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theblackw0lf posted:Has anyone read Daniel Abraham’s Long Price Quartet? What did you think? I read them. The core conceit is more memorable than the writing (and is really good), but I didn't have trouble getting through all four books.
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Jan 4, 2022 11:59
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anilEhilated posted:Have you tried The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber? Fits the description pretty well apart from the series thing. I love this book and didn’t even think of it. Read this!!!
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Jan 4, 2022 13:26
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Larry Parrish posted:I'm a little shaky on this, but, the way I thought of it is kind of simple. Internal power users are doing what I would call real-rear end magic. They start out doing esoteric, impossible bullshit. I'm taking this to the Commonweal thread, which is a ridiculous fuckin thing to say in the SFF megathread which gets a bajillion recurring posts about all the normal standbys but a dozen Graydon-sockpuppet-posters wanting to spend a dozen posts once a month on a niche series is just too far
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Jan 4, 2022 17:15
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Just finished Glen Cooks Shadows Linger , such a good drat book. I'm tempted to go ahead and order the next collection of Black Company books after I finish The White Rose however, I've still got this book Shadow and Claw by Gene Wolfe to read.
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Jan 4, 2022 17:55
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Hollismason posted:Just finished Glen Cooks Shadows Linger , such a good drat book. I'm tempted to go ahead and order the next collection of Black Company books after I finish The White Rose however, I've still got this book Shadow and Claw by Gene Wolfe to read. Fwiw opinions differ on which Black Company books are worth reading. I loved all of them, though I can see why a lot of people stop after the first trilogy. Also fwiw if you're anything like me you'll probably want to read all of the Book of the New Sun once you start it, Shadow and Claw are good but don't really end in a very satisfactory way. Not that that's surprising, by all accounts Wolfe didn't want the books split up at all, so I guess in a sense you're only reading half of the story, in a way that feels much more obvious than the way a lot of duologies/trilogies/whatever are written now.
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Jan 4, 2022 18:07
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MockingQuantum posted:Fwiw opinions differ on which Black Company books are worth reading. I loved all of them, though I can see why a lot of people stop after the first trilogy. Yeah I haven' decided yet whether I'mma get the next couple of Black Company Books of the South. I remember enjoying the later books of Glen Cook once its back to Croaker.
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Jan 4, 2022 18:09
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Hollismason posted:Yeah I haven' decided yet whether I'mma get the next couple of Black Company Books of the South. I remember enjoying the later books of Glen Cook once its back to Croaker. Oh I didn't realize you'd read them before, yeah then you know what you'd be getting into. I liked Books of the South and Books of Glittering Stone a lot too, but they definitely have a different feel to them. There's nothing wrong with Murgen as chronicler really, he just isn't as engaging of a narrator as Croaker IMO, he really drives the series even if he's not the most important or most interesting character at all times. I can't remember if that's really all that important of a spoiler since it's been a long time since I've read the books so better safe than sorry since people are currently reading them for the first time.
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Jan 4, 2022 18:22
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Sibling of TB posted:There is the last angel https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/the-last-angel.244209/ about an ai embodied dreadnaught, built by humans at their peak development before being conquered and subjuigated by an alien alliance, which has been wageing the war alone for thousands of years. But the story is posted on a bunch of forum threads so it's kind of difficult (for me at least) to keep track of the reading order. If you go to the OP of the third (still in progress) book, The Hungry Stars, there's a reading order listed there right under the table of contents. The TL;DR is: The Last Angel and The Angel's Fire first, then some of the short stories (which are in the thread for the sequel), then The Last Angel: Ascension, then Awakening and the rest of the short stories and novellas from that thread, then, once it's finished, The Hungry Stars. Also while the Threadmarks feature is of limited use since it lists posts in the order they were originally made, the OP of each thread is a table of contents that lists things in a more useful order. I've only read the first book and The Angel's Fire so far, but I enjoyed them, although as with pretty much all web serials they need a copyeditor.
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Jan 4, 2022 18:44
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MockingQuantum posted:Fwiw opinions differ on which Black Company books are worth reading. I loved all of them, though I can see why a lot of people stop after the first trilogy. I really want to dig on Black Company as a series. I tried the first one twice, I even think the second time I finished it. But there’s something about the narration, something in the way a lot of things are left vague and weird, or maybe I’m just dumb that’s definitely possible. But I felt perpetually like I was missing important stuff in that first book. Which sucks because the whole vibe of it is 100% my thing.
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Jan 4, 2022 18:45
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Zore posted:You might want to try the Web Serial thread for more recs. I've been enjoying War Queen which is a first contact novel between humans and giant alien bugs from the alien bug point of view. this is good
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Jan 4, 2022 19:13
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Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang - $1.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GD46PQZ/ The Girl and the Stars (Book of the Ice #1) by Mark Lawrence - $1.99 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07VJBBFN6/
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Jan 4, 2022 19:25
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BurningBeard posted:I really want to dig on Black Company as a series. I tried the first one twice, I even think the second time I finished it. But there’s something about the narration, something in the way a lot of things are left vague and weird, or maybe I’m just dumb that’s definitely possible. But I felt perpetually like I was missing important stuff in that first book. Which sucks because the whole vibe of it is 100% my thing. I can't remember if it changes as the books go on, but the early ones are definitely vague by intention. I don't know if it was a product of Cook trying to capture the feeling of chaos around war and the Company's somewhat unpredictable role in things, or if it was specifically a reaction against fantasy with heavy worldbuilding. Probably not the latter since I suppose that hadn't really become the norm quite yet. But yeah, there's definitely some events that happen offscreen and never totally get explained, some characters seem like they'll be important and just sort of fade into the background. Hell, there's a couple of the Taken who I don't think ever actually appear "onscreen" so to speak, to the point where they are basically just ominous names with little details sprinkled throughout. I was a little disappointed about that when I read the books because I loved the idea of the Taken, but I think in the end it contributes to the feel and vibe of the world more than it detracts from the experience. In any case, it's definitely not just you. I think there's a general suggestion in the way the books are written that Croaker is, at various points, either embellishing events in a way that couldn't be true, or leaving out details, or just has a faulty memory of exactly how things played out.
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Jan 4, 2022 20:14
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Yeah the Black Company definitely doesn't have this world building surrounding it beyond a some neccessary stuff. Mostly its concerned with the comings and goings of one person. There's not a lot of in depth explanation of the world around them because the books are written from a 1st person point of view and we only find out what that character knows. At least for the first couple of books. They're really easy books though to breeze through because things happen constantly and are constantly changing. I kind of feel that's one of the strengths of the books is that it really makes it feel like their in a military campaign and the focus is really on the rank and file soldiers. I'm not sure how much that changes in the later books but I remember it being kind of the same thing in the later books as well. You don't really find out much about the world surrounding them because the focus is on a character who isn't involved in all the coming and goings of everything.
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Jan 4, 2022 20:35
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The highlight of that style for me was the Limper travel sequence in Silver Spike - a heap of barely-sketched places in the background while our viewpoint character loped on past.
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Jan 4, 2022 20:56
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xiw posted:The highlight of that style for me was the Limper travel sequence in Silver Spike - a heap of barely-sketched places in the background while our viewpoint character loped on past. My favorite part of the Black Company is where they are suppose to capture a city and you think the next part is going to be all about the city and the next thing is a 2 sentence paragraph saying " So of course we captured the city , at night." and thats it . I like the Black Company writing style and Glen Cooks writing because he doesn't really gently caress around he just gets to the dialogue and the action of whats happening.
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Jan 4, 2022 20:59
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Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:15
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theblackw0lf posted:Has anyone read Daniel Abraham’s Long Price Quartet? What did you think? Like Jedit said. Writing was fine, central conceit ( poem djinni with infinite power in an extremely narrow portfolio ) was novel to me when I read it and interesting. The changing of the world over the 'four seasons' of one guy's life was, eh, but I've paid more to read worse without being mad. The one thing i have to say about them is, i read them interspersed with the Echoes of Empire trilogy (garden of stone/pillars of sand/obsidian heart) and now i will forever get the two mixed up, as workmanlike series with one big central weirdness the plot revolves around.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:16
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mllaneza posted:Arguably, the common meth in the street is better off when her story is over, I re-read these last year or the year before and that's not the way I remember it at all. I thought the human fleet bombed the hell out of the meth world and there were hardly any left
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Jan 4, 2022 21:21
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thotsky posted:Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me. Bunch of freaks out there. Robert Heinlein (incest). Jack Chalker (forced transformation). Piers Anthony (Piers Anthony). Norman Spinrad (FTL powered by female orgasm). John Norman (bondage).
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Jan 4, 2022 21:23
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For all the weird sex in The Culture those books are fairly normal and healthy about sex. Even Mr Thirty Dicks.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:36
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I could never get through more than a few pages of Heinlein because I thought they were so boring. Never read, or really heard much about those other authors. The culture books seem to mention sex as a boring thing humans do to excess, almost always in passing. Even the characters who are all about debauchery are also so over it. thotsky fucked around with this message at 21:45 on Jan 4, 2022 |
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Jan 4, 2022 21:43
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pradmer posted:Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang - $1.99 I enjoyed a number of Chiang's stories but I don't think he's a historically great author like many seem to. Rule of thumb for me is that the longer his stories are, the less I like them.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:44
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thotsky posted:Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me. Science Fiction & Fantasy Mega-thread: I wish there were more laser/sword/lasersword battles and less group sex.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:48
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thotsky posted:Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me. Depends on which SF you mean. Asimov's SF writing, like most 50s SF outside of the really pulpy stuff, tends to be pretty chaste (despite him being a notorious sexual harasser in real life), but Heinlein's later stuff was quite "magical realm," and there's also plenty of weird sexual stuff (for better or for worse), in, e.g., Frank Herbert and Ian McDonald, even without counting really gross guys like Piers Anthony and John Norman.
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Jan 4, 2022 21:54
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There's also just a lot of tiresome male-gaze poo poo whenever a woman turns up in a lot of genre stuff. I quit reading Uplift because it just exasperated me.
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Jan 4, 2022 22:09
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thotsky posted:Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me. I think part of it is just that sex in SF can be and often is weirder. Someone writing historical romance is going to stay within the limits of the possible, while someone writing SF has no narrative obstacles to writing out their fantasy of having their brain transplanted into a flying cyborg squid with twelve dick-tentacles and then having an orgy with a pack of psychic space elves. They still have to get it past the editor, but if you can do that the sky is the limit. That, I think, makes whatever sex is there a lot more memorable and makes it take up more space in people's memories of the books even if it isn't actually that common. On top of that, a lot of the foundational big names of the genre -- not necessarily widely read now, but popular and influential in their day -- were quite obviously writing their SF books about hermaphroditic centaur transformations one-handed.
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Jan 4, 2022 22:11
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ToxicFrog posted:quite obviously writing their SF books about hermaphroditic centaur transformations one-handed. Which is, of course, not a mere hypothetical example: Hedrigall posted:
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Jan 4, 2022 22:18
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Hollismason posted:Yeah the Black Company definitely doesn't have this world building surrounding it beyond a some neccessary stuff. Mostly its concerned with the comings and goings of one person. There's not a lot of in depth explanation of the world around them because the books are written from a 1st person point of view and we only find out what that character knows. At least for the first couple of books. They're really easy books though to breeze through because things happen constantly and are constantly changing. I kind of feel that's one of the strengths of the books is that it really makes it feel like their in a military campaign and the focus is really on the rank and file soldiers. I'm not sure how much that changes in the later books but I remember it being kind of the same thing in the later books as well. You don't really find out much about the world surrounding them because the focus is on a character who isn't involved in all the coming and goings of everything. Yeah the weird thing is I really hate excessive worldbuilding, see my complaining some pages back when MJH’s whole thing came up. But there’s something distinctive about Black Company that just hit different. Maybe I should try it again now. I think it was probably fifteen years ago that I actually finished the first book. I’ve heard that they get divisive as you go on. What’s the generally agreed upon number of books in the series that are best quality? And, is there a cutoff point where if you’re just not digging it don’t bother to tough it out? I’m not usually one to take lit like medicine. I think that’s an unhealthy attitude to have about books. But I’m motivated to try to like this stuff because on paper it goes hard on some themes and stylistic choices I really like.
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Jan 4, 2022 22:28
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Which is, of course, not a mere hypothetical example: I couldn't tell you why, but the Wizard's saliva is the line that sticks out to me as the most egregious. Who is the Wizard, and what makes his saliva so fertile???
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Jan 4, 2022 22:30
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Strom Cuzewon posted:For all the weird sex in The Culture those books are fairly normal and healthy about sex. The non-M books have a fair amount of incest in them, but I never got the feeling he was writing those scenes with one hand.
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Jan 4, 2022 22:35
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BurningBeard posted:Yeah the weird thing is I really hate excessive worldbuilding, see my complaining some pages back when MJH’s whole thing came up. If you really like Croaker then the first 3 books are really good and then the last of the series also features Croaker. I liked the first 3 books and I've read the whole series but its been years ago. The books are split up into 3 stories , the later books are more modernish. However the first 3 are just so good and if you look at when they were published they're really unique for that time period.
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Jan 4, 2022 22:36
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thotsky posted:Why does SF have the reputation for being horny/pervy? Aside from some use of rape for shock value, which seems pretty common in a lot of drama it seems like a pretty chaste genre to me. It's not just the stuff that makes it in to SFF works, but some of the really, horribly creepy stuff that some high profile authors say/do outside of their books. Case in point: https://www.reddit.com/r/menwritingwomen/comments/ophrmp/george_rr_martin_is_a_fucking_weirdo/
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Jan 4, 2022 22:39
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FPyat posted:I enjoyed a number of Chiang's stories but I don't think he's a historically great author like many seem to. Rule of thumb for me is that the longer his stories are, the less I like them. his tower of babylon short story is one of my favorite things i've ever read
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Jan 4, 2022 22:49
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Strom Cuzewon posted:For all the weird sex in The Culture those books are fairly normal and healthy about sex. Nothing that's on screen or actively alluded to is gross but you do have that weird part in Player of Games where Gurgeh is confirming that nothing sexual is taboo at all in The Culture including incest, pedophilia etc which was more than a little 
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Jan 4, 2022 22:51
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Zore posted:Nothing that's on screen or actively alluded to is gross but you do have that weird part in Player of Games where Gurgeh is confirming that nothing sexual is taboo at all in The Culture including incest, pedophilia etc which was more than a little "Hamin found the Culture's sexual mores even more fascinating. He was at once delighted and outraged that the Culture regarded homosexuality, incest, sex-changing, hermaphrodicy and sexual characteristic alteration as just something else people did, like going on a cruise or changing their hair-style." If this is the quote you are thinking of it doesnt mention pedophilia. Could be elsewhere in the book though, I'll admit I haven't done a super deep search.
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Jan 4, 2022 23:02
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Nae posted:I couldn't tell you why, but the Wizard's saliva is the line that sticks out to me as the most egregious. Who is the Wizard, and what makes his saliva so fertile??? The wizard is a she, and her saliva is integral to the process because the giant brain god space station she crashed on wanted to mess with her basically. Why the hell do I have trouble with names but that poo poo is still in my mind.
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Jan 4, 2022 23:06
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"hermaphrodicy" 
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Jan 4, 2022 23:07
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Hollismason posted:My favorite part of the Black Company is where they are suppose to capture a city and you think the next part is going to be all about the city and the next thing is a 2 sentence paragraph saying " So of course we captured the city , at night." and thats it . IMS there's at least one point where there's a major battle and it's drat close and some important people die; and the chronicler can't bear to write about it except to name some of the friends he lost.
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Jan 4, 2022 23:27
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Which is, of course, not a mare hypothetical example: C'mon, it was right there...
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Jan 4, 2022 23:39
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theblackw0lf posted:Has anyone read Daniel Abraham’s Long Price Quartet? What did you think? I adored them! I don’t understand how the same person can write those books and then The Expanse (boring, wooden characters, cool ideas)
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