ThReads Must Roll: the new, improved rolling fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction &c. thread

New year, new thread so will have another go at this: Basically, as editor of Astounding (later Analog) Campbell and his favorite writers Heinlein and Asimov cleaned up the and professionalized the genre, distancing it from its pulpy, Gernsbackian origins, creating well-constructed stories about problem solving engineers, written in a clear, efficient, logical if often inelegant or unadventurous style. The New Wave positioned themselves in opposition to this dominant form of sf. However this was somewhat of a simplification, since some of the suppressed elements of less straight-jawed, weird or more expressionistic or simpler better writing had already survived in the pulpier mags such as Planet Stories, or in the two main rival publications of Astounding, Horace Gold's (w/ help from Fred Pohl) Galaxy, which was way more welcoming of satirical material, a safe haven for such stuff in the Red Scare 50s, and Tony Boucher's Fantasy & Science Fiction, which placed a much higher premium on prose quality, or even through some of Campbell's other writers- "Vintage Season" first appeared in Astounding.

I was surprised that Unknown was another Campbell magazine, since it has a really great reputation for some of the best fantasy coming out at the time and seems to be similar to Weird Tales.

In Wizardry And Wild Romance, Moorcock mostly recommended RE Howard but taken issue with his imitators and the writers who written Conan books later on. Also that a lot of Howard's unfinished work got published and it spoiled his reputation to some extent. But I've heard some of his best work was posthumous stories that he might have polished up a bit more if he had lived.

I dont think Moorcock had anything against Howard per se, just that Elric is a pretty obvious inversion of Conan (similar to how Jerry Cornelius is an inversion of James Bond, altho in that case I imagine Moorcock really did have serious issues w Flwming and his ridiculous sexism, racism, imperialism etc.) I only brought up the Conan comparisob cuz Tolkien was not really referenced in the Elric books, I think its a mistake to categorize them as a reaction or response to LOTR.

I wonder if the Pre-Raphaelites were happy with that name?

They chose it themselves!

Browsing through the Borderlands stacks I was kinda bummed by how uninterested I am in so much of the modern sci-fi market - just tons of derivative looking steampunk and cyberpunk stuff, smart aleck-y dystopianism. I am judging by covers, blurbs, and bios here tbf. It bums me out that my favorite new guys just don't write that much, and the market appears to be otherwise dominated by interminable series' of recycled ideas. Of course if anyone's been totally blown away by some recently emerging writers I'm all ears...

Do you read the "Year's Best" type anthologies?

not habitually

Seems to me that is the last thing you want to read if you don't like current stuff.

as well documented here, my favorite recent/newish dudes are Jon Armstrong and Charles Yu, but both seem like outliers and neither are particularly prolific. Post-90s I seem to be drawn to the types of guys who write a couple books and then disappear (see also: Matthew Derby). Steve Aylett I like but can only take in limited doses. Jeff Noon appears to have given up on publishing novels in the US (and there was a bit of a decline in quality post-Automated Alice anyway).

this is supposed to be great!

http://www.amazon.com/Twenty-First-Century-Science-Fiction-Hartwell/dp/0765326000

Still working through the Twentieth Century one!

the names I do recognize (Doctorow, Scalzi, Bacigalupi) don't fill me with confidence but the rest is all unfamiliar to me so will see if I can get that at the library

I think Aliette de Bodard and E. Lily Yu are both doing interesting things in short forms, but I don't really keep up with SF all that well.

Did you try Ted Chiang yet?

not yet - so many short stories/novelettes, not sure about the easiest way to acquire a lot of them

used to be some you could read free online.

library has one of his books, most of his other stuff seems to be in random anthologies...?

Doesn't he only have one book so far?

I guess? I can't really tell from the wikipedia entry, which just lists titles and not formats

Stories of Your Life and Others. Give it a try. Even if you don't like it, plenty of others have read it so you will be able to have a meaningful discussion, at least in theory.

library has The Lifecycle of Software Objects but looks like it would be awhile before I can get it

That is a novella. I read it online. Believe you can too: http://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2010/fiction_the_lifecycle_of_software_objects_by_ted_chiang

ah cool thx

You can also find The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate somewhere, it is a thing of beauty.

Read that in one of those F&SF anthologies which had other good stuff iirc

For a while I thought these Ramble House books were genuine but they have to be parodies a bit similar to Steve Aylett. Makes me wonder how much else of their catalogue is pastiche by new writers under a pseudonym.

http://www.ramblehouse.com/kats.htm
http://www.ramblehouse.com/marceaucase.htm
http://www.ramblehouse.com/owlofdarkness.htm
http://www.ramblehouse.com/twostrangeladies.htm
http://www.ramblehouse.com/woodenspectacles.htm

There's a Jacques Sternberg story called Univers Zero. I guess that's where the band got their name?

I had a search around and came up light, apologies if this ground has been covered elsewhere.

Can anyone recommend a decent hard SF read, maybe along similar lines to Anderson's 'Tau Zero" perhaps?

Just finished Greg Bear's 'The Forge of God' and it was much too touchy feely and I feel a bit icky.

I haven't read this, but heard and read much praise--review from booklist gives the gist:

The Martian---Andy Weir
Remember Man Plus, Frederik Pohl’s award-winning 1976 novel about a cyborg astronaut who’s sent, alone, to Mars? Imagine, instead, that the astronaut was just a regular guy, part of a team sent to the red planet, and that, through a series of tragic events, he’s left behind, stranded and facing certain death. That’s the premise of this gripping and (given its subject matter) startlingly plausible novel. The story is told mostly through the log entries of astronaut Mark Watney, chronicling his efforts to survive: making the prefab habitat livable and finding a way to grow food, make water, and get himself off the planet. Interspersed among the log entries are sections told from the point of view of the NASA specialists, back on Earth, who discover that Watney is not dead (as everyone assumed) and scramble together a rescue plan. There are some inevitable similarities between the book and the 1964 movie Robinson Crusoe on Mars, but where the movie was a broad sci-fi adventure, the novel is a tightly constructed and completely believable story of a man’s ingenuity and strength in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Riveting. --David Pitt

The author breaks down the basics of Watney's situation:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Martian-Novel-Andy-Weir/dp/product-description/0804139024/ref=dp_proddesc_0/180-1509918-2958424?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books

I'd like to check Pohl's novel too, never heard of that.

It (Pohl's) is a candidate for the most hilarious ending in SF history.

hilarious good or bad?

that andy weir book was in my local supermarket this morning.

amazon's been pitching it at me for what seems like months but crossing over into hammersmith tescos is quite a jump.

xp good, but unintentionally so.

This guy pops in anthologies and looks intriguing but haven't read word one so far: http://www.sfwa.org/2014/01/geoffrey-landis-receive-2014-robert-heinlein-award/

Man Plus does have a ridiculous ending. It's okay, not his best novel (which, not counting Kornbluth collabs, would be JEM imo)

finished the Forever War. was not expecting the happy ending tbh. Very good, deserving of its plaudits, a few lol 70s bits but on the whole a great mix of hard sci-fi, some socio-political commentary, and a romantic subplot that I found unexpectedly moving.

xp good, but unintentionally so.

― ledge, Thursday, 8 January 2015 15:55 (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is probably misleading. It's a good book, definitely worth reading if you like yr hard sf. But the ending is pretty ridiculous and (unintentionally) lulz-worthy.

Can anyone recommend a decent hard SF read, maybe along similar lines to Anderson's 'Tau Zero" perhaps?

Rendezvous with Rama?
Alastair Reynold's Pushing Ice? A lot of what I complained about upthread re:Reynolds work is there, but in tolerably smaller doses, and it captures a lot of the excitement and peril of TZ.
Lem's His Master's Voice. Not really similar, not much excitement, pretty philosophical and political. Very intelligent though, and definitely not touchy-feely.

Internet says If you like Tau Zero, try Timescape by Gregory Benford and The Haertel Scholium by James Blish, I haven't tried them.

oddly i'd've said Rama too but would probably have chosen Revelation Space over Pushing Ice (PI probably closer to Tau Zero in theme, i just prefer RS as a book)

Greg Egan's Diaspora too, although it's nothing like those two.

i read Forever War immediately after / before Tau Zero and the similarities were startling.

Diaspora if you like books by, for, and about mathematicians.

On a whim went back to the all-time speculative fiction poll to decide a reading list for this year, came up with the following (pending further investigation):

091 Thomas Disch - Camp Concentration
087 Octavia Butler - Lilith's Brood
085 Gene Wolfe - Book of the Long Sun
084 Flann O'Brien - At Swim-Two-Birds
083 Joe Haldeman - The Forever War
082 Russell Hobon - Riddley Walker
074 John Crowley - Engine Summer
071 Ursula K. Le Guin - The Lathe of Heaven
064 James Tiptree - Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
062 Ted Chiang - Stories of Your Life and Others
047 Philip K. Dick - Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

Have read all but 11 of the top 50, mostly missing some fantasy and a bit of dick.

085 Gene Wolfe - Book of the Long Sun aargh how did this get in here I am not good with computer

+ 045 Madeleine L'Engle - A Wrinkle in Time. Damnit.

Had mixed feelings about that on old Rolling F thread, can paste them if you're curious. But gist of it: could see how this influenced the early 60s configuration of what's now called YA fiction, for transitional, middle school/high school, mercurial readers, but, as with some traditional complaints about CS Lewis's allegories, I (sometimes) felt like the religious bits were in my face, like yet another helping of sweets. Overall, the author came off like an intelligent, observant, imaginative, occasionally carried-away granny.
Still, glad I checked it out, and was told (on old thread, I think) that subsequent books in series were stronger (also apparently books in later series, judging by article about her in Science Fiction Encyclopedia online).This is the L'Engle to start with, pretty sure.

subsequent books in series were stronger

ah the old harry potter defence, always great to hear especially when each installment in the series can stop a heavier door than the last.

yeah this one's more of a maybe as i'm not crazy about YA type stuff, for the most part, mentioning CS Lewis doesn't strengthen the case. still, i won't rule it out in case i find myself in the mood or stumble across a copy.

It's very short and fast, but with no sense of skimpiness or hastiness---impulsiveness, maybe, re idealism. Which reminds me just a bit of Tiptree, now that I think of it, and don't sleep on xpostHer Smoke Rose Up For Ever, or any of her other stuff, though it does get even more reckless toward the end.

mentioning CS Lewis doesn't strengthen the case

I'm not a huge Lewis dude (never could make it through any of the Narnia books, even as a YA) but I will stan for the sci-fi trilogy, which, while def heavy handed with the Xtian allegories, is still pretty strange and batshit. The first one is like an HG Wells homage, the second one is the dumbest, and the third is the best fwiw

Her Smoke Rose Up Forever is incredible. true master shit there.

and Riddley Walker! omg what a book. had to stop myself from buying it the other day when I saw it in a shop, even though I've already read it. the terrible sleeve design prevented me.

Outic what do you think of the third inkling, Charles Williams?