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

Finished rereading Lethem's AMNESIA MOON. The relative incoherence of the narrative perhaps struck me more than before, the sense that things weren't holding together and perhaps JL didn't mind that, bearing in mind PKD's talk of wanting to build universes that fall apart.

it does wander - at the same time that seems appropriate. Also of a piece with Gun, With Occasional Music's narrative disruption, with the dude getting knocked out and waking up years later and the whole previous story basically abandoned/unresolved.

(at least that's my memory of it?)

One thing I learned from reading PLAYING AT THE WORLD, the excellent history of RPGs and their antecedents, is that Leiber was in very early. He created some sort of fantasy board game for his own use in the 30s, and began putting together the Lankhmar game in 1960. And of course he is a participant in Dragon Magazind later on.

D&D was definitely where I first heard of him. Moorcock too, probably.

Leiber invented fantasy board games!

(I didn't know)

OUTIS, GUN does have a 6-year break to its second section but it doesn't abandon the previous story at all - the detective goes back and confronts the villains. The notable thing about GUN is how tightly composed it is, next to the almost improvised sprawl of AMNESIA MOON. As I keep saying, there's a sense that the latter is the real 'first novel'. (JL has a little article on first novels where he comments on some of this.)

sheesh just getting to the end of Shadow of the Torturer and kinda bowled over by Wolfe's mastery all over again. also the ilx the NEWSUN!!! thread is a hoot, the late great has a lot of insightful posts on it. also making me glad the trilogy placed third in our spec fic poll.

Ended up being five books; he seemed embarrassed by that, but just couldn't figure out how to do it right in three. No prob; I read 'em in the 80s, mostly remember being greatly impressed overall, also when the main character is passing through a wall and sees people going about their lives in it, and the ending, which I won't spoil. Maybe should re-read, but put off by some early Borges-wannabee stories, though always did think he needed more room; did enjoy some longer stories, like "The Death of Doctor Island." Misogyny got to be more of a problem. Really did like the gothic Peace, but that and most others by him were also read in 80s, so who knows what I'd think now. Here's the complete NS: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Book-New-Sun-Conciliator-ebook/dp/B075JL493G/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1533761570&sr=1-3&keywords=gene+wolfe+book+of+the+new+sun

"Some early" stories I hadn't seen before, all in a single issue of the relaunched Weird Tales, from um (90s?) Also in a Hartwell anth from the 90s or early 00s.

Oh and some baddies in more recent Hartwell anths.

sorry dunno why I called it a trilogy there - I've got four books

his most recent book, A Borrowed Man, is excellent. I couldn't finish Home Fires. The Land Across was an interesting Kafka-esque sort of exercise.

Just got a copy of that. Now if only I could recapture the patience I need to read novels.

Peace definitely my favourite non-newsun, amazing book.

I've got a big collection of his short stories, which are mostly OK but made worse by his preening introductions to each piece. But New Sun/Long Sun are great. Still have to read the Short Sun trilogy. And Long Sun is the most literary book to feature a statuesque nude woman with big breasts running around with a bazooka.

tell me about the runners-up

Soldier books were fun and engrossing at the time, and v much up my alley subject wise, but didn't leave much of a lasting impression. I remember being v impressed by 5th head of Cerberus but don't actually remember much about it now. I posted something long about sorcerer's house possibly on this thread, v enjoyable but definitely weaker. And cosign borrowed man is great. I think that's everything I've read.

preening introductions to each piece

lol for a long time the only Wolfe I owned was short story collections (The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other Stories, Endangered Species, Strange Travelers, Starwater Strains, 5th Head of Cerberus), not sure which edition yr referring to but I thankfully dodged that one

I liked the first Soldiers book alright but remember thinking the ending was a confusing let-down. By the second one I got tired of constantly guessing which Greek myth/story/god was being referenced and gave up.

also he fuckin invented pringles

Always forget that

he wanted to call them pringellae

not quite true

Is it true you invented the machine that makes Pringles potato chips?

GW: I developed it. I did not invent it. That was done by a German gentlemen whose name I've forgotten for years. I developed the machine that cooks them. He had invented the basic idea, how to make the potato dough, pressing it between two forms, more or less as in a wrap-around, immersing them in hot cooking oil, and so forth and so on. And we were then called in, I was in the engineering development division, and asked to develop mass production equipment to make these chips. And we divided the task into the dough making/dough rolling portion, which was done by Len Hooper, and the cooking portion, which was done by me, and then the pickoff and salting portion, which was done by someone else, and then the can filling/can sealing portion which was done by a man who was almost driven insane by the program. Because he would develop a machine, and he would have it almost ready to go, and they would say "Oh, instead of 300 cans a minute, make it 500 cans a minute." And so he would have to throw out a bunch of stuff, and develop the new machine, and when he got that one about ready, they'd say "make it 700 cans a minute." And they almost put him in a mental hospital. He took his job very seriously and he just about flipped out.

That is a top 20 Wolfe short story right there

Lol

"Oh, instead of 300 cans a minute, make it 500 cans a minute."

"Ok build two machines."

The Cans of Dr. Pringellae and Other Cans

lol

I posted this on that late great NEWSUN thread without realizing it was on the (now dead?) noize board, so I'm just gonna put it here instead:

barelling through a re-read of these, just started Claw of the Conciliator. The transition from the end of Shadow of the Torturer to Claw of the Conciliator is so jarring and disorienting. And then it takes several chapters to get up to speed on where Severian is/how much time has passed.

one random thing that's stuck out at me this last time around - have people terraformed the moon? There's a reference to the moon's "green" glow, and then later a reference to the "fabled emerald forests of the moon". Just one of those weird details thrown in in the background with no further explication, easy to gloss over but curious to ponder.

also really enjoying reading these with the internet handy, cuz now I can look up all the weird words thrown about (most of which, like the thing with the moon, don't seem particularly critical but do add a compelling level of detail).

I can think of few other writers who do such an incredible job of keeping the reader off-balance - you never know what's going to turn out to be significant in the narrative.

"The Death of Doctor Island."
― dow, Wednesday, August 8, 2018 10:05 PM

I like this mistaken title.

I should have kept my list of words from Clark Ashton Smith that I couldn't find in my dictionary and had to use the internet for.

Mistaken? Isn’t it a real title? Let me see.

https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-isaac-asimov-blunder-that-led-to-three-new-gene-wol-1578875701

yeah idgi, every title variant is a distinct story

The Cans of Dr. Pringellae and Other Cans

next thread title

Lol

also been reading Karin Tidbeck's "Jagannath" bit by bit, she's great.

I read the beginning of that back when I could still read a little and it was pretty good

James Redd- That's cool, thanks.

Οὖτις - Would like to hear your thoughts when you're finished.

so far my favorites are the one with the kid grown in a can and the guy who fell in love with a spaceship (which subsequently considers him a presumptuous rapist)

Two books by Farah Rose Smith

The Visitor (3 out of 5 stars)

This is two short stories, one of them the title story and one is a preview from the upcoming (?) Anonyma.

The first story starts well with the depiction of the Afterworld but I found the rest not quite interesting enough. Something about the way the rock and roll/goth/decadent milieu was depicted seemed just a bit too familiar, maybe cliched.

Second story was far more interesting, simply an interview with an architect, good enough to save this book from two stars, despite again feeling that perhaps the depiction of the architect and the aesthetic movements he belongs to were too familiar, maybe cliched.

Weird Fiction sometimes has a problem with its lovingly depicted common character types (recluses, scholars, antiquarians, aesthetes, dandies, decadents, nihilists, goths, Crowley-esque bastards) and the associates art movements, feeling a bit too obvious or some other problem I cant quite put my finger on. Not that I want these things to be abandoned, they just need to be approached with extra care.

But it is absorbing and it contains references to Smith's later books The Almanac Of Dust (which is very good) and Eviscerator (which I've just started).

Do those Christian crosses between the words "Modern" and "Gothic" have any religious significance? I don't mind either way, I'm just curious. Maybe we'll find out if Anonyma comes out.

The Almanac Of Dust (4 out of 5 stars)

My main reservation about this is the "everything is nothing" doomy sermons. I heard someone complaining a while ago about too many stories featuring voids and nothingness, seeming kind of a empty threat. Could we take these sermons as a partial reflection of the arrogance of Von Rehm (who I guessed was a provocateur who was nonetheless onto something) and Bhodi (who is disgusted by Von Rehm but reluctantly absorbs his ideas)?

But don't let that put you off, for a book so much about nothingness and with a surprisingly small word count taking up its pages (many of the pages have only one or two sentences), this has so much in it. There's a lot of passages to puzzle over (wonder what is supposed to mean something and what is supposed to be the mad gibberish of men going insane), pause over and admire. I liked the observation about illness and medicine leaving different fragments of a person intact.

I like that Smith isn't afraid to bring the purple and use unnaturally theatrical speech (especially Bhodi's rant to the city as he stands outside in the wind). Some very pleasing imagery too.

James Thomson's City Of Dreadful Night (which I've been meaning to read) is quoted at the start and I don't know how much influence it is on this story but what it resembles more than anything else I've read is Hodgson's The Night Land, with similar kinds of monsters. The journey that ends the story was very good.

This may be regarded as my personal preference but I would have liked more description of the places. I think an earlier and more detailed description of the home and surrounding country would have enhanced it. And though we are told what the Silver City looks like generally, I still found it a little too vague when we actually get there.

But I hope you buy this from Lulu in print or get the kindle version. I hope it doesn't fly under the radar. I hope this is reprinted many times by increasingly large publishers and I hope Farah Rose Smith goes very far.

Lol-tastic true tale here, concerning the downside of winning the Church of $c13nt0l0gy-related short fiction contest: https://www.authoralden.com/2018/08/goingclearwater.html?spref=fb

Kind of glad the one time I entered it resulted in a straight rejection.

I read a comic adaptation of some Fafhrd & Grey Mouser stories and remember enjoying that a lot. Perhaps because it was my first taste of urban fantasy. Or maybe I was just distracted by the usual Mignola loveliness.

I’m definitely keeping my fafhrd/mouser paperbacks with the nice mignola covers and spot illos

Two new to me strugatsky brothers books in fopp this afternoon, 2 for £5 (as well as hard to be a God dvd cheap). Um, doomed city, and another...

Monday Begins on Saturday? I bought the same twofer myself the other day! Fopp have quite a lot of SF Masterworks in stock at the moment, at least in Glasgow - lots of PKD in particular.

I finished all the Marses, Red, Green, and Blue. For their faults they are an astonishing achievement, absolutely top tier SF. Hard SF so not everyone's cup of tea; however, rather than just being speculative physics the main scientific focus is geography and geology, with large helpings of meteorology, hydrology, ecology, biology, sociology, psychology, economics, politics... the breadth is really impressive. But hey it's not all dry facts and book learnin'! There's plenty of good, varied characterisation and even moments of poetry, enough to get you past the pages and pages of martian landscape description (which is less of a problem in books 2 and 3).

Now reading The Female Man, which is righteously angry.

Hugo Award results:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/aug/20/hugo-awards-women-nk-jemisin-wins-best-novel

Veteran writer Lois McMaster Bujold, herself a four-time best novel winner, won the best series award for her World of the Five Gods sequence. Really enjoyed Memory---pace and levels, incl allusions made-comprehensible-without-getting-bogged-down to total series noob me---will have to check Five Gods stories too.

I carried on upthread about Memory, natch.