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fandom is messy bitches all the way down
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Feb 9, 2021 12:18
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HopperUK posted:CJ Cherryh in some of her books writes just excellent prose. Clear, evocative, sweeps you into the world. I was blown away by Finity's End when I read it. She isn't flashy but she's effortless. Cherry is often mentioned together with Julie Czerneda (or is it the other way?). I always preferred the latter; great worldbuilding, a delightful focus on alien worlds and likeable characters. I don't know much about "style" though.
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Feb 14, 2021 02:22
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Aardvark! posted:Any recommendations for Czerneda? I've never read her but she sounds up my alley. I think the Web Shifters and Species Imperative trilogies are her best. The former is told from the perspective of a shapeshifting alien that a lot of fans really like. The latter trilogy is more polished, has more politics and some really great twists. Can't go wrong with either one, but Beholder's Eye from the Web Shifters trilogy was the first book I bought with my own money so it has a special place in my heart.
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Feb 14, 2021 04:10
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StrixNebulosa posted:Not gonna lie, it's been.... interesting being both extremely left politically and someone who enjoys reading military porn, especially sci-fi military porn. The trappings of a functioning military with all the hardware and training is cool, but the function of it in real life is not, and it's an ongoing struggle to find media that has the fun of that that isn't slanted too far to the right. David Drake is about the closest I've gotten - him and Glen Cook. Vorkosigan Saga... maybe?
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Feb 15, 2021 20:53
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I finished Banks's Excession after having bounced off it a decade ago. I love Player of Games, but the decision of having the Culture front and center in Excession just seems kind of self-indulgent. There's already too many humanoid characters, never mind the sprawling roster of ships. Trying to parse their messages for conspiracies and allegiances is pretty annoying. There was some pretty fun stuff in the book though. It managed to hold my attention.
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Feb 23, 2021 06:20
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Aardvark! posted:this poo poo SUCKS!!!!!!!!!! Pretty dumb but kinda hunky guys who need to be taught right by the female (?ish?) protagonist might be a weakness of Czernedas... It's been a while since I read this particular book, but these guys generally don't take up much of the books.
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Feb 23, 2021 17:54
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The problem with the Minds is that they're so stupid. Sure, they can make a great many decisions very quickly, but their decisions are never really shown to be particularly clever. They're often at odds with each other, and their petty plots and squabbling are the same as any human; the scale is just bigger. I guess it's kind of impossible to write a Mind that comes across as smarter than the author, but it makes for a weird plot hole.
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Mar 4, 2021 22:38
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General Battuta posted:That's not a plot hole! A weird inconsistency that goes against the flow of logic established in the story? I guess there might be a better word for it than plot hole. It breaks my suspension of disbelief at least.
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Mar 4, 2021 23:07
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branedotorg posted:Or that Utopia is enough for a long time, for most people, but eventually you either go into storage or radically reinvent yourself. It's a weirdly pessimistic take compared to something like Star Trek: The Next Generation, where improving oneself and the human condition is how humans stay fulfilled in a post-scarcity society. The culture books have this conceit that the minds of the Culture have basically explored pretty much everything already and is teetering on the edge of simply leaving this plane of existence, but eschewing it as some kind of cop-out.
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Mar 5, 2021 10:21
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Lt. Danger posted:some criticism I have heard of the Culture from a left-perspective is that, like Star Trek, it's merely a post-scarcity utopia - liberalism rather than communism, with all the humans as bourgeoisie It depends on the episode, and of course, series; "The Neutral Zone" from The Next Generation seems pretty overtly communist to me, while many DS9 episodes are not utopian at all. Star Trek has a decidedly liberal bent, one that adjusts with the times of the various shows (DS9 gets a lot more hawkish), but for the most part the utopia it presents is one where money has been done away with, humans are no longer concerned with accumulating property and material possessions, and work is done because you want to. thotsky fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Mar 7, 2021 |
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Mar 7, 2021 00:05
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It was dumb when the male protagonist in Excession is a secret rear end in a top hat. It was really dumb when his great moral failing was cheating on his girlfriend. It's super dumb when she attempts to murder him by cutting out his uterus, but he's cool with that. I thought Use of Weapons was good, but now I am expecting all the male protagonists of the Culture books to have secret moral failings that will be dramatically revealed at the end of the book.
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Mar 7, 2021 03:58
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I enjoyed Player of Games and Use of Weapons a lot, but Consider Phlebas and Excession were mediocre. I don't expect I'll read much more Banks.
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Mar 8, 2021 10:38
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Is there any good SF about black holes? I am fascinated by them as pure expressions of power. Like, they don't have to be portals or unlock time travel or whatever, they're plenty menacing and mysterious on their own.
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Mar 27, 2021 17:27
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pseudorandom name posted:The Hugos have been mostly good for the same length of time, although there’s been a few years recently when the neofascists have rigged the vote enough to skew the results. The sad puppies campaigns have at best managed to impact the nominations, with most of those "victories" then getting voted into oblivion. The only award winners to have appeared on their lists seem pretty unconnected to their agenda or outright in conflict with their stated goals, being Guardians of the Galaxy and, you know, works by women of color.
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Mar 29, 2021 13:11
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Basically, he's saying it was not his decision, but also he does not think it's that terrible. If you believe him it's a pretty good defense; it's difficult to be outraged that some stranger has bad taste.
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Mar 30, 2021 15:09
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Charles Stross have had some other clunkers too. These look like programming books or powerpoint presentations. .jpg)  This one looks like a stock image somebody would use in a piece of news about computer security. 
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Mar 30, 2021 15:26
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lol, you were all discussing a book in good faith; why do you have to make it into a cold war standoff
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Apr 13, 2021 12:42
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Yep, either through a "supporting membership" or by going to Worldcon. It's been many years since I last went, but it was fun, worth considering if COVID ever lets up.
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Apr 13, 2021 21:11
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I don't really want to vote for a sequel; it seems like it would be a waste even in series where each work is standalone and outright annoying if you pick up a winner in the shop only to find that it is the second in a series and you need to go get the first one. Introducing new works and preferably new authors should be a priority.
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Apr 13, 2021 23:45
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I think most, but not all, of the Discworld books gave me at least one solid chuckle. That's still fewer solid jokes in 35+ books than in one comedy special. Mostly they're interesting and enjoyable and make me smile.
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May 25, 2021 19:28
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Vatta's War is alright. I'm not sure I'd call it space truckers; it's Honor Harrington but better.
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Jun 2, 2021 10:34
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darkgray posted:Hi guys, my Kindle recommended this exciting book to me, and I was wondering if anyone happened to have read it and could tell me if it's as good as the blurb says. It's great, but you should start on the first book of the series.
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Jun 12, 2021 10:47
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high fantasy: elves and magic low fantasy: daggers and horseshit
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Jun 17, 2021 14:01
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wizzardstaff posted:Is there ANY series where this doesn’t hold true? Publication order is always best. The Vorkosigan saga. I think internal chronological order is best, except you skip the Cordelia books, start at The Warriors Apprentice and read the Cordelia books later as a sort of prequel.
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Jun 23, 2021 23:09
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A very cheap spotify-like service might work, but that's really just my library and taxes when you think about it. If I can't wait for the library to get me my book pirating whatever it is for my old-rear end kindle would (hypothetically) be easier than buying it, which is the only metric that really matters. It might be different for Americans who're fully connected to the Amazon service with one-click shopping and all that. I think buying comic omnibuses and collectors editions and poo poo still has a lot of merit, but single volumes seem more suited for library borrowing and single chapters really only makes sense online these days.
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Jun 25, 2021 00:01
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I bounced off The Blade Itself so hard it made a noise. Seems like a good example of "low fantasy" though.
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Jun 29, 2021 01:59
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Armauk posted:What made you bounce? I can't say for sure, or at least I don't remember. Granted, I am not a big fantasy fan; I think the only stuff I have enjoyed enough for it to stick with me are Brust's Taltos stuff, and I guess Discworld, if you would count that.
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Jun 29, 2021 11:05
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Copernic posted:I think its possible to be sympathetic both to Fall and to readers who have a negative, visceral reaction to slurs they may well have encountered in their own lives. Does anyone really support the title? Fall changed the title! Like, half of all queer fiction/poetry/biographies have some slur in the title. "Queer" itself is a slur. What is this argument? A trans person playing with a right-wing meme is not particularly surprising, a bit of controversy was probably the point, but the reaction was out of proportion.
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Jul 1, 2021 01:07
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The problem is not self-published books; it's self-published authors.
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Aug 9, 2021 15:40
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quantumfoam posted:More details for people, this plot synopsis (from a SFL Archives poster) sound familiar to anyone who read READY PLAYER ONE? Hints of Rainbows End. Not surprised novels with VR/AR gaming have a lot in common.
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Aug 12, 2021 08:05
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The Taltos books are probably the only fantasy novels I have actually liked rather than merely tolerated. I don't count Discworld as fantasy.
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Aug 13, 2021 13:07
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BananaNutkins posted:This is a tangent and I'm not spoiling for a fight, but isn't it sexist and presumptive to suggest to someone to read more female authors? lol
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Aug 15, 2021 13:42
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The Vorkosigan Saga is great because much like the Discworld books as the series goes on she starts experimenting with various genres to keep things fresh.
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Aug 16, 2021 01:51
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Unless you have a very strong preference for female protagonists I recommend starting with The Warrior's Apprentice and read the books in internal chronological order from then on. The Cordelia books work best as a prequel you can drop in whenever, maybe right after The Vor Game.
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Aug 16, 2021 14:06
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Seeing as how fanfiction definitely written as a masturbatory exercise by the author keeps getting published with the serial numbers filed off this seems like a dumb, and self-aggrandizing argument.
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Aug 17, 2021 02:17
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neongrey posted:The Watch books honestly feel the most explicitly hopeful to me out of any Discworld books if for no other reason than it's quite explicitly taking the concept of ACAB seriously but then asks "... but what if they didn't want to be bastards anymore?" which is really something you need the lens of fantasy for. That sounds glib and it is a little but its also something you need to have a designed/written society for just to make it even possible to take the notion very far. I love sociological fantasy so that's a lot of why the watch are my favourite subseries. It's been a while since I reread them, but their transformation to a functional, or rather, militarized and well-funded police force capable of bringing down a dragon, going through a liberal inclusivity reform so you might be getting your head kicked in by a multicultural group of guard officers, remaining at the beck and call of Vetinari throughout and defusing any revolutionary potential by making the guard leadership a member of the bourgeoisie is kind of peak ACAB. thotsky fucked around with this message at 02:28 on Aug 18, 2021 |
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Aug 18, 2021 02:25
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The first couple of Dresden Files books are a bit amateurish, but the series does settle into a pretty competent rhythm that fans of stuff like Buffy: The Vampire Slayer might like.
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Aug 18, 2021 10:49
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Ccs posted:I didn't get through the first Dresden book but I'd heard bits and pieces about his misogyny throughout the years. What I found interesting is he actually knows he's a misogynist. Like he remarks about women and does stuff he thinks is chivalrous and always thinks "yeah the women hate when I do this but that's just how I am." It's so strange. I guess it's the author going "I'm going to write this hardboiled detective type character and he has all the flaws that old hardboiled detectives had, but because we're in modern times he's going to know that what he's doing is either wrong or old fashioned. But he's still going to do them, because that's part of his character." This would be more acceptable if it was an actual flaw. At least half of the time it's played as a lovable quirk, and never really seems to get him into trouble, or at least, not trouble he can't heroically defeat. There's less of it as the series goes along, but it's brought up almost every time Dresden has to save a woman in distress, or leave a woman behind for their safety. Perhaps the author feels like the self-awareness excuses the clichés somewhat, but anyone reading urban fantasy probably tolerates those.
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Aug 18, 2021 21:18
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StrixNebulosa posted:The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it’s made by Alexis Kennedy, notorious sexual harasser who preyed on the women in junior positions in his company. The problem with Cultist Simulator is that it requires you to go through the same, very repetitive grind every time you have to start over or want to go for a different path. What you are describing is the problem with Alexis Kennedy.
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Aug 22, 2021 19:12
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I really enjoyed Pyramids. I read it at the beach during summer vacation, and I was fifteen so the memories associated with it quite vivid. I can feel the heat of the sun on my skin just thinking about the book, weird but nice.
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Aug 29, 2021 02:25
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