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Flaggy posted:No joke. That's not a novelization that's a... gameization.
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Jan 15, 2012 17:14
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Centipeed posted:That's not a novelization that's a... gameization. That is the actual front cover of the game and the novel. Reading the back of it is even more hilarious. 
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Jan 15, 2012 17:22
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Does anyone know of a good history of east asia, mainly including Japan, China, and the Koreas? I know there are tons of general history surveys of the west but I don't know what a good one would be for the east. Re: Dante's Inferno. I don't get it - it says Translated by Longfellow so that's the real Dante's Inferno, right? I bet a bunch of video game nerds have been really disappointed...
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Jan 15, 2012 22:46
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AARP LARPer fucked around with this message at 01:14 on Jan 22, 2016 |
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Jan 16, 2012 01:10
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Wiener Pee Mouth posted:I'm looking for dark, well-written fiction (I know that's an absurdly broad category). I'm not too picky about the subject matter and am open to any suggestions. The only thing I'm not really interested in is sci-fi. Damon Galgut's The Good Doctor is pretty dark and somewhat emotively draining, and his prose is wonderful and deceptively simple. J. M. Coetzee's Waiting for Barbarians is fantastic. It's an iconic allegory of imperialism and colonization, also very draining, but entirely worth it. Khushwant Singh's Train to Pakistan is more violent than dark per se, but he's also ridiculously talented. pandaK posted:I'd like something more in the realms of fantasy. The Travels of Marco Polo, then?
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Jan 16, 2012 05:22
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Jaded Mandarin posted:The Travels of Marco Polo, then? That was pretty fantastic, but it wasn't fantastic enough.
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Jan 16, 2012 09:14
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Hmm. Can't think of anything fitting besides Sindbad the Sailor, but if you don't mind branching out into the medium of comics, Bone fits the bill.
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Jan 16, 2012 09:49
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pandaK posted:Does anyone have any suggestions for stories about adventure, exploration and discovery of the like? For a lack of a suitable example in literature (excuse me for using anime and video games as an example), something like Kino no Tabi and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles that place heavy emphasis on discovery and world building. Idle Days on the Yann by Lord Dunsany, and a bunch of other random short stories by him. The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle (yes, the Holmes guy) Hrm. I'll try to think of others. If you stretch a LOT of early fantasy and sf fits (John Carter of Mars, etc., anything where human gets transported to fantasy world) but I don't thnk that's what you really want. All depends on how wide a net you cast. EDIT: Yeah, Bone is a great choice. Mieville's The Scar. Mary Renault's The Persian Boy. Robin Hobb's Dragon Haven/Dragon Keeper duology fits to a T but GOOD GOD be prepared for a heavy dose of estrogen: bigger Girl Book than anything since The Mists of Avalon. (Plot concerns exploration with a troupe of disabled dragon babies). Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Jan 16, 2012 |
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Jan 16, 2012 17:04
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Can anyone recommend some good books featuring characters with unusual abilities that take a realistic/scientific/intelligent approach to it? I'm thinking about stuff like the Merchant Princes series by Charles Stross, where characters use their ability to travel between our world and a geographically similar, feudal-era alternate history version of it to smuggle drugs past customs via medieval-land and take guns over to arm their chainmail-wearing henchmen with. The travel works by looking at a particular pattern/symbol, so they all have the symbol tattooed on them under their hair in case of emergencies. Stuff like that. Jack the Lad fucked around with this message at 18:16 on Jan 16, 2012 |
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Jan 16, 2012 17:57
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Stravaganza sounds much like the series you described, except that the setting is a parallel universe Renaissance Italy.
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Jan 16, 2012 20:35
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Jaded Mandarin posted:Stravaganza sounds much like the series you described, except that the setting is a parallel universe Renaissance Italy. Thanks, looked it up and those sound pretty cool - I'll see if I can pick up the first book somewhere. Come to think of it, alternate universes in general are pretty sweet. I liked Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy a lot. If anyone has recommendations for other books focused on travel to parallel worlds, I'd be glad to hear them.
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Jan 16, 2012 22:56
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Jack the Lad posted:Can anyone recommend some good books featuring characters with unusual abilities that take a realistic/scientific/intelligent approach to it? Sortof on this vein, Lawrence Watt-Evan's Ethshar series is fantasy but with very realistic, reaasonable characters who act intelligently given the fantasy world -- magic's just another set of rules and everyone knows those rules and responds to them appropriately. The first one is The Misenchanted Sword. Guy is a soldier, gets bound to a magic sword that makes him unbeatable in combat, and he has to deal with all the consequences of that. Don't want to give too much of the plot away but it's very much "how would a normal, reasonable guy who isn't a prophesied hero or megalomaniac or anything react to having a supremely powerful magic sword."
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Jan 17, 2012 19:07
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Jack the Lad posted:Can anyone recommend some good books featuring characters with unusual abilities that take a realistic/scientific/intelligent approach to it? This is a really anemic recommendation, but it sounds like Orson Scott Card's Pathfinder might fit your interest. I say anemic, because compared to Ender's Game I thought it was a horrible disappointment, but he seems to try to explain some supernatural abilities using some loose grasp of time travel paradox, etc. Ginger Beer Belly fucked around with this message at 03:40 on Jan 18, 2012 |
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Jan 18, 2012 03:35
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Jack the Lad posted:Can anyone recommend some good books featuring characters with unusual abilities that take a realistic/scientific/intelligent approach to it? Check out Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination. It's sort of an ur-cyberpunk novel with hard scifi teleportation, telepathy and super speed.
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Jan 18, 2012 05:53
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PeterWeller posted:Check out Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination. It's sort of an ur-cyberpunk novel with hard scifi teleportation, telepathy and super speed. Left Behind and A Game of Thrones have something in common. They are both fairly lengthy series' where main characters die. May somebody please tell me of another series which does the same thing? Thank you.
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Jan 18, 2012 21:54
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Lampsacus posted:Left Behind and A Game of Thrones have something in common. They are both fairly lengthy series' where main characters die. May somebody please tell me of another series which does the same thing? Thank you. Joel Rosenberg's "Guardians of the Flame" series is pretty lengthy (10 books if you count 3 kind of spinoffs), and IIRC a fair amount of main characters die throughout. First book is "The Sleeping Dragon."
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Jan 18, 2012 22:11
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DrGonzo90 posted:Anyone read Yann Martel's latest novel: http://www.amazon.com/Beatrice-Virgil-Novel-Yann-Martel/dp/0812981545/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1326237525&sr=8-3 ? Is it any good? Missed this the first time, sorry. I've read it and can't give a glowing recommendation. If you can find it on the cheap, go for it(I think the 11.20 on amazon for the paperback is too much, personally) but don't expect another Life of Pi. There is nothing "epic" about this book, even if the Amazon blurb says there is. An admitted author stand-in and a weird taxidermist argue about the taxidermist's manuscript for a play, that's the framing of the story. The best parts of the book are the bits of the manuscript we get to see which star Beatrice and Virgil (who are really two animals in the taxidermist's shop). It feels like the play was originally supposed to be the whole novel, but Martel ran out of time/gave up or the publisher didn't like it and so he threw this book together with the remnants. Parts of it are moving, and Martel's writing ranges from solid to outstanding (the play bits), but the story is small and quiet, and the ending is abrupt and unearned. It makes sense, storywise, but it's also a copout IMO. When I finished, I thought it was okay but forgettable, and recalling it now I feel the same way. At $5 in the remainder bin the book was a good buy, but I'd feel cheated if I had paid full price for it.
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Jan 19, 2012 01:36
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Lampsacus posted:Left Behind and A Game of Thrones have something in common. They are both fairly lengthy series' where main characters die. May somebody please tell me of another series which does the same thing? Thank you. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarchies_of_God Pseudo-early-modern-Europe fends off the pseudo-Ottoman-Empire while sending ships to explore pseudo-South-America. 
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Jan 19, 2012 19:12
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Jack the Lad posted:Can anyone recommend some good books featuring characters with unusual abilities that take a realistic/scientific/intelligent approach to it? "The Time Traveler's Wife."
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Jan 20, 2012 16:10
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Looking for as many non-fiction books about anything having to do with religious archaeology. Anything Indiana Jones might read. Doesn't necessarily have to be religious. Just finished "The Sign and Seal" and need more...
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Jan 23, 2012 13:09
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Flaggy posted:That is the actual front cover of the game and the novel. Reading the back of it is even more hilarious. Someone on NeoGAF made this after the announcement of the cover: 
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Jan 23, 2012 17:55
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I wouldn't have been surprised if you had said that was an actual page from the book.
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Jan 23, 2012 21:16
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Ok, I'm looking for a story/stories that spend a lot of time in that sort of semi-mythical idyllic rural utopia often evoked by the concept of "Merry England", in other words, pre-industrial, lots of carefree sitting around in cosy taverns drinking ale, feasting and telling stories by the fireside, and very "English". Furthermore, outside of this "Merry England" comfort zone, the world needs to be full of horrible/dangerous/scary poo poo, and the protagonists have to deal with it at some point or another. Now you may be thinking "this is basically every fantasy book ever", but here's the other requirement: I'd prefer to steer clear of fantasy, or at least the cliche "wizards and orcs" fantasy. Some light fantasy/supernatural stuff is acceptable I guess.
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Jan 25, 2012 01:33
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Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:Ok, I'm looking for a story/stories that spend a lot of time in that sort of semi-mythical idyllic rural utopia often evoked by the concept of "Merry England", in other words, pre-industrial, lots of carefree sitting around in cosy taverns drinking ale, feasting and telling stories by the fireside, and very "English".  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ladies_of_Grace_Adieu_and_Other_Stories
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Jan 25, 2012 01:40
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Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:Ok, I'm looking for a story/stories that spend a lot of time in that sort of semi-mythical idyllic rural utopia often evoked by the concept of "Merry England", in other words, pre-industrial, lots of carefree sitting around in cosy taverns drinking ale, feasting and telling stories by the fireside, and very "English". Some of the books by John Buchan have some of this idea, but in a more modern setting and an action genre. Both The 39 Steps and Huntingtower are set in a boring British (Huntingtower is a very Scottish novel) environment where everything is all cosy and nice, until a foreign threat (Germans, bolshevists) comes in and has to be stopped by the English/Scottish hero.
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Jan 25, 2012 11:30
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Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:Ok, I'm looking for a story/stories that spend a lot of time in that sort of semi-mythical idyllic rural utopia often evoked by the concept of "Merry England", in other words, pre-industrial, lots of carefree sitting around in cosy taverns drinking ale, feasting and telling stories by the fireside, and very "English". For the first part, I'd recommend Howard Pyle's The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, but there really isn't any outside horror or darkness there, unless you count King John and/or corrupt nuns. For the second, yeah, it's hard to find that without some supernatural elements. There's Susanna Clarke's books, as already mentioned, and you could try Neil Gaiman's Stardust (also, illustrated by Charles Vess). Susanna Clarke's stuff is set in the Napoleonic War era plus magic, so it's very nontraditional fantasy, almost closer to historic fiction. Stardust starts out set in Merrie Olde England but then the protagonist crosses over into Faerie -- it's closer in spirit to old-style fairy tales than to post-tolkien fantasy. EricBauman posted:Some of the books by John Buchan have some of this idea, but in a more modern setting and an action genre. Both The 39 Steps and Huntingtower are set in a boring British (Huntingtower is a very Scottish novel) environment where everything is all cosy and nice, until a foreign threat (Germans, bolshevists) comes in and has to be stopped by the English/Scottish hero. I read these recently and had a really hard time liking them -- I realize they're the foundations of the thriller genre but the raw cheerleading for the awesomosity of World War One trench warfare got really disconcerting after a while. In that general vein, though, I'd recommend The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers. It's similar in theme and setting but a little less disturbingly rah rah the Somme was awesome. Hieronymous Alloy fucked around with this message at 14:24 on Jan 25, 2012 |
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Jan 25, 2012 14:21
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I read these recently and had a really hard time liking them -- I realize they're the foundations of the thriller genre but the raw cheerleading for the awesomosity of World War One trench warfare got really disconcerting after a while. In that general vein, though, I'd recommend The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers. It's similar in theme and setting but a little less disturbingly rah rah the Somme was awesome. Yeah, I thought Childers was great too. Especially if you think about how his major 'chase scene' takes place in a slow rear end row boat. Thrillers have changed a lot in the last hundred years. The World War One nationalism wasn't my major gripe with Buchan, though. My main problem is that most if his narratives depend too much on coincidence and characters being in exactly the right place in the right time. And to be fair, he did recognise the not entirely glorious new nature of warfare in Greenmantle: “It is a great game, and you are the man for it, no doubt. But there are others who can play it, for soldiering today asks for the average rather than the exception in human nature. It is like a big machine where the parts are standardized.”
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Jan 25, 2012 17:08
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Where's the best place to start with Elmore Leonard?
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Jan 25, 2012 17:54
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Junkenstein posted:Where's the best place to start with Elmore Leonard? This is a great question (and "ha" at the avatar in relation). I was considering reading his Raylan books, but I heard he wrote more traditional period westerns. I'm wondering if this is true, since I've been on a Western kick the last few years.
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Jan 25, 2012 18:25
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EricBauman posted:The World War One nationalism wasn't my major gripe with Buchan, though. My main problem is that most if his narratives depend too much on coincidence and characters being in exactly the right place in the right time. Yeah, that's definitely a huge problem -- his characters are monstrously silly people who succeed only through massive amounts of luck, and the author isn't even self-aware enough to realize he's writing silly people -- he thinks he's writing Heroes of the British People. It didn't bother me too much, though, because hell, spy thrillers were a brand-new genre then, so a contrived plot and contrived characters are something I can swallow because the originality is in the overall concept. And there were moments where his prose style was truly memorable, too, so his books were worth reading for that reason also. The problem I had was just getting used to the idea of a non-ironic pro-world-war-one narrator. It's been ninety-odd years since the Somme and virtually every single thing ever written about it since, from T.S. Eliot to Tolkien, has been about what a horrible waste it was in every way, and what horrible fools the generals who led the Tommies had been. The entire history of the twentieth century can be read as the history of a mistake, and that mistake was the first world war. So a protagonist who was literally a World War I general, constantly spouting off about how jolly good it was to charge the machine guns or whatever, and how awesome world war one was, and how silly it was to be a pacifist . . . it was just a surreal reading experience.
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Jan 25, 2012 19:28
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Junkenstein posted:Where's the best place to start with Elmore Leonard? If you like Tarantino, Rum Punch.
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Jan 25, 2012 20:11
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Junkenstein posted:Where's the best place to start with Elmore Leonard? Cuba Libre is a good place to start. It's one of his capers, but it also shows off his historical chops. And it's a riot from beginning to end.
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Jan 25, 2012 22:39
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Joramun posted:suggestions EricBauman posted:suggestions Hieronymous Alloy posted:suggestions Thanks, this has given me some interesting stuff to look into 
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Jan 25, 2012 23:55
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I'm looking for a book on the history of witchcraft, preferably written by a genuine historian who has done genuine research, not someones fat mum who thinks she is a Wiccan. I'm interested in the practices themselves, community responses and religious responses to said practices. Bonus points if it is available on the kindle!
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Jan 26, 2012 01:50
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Can anyone recommend some comedy audiobooks? I recently listened to and enjoyed Bossypants by Tina Fey and I, Partridge by Alan Partridge.
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Jan 26, 2012 09:38
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Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:Ok, I'm looking for a story/stories that spend a lot of time in that sort of semi-mythical idyllic rural utopia often evoked by the concept of "Merry England", in other words, pre-industrial, lots of carefree sitting around in cosy taverns drinking ale, feasting and telling stories by the fireside, and very "English". This is not a direct answer, but I recently read "Electric Eden" - http://www.amazon.com/Electric-Eden/dp/0571237525 - which is about this exact concept, but from a music point of view. It spends quite a bit of time dealing with the concept and the historical/cultural background of the ideal.
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Jan 26, 2012 15:43
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AARP LARPer fucked around with this message at 01:14 on Jan 22, 2016 |
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Jan 26, 2012 17:42
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Koburn posted:Can anyone recommend some comedy audiobooks? I recently listened to and enjoyed Bossypants by Tina Fey and I, Partridge by Alan Partridge. Patton Oswalt's Zombie Spaceship Wasteland was pretty good, and so was Steve Martin's memoir. I read them, but I'd imagine the audiobook isn't too different.
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Jan 26, 2012 17:54
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barkingclam posted:Patton Oswalt's Zombie Spaceship Wasteland was pretty good, and so was Steve Martin's memoir. I read them, but I'd imagine the audiobook isn't too different. Two exemplary things about Patton's book; Michael Stipe himself actually reads the R.E.M. quotes in that chapter, and the hobo songs are actually performed/recorded. Wonderful!
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Jan 26, 2012 17:56
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Koburn posted:Can anyone recommend some comedy audiobooks? I recently listened to and enjoyed Bossypants by Tina Fey and I, Partridge by Alan Partridge. George Carlin and Lewis Black had some good ones, Stephen Colbert's "I Am America and So Can You" is also well done, and "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" narrated by Martin Freeman is excellent. Defenestrategy fucked around with this message at 21:46 on Jan 26, 2012 |
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Jan 26, 2012 21:42
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