SF & F Mega-thread: I had to google 'spock pirate depilatory'

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Lunsku: May 21, 2006

StrixNebulosa posted:

Strange question time: are there any other writing projects as ambitious/huge in scope as Warhammer 40k's Horus Heresy? If you don't know, that's a 54 book long series written by multiple authors that covers a mostly coherent narrative / piece of history in the 40k 'verse. It's in its final series now, the Siege of Terra thing, and I'm just... in awe of how huge it is, and how successful. And, more importantly to this thread, I cannot think of any other sci-fi/fantasy series that goes as big. Am I missing something? Please say yes.

Clearly you want to check out all 40 or so volumes of Gor! :biotruths:

# ? Sep 2, 2020 21:02

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# ? Apr 25, 2024 11:43

bagrada: Aug 4, 2007; The Demogorgon is tired of your silly human bickering!

StrixNebulosa posted:

Strange question time: are there any other writing projects as ambitious/huge in scope as Warhammer 40k's Horus Heresy? If you don't know, that's a 54 book long series written by multiple authors that covers a mostly coherent narrative / piece of history in the 40k 'verse. It's in its final series now, the Siege of Terra thing, and I'm just... in awe of how huge it is, and how successful. And, more importantly to this thread, I cannot think of any other sci-fi/fantasy series that goes as big. Am I missing something? Please say yes.

Oh yeah what's the huge YA series about people turning into animals that got into heavy sci fi? I missed the boat on that one but I see it pop up on reddit with heavy nostalgia often. Animorphs?

edit: yeah Animorphs, 54 books as well. All from a single husband & wife team though.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 21:07

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

bagrada posted:

Oh yeah what's the huge YA series about people turning into animals that got into heavy sci fi? I missed the boat on that one but I see it pop up on reddit with heavy nostalgia often. Animorphs?

edit: yeah Animorphs, 54 books as well. All from a single husband & wife team though.

Now that's a real solid rec, I read a ton of those as a kid. They're grimdark too so they fit the 40k mold :v:

But yeah, so far this thread has turned up some real interesting contenders but I haven't seen anything that's as huge and multi-authored with a single narrative event as the Horus Heresy.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 21:12

bagrada: Aug 4, 2007; The Demogorgon is tired of your silly human bickering!

StrixNebulosa posted:

Now that's a real solid rec, I read a ton of those as a kid. They're grimdark too so they fit the 40k mold

But yeah, so far this thread has turned up some real interesting contenders but I haven't seen anything that's as huge and multi-authored with a single narrative event as the Horus Heresy.

Oh yeah, taking your question strictly, nothing I've heard of comes close with the nearest genre/property series fitting that bill being New Jedi Order at 19 books, then the Vampire: The Masquerade Clan Novel series at 13 books.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 21:23

Kalman: Jan 17, 2010

bagrada posted:

Oh yeah, taking your question strictly, nothing I've heard of comes close with the nearest genre/property series fitting that bill being New Jedi Order at 19 books, then the Vampire: The Masquerade Clan Novel series at 13 books.

Battletech novels probably fit as well; the Clan invasion related novels alone, much less if you include scene-setting stuff like the Gray Death trilogy.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 22:13

Thranguy: Apr 21, 2010; Deceitful and black-hearted, perhaps we are. But we would never go against the Code. Well, perhaps for good reasons. But mostly never.

The real answer is Fallout Equestria.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 22:29

pradmer: Mar 31, 2009; Follow me for more books on special!

Revelation Space (Inhibitor #1) by Alistair Reynolds - $2.99
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0819W19WD/

The Rage of Dragons (Burning #1) by Evan Winter - $2.99
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07L2VKFP5/

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:03

ringu0: Feb 24, 2013

Look to Windward (A Culture Novel Book 6) $1.99

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:06

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

Okay I did it, I cracked, I bought a kindle I can finally partake of these deals y'all post. Or soon at least, it arrives friday. :toot:

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:08

withak: Jan 15, 2003; Fun Shoe

You know you can get ebooks on a phone or a tablet right.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:29

General Battuta: Feb 7, 2011; This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.

StrixNebulosa posted:

Okay I did it, I cracked, I bought a kindle I can finally partake of these deals y'all post. Or soon at least, it arrives friday.

Don't you have a smartphone

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:31

Black Griffon: Mar 12, 2005; Now, in the quantum moment before the closure, when all become one. One moment left. One point of space and time.

I know who you are. You are destiny.

I don't think I could read a fraction of what I've read on kindle on a tablet or smartphone. It works for some people, I know, but I'm extremely not one of them.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:39

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

I've tried reading on my phone and it feels wrong, screen's too tiny

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:48

Ornamented Death: Jan 25, 2006; Pew pew!

Lunsku posted:

Clearly you want to check out all 40 or so volumes of Gor!

I only have the first 25 :smith:

Inherited along with a bunch of other books, haven't bothered to do anything with them.

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:53

mewse: May 2, 2006

Black Griffon posted:

I don't think I could read a fraction of what I've read on kindle on a tablet or smartphone. It works for some people, I know, but I'm extremely not one of them.

Same af

# ? Sep 2, 2020 23:56

hannibal: Jul 27, 2001; [img-planes]

Also quite enjoying the SFL rehashes, keep it up. They should go up on a blog or something.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 00:36

freebooter: Jul 7, 2009

StrixNebulosa posted:

Now that's a real solid rec, I read a ton of those as a kid. They're grimdark too so they fit the 40k mold

But yeah, so far this thread has turned up some real interesting contenders but I haven't seen anything that's as huge and multi-authored with a single narrative event as the Horus Heresy.

There's an ongoing Let's Read of these right here on the forum btw, only up to book 8.

https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3917428

# ? Sep 3, 2020 01:06

quantumfoam: Dec 25, 2003

SFL Archives Volume 10 update 10 of 10
100% completion, 134 bookmarks created.

-Doctor Who had a extended 18 month hiatus announced earlier in 1985 that threatened to be a permanent series ending hiatus. Mail in efforts, call in efforts to the BBC, and elected British officials got the hiatus window shrunk. One of the downsides or bonuses of the SFL Archives read-through is witnessing hubris destroying and wrecking more and more bits of the Doctor Who franchise every time John Nathan-Turner opens his mouth and drives away more Doctor Who actors, writers, budget planners.

-First mention of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comic book in the SFL, the TNMT cartoon series came much later

-Harmony Gold. Macross Saga. Robotech. HARMONY GOLD. Captain Harlock. Waves of people chiming into add that Robotech is a mere bastardization of 3 different Japanese animation series. Harmony Gold seriously wants their Gold.

-New Heinlein book "The Cat Who Walked Through Walls" gets released and ties everything Heinlein has ever written closer together, which some Heinlein fans like and other people just groan about. Lazarus Long openly acting like the literal mother-loving douchebag he is makes some of the Heinlein defense squad turn in their "I HEART EVERYTHING HEINLEIN" badges.

-A few SFL edgelords get offended by all the feminist SF being mentioned and start trolling the feminist SF discussion thread by confusing who is a female writer and claiming that GOR and Heinlein are peak feminist SF.

-Steven Brust quits his job that has ARPANET access to become a full-time writer. Farewell SKZB, I will not miss you.

-The 1985 Amazing stories tv series, the 1980's Twilight Zone reboot, and 1980s Alfred Hitchcock presents tv-serials all come out around the same time and get discussed heavily. Amazing Stories has amazing visuals but not so much amazing plots or storytelling. 2020 take: this was where Steven Spielberg encountered a rare setback in his career (cashing out on the Medal of Honor videogame series before it hit big was Spielbergs 2nd setback). It turns out producing tv movies under contract is hard, especially since John Landis hosed up everything regarding child-actors with the Twilight Zone movie and malicious negligence lawsuits.

-The Shaver Mystery aka a variation of the Hollow Earth conspiracy theory gets mentioned in detail because Richard Shaver was a 1940s scifi writer.

-How to get published as a new SF&F writer part 3: a daisy wheel printers ink-catridge worth of SFL self-doxxed authors chime to give advice, conflicting advice, overriding advice and patronizing humble brags.

-A proposal to put the SF-LOVERS mailing list onto microfiche to preserve it for future study. Pretty sure the NSA already has that covered for you, 1985 person.

-Stephen King/Richard Bachman stories get discussed more, Thinner is the latest book being discussed as 1985 closes out

-The variety of mono-sex societies in fiction. Either all female societies, or all male societies, maintained via cloning, artifical insemination, or physical separation after birth to all male/all female zones. Outside forces usually arrive and hijinks happen but not like the creepy poo poo Star Trek:TNG got up too.

-Greg Bear's past few books (Eon, Infinity Concerto, etc) haven't impressed anyone posting about them in the SFL in 1985 and some people wonder if Greg Bear has peaked already or just hit a very very rough spot in his career.

-The movie Enemy Mine based on a novella of the same name comes out at the very end of 1985. One of Star Trek: TNG's best episodes, Darmok, "heavily" borrowed from Enemy Mine.

-"Do human bodies in outer space decompressing explode, implode or other"? discussion...2001 the movie is the main reference point for this discussion

-A insane seeming story about the last fertile man on Earth after a nuclear accident called MR ADAM by Pat Frank. This is how MR ADAM first got mentioned in the SFL

quote:

One of the secretaries here was talking about a book she read called
MR. ADAM. It was apparently written in the late 40's and concerned
a nuclear accident which left the male population of the earth
sterile, except for one man. As she explained it, the book
concerned the government's efforts at repopulation via this one man.

BTW, she said the book was hilarious. (Anyone with a pointer to
finding a copy?)

quantumfoam fucked around with this message at 14:24 on Sep 3, 2020

# ? Sep 3, 2020 01:40

PlushCow: Oct 19, 2005; The cow eats the grass

StrixNebulosa posted:

Okay I did it, I cracked, I bought a kindle I can finally partake of these deals y'all post. Or soon at least, it arrives friday.

Your local library may also lend out ebooks, so check there too.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 01:52

quantumfoam: Dec 25, 2003

SFL archives readthrough: Might take a break before starting Volume 11, or might not.
SFL Vol 11 is slightly smaller (half a megabyte) than SFL Vol 10 which is a bonus, plus Aliens 2 came out in 1986. Then again, so did Space Camp and Labyrinth. Then again again, so did Big Trouble in Little China.

hannibal posted:

Also quite enjoying the SFL rehashes, keep it up. They should go up on a blog or something.

Reposting these to a blog makes sense. Still not sure about the long term viability of the somethingawful forums.
Any suggestions as to blog platform or blog title? <this question is open to everyone>

# ? Sep 3, 2020 02:20

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Black Griffon posted:

I don't think I could read a fraction of what I've read on kindle on a tablet or smartphone. It works for some people, I know, but I'm extremely not one of them.

A phone, sure, but tablets are better than kindles. :colbert:

# ? Sep 3, 2020 03:04

BurgerQuest: Mar 17, 2009; by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Livejournal :agesilaus:

# ? Sep 3, 2020 03:04

Black Griffon: Mar 12, 2005; Now, in the quantum moment before the closure, when all become one. One moment left. One point of space and time.

I know who you are. You are destiny.

Evil Fluffy posted:

A phone, sure, but tablets are better than kindles.

Screen too shiny, light too bright, distractions too many, battery life too poor!

Also someone find that Mr. Adam story please.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 05:25

Khizan: Jul 30, 2013

Evil Fluffy posted:

A phone, sure, but tablets are better than kindles.

Easier to get distracted with a tablet. I've got discord and SA and all sorts of other things I can do on my ipad, but my Oasis just has books.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 05:45

Silver2195: Apr 4, 2012

bagrada posted:

Oh yeah what's the huge YA series about people turning into animals that got into heavy sci fi? I missed the boat on that one but I see it pop up on reddit with heavy nostalgia often. Animorphs?

edit: yeah Animorphs, 54 books as well. All from a single husband & wife team though.

Actually, most of the later Animorphs books were ghostwritten. :ssh:

Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 05:55 on Sep 3, 2020

# ? Sep 3, 2020 05:47

FPyat: Jan 17, 2020

pradmer posted:

Revelation Space (Inhibitor #1) by Alistair Reynolds - $2.99
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0819W19WD/

I don't think I've read anything that makes space feel so vast and empty as this. Even the other books in the setting dial back on it, like it was a fluke of Reynolds' inexperience.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 05:53

Jedit: Dec 10, 2011; Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

quantumfoam posted:

-Stephen King/Richard Bachman stories get discussed more, Thinner is the latest book being discussed as 1985 closes out

Wasn't the King/Bachman discussion pretty much over by this point because someone looked at the copyright sheet and saw it had King's name on it?

My local branch library used to have a hardback copy of the Bachman edition of Thinner. I wish I'd pretended to have damaged it and bought a replacement, it would go nicely with my Bachman edition of The Running Man.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 10:29

Ornamented Death: Jan 25, 2006; Pew pew!

Jedit posted:

My local branch library used to have a hardback copy of the Bachman edition of Thinner. I wish I'd pretended to have damaged it and bought a replacement, it would go nicely with my Bachman edition of The Running Man.

It's not a rare or expensive book, so you can still make this happen. And without typical ex libris damage!

# ? Sep 3, 2020 13:25

Selachian: Oct 9, 2012

Black Griffon posted:

Screen too shiny, light too bright, distractions too many, battery life too poor!

Also someone find that Mr. Adam story please.

Funny, James Davis Nicoll reviewed it a couple months ago (his verdict: "mostly harmless"). If you really want to read it, it's available free on Gutenberg Canada.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 14:16

ToxicFrog: Apr 26, 2008

Silver2195 posted:

Actually, most of the later Animorphs books were ghostwritten.

IIRC the ghostwriting starts about halfway through based on KAA's notes (and in my readthrough there's been a noticeable decline in quality around there), then she comes back for the last few books in the series.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 16:32

Happiness Commando: Feb 1, 2002; $$ joy at gunpoint $$

I think I found this here, but reposting. A bunch of fans were angry that the Animorphs ending was kind of brutal and KAA wrote an open letter in response. It's a pretty hardcore sentiment for a YA series and an excellent philosophical position, IMO

http://www.hiracdelest.com/database/articles/kaa_response-full.htm posted:

Dear Animorphs Readers:

Quite a number of people seem to be annoyed by the final chapter in the Animorphs story. There are a lot of complaints that I let Rachel die. That I let Visser Three/One live. That Cassie and Jake broke up. That Tobias seems to have been reduced to unexpressed grief. That there was no grand, final fight-to-end-all-fights. That there was no happy celebration. And everyone is mad about the cliffhanger ending.

So I thought I'd respond.

Animorphs was always a war story. Wars don't end happily. Not ever. Often relationships that were central during war, dissolve during peace. Some people who were brave and fearless in war are unable to handle peace, feel disconnected and confused. Other times people in war make the move to peace very easily. Always people die in wars. And always people are left shattered by the loss of loved ones.

That's what happens, so that's what I wrote. Jake and Cassie were in love during the war, and end up going their seperate ways afterward. Jake, who was so brave and capable during the war is adrift during the peace. Marco and Ax, on the other hand, move easily past the war and even manage to use their experience to good effect. Rachel dies, and Tobias will never get over it. That doesn't by any means cover everything that happens in a war, but it's a start.

Here's what doesn't happen in war: there are no wondrous, climactic battles that leave the good guys standing tall and the bad guys lying in the dirt. Life isn't a World Wrestling Federation Smackdown. Even the people who win a war, who survive and come out the other side with the conviction that they have done something brave and necessary, don't do a lot of celebrating. There's very little chanting of 'we're number one' among people who've personally experienced war.

I'm just a writer, and my main goal was always to entertain. But I've never let Animorphs turn into just another painless video game version of war, and I wasn't going to do it at the end. I've spent 60 books telling a strange, fanciful war story, sometimes very seriously, sometimes more tongue-in-cheek. I've written a lot of action and a lot of humor and a lot of sheer nonsense. But I have also, again and again, challenged readers to think about what they were reading. To think about the right and wrong, not just the who-beat-who. And to tell you the truth I'm a little shocked that so many readers seemed to believe I'd wrap it all up with a lot of high-fiving and backslapping. Wars very often end, sad to say, just as ours did: with a nearly seamless transition to another war.

So, you don't like the way our little fictional war came out? You don't like Rachel dead and Tobias shattered and Jake guilt-ridden? You don't like that one war simply led to another? Fine. Pretty soon you'll all be of voting age, and of draft age. So when someone proposes a war, remember that even the most necessary wars, even the rare wars where the lines of good and evil are clear and clean, end with a lot of people dead, a lot of people crippled, and a lot of orphans, widows and grieving parents.

If you're mad at me because that's what you have to take away from Animorphs, too bad. I couldn't have written it any other way and remained true to the respect I have always felt for Animorphs readers.

K.A. Applegate

# ? Sep 3, 2020 17:06

Strom Cuzewon: Jul 1, 2010

StrixNebulosa posted:

Strange question time: are there any other writing projects as ambitious/huge in scope as Warhammer 40k's Horus Heresy? If you don't know, that's a 54 book long series written by multiple authors that covers a mostly coherent narrative / piece of history in the 40k 'verse. It's in its final series now, the Siege of Terra thing, and I'm just... in awe of how huge it is, and how successful. And, more importantly to this thread, I cannot think of any other sci-fi/fantasy series that goes as big. Am I missing something? Please say yes.

HH books look pretty short, but a couple other books get close to their wordcount (I can only find the first 47 books, 5.3 million).

Wheel of Time is 13 books, 4.3 million words (and if I'm being charitable, 3 million of those are superfluos)

Malazan, with two authors, has combined 21 books, 5.5 million words, and a much higher ratio of them are good.

Looking up these numbers I'm impressed by the scale of fantasy bloat. Not just in books, but in book size. Dune is only 188k, which is pretty slender by modern standards - I have the combined Great Dune Trilogy, and WoT/Malazan will almost clock that with individual books!

# ? Sep 3, 2020 17:56

90s Cringe Rock: Nov 29, 2006

Tolkien's at what, 20 legendarium books now? Counting LotR as three, adding in HoME and the new things. Modern fantasy readers could probably knock it out in a long weekend.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:02

StrixNebulosa: Feb 14, 2012; You cheated not only the game, but yourself.
But most of all, you cheated BABA

Strom Cuzewon posted:

HH books look pretty short, but a couple other books get close to their wordcount (I can only find the first 47 books, 5.3 million).

Wheel of Time is 13 books, 4.3 million words (and if I'm being charitable, 3 million of those are superfluos)

Malazan, with two authors, has combined 21 books, 5.5 million words, and a much higher ratio of them are good.

Looking up these numbers I'm impressed by the scale of fantasy bloat. Not just in books, but in book size. Dune is only 188k, which is pretty slender by modern standards - I have the combined Great Dune Trilogy, and WoT/Malazan will almost clock that with individual books!

If we're going by wordcount, Malazan and Discworld remain the kings of "too many words":

quote:

Series with between 3.5 million and 4 million total words:

10) Essalieyan by Michelle West (3.501M)

9) Saga of Recluce by L.E. Modesitt, Jr. (3.899M)

Series with between 4 million and 4.5 million total words:

8) Realm of the Elderlings by Robin Hobb (4.061M)

7) Sword of Truth by Terry Goodkind (4.138M)

6) Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson 4.360M)

Series with between 4.5 million and 5 million total words:

5) Xanth by Piers Anthony (4.719M)

4) Riftwar Cycle by Raymond E. Feist (4.755M)

Series with between 5 million and 5.5 million total words:

3) Valdemar Universe by Mercedes Lackey (5.082M)

Series with between 5.5 million and 6 million total words:

2) Discworld by Terry Pratchett (5.625M)

Malazan Universe by Steven Erikson & Ian Cameron Esslemont (5.630M)

https://www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/8u2xj9/longest_fantasy_book_series/

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:05

mewse: May 2, 2006

Happiness Commando posted:

I think I found this here, but reposting. A bunch of fans were angry that the Animorphs ending was kind of brutal and KAA wrote an open letter in response. It's a pretty hardcore sentiment for a YA series and an excellent philosophical position, IMO

Having never read animorphs or the end of animorphs, it seems like the fans were saying "this ending wasn't entertaining" and the author's response was "WAR isn't entertaining!!"

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:11

tildes: Nov 16, 2018

mewse posted:

Having never read animorphs or the end of animorphs, it seems like the fans were saying "this ending wasn't entertaining" and the author's response was "WAR isn't entertaining!!"

I think it�s more that the ending was *really* not a happy ending. If you were hoping the series would end with everyone in a place where they�d be happy and things would be tied up neatly, that super wasn�t what you got which is rare for a children�s series. I actually think KAA did a pretty good job with the ending- I think it definitely was entertaining, just not feel good at all.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:16

mewse: May 2, 2006

tildes posted:

I think it�s more that the ending was *really* not a happy ending. If you were hoping the series would end with everyone in a place where they�d be happy and things would be tied up neatly, that super wasn�t what you got which is rare for a children�s series. I actually think KAA did a pretty good job with the ending- I think it definitely was entertaining, just not feel good at all.

Fair enough. I have seen interactions with authors that were basically "you shouldn't have killed that character!!" "well, that was the story, I'm sorry you didn't like the story"

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:41

General Battuta: Feb 7, 2011; This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.

That seems like a completely reasonable thing for an author to say.

# ? Sep 3, 2020 18:48