|
How are the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser books? I've heard they're really fun in a DnD sort of way, but were pretty sexist.
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 05:14 |
|
|
MockingQuantum posted:Yeah it was great, I'd love more like that too. Vladimir Sorokin is worth a look. Check out Blizzard. I’m not sure if Blue Blubber was translated into English/is in print, but it’s his top work. Thomas Ligotti writes horror, but captures that dreamlike quality present in Turin, except it’s not really about Italian fringe politics during the anni di piombo period.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:23
|
|
|
Hiro Protagonist posted:How are the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser books? I've heard they're really fun in a DnD sort of way, but were pretty sexist. You pretty much answered your own question there 
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:32
|
|
|
It's not particularly modern, but you could do a lot worse than Lud-In-The-Mist.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:34
|
|
|
Hiro Protagonist posted:How are the Fafhrd and Grey Mouser books? I've heard they're really fun in a DnD sort of way, but were pretty sexist. They're great and from what I recall the overt sexism mostly rears its ugly head in the later stories from the 60s and 70s (i.e. Lieber's lecherous old man phase) The earlier stories are a neat mix of fantasy and weird fiction, lots of strange wizards and creatures and such
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:39
|
|
|
my bony fealty posted:They're great and from what I recall the overt sexism mostly rears its ugly head in the later stories from the 60s and 70s (i.e. Lieber's lecherous old man phase)
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 21:53
|
|
|
FastestGunAlive posted:Wow I fell behind by six months on this thread because I just haven’t been reading much sff. I liked it and read it but it wasn't the deepest thing - it didn't leave a huge impression even, it is the one about dungeon crawling in a huge post magic continent from a previous civilisation? It's fun enough in an emo navel gazing way. I'll buy a second but won't preorder the third if you know what I mean.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 23:24
|
|
|
MockingQuantum posted:What's some good, dreamlike fantasy? I'm itching for something kind of weird and mythic and ethereal. It's kind of hard to explain, but I remember Earthsea and McKillip's Riddlemaster of Hed both kind of having this feeling of the worlds being truly magical even if the books didn't offer any particular explanation as to how they were magical. I read it years and years ago, but Riddlemaster sticks out in part because, if I remember right, there's this whole kind of dreamlike sequence where the main character just spends months or years learning how to turn into a deer because why not? I think you'd like Tanith Lee's Tales from the Flat Earth or the Secret Books of Paradys, both of which have a very dark, gothic, and mythical feel about them. Other possibilities: Little, Big or Viriconium. And if you liked the Riddle-master books, you'll probably like The Forgotten Beasts of Eld.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2019 00:22
|
|
|
branedotorg posted:I liked it and read it but it wasn't the deepest thing - it didn't leave a huge impression even, it is the one about dungeon crawling in a huge post magic continent from a previous civilisation? Sounds about right although I think it’s all in the same continent. I mean yea, it’s not reinventing the genre or doing anything brand new, it is very much a casual read which is what I’ve been looking for recently
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2019 01:13
|
|
|
GreyjoyBastard posted:i still can't decide if i hate the guy's writing style or feel it's appropriately trippy for the world His writing style is pretty bad (or at least EXTREMELY self-indulgent), but the world is good enough that I read it anyway.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2019 07:35
|
|
|
I finished The Monster Baru Cormorant (ok it's the UK edition so the title was shorter but I'll be damned if I'll use it) earlier today. Needless to say in really enjoyed it. Since then I've found myself mulling over the title of the next book. At one point I thought it would be The Hero Baru Cormorant or The Tyrant Baru Cormorant but the last few pages kicked that into the grass. I really find myself invested in this character and I fear is going to be The Cancer Baru Cormorant given the last chapter. Given the last page I wonder if it might be The Daughter Baru Cormorant and I don't know if that's better or worse. Damnit GB I really want to know how this ends! Well done, sir. Well done!
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2019 22:36
|
|
|
GreyjoyBastard posted:i still can't decide if i hate the guy's writing style or feel it's appropriately trippy for the world Kalman posted:His writing style is pretty bad (or at least EXTREMELY self-indulgent), but the world is good enough that I read it anyway. His writing style definitely makes me have to pay attention when I read it, which is worth it since can't get enough of that world. The fourth book came out last fall and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Something about the world and his style of writing pokes at the pleasure parts of my brain, enough that I've reread the books multiple times like the book form of comfort food.
|
|
#
?
Feb 14, 2019 23:14
|
|
|
Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 00:34
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. The Demons at Rainbow Bridge by Chalker is bizarre and awesome so far. Kate Elliot's Crown of Stars series is an epic fantasy that nails accurate medieval politics unlike anything I've read before. The Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews for some fun urban fantasy - a badass with a sword versus monsters in Atlanta, in a world that flipflops between magic working and tech working - so one hour your car works, and the next it doesn't, so get a horse.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 02:37
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. Murderbot, Bridge of Birds, Lord of Light, Night in the Lonesome October, Lud in the Mist, _Declare_ by Tim Powers
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 02:43
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:Murderbot, Bridge of Birds, Lord of Light, Night in the Lonesome October, Lud in the Mist, _Declare_ by Tim Powers And any Dunsany, novels or short stories.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 02:46
|
|
|
Ben Nevis posted:I'm not as wild for Gnomon as some, but the biggest draw for me was that it scratches that pattern matching part of your brain as you sift through the different stories for the little details to help reveal the story behind everything. It was super ambitious (which I appreciated) and pretty unique. I enjoyed the opportunity to put the puzzle together. I liked the depiction of a near future panopticon. I thought generally there were moments where the story shifts robbed the book of some momentum. It was also a little bloated and could have been tightened up some. Generally, I found it to be a pretty good read. Thanks for the response!!! I will say the "connections across stories" aspect was one of the more pleasant parts of the reading experience for me. It was definitely bloated though.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 04:12
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 05:08
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. Fourth Mansions by R A Lafferty.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 05:53
|
|
|
Thanks all for responding to a very unspecific request. A few of those were already on the list but some weren't. Much appreciated.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 06:33
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Got a 9 hour flight ahead of me. Throw me some reccs. Historical fiction as fantasy: The Physician by Noah Gordon. Read heaps of this from Melbourne-Sydney-LA recently and it's my definition of what makes good airport fiction (compelling, readable, good quality but not too fancy because you're tired and cranky and can't focus). edit - huh, I guess it wasn't that recently, because I wrote a review of it exactly a year ago today, time flies: https://grubstreethack.wordpress.com/2018/02/15/book-review-the-physician/ freebooter fucked around with this message at 10:58 on Feb 15, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 10:56
|
|
|
vulturesrow posted:Thanks all for responding to a very unspecific request. A few of those were already on the list but some weren't. Much appreciated. Come back after your flight and tell us what you read!
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 12:42
|
|
|
Another criminally underappreciated option: The Adventures of Doctor Eszterhazy by Avram Davidson.
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 18:16
|
|
|
anilEhilated posted:Another criminally underappreciated option: The Adventures of Doctor Eszterhazy by Avram Davidson. welp that just got ordered from Amazon thanks
|
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 18:24
|
|
|
Do share your opinion afterwards; I absolutely love these things. edit: And one of the stories is about a woman who lives with a bear so it's literary. anilEhilated fucked around with this message at 18:36 on Feb 15, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 15, 2019 18:33
|
|
|
Is there some context to Zelazny's Creatures of Light and Darkness that motivated it? I feel like there's some satire going on here which has a point to it - in particular, the repeated pairing of the portentous, mythical, and sacred with the laughably quotidian - the debased (probably Christian) priesthood of however far in the future is having its members called 'Dad' rather than 'Father', the image of a dog worrying an old glove being Cerberus guarding Set's lost gauntlet, the oracle which is a hyper-advanced computer paired with a human torso which will prognosticate and calculate so long as the user gives it a handjob to keep it aroused... It feels like Zelazny's getting at sometihng in particular rather than just putting this stuff together for amusement but I'm not sure what.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 06:04
|
|
|
Neurosis posted:Is there some context to Zelazny's Creatures of Light and Darkness that motivated it? I feel like there's some satire going on here which has a point to it - in particular, the repeated pairing of the portentous, mythical, and sacred with the laughably quotidian - the debased (probably Christian) priesthood of however far in the future is having its members called 'Dad' rather than 'Father', the image of a dog worrying an old glove being Cerberus guarding Set's lost gauntlet, the oracle which is a hyper-advanced computer paired with a human torso which will prognosticate and calculate so long as the user gives it a handjob to keep it aroused... It feels like Zelazny's getting at sometihng in particular rather than just putting this stuff together for amusement but I'm not sure what. Zelazny needed money + the publisher was willing to pay him: case solved? BTW, did you finish John Barnes's Candle?
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 06:26
|
|
|
Neurosis posted:Is there some context to Zelazny's Creatures of Light and Darkness that motivated it? I feel like there's some satire going on here which has a point to it - in particular, the repeated pairing of the portentous, mythical, and sacred with the laughably quotidian - the debased (probably Christian) priesthood of however far in the future is having its members called 'Dad' rather than 'Father', the image of a dog worrying an old glove being Cerberus guarding Set's lost gauntlet, the oracle which is a hyper-advanced computer paired with a human torso which will prognosticate and calculate so long as the user gives it a handjob to keep it aroused... It feels like Zelazny's getting at sometihng in particular rather than just putting this stuff together for amusement but I'm not sure what. There's a lot going on with that one. It was his first novel and he wrote it while working at the Social Security administration, mostly as a pet project. Apparently the bureaucracy of the Houses of Life and Death is intended as a roman a clef of government bureaucracies, or at least that's what I've read, anyway. Past that. . yeah you can probably dig as much into that one as you want. One neat thing about it: if you'll note, almost every chapter is written in a different format -- one chapter is a play, one's a lyric poem, one's a prayer, etc. I think for the most part he's jazzing around but he's a very smart man doing the jazzing around so there are probably a fair number of connections intended also. I'd love to see an annotated version of that one. I think he just had a lot of ideas floating around in his head and since it was his first novel he threw them all in at once rather than making each one a separate story. NoNostalgia4Grover posted:Zelazny needed money + the publisher was willing to pay him: case solved? That's the Amber books.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 06:30
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:
No that's To Die in Italbar, Zelazny's most disjointed book. Had a few interesting ideas, but was bad. Zelazny's Merlin Amber books were definitely written for the paycheck, and probably 3 or so of the original Amber books too.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 06:49
|
|
|
NoNostalgia4Grover posted:BTW, did you finish John Barnes's Candle? Yes. I was surprised at how optimistic it was; that there seemed to be two-way influence between the meme and the people who made up the distributed network on which it operated is not something I saw coming. There was also one interesting argument for One True I hadn't thought of before, that being how a meme with a soft touch could insure very high social capital; the erosion of social trust is a major issue in Western liberal democracies so it had some force. A surprisingly friendly tonic to chase away with incredible pessimism of Kaleidoscope Century. I also hope Grigor - the guy who was in Murphy's Comsat Avengers that Dave killed who said he worked for the Organisation - was in fact the main character from Kaleidoscope Century, but it seems unlikely because it was mentioned that Monica and Phil mentioned that their house had a defensive meme that would make those affected go crazy a few days after contracting it and attempt to kill those closest to them. That seems to be what happened in Kaleidoscope when the main character went nuts and killed that timeline's iteration of Sadi, albeit the thought patterns indicate it was Unreconstructed Catholic. At any rate, the books were good enough that I'm going to go to the trouble of tracking down the final book in the series, even though there's no eBook and a battered physical copy is the best that can be found...
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 07:26
|
|
|
Neurosis posted:Is there some context to Zelazny's Creatures of Light and Darkness that motivated it? I feel like there's some satire going on here which has a point to it - in particular, the repeated pairing of the portentous, mythical, and sacred with the laughably quotidian - the debased (probably Christian) priesthood of however far in the future is having its members called 'Dad' rather than 'Father', the image of a dog worrying an old glove being Cerberus guarding Set's lost gauntlet, the oracle which is a hyper-advanced computer paired with a human torso which will prognosticate and calculate so long as the user gives it a handjob to keep it aroused... It feels like Zelazny's getting at something in particular rather than just putting this stuff together for amusement but I'm not sure what. From what I've heard he wrote most of it as a writer's exercise and was ultimately persuaded to publish it by Delany. I could see Zelazny challenging himself to write a fight scene with a martial art based on time travel or a digression on a religious sect that believes humanity to be a cast-off robot genital. One of Zelazny's big themes is the intersection of the mythic and the mundane. I've seen a lot of people (myself included) suggest pairing Lord of Light with Creatures. Lord of Light is about science fiction being framed as Buddhist myth, Creatures is about people who are very clearly akin to Egyptian gods treating their sun chariots like spaceships. Like in the first chapter you have the four thousand year old myth of Osiris being reassembled from his component parts merging with the idea of a human being reassembled from their component atoms.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 08:12
|
|
|
Neurosis posted:Yes. I was surprised at how optimistic it was; that there seemed to be two-way influence between the meme and the people who made up the distributed network on which it operated is not something I saw coming. There was also one interesting argument for One True I hadn't thought of before, that being how a meme with a soft touch could insure very high social capital; the erosion of social trust is a major issue in Western liberal democracies so it had some force. A surprisingly friendly tonic to chase away with incredible pessimism of Kaleidoscope Century. I also hope Grigor - the guy who was in Murphy's Comsat Avengers that Dave killed who said he worked for the Organisation - was in fact the main character from Kaleidoscope Century, but it seems unlikely because it was mentioned that Monica and Phil mentioned that their house had a defensive meme that would make those affected go crazy a few days after contracting it and attempt to kill those closest to them. That seems to be what happened in Kaleidoscope when the main character went nuts and killed that timeline's iteration of Sadi, albeit the thought patterns indicate it was Unreconstructed Catholic. At any rate, the books were good enough that I'm going to go to the trouble of tracking down the final book in the series, even though there's no eBook and a battered physical copy is the best that can be found... I had the same thoughts + feelings the 1st time I read Candle. During my re-read of Candle earlier this month I caught more of the subtle creepy stuff, especially the rear end in a top hat main character of KC being responsible for at least 75% of the hosed up events in it + how the meme was effecting ThreeCurr's behavior towards the end, so the happy ending felt more...ominious on the re-read. Never read the 4th final book, pretty much burned out on Heinlein-YA style stories. Still waiting for the person who was reading Randall Garrett's Gandalara series to finish it/give their thoughts on it, as well as the other person who was reading E.R. Burrough's John Carter of Mars stories for the first time to finish reading the first 3 or 4 books and chime up too.
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 08:48
|
|
|
NoNostalgia4Grover posted:No that's To Die in Italbar, Zelazny's most disjointed book. Had a few interesting ideas, but was bad. Which is sad, because it's the sequel to my favorite of his books, Isle of the Dead. ( I love the "resolution" -- nobody really gets what they want, but Sandow adjusts to what he can have rather than what he wants. .
|
|
#
?
Feb 16, 2019 14:22
|
|
|
Huh. I never thought of the Ffard and Grey Mouser stories as particularly sexist compared to other fantasy and sci-fi stuff that was written around that time. The main characters are horny, scheming skirt-chasers, but a lot of the women they chase after actually seemed like characters with personality and agency in their own right, and *sometimes* they even got to drive the stories a bit. It’s cringy from a modern perspective, but better than some stories from that era where women just don’t seem to exist or are portrayed as pieces of set-dressing. Better than Howard or Lovecraft, at least, or most of Tolkien. Though yeah, the really late Leiber stories are terrible. I think when he got old he had enough clout in the 1970’s fantasy world that everything he submitted got published without question, and he ended up publishing a lot of his dirty-old-man wank-fantasies. Bad case of late stage Robert Heinlein syndrome.
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 05:24
|
|
|
Blastedhellscape posted:Huh. I never thought of the Ffard and Grey Mouser stories as particularly sexist compared to other fantasy and sci-fi stuff that was written around that time. The main characters are horny, scheming skirt-chasers, but a lot of the women they chase after actually seemed like characters with personality and agency in their own right, and *sometimes* they even got to drive the stories a bit. It’s cringy from a modern perspective, but better than some stories from that era where women just don’t seem to exist or are portrayed as pieces of set-dressing. Better than Howard or Lovecraft, at least, or most of Tolkien. Leiber does write better female characters than a lot of his contemporaries (damning with faint praise). But they often get stuck being secondary characters whose main job is to motivate The Two. Yeah, I'm still annoyed over Ivrian and Vlana getting fridged in "Ill Met in Lankhmar." And when Leiber gets pervy he's easily worse than Heinlein. (See: "The Mouser Goes Below.")
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 05:57
|
|
|
I love it when I look up a book and discover it has an intensely racist cover. Love it.   Or: this might be the only time in history where the Baen cover is better.
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 17:33
|
|
|
Selachian posted:Leiber does write better female characters than a lot of his contemporaries (damning with faint praise). But they often get stuck being secondary characters whose main job is to motivate The Two. Yeah, I'm still annoyed over Ivrian and Vlana getting fridged in "Ill Met in Lankhmar." Two Best Thieves in Lankhmar was The Two getting schooled and it owned. Max pervy Leiber is bad but not worse than perv Heinlein. Late Stage Heinlein was gender swapped sex slave clones of yourself + incest 25/8
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 17:57
|
|
|
StrixNebulosa posted:I love it when I look up a book and discover it has an intensely racist cover. Love it. I've been trying to understand this post and I believe you meant antisemitic rather than racist, which means you have this backwards -- Christian devil imagery predates Christianity itself and is derived from various pagan religious beliefs, the antisemitic canards defame Jews by implying they secretly look like devils, they're not defaming devils by implying that devils look like Jews. Sometimes a picture of a devil is just a picture of a devil.
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 19:29
|
|
|
StrixNebulosa posted:I love it when I look up a book and discover it has an intensely racist cover. Love it. While it does have a quote from Orson Scott Card, I see nothing else that might imply the cover is racist. The design is real bad, though. Take out the floating devil head and replace with some giant tits on a humanoid otter like every other classic dime cover. MartingaleJack fucked around with this message at 19:49 on Feb 17, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 19:46
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 28, 2024 05:14 |
|
|
Looked up the author and learned the last book in that trilogy is titled 90 Trillion Fausts
|
|
#
?
Feb 17, 2019 20:03
|
|