Return of the Book Thread

[Ard]

Almost finished The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton. Really good hard SF, not as readable as Iain M. Banks but it scratches my itch for that kind of thing.

I really liked the Reality Dysfunction when I read it.  The last book in that series however, I found abysmal.  It's like he realized he needed to cobble together an ending and have things make sense, and used the worst fit of deus ex machina I've ever seen.  It actually made me regret having read the other books.

[Johny Cee]

Almost finished The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton. Really good hard SF, not as readable as Iain M. Banks but it scratches my itch for that kind of thing.

I really liked the Reality Dysfunction when I read it.  The last book in that series however, I found abysmal.  It's like he realized he needed to cobble together an ending and have things make sense, and used the worst fit of deus ex machina I've ever seen.  It actually made me regret having read the other books.

Not sure I'd call in hard scifi when the bad guys are .  I liked Reality Dysfunction, but gave up because I had zero interest on the way the series was moving.

On second thought,  the book does have a good hard scifi beginning and middle, I was just put off by the genre switch.

[Johny Cee]

Almost finished The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton. Really good hard SF, not as readable as Iain M. Banks but it scratches my itch for that kind of thing.

How is Iain M. Banks? I've never read any of his stuff.

I did my dissertation on Banks and still liked his stuff !

Yes, he's that good.

I tried Banks again, just read Use of Weapons.  Still not my cup of tea.

[WayAbvPar]

My dad returned my copy of Snow Crash, and our ensuing discussion spurred me to read it again. About 100 pages left, and I think I am enjoying it even more than the first time I read it. I am getting much more out of the nam shub discussions- I remember being tired of all of the details the first time. This time I find them fascinating.

[Sky]

I did my dissertation on Banks and still liked his stuff !

Is KJ Parker his pseudonym? I bought the Engineer trilogy because it's not in our system, and Amazon kept recommending Banks.

I thought the Engineer trilogy was ok. Not awful.

[Johny Cee]

I did my dissertation on Banks and still liked his stuff !

Is KJ Parker his pseudonym? I bought the Engineer trilogy because it's not in our system, and Amazon kept recommending Banks.

I thought the Engineer trilogy was ok. Not awful.

KJ Parker is still unknown,  though his/her lawyer has referred to the author as a "her" a couple times recently.

[Ironwood]

I did my dissertation on Banks and still liked his stuff !

Is KJ Parker his pseudonym? I bought the Engineer trilogy because it's not in our system, and Amazon kept recommending Banks.

I thought the Engineer trilogy was ok. Not awful.

Not sure he's ever done that.  When I addressed his 'two names' in the paper, I referred to an interview where he once said that sticking the M in was as close as he'd ever come to a Pen Name.

Possibly that's a double bluff tho.

[Abagadro]

Almost finished The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton. Really good hard SF, not as readable as Iain M. Banks but it scratches my itch for that kind of thing.

I really liked the Reality Dysfunction when I read it.  The last book in that series however, I found abysmal.  It's like he realized he needed to cobble together an ending and have things make sense, and used the worst fit of deus ex machina I've ever seen.  It actually made me regret having read the other books.

Hamilton's endings pretty much universally suck. You just sorta have to accept it. His stuff is usually so good along the way that I can overlook them.

[MahrinSkel]

I don't mind the idea of erotic horror.  There's a reason why so many horror villains also tend to be pedophiles, rapists, and the like;  or why sex and violence are explicitly connected in most slasher movies.

The problem is that genre went quickly off the rails into author wish fullfillment romantic fantasies, combined with revenge fantasies where the monsters are generally only monsters to cardboard cutout archetypes.

For your reading pleasure:

Angry urban fantasy writer blog about it here.

Her feminist deconstruction is mostly bullshit, as are her arbitrary genre lines (and her justification for drawing them: They all wind up in Sci-Fi/Fantasy outside of "artsy" stores that mostly specialize in that unreadable "Serious Fiction").

But my secret shame is that I read my daughter's Urban Fantasy novels after she's done with them, and I generally find them readable (it helps she's no more fond of the purple prose Romance style love scenes than I am, and gets mostly the noirish stuff).  I don't care what genre she thinks Kim Harrison is writing for, I care that the stories are well-written and she avoids the temptation to McGuffin and deus ex machina the hell out of everything, she writes "Urban Fantasy" the way hard sci-fi writers write fantasy, but with deep characters.  Yes, sometimes she'll spend 3 pages discussing the decor, but then she makes it relevant to the plot in ways you don't need an advanced degree in literature to recognize.

Kelley Armstrong is another good one.  Sci-fi has become such a wasteland of warporn and alternate history potboilers, I had to find something new.  Aren't more than 4-6 sci-fi books coming out per year I consider worth reading (Charles Stross being near and dear to my heart, best futurist since the hard sci-fi bloom of the 70's and 80's).  Epic Fantasy is a fucking joke (how many fucking times a year do we need to deconstruct Tolkien?  And why is the decalogy the new trilogy?), Light Fantasy doesn't have enough funny ones anymore (I blame Pratchett, he used up all the good straight lines).

I tried Banks again, just read Use of Weapons.  Still not my cup of tea.

Please tell me you haven't read Player of Games yet.  If you don't like that one, I'm going to have to kill you.

--Dave

[Ironwood]

Ditto.

[Quinton]

Re Gaiman, Neverwhere is one of my favourite modern fairy tales (although I really liked Faery Tale by Raymond E Feist).  It does the whole "the world is stranger, darker and more wonderful than you imagine" thing that makes stuff from Lewis to Rowling so popular.

I recently re-read Coraline (after seeing the movie and wanting to verify that the story in the book was, in fact, better ^^) and then read The Graveyard Book.  Both are fantastic.  I think Neil works a bit better in short story form. 

It's been almost ten years since I've read all of Sandman -- probably time to read it again.  I certainly remember enjoying it immensely when I first read it.

[FatuousTwat]

Ok, I picked up the first Culture Novel, gonna read it as soon as I'm done with WoT book I'm reading.

Fucking Fred Meyers... They had some Dresden books, but only 2, 4, and 7. Wtf.

[Quinton]

Fucking Fred Meyers... They had some Dresden books, but only 2, 4, and 7. Wtf.

How did I miss this thread for so long.  Only today did I finally catch up on most of it.

After skimming through this thread, I started reading the first Dresden Files book.   So far (ch3), it's got me interested, if not amazed at the writing, but I gather this was his first book?

I started reading Pratchett's stuff in the middle, later going back to the early discworld books (which were pretty rough, but you can see the roots of a lot of stuff that evolved from satire into its own world and mythology).  I think the city watch books remain my favorite of the various discworld sub-genres, though Small Gods may be my single favorite discworld book.  What can I say, I'm a big fan of Vimes and the gang.

[rturja]

It kills me some times that Leiber and Zelazny (except for the Amber omnibus) haven't gotten a good re-release.

At least the 'Swords' have gotten a rerelease some years ago as four or five paperbacks, publisher is White Wolf. What I don't know is if those are available in hardback - never saw that version here in Finland - or if the print run has outsold.

Discworld seems to get better over time my personal favourite these days is 'Night Watch. Pratchett still has the great moments of whimsy in some titles like 'Going Postal' but the more serious books from last years are his best writing so far for me. He sadly writes a lot making him a very uneven writer qualitywise, although most of his books are at ok reads. Oh, and I'm still waiting for the 'Good Omens' movie...

My reading time lately has been pretty much devoted for Poul Anderson, which started from gathering some background ideas for RP campaign and ended up with me reading every single book from him, that I have in my collection. Nicely written fastpaced Sci-Fi with enough braincell provoking things sprinkled in to keep thoughts busy. If i'm ever going to pull my RP campaign off, I must hit my group with Hokas.

[apocrypha]

Just finished Cloudstreet by Tim Winton, fantastic book.

Not read any of his before but it was Amazon-recommended because of liking Peter Carey, and I can see why. Other than both being Australian there's a strong similarity of style, especially in the way they write from inside their characters heads so well. Cloudstreet is also incredibly evocative, with some amazing and sharp descriptions of times and places in an incredibly brief way.

It's a fairly tragic tale in many ways but it's also bursting with the life of it's characters and often very intense. Reminded me a lot of some of Salman Rushdie's stuff too, particularly later books like Shame.

The day any sci-fi writer manages to write as well as this is a day I will be very, very surprised and impressed, and it's still something that confuses me a bit. There just aren't any really good sci-fi writers, nobody that writes with one tenth of this kind of skill, not even people like Banks (who I like a lot, but he's no great wordsmith), and I don't really know why. Why is it that writing science fiction (or fantasy) is something that real writers just don't do?

[Arrrgh]

Free shipping worldwide...

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9781857983272/The-First-Book-of-Lankhmar

The fantasy masterworks edition is two volumes, the more recent edition that amazon has  milked it into 5 volumes.

[Morat20]

After skimming through this thread, I started reading the first Dresden Files book.   So far (ch3), it's got me interested, if not amazed at the writing, but I gather this was his first book?

Yeah. I think it started as a class project for a creative writing class, in fact. He doesn't really seem to find his stride and his voice until Summer Knight -- and while they're pretty predictable (they're detective novels, and as all hard-boiled detective novels do, the mystery isn't solved until AFTER the hard-boiled detective has been beaten to a pulp and believes himself past the limits of human endurance), he's gotten a bit better.

Decent sense of humor, leastwise. I've heard his straight fantasy stuff sucks balls -- I got the impression that as a writer he can handle the first-person narrative really well, but not third-person.

I started reading Pratchett's stuff in the middle, later going back to the early discworld books (which were pretty rough, but you can see the roots of a lot of stuff that evolved from satire into its own world and mythology).  I think the city watch books remain my favorite of the various discworld sub-genres, though Small Gods may be my single favorite discworld book.  What can I say, I'm a big fan of Vimes and the gang.

Pratchett -- years and years ago -- once noted that he seemed to have two types of fans. Those who felt Small Gods was the best of his books, and those who felt Reaper Man was.

I find Hogfather to be sort of a cross between both.

[FatuousTwat]

Anyone live near Bristol?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1156973/Thousands-scramble-free-books-Amazon-supplier-abandons-warehouse.html

[Strazos]

WTF, why was this stuff not given to charity or libraries?

I mean, sure if I was there I'd spend a few hours pouring over the piles...but damn.

[Murgos]

Fucking Fred Meyers... They had some Dresden books, but only 2, 4, and 7. Wtf.

How did I miss this thread for so long.  Only today did I finally catch up on most of it.

After skimming through this thread, I started reading the first Dresden Files book.   So far (ch3), it's got me interested, if not amazed at the writing, but I gather this was his first book?

I would have suggested starting with Book 2 and then going back to 1 sometime later.  He improves quite a bit by 5 or 6.

[Ard]

Fucking Fred Meyers... They had some Dresden books, but only 2, 4, and 7. Wtf.

How did I miss this thread for so long.  Only today did I finally catch up on most of it.

After skimming through this thread, I started reading the first Dresden Files book.   So far (ch3), it's got me interested, if not amazed at the writing, but I gather this was his first book?

I would have suggested starting with Book 2 and then going back to 1 sometime later.  He improves quite a bit by 5 or 6.

I'm mixed on this.  Book 1 is honestly fine on it's own, but the series gets FAR better as it goes along.  I personally started with Dead Beat, which is book 7, not realizing it was book 7.  I liked it so much I finished it in two days, and then went and bought the rest of the books.  The individual books can more or less stand on their own, aside from maybe the most recent one.  He does a good job of keeping the books mostly compartmentalized, although there IS an overarching story, but he mostly only touches on it on the sides.  That said, prepare for a long ride.  He's stated that he wants to do it as a 20 book series, with an apocalyptic trilogy after to wrap up the story.  On the upside, he's been reliably releasing them within a year, even while working on his much lower quality fantasy series.

[Mazakiel]

He also seems to be doing a short story or two a year set in the Dresden universe.  I just read one recently that was from the point of view of Thomas, and it was pretty good. 

There's also the comic book, which I think he's writing as well.  The man keeps busy. 

[Xilren's Twin]

Two recent series i've started and am enjoying

The Darkness that Comes Before: Prince of Nothing by R Scott Bakker.  This reminds me of Erikson's world building but has more of an arabic feel to it.

And Scar Night: Deepgate Codex Book 1 by Alan Campbell.

Both are darker fantasy in original settings.

[Johny Cee]

Two recent series i've started and am enjoying

The Darkness that Comes Before: Prince of Nothing by R Scott Bakker.  This reminds me of Erikson's world building but has more of an arabic feel to it.

I like Bakker.  To steal someone's quote on another forum "it's Dune meets Tolkien meets Nietszche, set against the First Crusade."

Bakker has started a new trilogy in the same setting,  set about 20 years after the first.  The Judging Eye was just released last week.

And Scar Night: Deepgate Codex Book 1 by Alan Campbell.

Both are darker fantasy in original settings.

I didn't particularly like Scar Night.  So much so that I didn't bother to pick up the follow that was released this summer.  Just felt too much like watered down Mieville for me.

[Ard]

I didn't particularly like Scar Night.  So much so that I didn't bother to pick up the follow that was released this summer.  Just felt too much like watered down Mieville for me.

Watered down Mieville might work for me.  I was about to off myself after finishing Perdido Street Station.  Talk about a scorched earth ending.

[JWIV]

Two recent series i've started and am enjoying

The Darkness that Comes Before: Prince of Nothing by R Scott Bakker.  This reminds me of Erikson's world building but has more of an arabic feel to it.

I like Bakker.  To steal someone's quote on another forum "it's Dune meets Tolkien meets Nietszche, set against the First Crusade."

Bakker has started a new trilogy in the same setting,  set about 20 years after the first.  The Judging Eye was just released last week.

I loved the first trilogy.   Has anyone read Judging Eye yet?  I'm sadly seeing mixed things.

[Johny Cee]

Two recent series i've started and am enjoying

The Darkness that Comes Before: Prince of Nothing by R Scott Bakker.  This reminds me of Erikson's world building but has more of an arabic feel to it.

I like Bakker.  To steal someone's quote on another forum "it's Dune meets Tolkien meets Nietszche, set against the First Crusade."

Bakker has started a new trilogy in the same setting,  set about 20 years after the first.  The Judging Eye was just released last week.

I loved the first trilogy.   Has anyone read Judging Eye yet?  I'm sadly seeing mixed things.

I'm a 150 pages into it now.  So far, it's enjoyable but not a page-turner.

Been splitting time between that and The Somnambulist,  which was pretty well reviewed and up for a fair amount of awards last year.

[FatuousTwat]

In the last few days I've finished Consider Phlebas (excellent), Neverwhere (great), and The Risen Empire (good). Just started on The First Chronicles of Amber, never finished it before.

Now I have a question that stems from my recent re-reading of The Wheel of Time... Do you guys consider it (at least partially) sci-fi, due to the fact that it seems to be set in the future, and they had advanced technology before the breaking?

[lamaros]

Read the first two Void books.  They were ok.

Some of the backstory was hard to follow, but it does all resolve itself.  I'm hesitating to call the end of the second book 'The Worst Fucking CopOut Ever, God it's Lame', merely because there's a 3rd book and I have hope.

At least the sex was interesting.

Bit late, but if you havn't got around to reading the 3rd one yet you are warned that if you hate the end of the second book you will probably end up killing something at the end of the third.

As Ab said, Hamilton does not do endings well. But you can count on him for generally interesting and imaginative stuff before it all ends. I think he's one of the best I've read for the sheer multitude of ideas he manages to generate in every book. When you take that away you're left with a guy who writes lots of cliche sex (not bad mostly, though somtimes he gets a bit worrying with it) and doesn't know how to end any of his stories without resorting to some kind of deux ex machina. Generaly related to the fact that he puts so much in them it's impossible to 'finish' them any other way. I don't mind this that much, at worst there's some kind of ironic enjoyment, and at best the deux ex machina seems to 'fit' consistently with the general themes of the story up to that point.

The few recent SF series he's put out havn't been as bad as some of his others in terms of endings, so if Naked God bothers you a lot don't be too hesitant about giving the other stuff a go. But for me The Reality Dysfunction is his high-point.

If you keep reading him I'd go in the following order:

Fallen Dragon
Pandora's Star and Judas Unchained
The Dreaming Void (it seems like he's falling back on formula, though I havn't read The Temporal Void, the second book yet).

Second Chance At Eden, the short story collection, is good in parts too.

Don't read Misspent Youth. It is truly awful. The worst thing I have read by an author I generally like, ever.

[Ironwood]

See, I thought Judas and Pandora were excellent.  I've read most of his stuff, but these two stand out as being more 'complete' than anything else he's done.  Which was why I was looking forward to the void stuff.

But it seems to be a return to lame form.

Didn't know the 3rd was out already.  I'll have a scour round the shops when I'm in Manchester.

[Abagadro]

I don't think it is out yet and won't be out until 2010.

I sense some confusion (based on him not reading Temporal Void but seeming to talk about the third in the series, The Evolutionary Void) and that he may be actually referring to the third book in the Night's Dawn series (i.e. Naked God).

[lamaros]

I sense some confusion (based on him not reading Temporal Void but seeming to talk about the third in the series, The Evolutionary Void) and that he may be actually referring to the third book in the Night's Dawn series (i.e. Naked God).

You're correct, I was confused. For some reason 'void' made me think of the nights dawn trilogy.

Speaking of things that aren't out yet, when is George R. R. Martin going to get off his ass and finish the Song of Ice and Fire?!

[gryeyes]

I hope its soon i am almost done with "A feast for crows" such an great series i have no clue how it fell off my radar till recently.

Before that i was reading A house of leaves. Book has an unsettling vibe to it.

[murdoc]

Speaking of things that aren't out yet, when is George R. R. Martin going to get off his ass and finish the Song of Ice and Fire?!

I just finished read this again and it's amazing how poor 'A Feast for Crows' is compared to the first three.

Currently reading '100 Years of Solitude' based on a recommendation. Probably one of he more difficult to read books I've picked up in a long time.

[Sky]

I just read Lovecraft's essay Supernatural Horror in Fiction before reading a book that pulled its selections from the essay: Lovecraft's Favorite Weird Tales. First up is Fall of the House of Usher, I've read it before but it's been a while. If, after reading this book, I'm still in the classic horror mode, I'm going to dive into other works he mentions, starting with the earliest stuff I can find and moving forward through time.