*i think
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Thursday, 30 June 2016 04:21 (seven years ago) link
oo'tis:
"I feel like a lot of the 80s vibe was one of "humorous deconstruction" - fantasy tropes were well established by that time and people were either goofing on them or making them "darker"/"edgier" "
like its interesting to think of yer robert asprins and yer Michael swanwicks existing in the same continuum but I feel like both these tendencies lay outside the terrible slick mainstream of the 80s fantasy machine (which was trying I think to replicate eddings-style 70s successes perhaps? I realise my ideas of sales figures for this stuff are basically entirely spurious)
does SF have a matching uptick in space opera do we think. I guess cyberpunk was busy happening
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Thursday, 30 June 2016 04:24 (seven years ago) link
When did the boring "military" SF book still carried on by Baen and their horrible covers kick in? The 80s might be too early, though I guess the (much better) book they sort of spawn from, The Forever War, is 1970s.
― 🐸a hairy howling toad torments a man whose wife is deathly ill (James Morrison), Thursday, 30 June 2016 04:42 (seven years ago) link
boring "military" SF BOOM I mean
― 🐸a hairy howling toad torments a man whose wife is deathly ill (James Morrison), Thursday, 30 June 2016 04:43 (seven years ago) link
The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe also made into the p good film Deathwatch by Bertrand Tavernier, w/ Harvey Kietel and Romy Schneider - parts of it filmed in Glasgow, so of local interest to me, but is now seen as being prophetic in some ways of 'reality TV' (tho Jim McBride's David Holzman's Diary got there first)
This is the book that screams FANTASY IN THE EIGHTIES to me (and this edition in partic)
http://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/photo.goodreads.com/books/1432756104i/12164830._UY200_.jpg
― Foster Twelvetrees (Ward Fowler), Thursday, 30 June 2016 08:23 (seven years ago) link
From what I hear, the first two Pern books are good and Piers Anthony did some good stuff (this coming from people who generally don't like their work)
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Thursday, 30 June 2016 11:14 (seven years ago) link
unrelated to my recent enquiries, tho also a fantasy novel of the 80s, i suppose, i've been reading diana wynne jones' 'witch week', which was advertised as a knockabout fantasy but turns out to be equal parts a satire on british schoolmasters and a masterful essay in pre-adolescent psychology
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Thursday, 30 June 2016 12:48 (seven years ago) link
I love Diane Wynne Jones, and will always be a little bummed that she didn't get more props from Jo Rowling.
― rb (soda), Thursday, 30 June 2016 14:30 (seven years ago) link
the first two Pern books are good
my wife is a huge Anne McCaffrey fan and was a completist at one point but even she can't bear the later cash-in/endless series of telepathicats and space unicorn girls or whatever. McCaffrey did have some good novels scattered across her different series' but she was not shy about banging crap out for quick $$$
― Οὖτις, Thursday, 30 June 2016 15:28 (seven years ago) link
(granted she's hardly unusual in that respect)
― Οὖτις, Thursday, 30 June 2016 15:29 (seven years ago) link
like its interesting to think of yer robert asprins and yer Michael swanwicks existing in the same continuum but I feel like both these tendencies lay outside the terrible slick mainstream of the 80s fantasy machine
this could v well be the case, I'm just spitballing based on personal memories of what was popular w my peers at the time
― Οὖτις, Thursday, 30 June 2016 15:30 (seven years ago) link
some friends of mine have an excuse to drink that they call an SF book club and i never go because i never read the books they are reading and i drink alone but they are reading The Name Of The Wind and they swear its good and that i should read it. but i don't really read straight fantasy ever.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Name_of_the_Wind
― scott seward, Thursday, 30 June 2016 15:35 (seven years ago) link
lol @ entire first paragraph being about the different cover editions
― Οὖτις, Thursday, 30 June 2016 15:36 (seven years ago) link
I think somebody here recommended it a month ago.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Thursday, 30 June 2016 16:39 (seven years ago) link
And neither cover referred to is the Chesty McPecs one shown there
― 🐸a hairy howling toad torments a man whose wife is deathly ill (James Morrison), Friday, 1 July 2016 00:21 (seven years ago) link
the name of the wind is sort of enjoyable, the second one totally awful. lamp compared it to harem anime which was p accurate
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Friday, 1 July 2016 00:32 (seven years ago) link
harem anime where you're continually expecting the lead to turn to camera and explain why polyamory is the only morally justifiable position but they never quite do
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Friday, 1 July 2016 00:34 (seven years ago) link
Thanks for the tip on xpost K Martenhoe and Deathwatch, Ward. Yeah, been wondering about DW Jones since Robert posted that list and descriptions of female fantasty writers (also I asked about her xpost Howl trilogy).
The only McCafferty I've read was a very early Pern story in a science fiction anthology, which seemed to fit, at least in terms of Dunean planetary romance, as they say @ SF Encyclopedia Online: no description of dragonic endocrine system etc., but the setting adds to dynamics of characters and plot, though mainly the family dynamics and intrigue make me think of a Mother-of-Dragons spinoff from Game of Thrones (I'd prob enjoy it more than the parent show). Think this was a Hartwell anth, and he introduced it by saying she was one of the later, if not last, younger writers carefully guided by John C. Campbell Jr., who, whatever his Big Ideas, did know something about how to tell a story. But maybe that wore off later, when she was really cranking 'em out.
― dow, Friday, 1 July 2016 03:57 (seven years ago) link
The Time of the Ghost is the most underrated Diana Wynne Jones novel, imho. it's a lot darker than her Howl's/Chrestomanci books — I like how even if you were to subtract all supernatural elements from the storyline, the children's behavior (making ritual offerings to invented gods, bribing their classmates to donate blood for a Homeric sacrifice) would still seem like a more-or-less reasonable reaction to the stresses of neglectful parents and bleak boarding school existence. much of it is apparently based on Jones's own difficult childhood.
I'd also recommend Fire & Hemlock, which is similar in tone. I haven't read much of her later work, but I'm not a fan of Dark Lord of Derkholm — it's meant to be a parody of po-faced heroic fantasy and a tie-in to her Tough Guide to Fantasyland, but it ends up being overly earnest in its own right (does she really expect me to empathize with her griffin-human hybrids?) when it would have worked better as pure over-the-top comedy.
― small doug yule carnival club (unregistered), Friday, 1 July 2016 04:03 (seven years ago) link
has anyone read William Gilbert's The Wizard of the Mountain? I'm not sure if it's typical Victorian Gothic or proto Tanith Lee, but it seems interesting either way:
Brianza, Lombardy, 14th Century Italy. A mysterious and solitary astrologer inhabits a magnificent castle overlooking Lake Como. The Innominato (Nameless) is known to provide advice and assistance to those in need of 'special' favours. Rumoured to be an augur, wizard and necromancer possessing immense power of unknown origin, he is spoken of with fear and respect by locals and deep suspicion by the Church.An array of spellbinding tales from a noted author at the height of his powers, this collection marks the eventual return of a lost classic to the ranks of Victorian horror and dark fiction. Compelling Gothic themes, exotic environs and engrossing plots are populated by a range of both pure and evil characters: decaying vampires, beautiful virgins, sinister phantoms, marauding bandits... These and more await in this collection of deliciously ghoulish and macabre stories as well as the Innominato himself: known to have made himself much beloved and yet also a man 'much dreaded for his sanguinary propensities.' Good or Evil? You decide.
An array of spellbinding tales from a noted author at the height of his powers, this collection marks the eventual return of a lost classic to the ranks of Victorian horror and dark fiction. Compelling Gothic themes, exotic environs and engrossing plots are populated by a range of both pure and evil characters: decaying vampires, beautiful virgins, sinister phantoms, marauding bandits... These and more await in this collection of deliciously ghoulish and macabre stories as well as the Innominato himself: known to have made himself much beloved and yet also a man 'much dreaded for his sanguinary propensities.' Good or Evil? You decide.
(it's available for free on this Gilbert & Sullivan fansite)
― small doug yule carnival club (unregistered), Friday, 1 July 2016 04:13 (seven years ago) link
'witch week' is nominally a chrestomanci thing, though who knows when he's going to show up. both of the others of those i've read have had moments when they tip into an extraordinary darkness tho -- the twist in charmed life, the punch and judy section in the caprona one ...
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Friday, 1 July 2016 06:23 (seven years ago) link
Gilbert book sounds cool.
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Friday, 1 July 2016 12:19 (seven years ago) link
man terry brooks is no david eddings
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Sunday, 3 July 2016 16:17 (seven years ago) link
think it says that on the back of the books
― and the Gove maths out Raab (Noodle Vague), Sunday, 3 July 2016 16:20 (seven years ago) link
Just might pre-order the VanderMeers' Big Book of Science Fiction, incl. stories never before translated into English, and some re-translations==Jeff V.'s crisp comments here:http://www.jeffvandermeer.com/2016/04/03/big-book-science-fiction-vintage-background-info/Also check his link to the complete table of contents.
― dow, Sunday, 3 July 2016 21:16 (seven years ago) link
Tempted
― Tarzan v. BMI (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 3 July 2016 21:24 (seven years ago) link
Looking forward to some of those new translations, such as for "Day of Wrath."
― Tarzan v. BMI (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 3 July 2016 21:37 (seven years ago) link
posted on Twitter by Luc Sante
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CluYTmeWkAAlg_J.jpg:large
― dow, Saturday, 9 July 2016 19:32 (seven years ago) link
If gone from here, it's the pulp cover vision posted on June 24:https://twitter.com/luxante
― dow, Saturday, 9 July 2016 19:35 (seven years ago) link
was at the book store and they had all three trade paper volumes of neal asher's The Owner trilogy.
should i buy them? anyone read them? they looked kinda cool. have read good/bad things online via goodreads and the like.
― scott seward, Monday, 11 July 2016 19:25 (seven years ago) link
also, they had some stuff by Paolo Bacigalupi. do i need to read those? they had The Windup Girl, The Water Knife, and Pump Six and other stories.
― scott seward, Monday, 11 July 2016 19:27 (seven years ago) link
Read a bit of PB in anthologies, and might have enjoyed the "Look What I Can Do!" in the midst of space opera, say---like the kind of "technical" prog-etc metal that can be fun when you're in the mood--but he applies the roiling bravura to serious themes, eco-trastrophe and genetic engineering, $cience Gone Too Far---which could work as a *principled* comic book, dammit--but, at least in the few stories I read, more like an Alfred Bester-wannabee---Bester, with Something To Say, also made the best of his comics background---kinda glib and half-assed.Although! Maybe I just didn't read the right stories, or maybe he's one of those relatively rare writers who are better in longform, because they just really need the room. So SF Encyclopedia, though they have some mixed reactions about the Hugo and Locus-award-winning Wind-Up Girl, do think it eventually works out OK: technically overcomplicated and perhaps underpowered, does in the end provide a series of linked angles of view, through the assembly of which a terrible new world, at the brink of further Disasters, can be almost literally tasted.On the other hand, I read the first chapter of The Water Knife, and maybe he decided he did need to go more pop, but it's like this suave badass antihero water pirate raiding reserves indignantly defended by the heroic underdog nerd engineer----in near-future Southwest, with docudrama clarity transposed to Summer Blockbuster potential, but ehhh I dunno maybe I'll read ithttp://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/bacigalupi_paolo
― dow, Monday, 11 July 2016 19:53 (seven years ago) link
PB "glib and half-assed," that is, not Alfie Bester!
― dow, Monday, 11 July 2016 19:54 (seven years ago) link
windup girl was fine, if not seemingly award-winning. it definitely had eco-trastrophe and genetic engineering and $cience Gone Too Far tho
the only mieville i've read was perdido street station -- i recall him spending a lot of time describing the environment as moist and fecund and worst of all, organic; there's a bit of that in the windup girl too
― mookieproof, Monday, 11 July 2016 20:22 (seven years ago) link
I haven't been able to bring myself to read PB, just the descriptions on the back of his books struck me as deeply irritating, just another update on the noir-ish protagonist confronting shadowy corporate powers with some ecological decline window-dressing, feel like the genre's been awash in that kind of crap since the 80s.
― Οὖτις, Monday, 11 July 2016 20:38 (seven years ago) link
The Windup Girl seems like the one to start with; I'll definitely give it another look when I get back to the library. The only Mieville I've read is The City and The City, which gets off to a bumpy start with a narrator who seems to be speaking in an East Euro accent, but distracts from the noir-Kafka urban and urbam tour with what sometimes looks like a transcription of Triumph The Insult Comic dogpuppet, without the jokes. But what he's actually talking about becomse engrossing enough to get me way past this conceit (though there's at least one, penultimate wobbler in passing). Helps that this is very imaginative police procedural---I keep getting pulled into those:Asmimov's robot detective stories, going way back, and much more recently Lock In, The Yiddish Policeman's Union---also Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, in a way, though this is less disturbing than PKD (most things are).
― dow, Monday, 11 July 2016 20:54 (seven years ago) link
"urban and urban", "Asimov's", sorry.
― dow, Monday, 11 July 2016 20:56 (seven years ago) link
I tried reading Perdido Street Station once, couldn't finish it
― Οὖτις, Monday, 11 July 2016 20:57 (seven years ago) link
i have a bunch of mieville at home and still haven't read any. i think maria read one. i bought them cuzza ilx. ilx also made me buy dizzee rascal albums once upon a time...
― scott seward, Monday, 11 July 2016 21:16 (seven years ago) link
Me three. I think Martin S recommended and I usually trusted him but just couldn't get into.
― Blandings Castle Magic (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 11 July 2016 21:47 (seven years ago) link
<i>also, they had some stuff by Paolo Bacigalupi. do i need to read those? they had The Windup Girl, The Water Knife, and Pump Six and other stories.</i>
i think 'water knife' is pretty good - its kinda like woke tom clancy more than anything - i liked the characters and the pacing was really good. i think hes a strong narrative writer even if he doesnt have great ~ideas about the future~ partic since the future is now or w/e in his work
― ( ^_^) (Lamp), Monday, 11 July 2016 22:38 (seven years ago) link
hmm, okay, maybe i'll hold off on Paolo. might go for the other guy's trilogy though.
Asher has 14 books all set in the same universe. The Owner Trilogy is not a part of that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neal_Asher
― scott seward, Monday, 11 July 2016 23:14 (seven years ago) link
although some people definitely loved his earlier stuff and hated this trilogy. hmmmm....
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10648878-the-departure
they do look cool though...
― scott seward, Monday, 11 July 2016 23:19 (seven years ago) link
on the other hand, i've got LOTS to read at home...
― scott seward, Tuesday, 12 July 2016 00:04 (seven years ago) link
SF Encyclopedia On-Line is pretty helpful, although I don't always agree with 'em.
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_INLtZF1lBQ/V4O7_4Rr4oI/AAAAAAAAA9c/6KEGKBZ-dQMm0xh5j0R52qyyo_FKXMrrgCLcB/s1600/Hartmann.jpg
Bio tending to ripping yarn, appropriately:http://wormwoodiana.blogspot.com/2016/07/douglas-fawcett-fantast-mountaineer.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Wormwoodiana+%28Wormwoodiana%29
― dow, Tuesday, 12 July 2016 00:16 (seven years ago) link
paolo bacigalupi is really creepy about women in 'the windup girl' but his YA novel was pretty good /:
― the ghost of tom, choad (thomp), Tuesday, 12 July 2016 01:47 (seven years ago) link
Neal asher is mostly smart action movie sf, nothing much deeper on the whole. Fun, bombastic, some big ideas, thin thin characters
― 🐸a hairy howling toad torments a man whose wife is deathly ill (James Morrison), Tuesday, 12 July 2016 02:05 (seven years ago) link
> paolo bacigalupi is really creepy about women in 'the windup girl'
I though this too, and there was one violent episode that went *way* beyond creepy.
― koogs, Tuesday, 12 July 2016 03:33 (seven years ago) link
okay, yeah, i'll skip paolo.
smart action movie sf i can hang with though.
― scott seward, Tuesday, 12 July 2016 04:45 (seven years ago) link
So that new omnibus...
― Gabba Gabba Hey in the Hayloft (James Redd and the Blecchs), Thursday, 14 July 2016 17:08 (seven years ago) link