced to Prism and a few of his other books--Foster is a middling author in most ways, but he writes a pretty good hostile ecosystem. Just avoid any books where he thinks he's being funny.
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Sep 13, 2019 02:24
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bowser posted:I asked this in the recommendation thread but didn't get any responses so I'm hoping you guys will be able to help. One thing I really like about Ted Chiang is his ability to take outlandish ideas and flesh them out into fully functional worlds - I'm thinking particularly of his stories "Hell is the Absence of God", in which miraculous visitations by angels are a common occurrence and "Omphalos", in which there's ample evidence that the Young Earth creation story is correct. I read Alastair Reynolds' Terminal World recently and really liked it - the premise is that the world is divided up into invisible "zones," higher technology only works within certain zones, humans moving between them get sick and sometimes die. Bizarre premise that works really well. Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee has a world revolving around perception-based physics operating around a religious calendar (or something??) which I can say felt fully realised even if I never understood it - which is possibly the mark of how well realised something is.
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Sep 13, 2019 02:46
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Kesper North posted:"The Gone-Away World" and, to a lesser degree, "Gnomon" by Nick Harkaway come to mind. Borges was an acknowledged influence on the latter. Warning: I haven't read The Gone-Away World, but Gnomon is mediocre if not bad. Harkaway spends 600 pages being in love with his cleverness for a coming up with a concept Borges would have handled in 6.
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Sep 13, 2019 05:16
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bowser posted:Thanks for the suggestions everyone, my "to read" list just got a lot longer. di Giovanni worked directly with Borges to translate at least two volumes, but they are more difficult to find in print. Huxley did the Penguin collection and I can't comment on his translation quality but you don't ever feel like you are reading a translation, because Borges is just that loving good. So basically I think it doesn't matter much.
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Sep 13, 2019 13:08
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Microcline posted:Warning: I haven't read The Gone-Away World, but Gnomon is mediocre if not bad. Harkaway spends 600 pages being in love with his cleverness for a coming up with a concept Borges would have handled in 6. I enjoyed Gnomon, but you absolutely nailed it with this comment.
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Sep 13, 2019 13:08
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Well, comparing someone unfavourably with Borges is, like... the inverse of damning with faint praise.
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Sep 13, 2019 15:44
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I'm finally caught up on a decade of book backlog and dipped in here to skim a few recommendations, several hours later I'm gonna N'th Gideon the Ninth. It's clever like authors like Rothfuss grasp for and come up empty and nearly every page has some phrase both novel and eminently quotable. Doesn't hurt that it's universe is extra weird.
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Sep 13, 2019 17:24
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ravenkult posted:Any more recommends about like, survival against the elements/space colonies/expeditions/exploration books that are SF&F? Offhand, and you've probably heard these in thread already - Quiet War, Annihilation, Forty Thousand in Gehenna, Children of Time, and Children of Ruin? I can't think of any survival/expedition/exploration in fantasy, although i feel like there's something on the tip of my tongue. I'd be interested if someone else has one there.
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Sep 13, 2019 17:56
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Ceebees posted:I can't think of any survival/expedition/exploration in fantasy, although i feel like there's something on the tip of my tongue. I'd be interested if someone else has one there. Iron Council and The Scar by China Mieville both fit the bill. Iron Council is pretty woke
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Sep 13, 2019 18:29
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ravenkult posted:Any more recommends about like, survival against the elements/space colonies/expeditions/exploration books that are SF&F? Aurora.
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Sep 13, 2019 18:35
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Speaking of Children of Time, something about the smugness/tone of the writing is hurting me bad. Only 4 pages in, and already ready to dumpster it. Luckily it's a library copy and no money was spent on it. Duke of Uranium by John Barnes is up next for me, and I know it's gonna be poo poo (back bookcover mentions "in the spirit of Harry Harrison and Robert A. Heinlein"). Next book up after that is Mack Reynolds Of Godlike Power, which even the editors apparently found impossible to classify.
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Sep 13, 2019 20:23
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Speaking of Children of Time, something about the smugness/tone of the writing is hurting me bad. Only 4 pages in, and already ready to dumpster it. Luckily it's a library copy and no money was spent on it. Pretty sure that's just the way that particular character is portrayed. There's a different pov very soon so I'd say give it a few chapters at least.
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Sep 13, 2019 20:35
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johnsonrod posted:Pretty sure that's just the way that particular character is portrayed. There's a different pov very soon so I'd say give it a few chapters at least. Yeah the first POV character is an rear end in a top hat
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Sep 13, 2019 21:06
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NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Duke of Uranium by John Barnes is up next for me, and I know it's gonna be poo poo (back bookcover mentions "in the spirit of Harry Harrison and Robert A. Heinlein"). Next book up after that is Mack Reynolds Of Godlike Power, which even the editors apparently found impossible to classify. Barnes likes to be a bit meta and deconstruct things. It's not his best book or anything close to it, but I thought it was fun. A lot of his viewpoint characters tend to be deliberately bad people in order to make the reader introspect on their own identification points with that protagonist, and that is true here also, so don't go in expecting things to be played straight. In defense of Harkaway/Gnomon: It was easily one of my favorite books in years, and if you complain that it resembles a book written by someone who has literally just discovered Borges (which is valid, because he literally just had) then you're glossing over what I found to be the good stuff. I found deep and meaningful commonality between the experience of people being gaslit by governments, and the experience of people who have suffered long-term mental and emotional abuse from partners or family that involved such gaslighting, and it was pretty vital in catalyzing my recovery from same. I also find Harkaway's prose beautiful and warm, and generally a pleasure to read. So. YMMV. Kesper North fucked around with this message at 22:35 on Sep 13, 2019 |
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Sep 13, 2019 22:24
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Kesper North posted:In defense of Harkaway/Gnomon: It was easily one of my favorite books in years, and if you complain that it resembles a book written by someone who has literally just discovered Borges (which is valid, because he literally just had) then you're glossing over what I found to be the good stuff. I found deep and meaningful commonality between the experience of people being gaslit by governments, and the experience of people who have suffered long-term mental and emotional abuse from partners or family that involved such gaslighting, and it was pretty vital in catalyzing my recovery from same. I also find Harkaway's prose beautiful and warm, and generally a pleasure to read. So. YMMV.
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Sep 13, 2019 22:58
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anilEhilated posted:I'm going to agree there; he even references Borges in the text so it's not like he was ripping off. The description about 600 and 6 pages was pretty spot-on, but I don't think that makes Gnomon a bad book, definitely not by the genre's standards. I mean, I'll reiterate it's a fair critique. When I went to his reading for Gnomon here, he talked specifically about how he'd spent his whole life low key avoiding Borges until recently, and Gnomon was the direct result of his first encounter.
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Sep 13, 2019 23:46
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Orv posted:I'm finally caught up on a decade of book backlog and dipped in here to skim a few recommendations, several hours later I'm gonna N'th Gideon the Ninth. It's clever like authors like Rothfuss grasp for and come up empty and nearly every page has some phrase both novel and eminently quotable. Doesn't hurt that it's universe is extra weird. Ok you've sold me it's either this or I have to re-read Wheel of Time again, isn't it
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Sep 14, 2019 00:09
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I dropped my Joe Abercrombie re-read for Gideon the Ninth and it was absolutely worth it. A++.
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Sep 14, 2019 01:37
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So Amazon calls Gideon #1 best seller in Lesbian Romance. I'm looking at the right book right?
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Sep 14, 2019 02:37
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Lowness 72 posted:So Amazon calls Gideon #1 best seller in Lesbian Romance. I'm looking at the right book right? If you're looking at Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, yes. Amazon categories can get...weird.
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Sep 14, 2019 02:40
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Lowness 72 posted:So Amazon calls Gideon #1 best seller in Lesbian Romance. I'm looking at the right book right? Yup, that’s the one! It’s not a false description, but it’s definitely not accurate.
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Sep 14, 2019 02:42
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mdemone posted:I enjoyed Gnomon, but you absolutely nailed it with this comment. I'm also currently enjoying it, and I should probably pick up some Borges from the library next time I visit.
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Sep 14, 2019 02:48
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Gave Children of Time a 2nd chance, and it slightly improved (yes, I read fast). Found the human chapters tedious, while the spider chapters gave the illusion of character development sheerly from re-usage of the same 3 or names for spiders each flash-forward. CoT had the shaky vibe of a 1st time published author going for a detached tone because they were mashing up too many disparate concepts (David Brins Uplift concept, Brian Aldiss's/Greg Bear's generation ship society breakdown, A. Reynolds "coldsleep", Vinge's Deepness in the sky, and finally the planetary monitor/eye in the sky concept from Terry Pratchett's most forgotten novel). The shaky vibe of CoT was very weird in retrospect given that (checking) Children of Time was Czajkowski's/Tchaikovsky's 11th loving published novel.....unless Czajkowski/Tchaikovsky is massively overrated and people were desperate for A Deepness in the Sky 2.0. If people are looking for something similar to CoT, James Blish's 1957 short story collection "the Seedling Stars" covers similar ground, more specifically the ocean story with its generational approach. Keep in mind the published date of 1957, some of those stories get weird with DNA and stuff.
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Sep 14, 2019 03:10
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Kesper North posted:I mean, I'll reiterate it's a fair critique. When I went to his reading for Gnomon here, he talked specifically about how he'd spent his whole life low key avoiding Borges until recently, and Gnomon was the direct result of his first encounter.
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Sep 14, 2019 03:36
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They put the romance in lesbian necromancer 
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Sep 14, 2019 03:37
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Khizan posted:I dropped my Joe Abercrombie re-read for Gideon the Ninth and it was absolutely worth it. A++. I am just reading the new Abercrombie instead. Also, selling a book solely based on having lesbian necromancers instead of a description of the story makes me think it is another “great in concept, bad in execution” book.
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Sep 14, 2019 05:34
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I mean that whole quote is not inaccurate, there are lesbians, there is a haunted house, many of them are necromancers, skeletons feature heavily. It is also grossly underselling how good the book is and it does anything but fail to execute.
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Sep 14, 2019 06:03
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never judge a book by its blurb im always telling people how bad the blurb for Use of Weapons is vs. how good the blurb for Consider Phlebas is, and those are two books in the same series from the same publisher!
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Sep 14, 2019 06:09
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