|
i will be seeing this thread again in february 
|
#
¿
Dec 27, 2023 17:49
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 02:57 |
|
|
in order to write good fantasy i must read good fantasy, and apparently this bad boy's available at the local library... either i'm good to check out two at once or ive got to speed through The Corrections lol e: success 
cumpantry fucked around with this message at 21:35 on Apr 4, 2024 |
|
#
¿
Apr 4, 2024 21:04
|
|
|
read the first 100 pages today. i flinched when i saw the dedication to gaiman as well as their Good Omens advertised and was right to because the humor is way too satisfied with itself and annoyingly genre savvy. prose wise it seems written more like it wishes it were a movie than a book. i mean obviously it has its buddy cop influences but still, are the other Discworlds written any different? well even so Gwards Gwards is fun and loose and fast to chew through, and pratchett is for sure good at keeping the story going and unfolding with POVs shooting around all over the place (just how i like it). but i didn't like the dwarf bar scene at all. in contrast poo poo like the monkey swooping around the rooftops of a city to get back to his infinite library someone stole a book from, and also he's a monkey--that's good poo poo. i keep reading, wishing someone was restraining pratchett somewhat in his jokes and dialogue, some of the crap he has his characters say is pretty rough to read. will probably finish
|
|
#
¿
Apr 8, 2024 03:29
|
|
|
crickets are chirping in here. hello? i finished Guards! yesterday and enjoyed it overall. it really was a breeze to read and the characters were interesting. well, i didn't care for sybil much in the back half of the book where she becomes relegated really to being vime's love interest/kidnapee, very zzzzzzzzz. carrot worked well as the new guy but seemed underutilized by the end, as did his connections to being a dwarf at all (seriously, the bar never comes up again? wha) dialogue was solid when Pratchett's on his a-game. the rest is terrible, stuff borne from the Gaiman school of thought of genre savvyness. i cannot freaking stand how trope aware everyone is, it's unbelievably obnoxious and the pitiful pop culture references like dirty harry fugging sucks. attempts at social commentary are cheeky but lack real teeth, and the overall resolution of reinstating the status quo plus that sort of obnoxious liberal view of the common man a la Parks and Rec adds up to annoyance. i finished Guards wishing it were more grounded and less too clever for its own good. while very readable (and i enjoyed the chapterlessness) the prose also had a tendency to feel like i said as if a movie script were being written out. but it's not like i hated it. i'll check out more Discworlds someday. well? anyone else been readin
|
|
#
¿
Apr 12, 2024 14:53
|
|
|
i don't doubt its difficulty but holy crap he fucks up like two distinct moments with wonderful buildup by way of pop culture reference with his own hands. twice. no comic should do this it feels inexcusable, 1990 or 2024. i fear a better writer could have done something with the concept of blue balling readers in the most awkward ways possible but Pratchett settles for simply making GBS threads on some of his scenes instead. i'm really curious about the humor of the first Discworld nowMcSpankWich posted:I agree with most of what you said. I was expecting carrot to somehow be crowned king or at least recognized and such and then bungled in some way but they did practically nothing with that, and then just lazily brought back the Patrician. I think part of the problem with pop culture references in media in general is that they always age poorly, and now you're sitting there looking back on what could have been a hot take in 1989 and it's just silly. A lot of people who told me to read Discworld said to start with Guards! Guards! because it's the best set of the books, I've now read the first one or two books in each of the story sets and I have to say that this one is my least favorite, by a lot. I think my favorite are the witches, starting with Equal Rites, then Mort starting the Death novels, and then The Colour of Magic starting the Rincewind novels. i would have greatly enjoyed that, Carrot somehow being thrusted into the position not by his own choice to contrast how much Vetenari obviously wants his power. i mean him essentially being a dwarven human could've meant representing both in the multiculturalistic bath of annkhmoore or however. hey and on that note, for a fantasy work featuring unique races like the ork (?) bouncing, this was quite a human dominated narrative. well, i guess you can argue the book's philosophy is addressing human rule and such but i don't think a few extra elves or gnomes could've hurt
|
|
#
¿
Apr 12, 2024 22:44
|
|
|
i didnt even realize typing that but for gently caress's sake that's how Carrot started the book innit, his dad forces him into guard service. i wonder if Pratchett was considering the idea of kinging him and just dropped it later on, rendering Carrot pretty inert imo
|
|
#
¿
Apr 12, 2024 22:48
|
|
|
great name btw, Carrot.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 12, 2024 22:49
|
|
|
i guess this is my problem with series versus self contained narratives. i don't really feel compelled to read another Pratchett anytime soon but entire arcs could have been realized over the 400something pages that sadly werent
|
|
#
¿
Apr 12, 2024 23:45
|
|
|
thought it'd be longer since i'd go for another pratchett but when i dropped off guards! guards! i left the library with wyrd sisters. maybe 150 pages later and im enjoying it much more. i like the macbeth regicide ghost deal and the three sisters themselves a lot more than the poor police procedural and limp end from guaguards. humor seems more subdued which is scary since it came before ggguuuaarrddss
|
|
#
¿
Apr 23, 2024 17:28
|
|
|
i finished wyrd sisters last night and its humor really was much better than guards, more patient, more clever, less farting, etc. i no poo poo laughed at a part and that didnt happen once with guardsguards. even then it was still an ok read. i don't think it set the ending sequence up right, and i like the art v reality deal but i don't think he explored it enough either. despite the attempts at dividing granny and nanny as characters they kinda both felt like the same one anyway. the traveling troupe needed way more of a presence than they had. like guards all the pieces are there but pratchett couldve played differently cuz as it stands both books are good and not greatMcSpankWich posted:Even the freaking librarian always comments about how much she loves them every time I take one out "Oh I try to reread the whole series every few years! Enjoy!" I can't imagine going back and rereading any of the ones I've read so far. man i keep thinking about this librarian lol, how does she do it?
|
|
#
¿
May 1, 2024 11:59
|
|
|
well well well my library's got a copy so i guess i'll be taking a peek. in general i'd like to read more 21st century lit, i'm nearly done with The Corrections by franzen and it's a pretty amazing slice of the 2000's with ridiculously strong interesting leads. put it in the queue if it's not there already
|
|
#
¿
May 3, 2024 02:24
|
|
|
a little past 100 pages and finding this pretty sluggish, i especially didn't enjoy the soap opera chapter being by far running the longest. i like the concept overall as the land as character, protagonist even. while the variation of writing forms (letter to prose to poetry etc) is interesting i think mason's poetry in particular is terrible and it's a shame you'd have to assume alice is just a terrible poet herself cause woof. my eyes aren't necessarily falling off these pages but they aren't really happy to be here either. the aforementioned styles ultimately all sound like one guy, which something like World War Z also suffers from but not V. idk the actual prose isnt doing anything for me either, i'll probably pick out some excerpts later to share and discuss. it's elegantly worded but stiffly so, like outdoing Nathaniel Hawthorne stiff*, and worse, Mason is telling jokes. *i havent read A Scarlet Letter since junior year
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2024 00:02
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 02:57 |
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:Suggestions for Future Months you still have Orlando here. on behalf of my observation i vote The Once and Future King as June's BOTM cuz i'm sitting here now thinking about high school assignments and i was fond of that one
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2024 00:06
|
|