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Aardvark! posted:Agreed I liked how in the third book they eventually just went ‘and my friends got me books’ because even the author got tired of it.
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Apr 22, 2021 20:59
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i think my other big complaint is Godrick's accent is .. what, African? Scandinavian? No matter how I read the text I can't find an accent that fits how he writes their speech so it always bogs me down
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Apr 22, 2021 21:40
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I always read it as generic Scottish, though I might be misremembering. I think the early books in the series definitely read like someone's first novel(s). They become noticeably more polished over time. I'm tempted to go back and do a re-read of Traveller's Gate (which I think is Will's first series?) and make that comparison, rather than to Cradle.
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Apr 22, 2021 21:51
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Yeah I read the accent as Scottish too But also that way of writing the pronunciation in the accent really annoyed me. I much prefer how Will Wight makes Yerin sounds folksy by giving her all these idioms
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Apr 23, 2021 00:03
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Cicero posted:Yeah I read the accent as Scottish too Very same. I’m always annoyed by phonetic accents though, even in non kindle unlimited fare.
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Apr 23, 2021 01:29
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Finished Mage Errant 4 last night and holding off on getting #5 because I accidentally had a look at the reviews. Half of them are complaining about the ending being out of character. Writing dialects in text always bug me as well, though I think I understand the authorial choice here, given the world building around language and the Ithonic Empire. Overall it's about on par with Traveler's Gate, and less polished compared to Cradle for sure. He kind of overuses Alustin's lectures for exposition dumps but otherwise I appreciate that he doesn't go overboard with it. The non apprentice POVs are more interesting to read because they don't have so much info dumping. The awkward teen relationship drama quotient is about on par with "girl holding magic in hand" novels in terms of page count but nowhere near as melodramatic. I have to say Will's reluctance to write romance is a plus target than a minus... There's other much more interesting things to write about!
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Apr 23, 2021 02:48
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I'll say ME5 starts slow but has a nice build that carries through to the ending I think. You may value different things, but definitely give it a read and make your own judgement. It's one of those endings where it's going to irritate some and be great to others so you might as well try it on yourself if you have KU.
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Apr 23, 2021 03:08
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I think the accent thing wouldn't be nearly as big an issue if he hadn't replaced "I" with "Ah", consistently, book after book. that is the real thorn in my side. also I guess it's cool that every single person is a perfect listener, incredibly patient, and an emotional mensch but it kind of makes the conversations feel really inauthentic every time hugh is slowly and calmly talked around his feelings.
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Apr 23, 2021 16:57
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Reading the Spiral Wars and I don't think the author knows what he wants the humans to be or generally act/believe. It's like he wanted there to be some unreliable narration type stuff but just got half way there.
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Apr 28, 2021 04:58
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Anias posted:I'll say ME5 starts slow but has a nice build that carries through to the ending I think. You may value different things, but definitely give it a read and make your own judgement. It's one of those endings where it's going to irritate some and be great to others so you might as well try it on yourself if you have KU. Alright, I've now finished Siege of Skyhold and now understand why some people are so mad about the ending. In which case I don't think they were paying attention to the first four books, because what happened was absolutely consistent with main character motivations. Maybe less so for the really minor supporting characters but I have no complaints about the ending, especially considering it's book 5 of a 7 book arc. I'm not really sure where the power escalation is going to go from here though. It feels like the timeline of books 6 and 7 are going to happen pretty quickly, and the main gang are as powered up as they're gonna get, unless Hugh makes another pact or Sabae develops more lightning spells.
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Apr 28, 2021 07:14
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Leng posted:Alright, I've now finished Siege of Skyhold and now understand why some people are so mad about the ending. In which case I don't think they were paying attention to the first four books, because what happened was absolutely consistent with main character motivations. Maybe less so for the really minor supporting characters but I have no complaints about the ending, especially considering it's book 5 of a 7 book arc. I just finished as well and the ending was great. Entirely within the bounds of the characters, but surprising because normally the empire is crushed and the main character gets their revenge. It's only disappointing in that an interesting character is dead and the other is a villain and I'm a little concerned in the capability of the remaining four to actually hold the story.
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Apr 29, 2021 07:11
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Finished Siege of Skyhold as well, I called Artur and Kanderon dying but I did not see Alustin's betrayal coming. and I think there was foreshadowing of it but it was far enough between that I forgot about it entirely. One thing I've been thinking about is aether crystals. I feel like given that they were pacted, hugh should be able to take some of Kanderon's crystals pretty easy, but obviously the author could just say that attuned crystals are Only Useful For Enchanters or something. It seems like the aether crystals are crucial to gaining power as a crystal mage, so it would be cool if he went psycho mode and suddenly had great power levels from it. Considering this is a progression fantasy on book 5/7 I am really hoping we get even more power creep so we can see the Squad vs. the Librarians Errant as an even bigger battle than the one we just had.
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Apr 30, 2021 03:25
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Aardvark! posted:Finished Siege of Skyhold as well, Kanderon dying is unclear; I suspect Kanderon is simply offstage until the end of book 6 or maybe 7. Hugh specifically says he doesn't know if she's dead or alive, and that he can tell the bond is still there but can't feel anything through it.
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Apr 30, 2021 14:55
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asur posted:I just finished as well and the ending was great. I'm in full agreement Including concern about how it'll play out going forward. The series has done a fairly good job establishing supporting characters, and they were used effectively in Siege of Skyhold, but by the end of the book it appears obvious most of them are going to be out of the picture for at least a while if not permanently (due to being dead / comatose / antagonistic / soon-to-be geographically separated). There's nothing inherently wrong with this, but we've still got two books to go and the reduction in the established cast necessitates either a more intense and exclusive focus on the main protagonists, or introducing and getting us to actually care about a decent number of new characters in the back quarter of the story. Both have high potential to result in something of a letdown (in the next book especially). Obviously Siege gains significant narrative power from the degree to which its conclusion disrupts nearly all of the established world/relationships, but I confess I'd be more reassured if it wasn't quite so all-encompassing (due to preparatory world and character building in Siege or earlier works).
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Apr 30, 2021 18:53
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SOMEONE JUST TEACH SABAE TO WHISTLE GOD DAMNIT - my review from binging all the books of Mage Errant
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May 12, 2021 18:53
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She’s a friggin’ wind mage!!!
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May 12, 2021 19:01
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Just wanted to chime in that I really, really like the Mage Errant series. Clever world-building, likeable and interesting characters. Very much binge-worthy!
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May 13, 2021 02:32
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In unfortunate news, the US version of Amazon experienced some huge technical glitch related to titles published through Kindle Direct Publishing. I checked how widespread the issue was to see if bigger authors were spared. Nope. Apparently only 2 books in the Cradle series still exist according to Wight’s author page or what you can find through searching. If you search for “Unsouled” you get a book about mystics, if you search “Unsouled Will Wight” you get “Burdens Edge: Fury of a Rising Dragon”. I spoke with KDP about this issue and they’re hoping it can be globally resolved for all authors in 48 hours, but authors are going to see a massive dip in sales and KU reads this weekend thanks to this glitch.
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May 15, 2021 21:02
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I’m glad I usually keep a backlog of 8-10 books checked out and downloaded rather than getting a new one each time, hopefully it’s resolved soon.
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May 15, 2021 22:36
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I see there's a fifth Thousand Li book out on the first of June. Did anyone read the fourth one? Are you excited for this one? I remember picking it up, reading the first couple of pages, going "I'll come back to this... later", and just... not doing that.
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May 18, 2021 14:35
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Yeah fifty thousand li is very put downable as a whole I find. It's fine, but it's not going to compel me to finish. Maybe one day my journey through it when I have nothing better to do will complete, but honestly I hope not. Having better things to do is pretty great.
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May 18, 2021 14:52
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:I see there's a fifth Thousand Li book out on the first of June. It’s fine, not great. The overarching series-wide plot is probably picking up pace though as in book four we learn about and see some fights against a secret evil martial arts society who are seemingly going to be the villains of the series and in the summary for the fifth book it mentions about the main character unlocking their bloodline which presumably harks back to those vague comments by the dragon in book 2.
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May 18, 2021 16:09
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I've read them all so far and it's fine, but the pacing is very hard to adjust to if you've recently read any Cradle. And yeah it's just not as evocative or fun.
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May 18, 2021 21:38
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I just started reading cradle last week, and i am now up to date on it. Hell of a ride.
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May 19, 2021 01:07
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Dilber posted:I just started reading cradle last week, and i am now up to date on it. Good thing about KU artist is they churn out content fast
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May 19, 2021 01:18
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In case anyone on this thread somehow hasn’t read them, the entire Cradle series is available for free today. And by that I mean available to buy for free, not just through KU.
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May 30, 2021 16:18
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Silynt posted:In case anyone on this thread somehow hasn’t read them, the entire Cradle series is available for free today. And by that I mean available to buy for free, not just through KU. Thanks, this let me grab book 9 for free when I already had the other eight from the last "all the books are free"
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May 31, 2021 00:38
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Craig Schaefer's new book The Hungry Dreaming was released yesterday. Wish it was a Daniel Faust novel but the premise sounds fun, reminds me of the Sleepy Hollow show they did on Fox until the writer's strike killed it. 
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Jun 2, 2021 17:33
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These Hollow Core series books seem an awful lot like Cradle so far...
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Jun 3, 2021 03:21
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Book 5 of Thousand Li (The Second Sect) is out now.
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Jun 3, 2021 11:43
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Cicero posted:Book 5 of Thousand Li (The Second Sect) is out now. Has he finally stopped acting like a total sadsack all the time? One of my favorite parts of Cradle is Lindon in Book 1 vs Lindon in the later books, and the steady progression of 'Oh, I'm a badass.' without losing his polite exterior.
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Jun 3, 2021 16:16
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Acting like a sad sack and all his worrying is infinitely better then the vast, vast, vast vast majority of main characters who go around being tremendous assholes because they get a modicum of power and everyone being fine with it because that's just how the strong are supposed to act.
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Jun 4, 2021 01:04
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I do not disagree.
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Jun 4, 2021 03:38
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Captain Monkey posted:Has he finally stopped acting like a total sadsack all the time? One of my favorite parts of Cradle is Lindon in Book 1 vs Lindon in the later books, and the steady progression of 'Oh, I'm a badass.' without losing his polite exterior. One of my favorite bits from the early books was Lindon doing his "please forgive this one" routine but he hadn't put together that the magic he channels gives him jet black eyes with red irises.
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Jun 4, 2021 07:34
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A Hollow Mountain (The Brightest Shadow #2) comes out today. Brightest Shadow is my pick for favorite fantasy that I was confused about most of the way through. Really unusually structured, that one, what with the main characters just getting forcibly dragged along with 'The Hero' every time a new one pops up, even though they think he's an rear end in a top hat each time. Also the fact that at one point they're mining slaves who are allowed to continue martial training and keep (some of?) their weapons is bizarre. But I still found the setup intriguing, especially the alien race/culture.
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Jun 5, 2021 00:27
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Captain Monkey posted:Has he finally stopped acting like a total sadsack all the time? One of my favorite parts of Cradle is Lindon in Book 1 vs Lindon in the later books, and the steady progression of 'Oh, I'm a badass.' without losing his polite exterior. I don’t think Wu Yong in Thousand Li has the same sad sack problem as Lindon, if anything it was kind of the other way with being permanently annoyed with nobles rather than deferential . Either way, by book 4 he’s definitely confident in himself and casually taking on multiple opponents one after the other. Book 5 is a bit of a step backwards in that he spends most of it spiritually crippled from the final events of book 4 and trying to fix himself, but he ends up gaining a lot of advantages in this book in the same way that Lindon getting his top tier iron body and blackflame path then sets Lindon up to kick rear end throughout the rest of the series
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Jun 5, 2021 11:39
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Cicero posted:A Hollow Mountain (The Brightest Shadow #2) comes out today. Brightest Shadow is my pick for favorite fantasy that I was confused about most of the way through. Really unusually structured, that one, what with the main characters just getting forcibly dragged along with 'The Hero' every time a new one pops up, even though they think he's an rear end in a top hat each time. Also the fact that at one point they're mining slaves who are allowed to continue martial training and keep (some of?) their weapons is bizarre. But I still found the setup intriguing, especially the alien race/culture. I've really enjoyed the series, though yeah sometimes it doesn't seem to hang together entirely plausibly. On the other hand I think that a good deal of that illogic around the Hero is part of the point - its a simplistic destiny/narrative that is being externally imposed and makes people do wildly out of character things. Having just spent most of the day binge reading A Hollow Mountain I think this is a worthy sequel, and I'm certainly looking forward to the next in 2022. Certainly more than a few cuts above most of what people put out on Kindle Unlimited. This one was also a bit more conventionally structured since we're more familiar with the main cast of characters, and the issues at stake are a bit clearer from the get-go.
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Jun 6, 2021 03:08
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i'm on to book 2 of Thousand Li and so far it's less a copy of Cradle than Mage Errant was, honestly however i want to know what gets in to authors in this genre that makes them all relentlessly mention "wry smiles" and chuckling
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Jun 14, 2021 19:56
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Aardvark! posted:i'm on to book 2 of Thousand Li and so far it's less a copy of Cradle than Mage Errant was, honestly Lack of experience writing dialogue? In friendly interactions people smile and chuckle way more than you think. 
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Jun 14, 2021 20:19
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Yeah some authors really repeat certain things as dialogue tags. If it calls attention to itself by overuse it should be excised. "Wry smile" in particular comes off as very "i want this character to be ironical or above it all" and most of the time puts me in mind of those smug anime characters who are always "heh"-ing to themselves.
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Jun 14, 2021 21:20
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