seriously though, I don't know what she was thinking re: Soldier Son aside from "how can I come up with a unique magic system" without completing the thought with "that people will want to read about without hurling"
xp: last time I checked
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 17:20 (seven years ago) link
Why was it that bad, I thought it was just gross in a gross-out way?
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 17:21 (seven years ago) link
I haven't read it.
Maybe it wasn't as terrible for anyone else, but for me the whole concept of stuffing yourself with food past the point of fullness causes me psychosomatic pain.
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 17:25 (seven years ago) link
Sounds kind of funny, is it used for comedy?
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 17:30 (seven years ago) link
Not in the slightest.
― this iphone speaks many languages (DJP), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 17:31 (seven years ago) link
my bad, it's called the tawny man trilogy not the fool trilogy, thx djp
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 18:12 (seven years ago) link
I've never read a John Wyndham book and kinda want to. Should I? What's a good one?
― Chuck_Tatum, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 18:59 (seven years ago) link
The Day of the Triffids is his most famous work for a reason
― Number None, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 19:21 (seven years ago) link
Chocky isn't bad
― Οὖτις, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 19:21 (seven years ago) link
They're all good imo but yeah I would with Triffids. Kraken Wakes is more of the same, Chocky is classic YA.
― angelo irishagreementi (ledge), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 19:25 (seven years ago) link
Seen some really passionate for The Chrysalids.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 19:38 (seven years ago) link
What about Robin Hobb's books under the name Megan Lindholm? Her real name is Margaret Astrid Lindholm Ogden.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 19:40 (seven years ago) link
omg she's megan lindholm?
i've had wizard of pigeons on my list to read forever but it's out of print
ok def reading robin hobb then
― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 20:00 (seven years ago) link
Yeah IIRC she hit some sort of wall wrt writing and decided fuck it, pen name time, and had a renaissance.
I haven't read any OG lindholm stuff.
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 20:23 (seven years ago) link
On recommendation, I just read the kids' book Holes, which has some magical realism whatnot. It's so good. Haven't read the book, but really liked the movie.
― dow, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 20:44 (seven years ago) link
IT'S SO FUN READ IT NOW
― Chuck_Tatum, Tuesday, 12 September 2017 20:56 (seven years ago) link
WYNDHAM: The Day of the Triffids and The Chrysalids are the pure good stuff.
Just read Dave hUTCHINSON'S SPACE OPERA NOVELLA aCADIE, WHICH WAS FUN AND CLEVER AND fuck I can't use caps lock properly
― Mince Pramthwart (James Morrison), Tuesday, 12 September 2017 23:24 (seven years ago) link
Been looking at hundreds of listings of small press magazines and buying a few here and there. It's just astonishing how many there were. DF Lewis made a thread with cover scans of a lot of the magazines he appeared in. Cover art quality is all over the place. http://vaultofevil.proboards.com/thread/672/small-press-cover-ark?page=1
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Wednesday, 13 September 2017 15:58 (seven years ago) link
Lavie Tidhar's "Central Station" is okay so far - a lot of description (some of which gets p repetitive) and not much in the way of a plot or central conflict 100 pages in, he seems more preoccupied with detailing this exotic tableau he's come up with. idk, I'll probably finish it but I'm getting the impression this isn't going to amount to much more than a bunch of wacky concepts and ethnographic mash-ups.
― Οὖτις, Wednesday, 13 September 2017 17:11 (seven years ago) link
That's about right for Central Station, I enjoyed it but it's more a collection of interlinked short stories (a lot of it is previously published in Interzone etc) than a novel that actually builds to something.
― めんどくさかった (Matt #2), Thursday, 14 September 2017 10:27 (seven years ago) link
Sounds Vancian? I'm intrigued.
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Thursday, 14 September 2017 11:04 (seven years ago) link
I actually liked the repetitiveness of the descriptive passages, kinda hypnotic.
― めんどくさかった (Matt #2), Thursday, 14 September 2017 13:11 (seven years ago) link
His Gorel books are weird adventure stuff.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 15 September 2017 16:10 (seven years ago) link
watched this yesterday. almost cried! i'm an old softy. sound/video is messed up but it doesn't matter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Deuas-AuzbU
― scott seward, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 16:46 (seven years ago) link
I haven't read a ton of Vance but I don't get a Vance vibe from Tidhar. As far as old-school references go, he does have one story in here that is an extended riff on CL Moore's first and best-known story, "Shambleau", and there's a number of other minor refs to other sci-fi works ("ubicked" is used as a verb, for ex.)
― Οὖτις, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 16:51 (seven years ago) link
I've read first two earthseas in a sitting each and have really enjoyed the sparse simplicity of them tbh
VG, if you want even more robin Gibb advice, the liveship and rain wilder books are imo skippable
Essentially Fitz and the fool are great and there's none of those books to keep you going (though if you found kvothe a maddening meathead I dunno how frustrated some of the mcguffining will make you tbh)
― passé aggresif (darraghmac), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:11 (seven years ago) link
That is an autocorrect
But it is a damn fine one
woudl read sci-fi books written by Robin Gibb. Sad mopey space operas about ships crashing into each other
― Οὖτις, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:13 (seven years ago) link
i finally went back to reading The Mote In God's Eye. i was kinda limping through it. when does it become the greatest sci-fi novel ever written (according to heinlein)? it's okay. i've read about five books in the meantime. but i'll finish it. don't know if i'll get to the sequel though.
(sometimes my brain can't handle the idea of collaborations. it's a thing i have. it makes me nervous not knowing who wrote what. i tend to avoid them. which is irrational, but it's a brain thing...)
― scott seward, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:30 (seven years ago) link
what would be the prose analogue of the gibb banshee falsetto?
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:32 (seven years ago) link
When an alien consciousness speaks in italics
― passé aggresif (darraghmac), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:32 (seven years ago) link
One of the Tidhar Gorel books is called Black Gods Kiss so that has to be another Catherine L Moore reference. I think he calls Gorel "guns and sorcery".
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 19 September 2017 17:37 (seven years ago) link
good to know, thx deems!
― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 18:43 (seven years ago) link
(many many xposts, sorry)
I disagree that liveship is skippable. It's great!
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 18:54 (seven years ago) link
well then i guess you'll both have to settle this in the parking lot
― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 18:59 (seven years ago) link
i cannot fight an irishes
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 19:10 (seven years ago) link
ah they love it
― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 19:40 (seven years ago) link
I won't go to scrapping for it but when the sexual politics of a fantasy novel leave me thinking it was a bit much I have to consider how I would recommend it. Some of it was rough rough stuff iirc.
I'm not sorry I read the or anything tbf
― passé aggresif (darraghmac), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 19:42 (seven years ago) link
Thought the reason Vance was mentioned was only because Central Station seemed like a fix-up, not for any stylistic reasons. I bought it the other day because the ebook was on sale and the blurbs were from some other interesting writers, but doesn't seem to be something I feel like reading right now
― Merry-Go-Sorry Somehow (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 23:02 (seven years ago) link
Also, just found this: https://www.io9.gizmodo.com/is-the-fix-up-the-best-kind-of-science-fiction-novel-1690623190/
― Merry-Go-Sorry Somehow (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 23:03 (seven years ago) link
Maybe better without the www (tried to remove the Google amp stuff) https://io9.gizmodo.com/is-the-fix-up-the-best-kind-of-science-fiction-novel-1690623190/
― Merry-Go-Sorry Somehow (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 19 September 2017 23:04 (seven years ago) link
keep going
― angelo irishagreementi (ledge), Wednesday, 20 September 2017 07:55 (seven years ago) link
There are undeniably a lot of great fix-up novels but I dunno if I would say they are inherently the "best"
I'm coming around on Central Station, the middle section (Shambleau, Robotnik, the Bookseller) really delivers
started in on "City" as well (another classic fix-up case) which is oddly fascinating both for its anachronisms and it's overall elegiac tone
― Οὖτις, Wednesday, 20 September 2017 15:45 (seven years ago) link
been putting off City forever because I expect to love it a lot
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Wednesday, 20 September 2017 16:01 (seven years ago) link
Heh excellently expressed sentiment
― passé aggresif (darraghmac), Wednesday, 20 September 2017 16:06 (seven years ago) link
i do that kind of thing almost pathologically
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Wednesday, 20 September 2017 16:07 (seven years ago) link
Adam- which Jemisin book did you read? Quite a few people who disliked her earlier stuff said the recent trilogy is a huge improvement.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 22 September 2017 21:29 (six years ago) link
heyo
http://bonsall-books.co.uk/interviewsconc/
― Οὖτις, Friday, 22 September 2017 22:47 (six years ago) link