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Her Dryer posted:My dad was a big fan of Wilbur Smith when I was younger. He writes epic action adventure novels set mostly in Africa. I'd read them when he was finished, and enjoyed a few of them, but even then I thought his female characters were ridiculous, existing only to either romance the lead of get raped by a villain. I've forgotten a lot, but things that stand out: This post made me angry, because yeah, it's all true. The first book in the series, River God, is loving amazing. Read it when I was a kid, it's one of my favourite books of all time. Set in Ancient Egypt it is from the viewpoint of the Eunuch Taita, that Ancient Egyptian Wizard mentioned (he's more of a wise man than a wizard at this point) and the book is really entertaining and at the same time feels like it could all have happened and that Wilbur Smith did a metric ton of research. Everything that happens (barring possible the main character using something called Red Sheppen to go on a vision quest type thing) could realistically have happened. There's action, adventure, a tragic romance (Taita the eunuch is in love with his owner, Queen Lostris) and she dies in the end of the book, lamenting they could never be together. It's all very sad. Years later he decides to write a sequel. I'm overjoyed. I read the Sequel, called Warlock. This is the point where Taita, who has up to now just been a very intelligent man, is suddenly a wizard. Personally, I suspect the author became some sort of mentally ill, because if I remember correctly, it takes less than fifty pages before people are shooting magical penis orgasm beams at each other, because that's how wizards work. Gone is any attention to detail or historical accuracy, now it's psychic sexual warfare and pages long descriptions of big throbbing cocks. Towards the end of the book, in the last few pages, that fairly important female character Her Dryer mentions? the one who gets spearfucked? her own sister does that. The next book in the series is I think called 'the quest' and that I never read. I have heard that Taita magically grows his cock and balls back in this one. Remember a paragraph or so ago when I mentioned the tragic love between Taita and his owner, Queen Lostris? they end River God saying one day in another life they can be together. That time is now, in book three. Taita is around 120 right now, and Lostris has been reincarnated and is now I wanna say sixteen or so. The sex witch parts are new to me, but now I've heard about them and having Warlock, anyone who said they were made up and not in the book I'd call a liar.
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Jul 9, 2015 16:22
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What is it about Sci-Fi that makes authors loose their minds? I picked up a book awhile back - Hunting Party by Elizabeth Moon. It isn't amazing, but it certainly isn't terrible. The plots pretty generic but Moon handles the characters pretty well I think. One of them is a rich girl who it seems like is going to turn out to be the helpless 'oh save me, anyone!' type who trips and breaks her ankle at random but it turns out to pretty much be an act she's been forced into because she's supposed to be the simpering rich idiot, not the pretty smart and resourceful woman she is. There's acceptable character development, the bad guy looses in the end, the good guys win, happy endings all around. Like I said, not amazing, but not terrible. I spotted the fifth book in the series, Rules of Engagement, in a charity shop last week and snagged it. Kinda wishing I'd saved that ten pence now because after a few chapters all I could think was 'maybe the author got hit in the head? like really, really hard.' I don't know if it happened in the intervening books or what, but all the characters are basically two dimensional caricatures now. The rich girl I mentioned has gone from an actual character to what may as well be a bipedal sign that reads 'I'M RICH YOUR NOT SO I HATE YOU BECAUSE YOU HATE ME' The really, really awful part about the book though, is what actually happens. The rich girl (her name is Brun) is talking about casual relationships and making fun of another female character because she's a bit shy and not into them and the author feels the need to drop a little flashback into the scene where Brun says being raped wouldn't be an utterly nightmarish thing because it's just sex and anyway she's got an implant to keep her from getting pregnant. It's not so much the author setting the scene as it is her using one of those giant WW2 air raid sirens while fireworks spell out SEXHAVER PUNISHMENT TIME SOON It takes about thirty pages before yup, gangraped pregnant. Also Brun's name is now slut. Literally, that's what her captors tell her her new name is. I really, really want to throw the book away but at the same time I'm really morbidly curious just what's going to happen. I suspect it'll end with Brun deciding to keep her rape baby and settle down and be a mom, giving up any thoughts of a career or life of her own, probably with an as yet unintroduced male character who rescues her or who happens to be one of her captors only he isn't as bad as the rest of them and oh, yeah, did I mention she's been rendered mute? because that's a thing that happens. I genuinely regret picking this book up because it's retroactively ruined the first book as well, it's that bad. King Doom has a new favorite as of 20:50 on Dec 9, 2015 |
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Dec 9, 2015 17:15
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All you ungreatful assholes complaining about having to read Shakespeare in shool. I had to read 'The Shrinking of Treehorn'. Try writing an essay on a book where you can open it to any single page, read it and literally be unable to describe what you just read as anything other than 'the man got smaller and no one listened to him'. It wasn't a metaphor or anything, it was a hosed up childrens book for six year olds and we had to do actual coursework and essays about that thing.
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Sep 11, 2016 13:31
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Djeser posted:I was reading a historical fiction book set in ancient Egypt and the first chapter was a eunuch ogling a nubile nobleman's daughter. River God by any chance? by Wilbur Smith? one of my all time favourite books, and certainly Smith's best work. Shame he goes loving mental and has the eunuch firing lasers out of his dick by book three.
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Jun 22, 2023 17:18
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Stuporstar posted:Please tell me this is not hyperbole River God is set in ancient egypt and really feels like two books in one. There's a big even halfway through and the characters need to leg it out of Egypt and the second half of the book is wandering and having adventures in Africa. I love it. The sequel, seventh scroll, is set in the 1980's and is about a generic wilbur smith manly man doing an adventure to find a tomb that the characters in book one made. It's meh. Nothing super terrible, but not amazing. Some twenty odd years later, the next book in the series, Warlock, turns up and genuinely made me wonder if smith had had a stroke or joined a cult. The main character and narrator from River God, a eunuch slave named Taita had a tragic romance with the female main character, Lostris. She goes on to become queen and has a tragic romance with a guy named Tanus, Taita's protégé. It's all very sad in a noble sacrifice kind of way. It made me cry the first time I read it. Warlock throws all that away because Taita has gone off to learn true magic, grows his penis back, has a magic duel with an evil wizard complete with shooting magic beams from their dongs at each other (the bad wizard looses because he climaxes) and discovers Lostris has been reincarnated and is now a totally hot sixteen year old who is super into ancient old wizard junk and this is the point where I literally threw the book out the window.
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Jun 25, 2023 23:11
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