Forgive my terrible crime of necromancy (four years, whew), but for the benefit of anyone in the future searching the forums for recommendations on their first AP to run, I strongly discourage you from running Dead Suns (no offense to those who suggested it those many moons ago).
Narratively, Dead Suns has an interesting premise, but commits many storytelling cardinal sins: events that play out exactly as written regardless of player action, an entire chapter that turns out to be a wild goose chase/red herring, the second half of the AP is almost entirely on-rails with no option to "go back to town," and the course of action that the final chapter proposes the players take is illogical, improbable, and infeasible, to the point that it seems most GMs have to tell the players what the game expects them to do.
SPOILER: ** spoiler omitted **
Gameplay-wise, Dead Suns was being written before the Starfinder base rules had even been finished, meaning it incorporates a lot of obscenely poorly-balanced encounters, including a boss at the end of chapter one which seems, at least anecdotally, to boast a rougly 40-50% TPK ratio, and a boss in (IIRC) chapter 4 whose AC was miscalculated, and as a result, most PCs won't be able to hit without rolling nat 20s (which, per the rules, won't even result in a critical hit). There's also very little money to go around, so players who are itching to play around with some cool weapons and armor upgrades are going to be sorely diappointed.
Of course, all of these issues can be circumvented if you're willing to put in the effort, but you should know that you've got your work cut out for you.
Again, no offense to anyone who enjoys (or worked on!) Dead Suns, but to give my honest opinion, and echo that of others, it's a mess.
From the store page it appears that the last volume of the latest announced AP (Curtain Call) is already here. Do we know what the next ones are? themes, number of books, level ranges, etc?
Man I remember back when I was young, when anthropomorphized flytrap plants had a damn firm human gender. Dunno what chemicals the govmnt is putting in in the sprinklers these days, but they're for sure priming young Leshies to disrespect tradition and their elders. What a farce.
Shout out to Scarwall, from the end of Curse of the Crimson Throne! A high-ish level dungeon done right, in my opinion. It's huge, filled with interesting and varied encounters, and simply drips with atmosphere.
I'm also a huge fan of the Lady's Light, from the second adventure in Shards of Sin. I think it really has this feeling of discovery, alongside some serious highlights, both in traps and encounters.
Haven't been frequenting this board in a while, but I figure now's as good a time as any to return, starting with my 2020 reading summary. Yay!
stats:
Books read this year: 21
diversity: this year I've tried six authors that were new to me. I've read five science fiction books, three urban fantasy, four non fiction, and nine fantasy. Five in of the books were the next installment of a series I was already partway through, and the rest were either standalones or new to me.
Bottom 3 reads of 2020:
1) The Dreaming Void, by Peter F. Hamilton - this might be the last book I read by this author. It's not that he's terrible - some of his ideas are mind bending and interesting, and I appreciate the overall experience of some stuff by him that I've read. However, these books are also... kinda boring. Characterization is weak, there's tons of bloat, and the recurring theme of focusing on high society sex escapades just doesn't grab me.
2) All Systems Red, by Martha Wells - I can see some potential in the concept, I actually like many of the characters and the writing is solid - but I find the book dreadfully unfunny, and I'm pretty sure that giggling at the PoV is a large part of the supposed appeal here. Without it, all that remains is a perfectly fine adventure story, but nothing to compel me to read onwards.
3) Every Heart A Doorway, by Seanen Mcguire - I like the idea of this book so much, but I actually literally hated the execution, and I *never* hate books. It was just so damned short that I felt compelled to finish the thing even though I knew by the halfway mark that this isn't for me. The plot of this book is utter nonsense, nobody acts remotely like a human being, the mystery at the heart of it was incredibly easy to see through for a seasoned reader, and to top everything off, the novella is way overprices for each page count on Amazon. This is the one book I actually regret reading this year.
Top Five reads of 2020:
Onwards to some positivity!
5) One Word Kill, by Mark Lawrence - what a delightful little package of prose, ideas and character. It isn't any sort of great literary achievement, just a very compact delivery of great story telling. One of the most fun reads of the year for sure, featuring intelligently-done time travel, and capturing the feeling of playing D&D as a kid perfectly.
4) The Heroes, by Joe Abercrombie - while not quite as pitch perfect as Best Served Cold, this one is still very distinctly something that only Abercrombie could have pulled off. Best rendition of large scale battle I've ever seen in fantasy? absolutely. The chapter titled "casualties" should win some kind of literary award all on its own. This book is gritty and action packed, hilarious and shocking, amazing with characters, and splendidly written. However, it is more spread out across PoVs than any other Abercrombie book I've read - very methodologically and purposefully so, as it aims to show this gigantic event from as many angles as possible - but still, it comes at the expense of some of the tightbeam focus that previous Abercrombie main PoVs enjoyed.
3) Changes (Dresden #12) by Jim Butcher - hoo boy. Talk about shaking the status quo. Very clearly a pivot point for the series, and I enjoyed almost every moment of it. Like the best Dresden books it took me through the full range of emotional responses, from fist pumping adrenaline and out loud laughter to the verge of tears. Seriously, the emotional gut punch this one drew out of me with the line "Oh, hoss" is quite difficult to believe. Obviously I'm intensely curious to find out what happens next.
2) The Sword of Kaigen, by M.L Wang - I've made a gigantic rambling exploration of why this book is so special to me over at r/fantasy, and I have not the intention of capacity of repeating it here, hence the link. But yeah, this book is amazing.
1) The Big Picture by Sean Caroll - this non fiction is topping my list this year for doing the rarest, greatest thing that a non fiction book can aspire to: it changed how I view and understand the world. A philosophy book written by a physicist, it had just the right state of mind to discuss a fundamental understanding of the universe for me. It promotes the philosophy of the "poetic naturalist", who understands reality through layers of models that are all equally "true" in their applicable domains, and finds beauty and meaning in nature as it is without the need to pile up extra stories of the supernatural. If you want to read a book that convinces you free will is a superficial construct and that you absloutly have it and that's a good thing - this is the book for you. The author is quite possibly the best educational personality I know and in a proper world would have risen to major superstar status. In our world he has an amazing podcast (Mindscape) and a possibly even better Youtube channel.
Hello fellow Paizonians!
As has been my modest, home-grown tradition this last past half decade or so, I'd like to share an overall view of the year I've just had in reading. Some basic statistics, some top lists (because resisting the urge to list things is basically a failure of the Turing test, as far as I'm concerned) and some reflections on the overall trend of things this past year.
I'd love to hear about the year that all you people had, too!
Lord Snow's year in reading, 2019 edition:
Perhaps the most remarkable fact about this year has not to do with any of the books that I've read, but with the one I didn't - Dresden Files #12. For half a decade I've been reading two of these each year, slowly working my way through an impressive backlog of tomes, and slowly falling in love with Dresden and his friends and family. However, being so close to the last released book and knowing that the wait for the finishing act of the series might last many years, I've decided to take my time and slow down a bit. It was still my intention to read one book this year, but somehow by the time December descended on me, I realized I'm just not going to be able to cram it into the remaining time I had.
Other than this single glaring omission, I've had a pretty good year. I'm a slow reader, and having set a Goodreads challenge to the number of 22 books, managed to motivate myself to put in some extra reading hours (beyond the usual accumulated 60 minutes a day of surviving public transport by sinking into a book).
With no further preamble, I present to your questing eyes - some stats!
Number of books read: 22
Books by genre: 13 fantasy, 5 science fiction, 2 urban fantasy , 1 horror, 1 non fiction
Author diversity: 20 authors, of which 6 I've never read in any previous year
% self published: 1/22
Bottom three books:
3) The Ninefox Gambit - I like weird SF, and some elements in this book were rather astounding, but in the bottom line I found it hard to understand what exactly is going on and, much more damning, found it hard to care. I just don't feel any urge to pick up a sequel.
2) Veil of the Betrayer - a self published debut... and very noticeably so. The writing is almost amateurish, on every level - from sentence structure and word choice to pacing and plotting, this novel simply isn't quite up to the standards I expect from authors I enjpy. There's some good stuff - this book has some intense fight scenes - but generally, this one let me down.
1) Dracula - perhaps it has been too long since this book fed on the blood of some young London lady, because it is not wearing its age well at all. Almost comically sexist by modern standards, full of flat characters and bad dialog, this book has probably sparked such a cultural phenomenon based mostly on the premise and on the resonance of a few standout set pieces. Reading it was dull and frustrating experience.
Top Five Books:
5) Bauchelain and Korbal Broach: I've read 5 books and one collection of three novellas in the Malazan Book of the Fallen saga, and decided to quit the series. It had some good things going for it, but in the bottom line it was mostly noise. The positive stnadout for me was this collection of novellas - some of the most deranged, absurd, and repulsive stuff I've ever read, and in such a unique and quirky way. These stories are just unlike anything else I've read, and I love them for it, even if I would never inflict them upon another, possibly saner, person.
4) Persepolis Rising: After a year of haitus I'm back with The Expanse, and this book is a very good rebound from the previous one, which I considered to be the weakest of the series. This one is vintage Expanse - it breaks completely new grounds in the story and setting while following the same throughline of theme that ties the series together. I don't wish to spoil anything from it, but suffice it to say that this book changes everything in the series, and was a great read.
3) The Selfish Gene: This book expanded my mind and gave me a whole new way to examine my world, all while being written with aplomb (and narrated equally well by Mr. Dwakins himself in the audible version). It is fascinating, well structured and very convincing. Not reading this book is like intentionally tying a scarfy around the eyes - I think everybody should read it, and get an appreciation of just how wonderfully complex yet ultimately comprehensible life is.
2) Merchanter's Luck: If a Han Solo type character were real, he'd be a pretty damaged guy. A charismatic yet lonesome smuggler who keeps barely scrapping by, and who learned to fear and mistrust good fortune and human company. This story captures this character so well as to be called perfect, as far as I'm concerned. Such a short book, and so packed with feeling and sympathy... it was a beautiful, heartbreaking thing.
1) Best Served Cold: Bloody, brilliant, hilarious, shocking... this book is just incredible. Only a real master of the craft is capable of creating anything like this, and it is quite possibly my favorite book in the decade. Not for the feint of heart, but I feel like this could be a good stand alone entrypoint to the first law universe and to Abercrombie's writing, if one is willing to treat the original trilogy as prequels. Sharp as a Tarantino film, polished as a Janny Wurts book, funny and well structured like a Sanderson epic. Just... simply, a 100% perfect execution of what this kind of book can be.
Finished Windhaven (Lisa Tuttle and George Martin), which was a very fine book, the story of a woman intertwined with the story of a changing society. Very light on SFF elements, but set in an imaginative and original secondary world, with a take on history that is both nuanced and fascinating. Not too much incident or action, but strong characters who live through some interesting times (in the Chinese curse sense of that phrase) and a writing style that is compulsively readable. This isn't some all time classic or anything, but I certainly recommend it, especially to Martin fans who want to experience his more melancholy side. This is quite a difference experience from his Song of Ice and Fire saga, although there are some fun discoveries to be made. There's a fun moment where some character offhandedly throws a comment about someone they met on a far away island - a dwarf who is "the ugliest man I've ever seen, and possibly the smartest", and I couldn't fail to imagine some prototype of Tyrion Lannister lurking there, off screen, but growing and consolidating in Martin's mind.
It is not often that reading a book would win me a new perspective with which to consider the world. But through excellent and crystal clear writing, Dawkins managed to do that just. The basic premise of his book is one that anyone who knows the concept of evolution just be at least vaguly aware of by intuition - that evolution is a competition between genes, not individual organism, and that the genes that "win" the competition by becoming widespred are those that were better able to exploit the enviornment (composed of other genes) the best.
The book offered two major new insights to me: first, that a gene is the only "immortal" component of bioligy (I will be dead a hundred years from now - but exact replicas of my genes will be found in tens of descendants and descendants of relatives), and that the genes can be considered as players acting out repeting games (in the game theory sense of those terms).
These insights are well explained and applied in various fascinating examples - like "games" between family members. Since I share half of my genes with each of my brothers, a gene for sacrificing myself to save three brothers would be genetically favorable, as on average is would save 1.5 copies of itsel at the price of sacrificng one copy.
Dawkins lays out the science in a way that I believe anyone can undersand, even without any preexisting knowledge of genetics or game theory. He also addreses the moral, philosophical and practical implications of the ideas he's promoting with admirable aplomb. His famous anti-religeon ranting only appears in one chapter towards the end of the book, and even there it is only mildly combatitive. In general his musings on the significance of the Selfish Gene theory on our lives and understanding of the world are precise and insightful.
I think is book is brilliant, and would strongly recommend anybody with even the slightest interest in the subject matter to give it a try. The audiobook is narrated by Dawkins and another woman who's name I forget, and they both do a great job, making it a good choice for the format.
Had lone and awesome vacation in Vietnam, with lots of time to read\listen to audio while getting from place to place in various crazy kinds of long-distance land transport.
This allowed me to finish reading Midnight Tides (Malazan #5 by Steven Erikson) and get halfway through To Ride Hell's Chasm (by Jenny Wurts).
In the audio front, finished listening to the superb "The Selfish Gene" (by Richard Dawkins) and started on Blade of Tyshell (Cain #2 by Matthew Stover).
Midnight Tides thoughts:
More readable and streamlined than previous books in the series, yet still a giant structural junkyard. Most plot threads in the book go nowehere, some are easily resolved by random newcome characers after being set up for hundreds of pages. Some PoV characters do literally nothing for the entire book, simply observing some of the events from the side, not really adding any interesting new perspective on them.
It also begins to feel inenvitable to me that weird sexual kinks of the authors of giant epic fantasy stories will start playing into thing as their series progresses. With wheel of time it was hundreds of pages of women spanking each other, among other things. Here though... yeah, sexuality in this book runs a whole gamut of flinch-worthyness that I wasn't even aware was possible. For all you necrophilia fans out there, by all means, get your cold, dirt caked yellow talons on this book as soon as possible!
This is not to say that the book lacks all merit. Tehol and Bugg, a pair of new characters, are some of the funniest I've ever read. Trull is a good main character, with definable traits and understandable motivations, putting him on a high pedastal of quality in this series. Some other characters and set pieces were also really fun, and I'm beginning to get shape of the actual plot of the series, I think. Towards the end there were a few moments of real pathos and tragedy which left an impact on me.
Ah, this series is difficult to love, but seemingly also difficult to abandon...
Finished reading Liar's Key (Red Queen's War #2, by Mark Lawrence), and next up is Broken Angels (Kovacs #2 by Richard K Morgan).
Liar's Key thoughts:
This one was among the weaker of the author's books - which leaves it merely as a witty, imaginative and exciting adventure.
To a pretty great degree I think this is Middle Book Syndrom - almost everything that took place was incidental to the overall plot, and only in the very last few pages did the book get to the next plot point. Some imoprtant information is uncovered, but in the form of flashbacks to the past of the ancestors of the characters. While interesting, these don't really count as advancing the plot much...
Second there's Jalan. Very few characters can hold a candle to Jorg of Ancarath, and Jalan isn't one of them to me. I applaud Lawrence for going the full distance with him - the guy way and remains a cowardly lout who stumbles into heroism, and I've never seen the concept carried quite so far. Nothing seems to be able to reform him or toughen him up. However, this just isn't as fun to read about for me.
Anyway, I liked Liar's Key. It had a ton of good stuff - The Wheel of Osheim, The Lady Blue, young Alica and Garius, and even some unnecessary yet fun cameos from The Broken Empire. Not much of Snorri breaking faces this time around, but some rather crazy set pieces offset that handsomly.
Looking forward to the Wheel of Osheim and to telling this world godbye (to make room for more Mark Lawrence books, of course!)
Finished listening to Children of Time (Adrian Tchaikovsky) and started on The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins).
** spoiler omitted **
Have you read Tchaikovsky's SHADOWS OF THE APT series? Very unique and interesting fantasy series (and long at ten books, but completed) mixing standard epic fantasy, steampunk and kind-of bugpunk. Very good and underrated.
I've heard good things of it - however, being four books into Malazan Book of the Fallen, I'm not exactly aching for new ten book series at this very moment :)
Finished listening to Children of Time (Adrian Tchaikovsky) and started on The Selfish Gene (Richard Dawkins).
Children of Time thoughts:
This is a really cool and unique book. The story follows two threads. In one, an ark ship carrying the last and increasingly desperate remnants of mankind, wondering the infinite space and looking for a new home to start over. This thread is done reasonably well, but is pretty standard SF fair.
Where the book shines through is with the second thread - the story of the rise of a civilization of hyper intelligent spiders, engineered by a long forgotten human civilization and watched over by a single ancinet setallite orbiting their planet. Tchaikovsky does an incredible job of showing how alien the spiders are to us while making you care about their woes. The story follows the spider across millenia, and they have a very different path to technological and societal advancement than us humans. Fascinating stuff.
The only thing keeping this book back from being a classic is, to me, the somewhat detached writing style. I never quite felt 100% invested in the book because the narration (both the prose and the voice acting) was somewhat... cold. Distant.
There are other issues - in the human side of the story, I can't figure out why the PoV character was chosen, as he is very passive and not very impressive, and his inner world isn't distinctly more interesting than that of anyone else around him. I kep expecting him to have some sort of impact on the story, but this never happened.
Anyway, if you like big idea SF, do yourself a favor and read this book, it's a treasure trove :)
Turned over the last page of The Ninefox Gambit (Machineries of Empire #1 by Yoon Ha Lee) and, taking a gulping breath, dived back into Malazan with House of Chains (Malazan Book of the Fallen #4 by Steven Erikson). Life is kinda hectic with an exciting new job that comes attached to a boss basically frothing at the mouth on delivery times, so this billion page beast of a book might take a while to finish!
Ninefox Gambit thoughts:
. As time goes on and I begin to stockpile years of lived experience, I cultivate a greater appreciation for the totally unfamiliar. I seek this sensation of facing something so strange and different that I have to recalibrate my imagination to accommodate it.
I didn't like The Ninefox Gambit, but I am thankful to it for letting me experience this adult sense of childish wonder.
The premise can actually be written succinctly and clearly - a far future in which hyper advanced mathematics allow boundless technology that only works if society is shaped a certain way. Each stable version of a society is based on a "calendar". Holidays, traditions and social structures enable the use of "exotics" - a technology leaps and bounds ahead of anything else. This naturally results in extremely strict and brutal societies in which any deviation from the norm is punished with barbaric severity. Imagine our world if all electrical devices stop working if somebody somewhere does not celebrate Christmas in the correct way.
The setting is new and interesting, and the plot is, on paper, not at all bad. Prose is serviceable and characters are clearly defined. On most technical levels I give this novel a good grade.
However, it just felt... cold... to me. I was never emotionally invested. Maybe the culture was too weird for me, maybe the sparse and unconventional style (that has very little emphasis on story structure considerations such as build up and payoff) just wasn't for me. I'm not sure what exactly went wrong, but something did.
I'm not sure if I'll continue with this. Maybe in a couple of years, but I have very low motivation to find out what happens next, and the book does stand reasonably well on its own. I'd only recommend it to serious weirdness junkies.
I always figued Lynch has the heighest odds of actually producing another book (in the tight, wholly unreal race he has in my head with Martin and Rothfuss).
This would be an interesting test to the online bookreading community, I think. Are people going to dive into this with exeggerated hype and overblown expectations? Or does nobody actually care much after so many years have passed?
Alright, thank you to all those who answered about Tim Powers. I suspected that such a well known and respected author must have something more going for him than what I saw in Drawing of the Dark. I added Anubis Gates to my TBR :)
Finished By The Sword (Repairman Jack #12, by F. Paul Wilson) and am tumbling with some bewilderness through The Ninefox Gambit (Machineries of Empire #1, by Yoon Ha Lee).
By The Sword thoughts:
This is the first Repairman Jack story that feels completely and entirely as part of a series to me - while there is certainly a continous main thread to the story up to this point, now for the first time the story of this book won't make sense at all to a newcomer. Happy to see that the stage is being set in earnest for a big ending.
This one revolves around a pair of mcgufins that four seperate factions are trying to collect, both of which holding some great cosmic power. Most of the people chasing it don't even know what that power is, just that they need to have it. This is a very tired trope in this modern age of superheroes chasing Ininifty Stones, yet Wilson works his usual magic here and creates a story that I couldn't help but munch on like a can of Pringles. The prose slides by, the pacing is perfect, Jack as likable as ever. Some actions, some trickery, some supernatural horror, some new well conceived characters - the usual deal.
Finished reading The Drawing of the Dark by Tim Powers and started on By The Sword (Repairman Jack #12 by Paul Wilson).
The Drawing of the Dark thoughts:
I read this book due to an upcoming trip to Vienna. I honestly do not have all that much to say about it - it was an entertaining, solid little piece, with touches of humor, action and weirdness. Never too emotionally impactful, rather predictable and not terribly original, it was still energetic and fun. I'd not exactly shove this one in people's faces and yell at them that they must read it, but I had a good enough time.
I must ask - has anybody read the more well known Tim Powers books? are they similar to this one in tone and style?
Staggered past the finish line with Memory of Ice (Malazan Book of the Fallen #3, by Steven Erikson). Due to an upcoming trip to Vienna, I decided to prepare myself by reading something set there - and found The Drawing of the Dark by Tim Powers. I've been meaning to check out something by the author anyway, so this gave me a good opening to do so.
A Memory of Ice review:
Malazan is just not a good series.
It has bad writing, a bad structure, a general clumsiness which is hard to accept after reading sleek and beautiful books such as The Tower of Babel series or something as coherently and genuinely exciting and emotional such as the Dresden Files. I don't understand why it is so vaunted among genre fans.
However, epic fantasy *is* addicting, and I found myself once again flipping through 950 pages of overstuffed Fantasy in a feverish pace, and losing some precious sleep over it too. Gods, ancient civilizations, undead armies, soul stealing swords... I can just gobble this kind of fast food up.
While these books have philosophical themes, they come at the expanse of actual relatable human emotion. The biggest flaw of the series has always been to me that we can barely understand what motivates the characters (who often end up sacrificing damn near everything for some cause or another) into action. When glimpses of motivation are actually provided, they tend to be high-brow concepts that lack the simple human connection that would really make the reader care. Who, exactly, is Whiskyjack? What does he care about? Why is he a soldier? Why does he care about the Malazan Empire? the book simply never addresses any of these issues, and so it is hard to truly feel a connection to him. He, like all the other characters, ends up being just another little engine that propels The Plot forward.
This book is not very good. It has some stronger moments, a surprising sense of humor, and better cohesion than the previous two in the series, but that's as high as my praise gets. This series does not belong in the echelon of the best of fantasy, and while at least for now I'll keep reading it, I'm never recommending it to a friend.
Finished the brutal and brutalizing "Best Served Cold" by Joe Abercrombie, and decided to have a lovely little vacation in australia with Sir Terry Pratchett's The Last Continent to chill down a bit.
Best Served Cold thoughts:
On a recent vacation to western France I visited the production factory of the world famous Cointreau. The highlight of the tour was the distillery - imagine a large hall with rows of gleaming copper containers, connected through arched tubes to towers of intricate machinery. To get the distinct orange flavor and scent, the Cointreau family devised over centuries an impressive method. You submerge a large quantity of dried orange peel in alcohol inside the container. You use a carefully balanced mixture of orange and sweet ones to gain the full range of taste that an orange peel can offer. After many hours, you boil the fluid, and out of the resulting steam you capture the essence of orange that makes the basis of the drink.
This is what the book was to me - purified, distilled, bittersweet Abercrombie. The result is so concentrated it may almost be overwhelming, but certainly a world class extract of the essence of this author.
This book is good. best-of-all-times levels of good, for what it does. At times it felt like watching a 25 hours long Tarantino movie. The characters are so distinct and interesting, the action so crunching and hard hitting, the writing style so refined, the pacing immaculate, the themes so coherent, that I was left with a strong feeling of awe after a book which I enjoyed greatly, quite literally without a page I found slow or dull or badly written.
This book is also not for everyone. It is at times crude, gut wrenching, depressing and extremely violent. If any of these things is too off putting, considert skipping it.
I also wish the book stood on its own just a little bit more - mostly it can be read as a standalone, but some parts will not make sense to anyone who hasn't read the first law trilogy, and they end up playing a big enough role in the plot that someone who started here might bt perplexed.
Also, this is the seventh Abercrombie book that I've read and by this point I figured out his forumula and was able to see most of the plot coming, including most of the twists. Still, Abercrombie does everything so masterfully that my enjoyment was not harmed at all by this.
Best Served Cold is a masterpiece. If this isn't regarded as a classic in a couple of decades I don't know what will.
I've noticed he's not the biggest on in-depth characterization, but his faith in science, and mankind's ability to use that knowledge for the right things, is unbounded. Sometime I miss that kind of attitude from Golden Age SF.
Optimistic futurism is basically porn to me, in the sense that it is exciting on a visecral level and like 70% of my internet use is for consuming content related to it. Do you have any recommendation for a great, well written and interesting optimistic SF?
-----------------------------
Finished listening to The Atrocity Archives (Laundry Files #1) on audio and went on to Children of Time by Adrian Tachikovski.
Atrocity Archive thoughts:
I liked this one is a different take on urban fantasy. IT features a bitter and cynical main character who is quite obviously an empowerment fantasy of the author (and of IT guys everywhere, basically). The character and the novel are quick to display deep knowledge of a plethora of topics, from history to mathematics to governmental beaurucracy. Some might find it grating, but this does cater to my type, so I got some enjoyment out of it.
The world is interesting and I was left hungry for more, as the idea of lovecraftian beings who can be accessed as information leaks from other universes is wicked cool, but the story itself was utterly forgetable, except for one moment of cosmic horror near the end which scracthed just the right itch for me.
At least at this point (the very beginning), The Laundry Files does not appear to be a masterpiece of a series, but it is hitting just enough right notes for me to give it another shot.
I've now read all three Bauchelain and Korbal Broach novellas that happen between Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice and the Malazan series, so after this dip of the toes my next encounter with this series would be a deep dive.
In general I flat out refuse to believe that the man who wrote these novellas is the same one who created Gardens of the Moon. These have such a unique voice - not the best writing I've ever encountered, but this is an artist doing his thing, in a very deliberate fashion.
These stories are messed up, in a way that I can't quite pin down as good or bad (which I'm sure is part of the intention). There's some humor that borders on Discworld levels of absurdity, but often with such a sick and almost offensive twist that I'm left not knowing what to do with it. For example, where comical stories usually have that one unlucky character who keeps getting hit on the head by falling objects or whatever, one of these stories has a guy who keeps losing sensory organs - in an escalatingly outlandish series of events.
The stories should be bleak and intense and stomach churning... except that they aren't. The characters inhebiting these tales seem to have accepted that their reality is horrible - they seem to accept their tragic and grotesque fates with such a fatalistic, affable cheer that it becomes easy to smile along with them as more and more obscene tragedies strike. At one point a woman reminisces about how her father died "in combat", losing a lifelong struggle with a family of squirrels over a patch of shore where he collected clams to be sold. This is what the lives of the people here are - miserable and prone to pointless ends.
The structual problems I learned to expect from the author are all here. Each novella is way too busy, featuring a dozen ideas all clamoring for your attention and most of them not going anywhere at all. There isn't really even much of a story to any of them, in the beginning-conflict-middle-resolution-end style that we all know and love. Motivation for some characters is slim or nonexistent, and the titular characaters in particular seem to sort of drift on without purpose. They really don't even feature much at any point in this story collection named after them.
Anyway, this was a weird yet enjoyable experience. I have no idea how it relates to anything else in the Malazan universe, if at all, but any fan should check them out.
Finished Merchanter's Luck (Alliance-Union #2 by C.J Cherryh), and, for some reason neglecting to consider the lingering pain from the still open wounds his previous books left me with, started on Best Served Cold (First Law #4, sort of).
Merchanter's Luck thoughts:
This was fantastic. A book that kept throwing me off balance from the first page to the last, and almost always in a good way. I came in epecting a yarn about a daring Han Solo type, found a story of a traumetized lonely man on the edge of giving up. Came to think I was reading a romance, found a story of power games, desperate survival, pain, and the hope of healing wounds.
This book was sohrt (perhaps a bit too short, as the ending felt rushed) but pakced in more touching and complex emotion than some five thousand long pages series I've read. It was more of a direct sequal to Downbelow Station than I thought it would be, and while it was nice to see some favorite from that book popping up again and doing their thing, they at some stages took the show away from the new guys.
Anyway, this was seriously impressive, touching and enjoyable. Big thumbs up!
I've had quite a tumultuous couple of weeks in reading: they began by reading The Collected Tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach (Malazan novellas) - and finding out that the chronological reading order recommended by the Malazan forum actually requires that I get two seperate collections (the first two stories of the first collection and the first story of the second collection should all be read before Memory of Ice). When I looked up the second collection in the Kindle store I noticed the price was quite outrageous - 25$ (!!) for 300 pages worth of 0s and 1s. I logged off Amazon with some disgust and within five minutes bought a physical copy from book depository for less than half the price, with free shipment. I'm not usually a price-aware customer when it comes to book, but I'm not in favor of daylight theft either.
To pass the time and for a change of pace, I got Merchanter's Luck (Alliance-Union #2) by C.J Cherryh, which I'm currently reading and fininding much more to my liking that I expected - a book that defied every expectation I had of it and is the better for it.
Meanwhile, on the audio front, I finished listening to Dracula (Bram Stoker) and started on The Atrocity Archive (Charles Stross).
Dracula thoughts:
Unlike a vampire who maintains an unholy vitality centuries after his time has past, this book did not age well at all. I don't know if there was ever a time where Stoker's writing style would have been considered good, but it certainly doesn't work today. All the characters are very simplistic, dialog is as wooden and clunky as can be asked for, and sexism abound.
However, there is a core of ingenuity to enjoy in this story. For an audiance unprepared for it, the mere concept of a vampire is probably quite shocking and absorbing. There's a lot going on with what the count Dracula is, the powers that he has, and his goals. I'm actually somewhat surprised at how different vampires are in this novel to their evolved forms today. A lot of stuff - like control over wolves and bats, shapeshifting into mist and hairy palms (yeah, really) - was dropped at the wayside.
I began listening to the book on a trip to transylvania, and find that the first section that actually happens there is the best in the story, and conveys the spirit of the place rather well. After the action shifts to London I found it to be less intriguing, and only the character of Van Hellsing provided some entertainment.
I would not really recommend reading this book to anyone but the most diehard completionist or historically curious fantasy readers
Finished Two Serpents Rise (Craft #2 by Max Gladstone). As is my habit, after a 3 book break I am back on to the "main" series I'm reading now, that being the Malazan Book of the Fallen. Following the ultimate reading order from the Malazan forums, next up are three novellas about a pair of necromancers with complicated names which I can't be bothered to look up.
Two Serpents Rise thoughts:
A good book, representing a step up in the prose and writing over the first. The main attraction to me was the setting itself - a vibrant "modern" city based on native american myth and culture, tinged with the heavy dose of weirdness the is a trademark of this world. The story was well structured and paced, if a tad predictable and less original than that of the first book.
I like how the book presents a very complex morality, showing the costs and the benefits of multiple conflicting world orders. The only thing I feel is a slight miss is that Quachel religeon is never really explored beyond the question of human sacrifice - as someone who has had his share of debates with theists, I know there are whole universes of lore and philosophy behind a religeon, and a deeper exploration of this would have been an interesting challenge to the main character.
1) Perdido Street Station - holy crap. Such a buzzing and bursting imagination I haven't seen in a long time - quite possibly ever. This book has so much going on that at times it feels more like a treasure trove than a collection of pages. Every time the reader thinks he's gotten the hang of this world, some new crazyness or intriguing mystery would pop up, prance around a bit, showing off - than retreat to allow two others to take its place. It's a long read and it isn't easy, but is so very rewarding. An appluadable work of genuis.
I'veonly read PSS and "The Scar", but both convinced me that Mieville is brilliant at world building and flavor text, passable at plots and s*~$ at characters. If he did nothing but write a campaign setting, I would be happy. I just can't work up any enthusiasm about any of his dull characters. (yes, I know someone has collected his stuff for a setting, and it was cool)
Of his books that I read, Embassytown had the best characters. Although, I don't think I'm quite capable of forgiving him for having the initials of the name of the PoV in a book about language be A.B.C >_<
Another year has gone by with blazing speed, and I want to take the chance for another summary of my year in reading (powered by Goodreads).
2018 had some good and some bad for me, ant in the bottom line it resulted in reading less than I usually do - only got around to 19 books this time.
Some boring stats:
# of books - 19
# of pages - 9468
# new authors I tried - 7
Longest book of the year - Last Mortal Bond by Brian Stavely
Now for the juicier part - top 5, bottom 3 and surprise of the year. All mini reviews are spoiler free.
Top 5 (places 5-2 in no particular order)
Spoiler:
5) Altered Carbon. I'm not the biggest fan on noir and while reading the book I was mildly enjoying it. However, it turned out to be one of those stories that sticks around a long time after you've turned the last page. The main character avoids the craggy, macho stereotype and has some actual dpeth and a way to view the world I've never considered. Altered Carbon is more than what first meets the eye. It is also much better than the Netflix show.
2) Arm Of The Sphinx, by Josiah Bencroft - The second book in a series that is a beautifully written fantasy version of the Big Dumb Objec trope from science fiction. Arm of the sphinx is different from its predecessor, perhaps a bit less unique as the plot becomes about bigger stakes than the refreshingly small story of a man an woman seperated by the torrential, gravitational pull of a tower that seems to stand at the center of the world. It does deliever heaps of delicious weirdness and dangerous misadventures though, and I can't wait to read the next one.
3) Deadhouse Gates - I'm still not sold on Malazan Book of the Fallen being this masterpiece epic fantasy to end all epic fantasies. I think Erikson's writing and characterization just can't hold a candle to Geroge R. R. Martin's ASoIaF, and while the world and story in it are different and interesting, they lack the powerful and immediate resonance that Wheel of Time was brimming with. However, certain parts of this book were very powerful, and the sheer scope of it warrants a nod from me. If nothing else, this book is impressive.
2) Turn Coat - Man, the Dresden Files is just such an amazing series. I think that Harry has taken the role of the arcthypical Hero for me - a relentless force of good, chosen and choosing to fight and suffer for others. All while cracking a stupid pun based joke at some world ending archdemon, of course. The emotional and powerful bonds between the characters in this serious harps on my heart and I laugh, fear and cry with them. This book in particular help up to expectations, though it was a bit too heavy on fighting scenes for me and I would have appreciated some more subtle stuff. Some long established characters get to prove themselves for the first time here, and the payoff is incredible.
Even though each of the previous four books has been truly fantastic, one book just towered over the rest this year.
1) Perdido Street Station - holy crap. Such a buzzing and bursting imagination I haven't seen in a long time - quite possibly ever. This book has so much going on that at times it feels more like a treasure trove than a collection of pages. Every time the reader thinks he's gotten the hang of this world, some new crazyness or intriguing mystery would pop up, prance around a bit, showing off - than retreat to allow two others to take its place. It's a long read and it isn't easy, but is so very rewarding. An appluadable work of genuis.
I've read many other very good books this year - Prince of Fools, Stormwarden, Soonish, Maskerade, Heroes Die - but these five stood out in particular.
As mathematics dictate, there are also a bottom three. I'll be quicker about these ones:
Spoiler:
1) Retrebution Road - this wasn't for me. The main character was a deadly combination of uninteresting and morally abhorent, and while things do get better in the last third, I sort of regret reading this over something else
2) Bands of Mourning - this is not Brandon Sanderson in his full power, this is Brandon Sanderson taking a vacation from his main series to relax a bit... and it shows.
3) Last Mortal Bond - This is the last in an entire series that left me feeling somewhat dead inside over just how... mundane they were. They had all the ingredients for a good epic fantasy, but the spark wasn't there to light the cookfire and the meal was served cold and unseasoned.
Surprise of the year: The Fifth Harmonic. Never heard of this book before, don't really connect with its central theme of native american spirituality (the mother-nature-is-your-mother stuff where modern medicine is bad and so is asking questions). However, I discovered it counts as part of the continuity of the Repairman/Adversary cycle of that author, so I decided to give it a shot. It is a bite sized story that I finished in about two and a half days and really rather enjoyed.
Anyway, this was my year. I've already started another Goodreads reading challenge of 22 books for 2019.
Here's to another good year of reading to everyone who still frequents the echoing halls of this forum. Cheers!
Finished a couple a books the past week!
First was Brandon Sanderson's "The Bands of Mourning" (Mistborn #6), and second was Prince of Fools (Red Queen's War #1) by Mark Lawrence. Am now reading Two Serpents Rise (Craft Sequence #2, sort of, by Max Gladstone).
Bands of Mourning discussion:
For the past couple of years I've avoided Sanderson's magnum opus in shaping, The Stormlight Archive, in favor of the smaller works he's doing as side projects (because he's insane in that very good way). While my appreciation for the man is immense for his output, and his books are never bad - I have to say, I can very much feel that what I'm reading is the side stuff. The stories are action packed, the world and magic system inventive, and there are even some very unique aspects (a great example for the Mistborn 2nd era is Wayne - I've never encountered a character like him, and he gets some very well written solo segments in this book).
However, the structure and writing are just not what I've seen in his prior work. I think Bands Of Mourning and the final of Reckoners series show this most prominently - they have huge, world altering events and ideas that simply come off as rushed and lack they impact they really aught to have had.
I'm still having fun, but am growing tired of reading second tier Sanderson. Guess I'll have to dive into Stormligh Archive at some point, though I am hesitent to do so before at least book 4 is out, and this would take two years at the very least...
Prine Of Fools:
This was absolutely delightful. Witty, cowardly Jalan and the mighty Snorri make for an unforgettable duo, and backed by the trademark clever language of Mark Lawrence and some crunching action, we get a great book. The story is much more structured and coherent than what I'm used to with The Broken Empire series, a straightforward revenge quest with enough twists to maintain a recognizable identity. There's good foreshadowing and magical solutions don't regularly come out of nowhere to save our heroes. This is an accomplished book, tight and focused, with a sense of fun and a good balance between the various elements that make a great adventure to read about.
My only regret is that, while Jalan is a well written character, he's not nearly as challenging as Jorg (PoV for Broken Empire). His shtick - that he's a spoiled, self centered coward with some potential, who ends up being the hero by solving one problem while running away from another - is well explored by the halfway point of the novel, and not really developed in a meaningful way. Jorg, on the other hand, that bastard kept shocking me from the first page of book one to the last page of book three. Jalan even embraces his own shalowness and acknowledges it. While this is an interesting kink, it is also true - he is shallow, and that causes the book to fall short of achieving the thought provoking nature of Prince of Thorns.
For the hesitant Mark Lawrence fan - you'll love this book. For those yet to try him - if the grimdark nature of Prince Of Thorns doesn't attract you, this is a fine place to check the author out.
As a huge fan who is still refusing to watch later seasons of the show because I'm waiting for the books, it is somewhat astonishing how little I care about Fire and Blood.
Finished reading Deadhouse Gates (Malazan Book of the Fallen #2, Steven Erikson). Next up is a refreshing hop back to old favorite Brandon Sanderson with the latest published Mistborn novel - The Bands of Mourning.
Deadhouse Gates thoughts:
Hoo boy, where to start.
First, I can see why people react so strongly to this book. It is huge, thick with theme and plot and worldbuilding, and in some respects incredibly ambitious.
However, if this is the epitome of what Malazan is, than I am sad to report that I am left feeling a little disappointed.
I'll start with the good. Erikson's writing has improved dramatically since Gardens of the Moon (A book that I found mildly readable, but would never have read the sequal to if I didn't know the series to be so praised). It is most obvious with the few characters who carried over from that book, who suddenly feel that much more alive and convincing.
During the read I researched Erikson a bit an became aware that he is an archeologist. This made sense to me, as unlike other gigantic fantasy epics such as the Wheel of Time and Song of Ice and Fire, the worldbuilding in Malazan appears to be heavily focused on the very distant past. If you asked me to describe the conquest of the Seven Cities by the Malazan empire I'd be at a loss. Ask me to descirbe Jaghut culture, though, and I could write pages. This grants a unique and refreshing flavor to the story.
Of the various plotlines in Deadhouse Gates, the Chain of Dogs was by far the most impactful. The suffering and heroism of Coltaine, Duiker and the thousands with them is of frankly legendary proportions, and the way they so slowly lost everything while fighting on was undeniably epic and tragic.
Felisin's story was also compelling, and I think her character is the most unique in the book. There are some interludes of weird cosmic stuff in there that really don't make any sense yet, but I assume this is a case where the payoff comes later down the line.
I also enjoyed most of the stuff Kalam was up to, and his fighting scenes are awesome.
Now, while the book does earn all the praise I just gave it, there are issues. Foremost is with characterization, and specifically - motivation. I honestly just don't know what motivates almost anyone in the story. Many of the characters go through such intense danger and sacrifice so much, and I simply couldn't figure out why. For some it is loyalty to an empire we've never actually seen yet, that has never proved its worth to the reader. What is it about Malazan that inspires the likes of Coltaine, Kalam and Fiddler to be willing to give everything? They never express real patriotism, their mind never wanders to their beloved homes, and some of them are revealed to have never really been impressed by the leadership of either the previous emperor and the current one - so what is it? The book never addresses this, never gives me this anchor to hold on to through the brutality it presents.
There are further problems. It often felt to me like characters experienced feelings on more of a philosophical level than a truly human one, with basically everyone from the most common soldier, through 15 years old Felisin, to barbarian horsemen going about talking like a philosophy major trying to impress his head of faculty. A character would witness something horrific, and instead of raw emotion we'd get three paragraphs of anguished pontificating. This truly reduced the impact of even the most shocking parts of the book, and created some distance between me and the characters.
Finally, there are the structural problems. The book is massive, and this creates the usual disorders that epic fantasy suffers from. Some characters get completely lost in the mix (What role, exactly, did Crokus play in the story?), large sections of the book were little more than setup for further novels with many subplots that had nothing approaching even temporary resolution, and the even major plot threads just sort of sizzled at the end because the author went out of pagecount.
Bottom line? Deadhouse Gates is a massive improvement on Gardens of the Moon, and I intend to continue on with the series. However, at the moment, I can't place the series near the top works in modern fantays. While it has some unique character and never lacks in ambition, to my tastes it cannot hold a candle to works by George Martin, Joe Abercrombie, Robin Hobb or Jim Butcher, who are my current favorites.
Finished reading Soonish (by Zach and Kelly Weinersmith), and took a second plunge into the miasmic depths known as The Malazan Book of the Fallen series - about a qurater of the way through Deadhouse Gates currently.
Soonish thoughts:
Soonish is a really nice nonfiction for the tech inclined nerd. I enjoy futurism and am at least passingly savvy in most of the fields the books discusses - but still found it to be a treasure trove of quirky little stories, SMBC style humor, and most importantly aspects of those fields that I've never heard of or considered.
The format is great - for each field, the book discusses where things currently are, several groups and initiatives that are pushing the limits in promising ways, the technical challenges that need to be overcome, how a succesful implementation might change the world for the better, and the new risks these changes might create. The research is wide and deep yet the presentation is absurdly easy to follow, with a lot of slightly unhinged yet intuitive metaphores (not least of which are the tomato pipe launcher or the nighlist donut).
Most of the humor was nice, though sometimes repetitive - which is one thing we wouldn't have to worry about after the robot uprising of 2027, since all humor would be eradicated by the steel overlords - and if you didn't get that last part, just open any random page of Soonish and see where the joke came from. For fans of SMBC comics this is a slight disappointment, though there are still a lot of smatterings of wit throughout the book that made me chuckle.
Soonish was a great read, and it is a book that is nice to have around since you can always just pick it up and read one of the bite sized chapters. If the subject matter sounds at all interesting to you, you'd probably get a lot of it!
A couple of unexpected circumstances had me putting Soonish on hold for a week. I decided to slip back in to Repairman Jack series by F. Paul Wilson. However, having investigated a bit Iv'e found a smallish book set in the same universe and loosely connected to the themes of the main series. I jumped on the opportunity to mix things up while still advancing deeper into the story.
Thus I've found myself reading The Fifth Harmonic. It was a bite sized books in SFF terms at only 230 pages, but the length works well for the small scale story, and I enjoyed it a lot. It can be read entirely without any knowledge of the Repairman Jack/Adversary Cycle and basically nothing will be lost on the reader. I did, however, enjoy the greater context that knowing the overarching plot gave me.
Wilson, while not in line to get the next Nobel prize for his prose, has a keen ear for the human psyche. His characters always feel real and are always more complex than is first apparent. The Fifth Harmonic was a neat little package, an emotional journey and an adventure, and I think it actually works as the best introduction to Wilson's work that I've seen so far (Previously I pointed people to The Tomb, which is overall a much more impressive work... however, Wilson really has grown as a writer noticeably since than, and this one is less of a commitment).
No one's posted here in over a month! I'd better rectify that.
Codus. I've actually read a somewhat western like this year, for the first time ever - Retrebution Road. It starts out in Maynmar and only really gets good when it gets to the wild west, but it's pretty solid when it does. It offers a more frank and sober look on the setting and is probably rather historically accurate. If you're looking for something different within that setting, this may work for you.
Anyway, finished reading the delightful Arm of The Sphinx (Books of Babel #2, by Josiah Bancroft). Coming up next is the non fiction Soonish, by cartoonist and fellow ginger Zech Weinersmith (as an aside - if there is anyone in this forum unfamiliar with SMBC comics - what the hell, and go check him out!).
Arm of The Sphinx thoughts:
Like many others, I stumbled across this series following a recommendation by Mark Lawrence, a more famous author who has been pushing pretty hard for this to get the attention it desrves.
The first book was a unique and interesting read.In some senses it was a low key, small stakes kind of story, a dual character study of Senlin and the Tower. The joy in that book came from the wonderful writing, the complex and satisfactory character growth and development for Senlin on his journey from a prissy and really rather unlikable school teacher to something quite a bit more. The central mystery of the tower was built in the background, until by the end I was itching like mad to know what this all means when an awesome reveal cast a new light on what I've read so far.
In the second book the writing gets even better, the weirdness is turned up to 11, and the story becomes quite literally biblical in scope. I won't spoil it, but in a brilliant turn the book managed to sneak in a strong connection to the Babel of the old testiment, and I'm looking forward to see how this theme will be developed further.
What is so impressive in the series is not just the ideas, that approach Mieville levels of ingenuity and strangeness, or the writing, which competes with the masters of the field, or any other specific aspect. Rather, it is in how different they are from what we normally get to read in fantasy. They truly are the product of an imagination and a mind unlike any other I ever encountered.
So I just finished readong Gardens of the Moon. I must say that I found it mediocre in a plethora of ways, none of which are the ones usually discussed.
spoilers to follow.
People say it is bewildering and hard to follow, that you can't keep track of all the characters and places and magic systems and such. Honestly, keeping track was not an issue at all. I always understood at least the vauge shape of what people were talking about, except where information has been deliberately hidden. For many of the factions (Havelock, Shadowthrone, Oppon, Brood) motivation and sometimes even goals are simply never discussed or mentioned. I did not find this confusing, I just accepted it because, well, sometimes the fantasy genre is like that. Many other factions who were initially opaque did eventually get explained.
My actual trouble with the book is three pronged - writing, structure, and characters.
The writing was not awful, but kind of bad. Here's the climax of Empire Strikes Back, as written by Erikson:
My Erikson impression:
With a swift stroke, Vader cut off Luke's hand, which tumbled into the abyss.
"Luke, I am your father".
"Vader, No, that is impossible - the hermit Obi Wan had told me you betrayed and killed him."
"Luke, Look into yourself and see the truth"
"you are lying, Sith Lord!"
Dialogs are stilted as all hell. The inner world of characters is not a part of how they are written, it is something to be inspected every now and then by a couple pages of pseudo-philosophical remblings, then discarded. At some point near the end of the novel, a Jaghut Tyrant shows up to destory the city, is stopped by Quick Ben who reveals himself to be stuipdly powerful, and is imprisoned by a weirdo tree that grew out of nowehre. None of this elicits any sort of emotional reaction at all for any of the characters that witnessed it. Like, nothing. There's even a line of dialog where a bridgeburner goes like, "oh cool the Tyrant is dead, let's get on with our original plans".
Structural mess. The story in this book has no shape. Tension isn't ramped up, nothing is resolved, no character has an arc. What little foreshadowing there is always happens a couple of pages before it becomes relevent (except for one neat trick I spotted with the spinning coin of Oponn), and ususally even that is lacking. Again, the problem here is not that I've been unable to understand what was happening - it is that it is not satisfying to experience a story that feels so much like a bunch of cool ideas the author had and wasn't sure how to tie them all together.
Telling rather than showing was also a persistent issue. Prominent example - we are told that Whiskyjack is some kind of badass, but what he actually does in the story is feel miserable and make sly poticial plans. He never fights during the entire book - in the one fight where he is even present, a random magical explosion disables him immediately.
Finally, most of the characters were simply uninteresting. Anomander Rake and Kruppe were two standouts, but between the stilted writing and the refusal to even explain the motivations of almost everyone, I simply didn't care about most of the people in the story.
Honestly, if Malazan didn't have such a strong backing, I would dismiss the series as one being written by an ameture and not particualrly skilled author at this point. As it is, I'm going to give Deadhouse Gates a shot. However, I must say - Gardens of the Moon really failed to impress me...
Oh, and also a shout-out for Otherland Berlin, a fantastic bookstore (you can guess where) completely dedicated to SFF and horror. They have an amazing selection of books, many that I couldn't find in any large bookstore that I tried. The reason I was able to read Stormwarden (which is long out of print and doesn't have a kindle ebook version) is that I found it while rummaging about in their cardboard crates filled with second hand books. They are also, I have to add, really lovely people. For any SFF book lover, if you happen to visit Berlin, do yourselves the favor of checking the place out :)
Finished Stormwarden (Cycle of Fire #1 by Janny Wurts).
spoiler free thoughts::
An older book, a bit stooped and gnarled under the burden of years, that still bears its age proudly and well. Don't come to Stormwarden looking for something you've never seen before (although, with a rather brilliant world building twist, it does deliver something you've probably never quite seen before). Rather, approach it to be swept off your feet by a fast moving plot described in elegant prose that has a persistent rythem that would have you losing yourself in a different world. Based on descriptions of The Wars of Light and Shadow I(the magnum opus of this books' author) I expected Stormworden to be a slow burn of a story, but the truth of it is quite the opposite. Events pile on with sometimes overwhelming pace, with no pagecount at all dedicated to cheff and superfluous descriptions of mundanity that some other fantasy series exhibit. There's barely any fighting in the books, but excitement is kept high by awesome displays of sorcery and some really abysmal weather.
Stormwarden is great, and fantasy enthusiests would get hooked early and enjoy the ride. A shame getting the rest of the trilogy might prove difficult with them out of print...
Finished listening to the audio of Heroes Die (Acts of Caine #1, by Matthew Woodring Stover). My next listen is Consider Phlebas (Culture #1 by the late Ian M. Banks). which I admit I've chosen partly for curiosity about the Culture series and partly because of the fantastic job the narrator did on First Fifteen Lives of Harry August.
[spoier=spoiler free thoughts on Heroes Die]If anyone is on the lookout fora testosterone fueled, sweat drenched, bloody tale - you found your book. An interesting combination between a futuristic cultural dystopia and a fantasy adventure, Heroes Die delivers well on multiple fronts. extreme violence and badass magic coexist impressively with social commentary.
I'm not in love with Heroes Die. Some characters are interesting but others are almost caricatures (especially some of the villains), some plot elements feel a bit out of place, and the ending left me a bit apathetic (though I will probably continue with the series at some point).
This is a book for those who want something a little bit different without giving up on kickass magic, overtly badass characters and a fast moving plot. I had a lout of fun with it, and you probably will too - just don't expect much of a lingering impression
Aaaaaannd that's a wrap, folks! Finished Infernal Battalion (Shadow Campaigns #5 by Django Wexler). Next up - Persepolis Rising (The Expanse #7 by James S.A Corey)
spoiler free thoughts on entire Shadow Campaigns series:
Writing an epic fantasy story that spans five books is a tough act. You walk a tightrope over a chasm of worldbuilding, doing your best to walk straight ahead without falling and sinking in unnecessary detail and meandering plot. All the while, you have to spin multiple plates on the end of long an unwieldy sticks. PoVs, story threads, theme and prose, setup and payoff. It doesn't help that people not only expect you to stumble onto the platform at the other end, but rather to perform a flourish and perhaps even a somersault or two as you approach it - after all, they invested so much of their time watching you slowly edging across the rope, you have to do something special at the end to prove that it was worth their time.
Wexler is a pro, though. He walked the tightrope, he span the plates, and he finished with style. The entire Shadow Campaigns series is written with considerable skills and a good understanding of the rhythm and beats of a story. The result is a fast and easy to read story that sucks you in right away and draws you on right up to the end. There really was not a dull moment in the whole series, even as the lion's share of multiple of the books was spent politicizing and planning.
Where the series most distinguishes itself is in setting - we are following a realistically depicted colonial-era NotFrench army fight its way across NotEurope. This has a unique flavor - the characters spend as much time unsnarling supply chains as they do fighting, and when the gunfire starts there's a focus on real world tactics. At the start it may be unfamiliar and a bit difficult to see the value in these maneuvers, but as the reader grows more experienced alongside the characters, there's plenty of opportunity to learn and understand how battlefields looked like when the flintlock musket and the 12 pounder cannon were the best weapon systems in the world.
This core military campaign theme has a strong basis to stand on. The story centers on characters who feel real and are easy to like, the plot is interesting, the writing good. One character, I won't spoil which, is an absolute joy to have around, enigmatic and larger than life.
If there is one problem with the Shadow Campaigns is that I feel it could have been more. Everything about Wexler's writing exudes competence, but this is an example of craftsmanship with little art, to me. The plot of each book is straightforward to a point I rarely see. "We need to get to place X, but to get there we have to defeat A,B and C", promptly followed by hundreds of pages during which the characters defeat A, then B, then C, and finally reach place X. This template is broken, and rather impactfully, at a few points - but I was generally able to know where the story was going by the simplest form of conjecture - that is, guessing that things would continue on their current tracks.
Additionally, while the characters are likable, they are partly made so with a literary shortcut that in the wrong hands could leader to disaster - they are all exceptional in what they do. A genius general, a genius economist,a James Bond levels of capable secret agent, and a political prodigy are only some of the characters, and the rest don't lag far behind. While it is always fun to read about people succeeding, and epic fantasy as a rule has heroes who are very good at winning, I felt like Wexler went a bit far in this direction. It never reaches the point of obnoxiousness, luckily.
Lastly, I feel like there was so much more to do with the magic system. There is a great deal of the supernatural in the story, but it never really crosses over significantly with the military. It would have been amazing to see Wexler's take on how real world strategies and tactics would have to warp themselves around the presence of humans who can break walls with their fists, turn invisible or take a headshot and shake it off like a mosquito bite. Regrettably, nothing of the sort ever happens.
On the bottom line, I really enjoyed The Shadow Campaigns, and the fact that I read the entire five book series over the span of half a year is evidence of that, since I spread most series over years. If the concept of flintlock fantasy appeals to you, this is a must read.
P.S: I should mention that the series includes a strong showing of gay characters, and that at most points in the story I'm pretty sure that female characters outnumbered male characters 2 to 1 or so (except in the first book, which tightly follows a military camp and still manages to have about 50-50 male to female ratio). I know many readers are actively seeking books that do this, and here it is performed seamlessly, in a completely natural and unforced way. If this is your thing - definitely give the series a try!
My next book is a return to an old and favorite SF series... and looming beyond it, already casting a long shadow, is the Malazan Book Of The Fallen. I can feel anticipation beginning to build...
Mieville is amazing at worldbuilding, passable plots and atrocious at characters.
That is also how I would rank his prowess in each of these fields, although I wouldn't call his characters atrocious. They're not the reason I'm reading the book, but they are convincing and many of them are unusual.
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There is an excellent fan-made RPG version of Bas-Lag here. It's for D&D3.5, so easy to convert to Pathfinder, if that's your jam.
This is incredible, thank you! :D
I can hardly imagine actually scrounging up four entire, individual humans who will also think Bas Lag is cool and want to play an RPG set in it, but I'm going to read the hell out of that sourcebook.
It took a while (perhaps even two or three whiles) but I finished Perdido Street Station (New Crubzon #1 by China Mievelle) and am about to read the Infernal Battalion, the final book in the Shadow Campaigns series by Django Wrexler.
spoiler free thoughts on Perdido Street Station:
Having already fumbled my way through a couple of the twisting mazes that China Mievlle markets as books, I approached Perdid Street Station with caution. This is the first novel by a truly great writer with a knack for the convoluted, I thought, and his first public effort may very well be the overtly stylized product of a young man with some distinct ideas who's trying too hard. When I discovered the books starts with multiple pages of purple prose, my trepidation grew.
It quickly evaporated, like the spewed smog from the chimney of a factory being shut down for the last time. Beyond the dissipated black cloud I discovered the city of New Crubzon, nestled comfortably in a bigger world around it.
Perdido Street station is indeed more about world building than anything else. The story if packed with small digressions and side trips, pausing to examine more and more aspect of the city and the world it takes place in. Rather than killing the pace, it induces immersion and suffuses a constant sense of wonder to the reading experience. As events unfold, the reader stumbles across more and more surprises. Off handed remarks hint at hidden depths and a long and complex history. The elements themselves are great as well - right at the start it displays a race of beetle-headed people. Not humans with the head of a beetle. Humans whose head is an entire, living beetle, semi independent from the human body. After this, things rapidly grow more exotic.
The world is not a background but an integral part of the story, weaving in and out of the narrative. The main plotline is haunting, dire and quite tense at parts. The characters are interesting and fun, and some truly enjoyable and villainous side characters spice things up when needed.
I was thoroughly enthralled and impressed by Perdido Street Station (and can even vouch that some of its cleverer parts must have gone over my head, as I can't quite figure out why this title was chosen - the station doesn't seem to play any major thematic or plot role in the book), and it cements Mievelle as one of the best SFF writers ever, in my opinion. To all those who hesitate - don't. Grab the hand that Mievlle offers and let him lead you into the narrow, dark, stench-choked,industrial alleys of New Crubzon. You will never forget your tour.
Finished listening to The Red Knight (Traitor Son #1, by Miles Cameron) on audio, where I moved on to the first Acts of Caine book, "Heroes Die".
on the ebook front, gulped Turn Coat (Dresden File #11, by Jim Butcher) like an alcoholic sailor gulps his rum ration, and started on Perdido Street Station, for a touch of weird.
spoiler-free thought on The Red Knight:
lots and lots of monster bashing in this one. I honestly can't even think what other book I read in the past few years had this many monsters and so much fighting.
The Red Knight is an odd book. It suffers from an absurd over abundance of PoVs, and characterization is not very deep on any of them. It is unsurprising that my favorite characters were those the most larger than life - emotions and inner dialog play second fiddle to deeds in this story.
While the plot of the book is not very gripping and is perhaps more complex than it needs to be, the imagination on display is quite impressive and the pages are filled with rosters of beasts, spells, locations and factions. The middle-ages setting is also imbued with more realistic detail than what one is used to with typical fantasy novels, and the contrast of the muddy and believable world with the outrageous supernatural elements is quite fun, those polar opposites reinforcing one another rather well.
I will eventually continue the series, but ultimately The Red Knight is not great, merely enjoyable.[
spoiler free thoughts on Turn Coat:
I love this series so much. This incredible combination of fast paced action, laugh-out-loud humor and a large cast of characters with strong emotional ties that it is impossible not to care deeply about, just gets me every time. This time around, the story involves genuinely deep and complex politics, taking the world building to the next level as far as I am concerned. The overall conflict of the story is ramping up in an accelerating manner, and Harry is finally starting to become a really major player in it.
There are twists and reveals, moments of tenderness and bravery, great tragedies and some incredible action set pieces. Some characters who up until now the reader was only told are incredibly powerful show up and do their thing, and it is seriously awe-striking.
All in all this kind of book is what keeps me hooked on reading. Deep, emotional, thrilling, funny and immersive. I loved it.
I am a bit beyond the halfway point in Shadowplay, the second book in Tad Williams' Shadowmarch quadrilogy (is that a word?). Williams is taking his time developing the story (I suppose that's the case with a lot of epic fantasy), but at least this series has the benefit of being completed; I won't be two-thirds of the way through it and waiting for the last volume for years (get cracking, Patrick Rothfuss!).
Tad Williams can be glacial when it comes to pacing. His Otherland series had huge emotional impact on me, it was written with aplomb and showcased some serious imagination... but reading it was often torturous as a whole book might go by without anything really happening.
I'm curius yo hear your opinion of the whole Shadowmarch series, when you finish, becuase the premise sounds good but I'm honestly a bit hesitant to dive into another Willimas series....
Man, I had to dust off my account here (and, apparently, the thread itself!). I've been reading the same book for more than a month, which is exceptionally slow for me, but I've really been struggling with earlier parts of it. However, the past week I rebounded strongly and tore through a few hundred pages (in kindle form! no pages were harmed). Now, having finished Retribution Road (by Antonin Varenne) I'm back to something more familiar and breezy - Turn Coat, the next Dresden Story. It's been a while, and I missed Harry and his friends.
Retribution Road is a historic novel set in Burma, Britain and the fresh and young United States Of America in the 19th century, and here are my spoiler free thought on it:
spoiler free thoughts on Retribution Road:
Retribution Road was a difficult read for me, as the first half of the book had me wondering why anyone thought this story is worth telling - and while things did get better as the story progressed, the stronger sections never quite covered up the weaker ones.
For the entire start and middle of Retribution Road, the PoV character Arthur Bowman is as unrelatable a character as you'll find. He is aggressive and forceful, a brute who loves no one and is loved by no one. Events in the story lead him to being even more of an unpleasent outsider, and he doesn't really appear to have any hidden depth or inner good to coax the reader to forgive him his serious flaws.
The environment around him seems to suit his character. Most other characters are repulsive or apprehensive in some way or another, and the author makes no attempt to glorify history, thrusting the evils of western colonialism and the horrifying consequences of post trauma on the human psyche to the front.
The result is a long series of encounters and events that are gruesome, sad, or tragic. Bowman seems to drift without purpose in a world that isn't worth the trouble of trying to change himself.
Luckily, things do pick up after that. Bowman sets on a physical and mental journey that redeem him to the reader in slow, hesitant steps. While the writing is always emotionally distant, Bowman is a believable enough person that the reader can fill in the gaps and experience the pain and the blossoming hope alongside him. While the story has a very slow pace and a strong tendency to wonder into side tracks and digressions, the narrative accrues inertia until a compulsion to turn the next page grows - I've never quite noticed at what point it happened, but at some point I found myself seriously hooked.
This just about covers my impression of the plot and characters. As for the setting, large parts of the world in the late 1800s are explored, and each of them feel distinct from the others. It's immersive, even if there's never a true wealth of details to discover. For Varenne the historical canvas is not about the places, or the events, or the technology - it is about the mood, the ephemeral spirit of the time, and the kinds of people who populated it.
I cannot wholeheartedly recommend Retribution Road, as it takes some serious dedication to extract enjoyment from it. However, for those who don't mind sloughing through some muck to find gold, or those who particularity enjoy redemption stories, there's certainly an epic yet personal story of growth and pain to be found here that would keep you engaged and stir your emotions.
