|
Fallom posted:
I don't recall people being sanguine about death due to re-lifing. That's not really a spoiler in any event, the concept of re-lifing is a pretty basic premise to the universe. The concept of electronic records of consciousness/memory is a fairly common staple in modern sci-fi anyway, although not so much in space opera, I guess. I don't recall any cases where people are unaware of the fact that death of the body is the death of that particular instance of the consciousness, though. Probably the setting where people care the least is in Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon, where soul or personalitiy of person is continually backed up on chips implanted in the spinal cord. Death of the body alone is merely "organic damage", while "Real Death" is the idea of destruction not only of the body but also of the chip, that way continuity of experience/consciousness is explicitly broken. Then again, in that universe consciousness appears to be pretty much entirely electronically housed, since interstellar travel, for instance, is almost exclusively achieved by transmitting the digitalized personalities of people at FTL prior to downloading them into new bodies, so it's not exactly the same as if the body housed some part of the 'soul' or whathaveyou.
|
#
¿
Jun 8, 2009 17:15
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 13:53 |
|
|
Adar posted:Vernor Vinge is a co-definer of the genre and should be in the top five of any list. I don't think he's a definer of the genre as much as a transcender of the genre (hehe). Space opera has a generally low regard even within the field of sci-fi/fantasy, because a lot of it's more about world-building or nifty toys than science. Vinge manages to put amazing ideas together with interesting characters and conjure up an awesome storyline besides. A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky are both among my favorite novels, and for good reason; they're definitely the finest space opera I've read. The only author that comes close would probably be Iain M. Banks, and while I've only read a handful of the Culture novels they're good, but not to the same quality. Vinge's Marooned in Realtime is more space-mystery than space opera, but it's also good stuff. Pity The Peace War is at least somewhat a prerequisite, since it's really not up to the standards of his other works. On a similar nature as Vinge there's also Charles Stross's far future novels Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise, both of which are space-opera-y, but set in a less conventional setting of somewhat post-singularity humanity. They're good as well, and he has some cool ideas. I'd put them as on par with the Night's Dawn and Revelation Space series as far as how much I enjoyed them. Good, but less good than Vinge. Velius fucked around with this message at 02:25 on Jun 12, 2009 |
|
#
¿
Jun 12, 2009 02:21
|
|
|
ZipOtter posted:Quick question about the Culture novels: Do these improve significantly after Consider Phlebas? I read it a while ago because I'm a huge fan of Vernor Vinge and was looking for something similarly epic/crazy but ended up hating everything about it. But I still think the Culture itself is a cool concept and would like to give the series another chance. I'm picking them up as they get re-released in the US, so I've read Consider Phlebas, Use of Weapons, and Matter, the latter two are significantly better than the former. Anyway, as I said above, if you're a fan of Vinge and/or into Singularity stuff, Charles Stross has some okay pre- and post-singularity stuff of quality.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 14, 2009 18:01
|
|
|
Baron Von Awesome posted:So, I want to start a new space opera book but I'm having trouble choosing which one to buy next. I've narrowed it down to three choices, all coming recommended from this thread: A Fire Upon the Deep is my favorite of the three, but I'd say the prequel A Deepness in the Sky is more accessible, in that it's not ultratech. Fire has more revolutionary ideas/concepts, but I think the story of Deepness is better. For reference, I would venture that it's my favorite novel in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy genre overall right now.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 3, 2009 01:57
|
|
|
Chokeslam posted:I cant beleive I've never read Vinge before this thread, being a big fan of the genre. Thanks heaps for bringing him up, I just finished Fire (great read) and am starting Deepness. People have pretty well covered the Genre in the thread, honestly. I hope you enjoy Deepness, I know I did, but if you want more Vinge you're unfortunately limited to the couple other books he has out there, none of which is really Space Opera: Rainbows End is an attempt by Vinge to explore the early threshold of the technological singularity, and it's a good read, but it's entirely set on Earth in about 50 years or so. The Peace War is mediocre, I felt, but it's pseudo-sequel Marooned in Realtime is a far future murder mystery that's actually quite good, I thought. You don't really need to read the former for the latter, either. His next book is a sequel to Fire Upon the Deep, but I haven't seen any information on when it's going to be finished, much less published.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 15, 2009 15:33
|
|
|
A Fire Upon the Deep is significantly harder to get into than A Deepness in the Sky. Everything is much more alien, and I also couldn't get into the Tines as much as the Spiders. It doesn't help that Steel isn't a very fun character to read about, certainly in comparison with Sherkaner Unnerby. The intrigue in Deepness is also human-centric, and accordingly more interesting. Plus Pham Nuwen is way cooler.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 29, 2009 21:18
|
|
|
Anthrovore posted:Guys and gals, this very well may be common knowledge, but according to the all knowing wikipedia, Vinge is currently working on a sequel to A Fire Upon the Deep, set ten years after the events of that book. Jesus I cannot wait. If it's half as creative and deep(hah) as the other two books, we may have a triple crown winner on our hands. As far as I know, he's been 'currently working' on that sequel ever since Rainbows End came out almost four years ago, with no details released since then. Since the gap between his novels seems to be 7 years (Fire in 1992, Deepness in 1999, Rainbows in 2006) I'd say we probably have at least a year or two before it's out. Also, I'd be much more interested in a sequel to Deepness, although since we pretty much know how things turn out I'm not sure where he could go with the human characters, anyway.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 15, 2009 15:10
|
|
|
Anthrovore posted:edit: Since we've had a Vinge novel set in the slow zone and one set in the beyond, I'm hoping for a traditional fantasy set in the depths and a ridiculously high tech, Joycean philosophical novel set in the transcend. One can hope, right? This is an old point, but I figured with the other bump I'd address it. The whole point of the Transcend is that it's home to beings which are by definition incomprehensible to us. From the end of Fire (extreme spoilers): The last minutes of his life were beyond any description that might be rendered in the slowness, or even in the Beyond. So try metaphor and simile. It was like ... it was like ... Pham stood with Old One on a vast and empty beach. Ravna and Tines were tiny creatures at their feet. Planets and stars were the grains of sand. And the sea had drawn briefly back, letting the brightness of thought reach here where before there had been darkness. The Transcendence would be brief. So I wouldn't wait on a Transcend novel, Vinge is pretty serious about the notion of the Singularity, and a central concept is the incomprehensibility of the post-Singular world to those not progressing through it. That's explicitly the reason the Zones of Thought exist, since he doesn't think it's possible for society to advance to interstellar levels without getting to the Singularity without some external limiting factor. In the Peace War universe that's the plagues and other global events that set everything back, in Marooned it's avoided because the protagonists most likely just missed it. Anyway, it's been kind of a lovely year or two for Space Opera. All the good new authors seem to be taking a bit longer to get their latest offerings out; Morgan, Banks, Asher, Reynolds, and Vinge haven't had books out in over a year as far as I can tell. It's pretty depressing. And Stross isn't doing Space Opera anymore. Velius fucked around with this message at 20:51 on Mar 26, 2010 |
|
#
¿
Mar 26, 2010 20:43
|
|
|
Tanith posted:How do we feel about Campbell's Lost Fleet stuff? I picked up the first one, and I want to know if I should stop before I hurt myself or want to read the next five books. Read book one. I really like military sci-fi. Conclusion: "This is neat!" Read book two. I still really like military sci-fi. "hm. Kind of similar to the last book. Why do the main character and love interest keep repeating the same problem/resolution cycle?" Read book three. "I hate the woman. This constant 'intrigue' is really dumb." Read book four. "Arg." Basically, as stated in the prior replies they're incredibly repetitive in terms of the non-combat aspects. In every single book the protagonist 'struggles' with the conflict between his being a nice guy and the apparently strong temptation to become DICTATOR OF ALL, despite being in the middle of a running battle for their survival. The love interest is a huge bitch, they fight, then have make-up sex. A new group of officers undermine his authority because they're idiots, and they cause a few people to die, usually including themselves. Then a new batch start grumbling, foreshadowing the totally novel and interesting conflict for the next book. There's also two battles, one at the start, and one at the end, which are the only really entertaining parts of the series. If you like spaceship military sci-fi, your options are unfortunately quite limited. Walter Jon Williams has the Dread Empires Fall series, which starts out promising but ends up having similar issues of repetitiveness. It also suffers because there's absolutely no tension whatsoever; the premise of the series has the two main characters as literally the only beings capable of tactical innovation in a stagnant universe, so they keep winning battles over and over again pretty much effortlessly. Peter F. Hamilton has been discussed here and elsewhere, his pros and cons are pretty obvious. Weber's Honorverse is horrible tripe, but the battles in the novels are actually pretty entertaining. If his characters weren't so ridiculous it'd be a lot more tolerable. He also has a duology of "In Death Ground" and "The Shiva Option' which are also horribly written and characterized, but the books are 95% straight up battles that end up being pretty entertaining. The other series that come to mind, ones I'd actually recommend, are Elizabeth Moon's Serano/Suiza series, and the Vatta's war series. They're pretty similar to the Honorverse stuff, but without the insane anti-liberal/commie bias, and with a bit better characterization. The good guys are still pretty much always good people, but they're not inhumanly perfect. A bit more sparse on the combat side, but there's a decent enough amount. Velius fucked around with this message at 17:30 on May 12, 2010 |
|
#
¿
May 12, 2010 14:20
|
|
|
Tanith posted:For shits and giggles, I just reread the Temporal Void and I forgot the absolute best part of the book: Gore Burnelli at the end. I'm so psyched for the end of the summer to see how he concludes this. While I enjoyed the book, I do kind of have an issue with that aspect of it. Namely (spoilers?) that there's really no frame of reference or reason for folks like us as to why this dude's force fields are puny and laughable, while that guy has the bestest force fields ever and he can punch right through the first guy's force field and tear out his heart. And meanwhile the alien guys have really terrible force fields except those other aliens just totally had better ones. I mean, part of it's that it's ultratech, so actual descriptions are either meaningless or silly (huzzah, I have class XII shields, villain!), but there's a fair amount of actual implications to the various tech levels and availabilities. I guess my issue really is that for a sci-fi series, there's effectively no in-universe justification or explanation for any of it, be it that this guy has really good power sources or whathaveyou, it's just that this guy's gold colored force field is totally hardcore.
|
|
#
¿
May 25, 2010 00:59
|
|
|
fritz posted:Rob Yeah, I really don't get how anyone can take Weber remotely seriously. IN DEATH GROUND/THE SHIVA OPTION were in some ways refreshing, because he abandoned even the slightest pretense of character development in favor of battle, battle, battle. There was only a small amount of 'boy, those lib'rals sure are stupid', as well. But Harrington is pretty terrible.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 12, 2010 03:29
|
|
|
Tanith posted:Someone explain why this thread loves Vernor Vinge, because I've read A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky and was not overly excited. They both won the Hugo award, as well as receiving many other accolades? They're both filled with interesting ideas, non-cliche aliens, and well realized characters? You're in a 'SPACE OPERA' thread, what else were you looking for, exactly?
|
|
#
¿
Jun 12, 2010 20:15
|
|
|
Tanith posted:TLDR: It really isn't particularly complicated, but you're right, Vinge doesn't hit you over the head with all the 'rules' of his settings. That said, I certainly don't think Fire is more challenging than most far-future/post-human sci-fi. If you're struggling with it, I'd suggest you not read any Charles Stross, given his inclination to providing the reader with even less information. quote:The conclusion wasn't particularly fulfilling either, and the purpose of traveling to the planet in the first place beyond simply rescuing the children, if this even merits spoiler tags? seemed vague. I felt that he didn't do a good job bridging the events of the very beginning and explaining their significance to the intervening book. The pace of exposition wasn't to my liking, and the fact that a great deal of the book takes place in a decidedly non space-operatic setting turned me off. You really think the sole result of the book was rescuing the children? Did you, in your disdain for the usenet messages, skip over the entire, rather significant plot point of the Blight, you know, subsuming effectively all life within its rapidly expanding domain? quote:The net-style bits of conversation didn't appeal to me much either, because while maybe true to the style of the universe and helping convey the actual dialogue between characters, it doesn't make for interesting reading. I was about as enthused by that as by the interaction in Hyperion or the Fall of Hyperion with one of the greater sentient intelligences. If he'd limited these sections to some net article at the beginning of each chapter about the current events or as some other form of associated fluff to help flesh out the universe, I would have liked that more. Vinge was explicitly calling back to the old days of BBS postings and usenet. Which itself ties in with the overarching concept of the Zones of Space; that is, the universe he made has fundamental limitations in terms of technological potential depending on geography. Without the Zones, Vinge believes that space-faring civilizations can't possibly be rendered in a fashion conceivable to us, which is what the Transcendant Powers represent. quote:Feel free to disagree with me and point out why I should reread the stuff, but in general it just really didn't fit with my interests. Maybe Vinge is too cerebral an author for me, but space opera is supposed to be pew pew zoom zoom. You can have whatever preferences you want in what you read. I'd certainly agree that Vinge's novels have more substance than your average Hamilton or Scalzi book, which is why I (and many others) like them.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 14, 2010 14:27
|
|
and "pew pew zoom zoom"
|
Noricae posted:I never see this mentioned in space sci-fi threads but: Julian May (Rampart Worlds trilogy, maybe even the Galactic Mileu stuff (which is better) is a good read, and the Rampart Worlds stuff has a similar feel to Dan Simmons' sci-fi. May's having a tough time staying in print, for whatever reason. I read a couple of the Rampart World books, and I honestly can't remember any significant details with regard to the plots. She also put out a Fantasy series that was nearly impossible to track down even immediately after release. I'd guess she sells very poorly. Anyway, Hamilton is fun. Definitely on the pulpier side of sci-fi of late, although he has some interesting thoughts along the way, but entertaining nonetheless. The sex stuff is largely ignorable, and if you seriously find overly purple descriptions of multi-body sex that off-putting, I'm not sure why you'd be reading SPACE OPERA in the first place. It's a bit tacky, but you can always, you know, skip a couple pages.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 14, 2010 14:32
|
|
|
Decius posted:Neal Asher's Polity series takes a similar setting (AIs ruling over humans for their own good in a (nearly) post scarcity setting) but goes in a bit different (=grayer/darker) direction. I like the Polity novels, but they're loving impossible to get in bookstores in the states, and I don't like buying off Amazon. I ended up accidentally sequence-breaking, because us Yanks don't apparently need any indication of where a book falls in a series, either. 
|
|
#
¿
Jun 28, 2010 13:33
|
|
|
Phummus posted:Here there be spoilers for the Night's Dawn Trilogy. Actually, your summary isn't entirely accurate. It's more like: It's more like this: Good guy is genetically lucky and/or psychic, which is mostly used to make him improbably able to survive and do anything in a mary-sue fashion. He also has sex with everything with two legs, but it's okay because he's so awesome everyone wants to do it. Bad guy is evil and so full of conviction that nothing is ever able to stop him, and he is improbably able to survive anything. Also he worships the devil, technically in a pseudo-church of satan 'liberating man from the shackles of religious rules' fashion, but which manifests mostly in lots of torturing of dudes and rape. Alien space magic somehow lets the dead possess the living, starting with satan worshiping dude. The returned dead also get a lot of magic abilities (in particular the ability to make technology stop working, conveniently) and torture people until they also get possessed by dead dudes, making it a weird space-zombie-pocalypse, since the possessed dudes possess more dudes in a nasty cycle. Al Capone becomes ruler of a couple planets, and he's paranoid that interplanetary G-men will figure out some way to reverse the possession thing. He somehow gets a credible naval force and a hot pop-star girlfriend. There are also magic bioships that can get possessed, and he gets a bunch of these. There are a bunch of other sub-plots, focusing on a space-habitat that gets possessed, space-children who don't get possessed but work with a guy who is half-possessed, and space-princess-turned-space-station-administrator woman (who totally has sex with the hero, lots of times and is hot). And a space-superweapon that has no actual importance to the plot whatsoever. But none of this matters because the hero finds a space-God who magically fixes all of the problems instantly. Then he marries the girl he knocked up. The end.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 12, 2010 15:18
|
|
|
I picked up Evolutionary on e-book, and I'm skimming through the dreams a bit before settling in for the whole thing. The Edeard stuff gets a lot more grim this time, and I think it's pretty interesting where it goes. Main plotline is also pretty good. The main question I have is how much of a ending-out-of-nowhere it's going to have. Guess I get to find out in a few days!
|
|
#
¿
Aug 24, 2010 20:19
|
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Can anyone give me a run down on Alastair Reynolds' novels? I keep seeing them at my local(ish) Waterstones, specifically the Revelation Space novel/timeline? They look and sound interesting but I'm a bit hesitant to pick them up on the fly. Revelation Space is good, somewhat hard sci-fi space opera. The central plotline is all about Fermi's Paradox, in particular why there's no sign of intelligent life in the galaxy, and it's pretty neat. The sequel, Redemption Ark, is still pretty good, but it starts to get pretty wacky. The final book, Absolution Gap is pretty much totally bizarre and I hated the ending. The spinoff books include Chasm City (which is a space opera/noir mystery), which I found better than any of the main-series books, and The Prefect, which is also pretty good. I would say you probably should read Revelation Space, then Redemption Ark, then the spinoffs, and maybe read Absolution Gap after that if you want. Don't read the spinoffs after Absolution, though, unless you can't avoid it. Century Rain is also a weird sci-fi/noir mystery hybrid, and it's also pretty enjoyable.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 25, 2010 21:55
|
|
|
Flipswitch posted:Thanks, I'll definitely give the first one a go when I get chance to pick up a copy (which would be now if I wasn't enjoyably struggling my way through The Brothers Karamazov) and I'll give Chasm City a shot regardless as there are other novels some people have disliked that I tend to have a soft-spot for anyway so it's worth a shot. I think I'm afraid to ask about the last bit of your post though. As Warlocke said, there are three 'main sequence' novels and then two spin-offs. The thing is the three books are pretty spread out in time, and while the universe concluding happens in Absolution Gap, it's quite stupid. Really, really stupid. In fact, the whole book is pretty lame, and the actual relevant plot material is a tiny fraction of the story, most of it is a bizarre side-plot that's only important because of the above stupid ending. I can't remember where the timeline stands at the end of Redemption Ark, it might be satisfying enough to just stop there. Also, don't read that spoiler. With regard to the Culture comparison, I'd say that reading Revelation Space would be all the introduction you'd need to the setting to be able to read any of Chasm City, The Prefect, or Redemption Ark.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 26, 2010 00:27
|
|
|
Strange Matter posted:Based on the recommendations of this thread I just finished A Fire Upon the Deep. Now I'm really disappointed that Vinge follow up is a prequel. I feel like I know everything I need to know about the history of the setting, and what's really interesting to me is seeing how things progress from the game changing ending of Fire. Is the follow-up worth it? As Trig said, it's a prequel in the sense that it's the same universe, with one character shared, but it's totally disconnected aside from that, you'll have to read it and see - it will be obvious what we're talking about once you start the book, but I don't want to spoil anything.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 9, 2010 18:12
|
|
|
Ebethron posted:As a major Reynolds fan, I'd defend Redemption Ark and Absolution Gap. Their plots aren't as strong as Revelation Space, and Chasm City leaves them all standing, but they aren't so bad as people are suggesting, plenty of strange warped characters, extreme technology and strange worlds. The short story collection Galactic North helps tie up lots of the loose ends from the series. I love Reynolds, especially the stand-alones like Chasm City, but Absolution Gap was astonishingly bad. (spoilers follow) Nothing the characters did in the book mattered at all in the end, and in marked contrast to the other books Reynolds has written, none of the characters were remotely interesting or sympathetic. The ending is also a huge downer given that it renders the actions across the entire series basically meaningless. Maybe, since he's an astrophysicist, that's sort of his point (it's a really, really big universe), but it's not like the journey, particularly in Gap, was remotely meaningful even as events happened. I stand by my view that people interested in Reynolds should read everything he wrote except Gap, and possibly not bother with Ark either - the latter at least isn't too bad, it just gets a bit too wacky in the 'science'. Velius fucked around with this message at 17:20 on Nov 3, 2010 |
|
#
¿
Nov 3, 2010 17:10
|
|
|
HerrMorden posted:I've been listening to The Lost Fleet on audiobook, and I just reached this exchange in book 3: It's incredibly repetitive the whole way through, particularly in the context of the relationships and 'tension' amongst the crew. It also suffers, in a similar fashion to Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall series, from a lack of any remotely threatening adversaries. When your setting pits awesome, heroic, brilliant tactician character against moronic mooks over and over the tension starts to fade, even with ever-dwindling ships, etc. The first book or two is probably sufficient, unless you get really into the setting for some reason.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 18, 2010 10:34
|
|
|
annatar posted:I'm having real trouble reading outside of Banks, Reynolds & MacLeod (and occasionally Stross), I just feel like theres a huge gap for me between them and the rest of the active field. Why don't you mention who you've actually tried (and disliked), rather than force us to list every author under the sun?
|
|
#
¿
Nov 21, 2010 14:30
|
|
|
Jigoku San posted:Personally I liked Moon's Vatta's War series better than Serrano. I did as well, although both are worth reading; Moon tends to make far more interesting non-combat drama in her books, but they also usually have one or two large set-pieces. Whereas reading Harrington is mostly skipping everything that's NOT a set-piece.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 18, 2011 15:16
|
|
|
Ugh. The Praxis series might have most of those things, but the actual battles are incredibly dull and repetitive affairs. When the protagonists are portrayed repeatedly as the only remotely competent people in a galaxy-spanning empire, far and above over any opposition, the series loses any real tension. That said, the fact they did have flaws was a nice change of pace from the usual Mary Sues of the genre.
|
|
#
¿
May 1, 2012 21:42
|
|
|
With regards to the end of Night's Dawn, the little change, unless I'm misremembering, is that he made himself telepathic.
|
|
#
¿
May 24, 2012 18:57
|
|
|
Fallorn posted:You can always do the Elizabeth Moon Mary Sue in Space thing I think she has like 2 or 3 of them for series. For being military sci-fi, Moon's stuff never struck me as being filled with Mary-sues. Sure, the protagonists are always generally good people, and they always go from relatively humble origins to fame. But they're also flawed, even if the flaws are virtuous flaws, and they make mistakes. By the standards of the genre they're certainly not outlandishly perfect, unlike say Honor Harrington.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 13, 2012 16:52
|
|
|
BadOptics posted:What is the consensus on Walter Jon Williams' Dread Empire's Fall? I'm about half way through The Praxis, and while it's not bad so far, I can tell it's not going to be as good as, say, any of Bank's novels. Hoping to not get let down too much; bought the books a while back and have been trying to find time to tear through them. You mentioned the Conquerors Legacy series as one you struggled through. I would say Dread Empire is somewhat the inverse. The characters in Dread Empire are imperfect and interesting, but the setting drains any drama or tension away. As flawed as the protagonists are, everyone else is profoundly stupid and incapable of independent thoughts, so the outcome is foregone. Zahn tends to have iffy character depth, but good ploting. I bailed on Dread Empire after book two and a brief skimming of book three, when it became guerrilla warfare against idiots.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 19, 2013 16:35
|
|
|
Vanilla posted:I've started reading the Star Force series, first book swarm and i'm enjoying it. Description below, an enjoying read, not a lot of 'hard' sci fi so far but it's killing the time while sat on the train I read the first two, I believe. Unlike, for example, Wool (which also started as self published ultra cheap ebooks), the star force books seem pretty unabashedly pure pulp. Gary Sue protagonist, stupid government doesn't realize how awesome he is, and other common tropes. That doesn't mean they're horrible or anything, provided you know what you are getting into and check your brain at the cover.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 22, 2013 23:10
|
|
|
Just Another Lurker posted:Bought all of the Lost Fleet series last week and after finishing the last one this morning i can honestly say i feel thoroughly ripped off from the experience. You could have asked about Lost Fleet. I'm not alone in being very vocal in my dislike in this and the general Sci fi thread.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 4, 2013 22:34
|
|
out of my life with no regrets on my side.
|
Velius bitching about The Lost Fleet posted:Read book one. I really like military sci-fi. Conclusion: "This is neat!" Quoting myself from three years ago, because it's still true. Mil Sci-fi is a tough genre to find decent stuff. Velius fucked around with this message at 22:40 on Dec 4, 2013 |
|
#
¿
Dec 4, 2013 22:38
|
|
|
Vanilla posted:Just FYI The last book in the Lost Fleet saga that focuses on the Midway systems, which rebelled from the Sydics, came out a few weeks ago. The Lost Stars: Imperfect Sword What about "Black Jack" Geary? Is he a soon-to-be dictator, or a thoughtful, considerate officer who respects the rule of law and civilian governance? I'm not sure which one it is this sentence.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 24, 2014 02:21
|
|
|
syphon posted:The Lost Fleet series is a thinly veiled series of plots designed as an excuse to write fairly interesting space tactics/battles. The trouble is they all had two battles, one at the start, one at the end, and three hundred pages of repetitive and boring relationship drama/tension with the battlecruiser captains (battlecruisers are faster than battleships, while lacking the armor and full broadsides; hence the captains posted to them tended to be the ones motived by glory seeking) filler. Repeat through five novels. At least Weber can write crazy popcorn military Sci fi that completely ignores character (non) development for constantly fighting (see: On Death Ground). The Lost Fleet just mangled the ratio in light of how ungodly boring and repetitive the filler is.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 28, 2014 19:31
|
|
|
Hedrigall posted:Are you talking about the end of Fire? I thought the zone boundaries just shifted, not dissolved entirely. Man, I'd love a proper sequel to Deepness. Fire was the more creative setting, and I enjoyed Children, but Ravna just isn't as compelling as Pham as a protagonist. I should re-read Children sometime. I was just annoyed by how telegraphed the antagonists were. I guess Nau was always obvious too, but at least we had in-setting people who realized, while no one twigs on what's his face being not very secretly evil.
|
|
#
¿
May 30, 2015 02:17
|
|
|
Finished Nemesis Games. Kind of blitzed through since the building where I work was closed due to a power failure all afternoon. I thought it was very enjoyable. A ton of focus on the non-Holden characters, and a more large scale, plot centric story. Only complaints so far are that there were a few too many plot contrivances, one in particular being almost insanely implausibly coincidental, and that the ending didn't resolve anything, but it's book five of nine so what can you do. Overall it's a super dark tone and crazily engaging. Very empire strikes back.
|
|
#
¿
Jun 4, 2015 01:43
|
|
|
froody guy posted:I don't know if this is the right place to ask for a reccomendation but since I'd need it about my next space opera saga I guess I may try my luck here. Alastair Reynolds is solid, epic scope space opera. Workmanlike writing and pretty dry but not painful. Campbell's Lost Fleet is the same book written seven times. Same plot, same absurdly paper thin characters, bizarrely same relationship drama every book. Hamilton is a weird fish. The series is absolutely popcorn space opera like something out of the sixties, but with a ton of sex and just absurd plot points. Not bad writing as best I can judge. I found them enjoyable, but deep characters? Nah. Hamilton can't write endings though. Vinge is awesome. I prefer A Deepness in the Sky, which is my favorite Sci fi book of all time, but Fire is also outstanding. While Hyperion was actually decent the Endymion books are atrocious and retroactively make the first two much worse. Haven't read the others. Hope this helps! Velius fucked around with this message at 01:23 on Aug 11, 2015 |
|
#
¿
Aug 11, 2015 01:20
|
|
|
Didn't Enders Game bomb? I'm shocked they're going to try another Sci fi epic from a homophobe so soon after...
|
|
#
¿
Aug 15, 2015 13:27
|
|
|
jng2058 posted:The Forever War is a good choice. So is Armor. If you don't mind Space Navy instead of Space Marines, I'm quite fond of In Death Ground and The Shiva Option. There are other books in that series, but IDG and TSO are by far the best, and you don't need to read the ones before or after them to get them. Do just those two and tap out. (I wish I had. Just be aware that On Death Ground and Shiva Option are 100% relentless space battles with thinner than cardboard characters. Also a lot of "the new tier XII shields held the tier 7 warheads, but only for a moment before they were overwhelmed, the ship engulfed in explosions as it fell off the line." Basically it's Weber without being loaded down with Honor.
|
|
#
¿
Sep 12, 2015 01:18
|
|
)
|
gohmak posted:It's been a while but I kind of remember Kovacs having sex with a male character that prefers woman's sleeve in a VR setting that allowed each other to make instantaneous cosmetic alterations to their partner at a touch while loving. or was it the rape her to save her therapy part? To be fair about that spoiler (from Broken Angels), the woman is explicitly manipulating Kovacs. Kovacs thinks she's in shock because she was in a labor camp or some such, but it's actually because she murdered a bunch of her colleagues in cold blood. She needs Kovacs help and believes sleeping with him (in virtual) will help keep him from asking too many questions.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 22, 2016 19:29
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 13:53 |
|
|
Amberskin posted:If you are thinking about "Absolution Gap", it is not at level with the other two books in the story arc (Revelation Space and Redemption Ark), but I would not say it is poo poo. Its definitely the weakest of the series, but it is still readable. It's pretty bad. It's the rare book that retroactively makes the earlier books worse, like Endymion. Reynolds spends books one and two creating an amazing hard-ish science fiction setting with a bunch of cool mysteries, and answers many of them very poorly in Absolution Gap. He also randomly shits all over the hard Sci-fi rules he'd earlier established without much explanation.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 24, 2016 01:48
|
|