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alnilam posted:Currently reading Earthsea for the first time and it's very enjoyable, and checks all those points off yeah Second, or thirded
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Oct 3, 2025 21:10
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Thanks, I just read chapter 1. Not bad!
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Oct 3, 2025 22:50
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Hugh Mann posted:Any fantasy novels along these lines: The Goblin Emperor would check these boxes And yeah earthsea is great
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Oct 4, 2025 01:08
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alnilam posted:Currently reading Earthsea for the first time and it's very enjoyable, and checks all those points off yeah oooh yeah, I got these, will be my next big series read (literally, that book is loving heavy!)
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Oct 4, 2025 05:01
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Know what I wanna read? True Detective, but it's set in a fantasy world.
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Oct 13, 2025 01:42
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BigRed0427 posted:Know what I wanna read? True Detective, but it's set in a fantasy world. Okay this isn't what you asked for, but there is a sci-fi detective book called the Gone World by Tom Switterlich and it definitely evokes True Detective as well as Twin Peaks.
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Oct 13, 2025 03:29
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BigRed0427 posted:Know what I wanna read? True Detective, but it's set in a fantasy world. can I compromise and give you Poirot in medieval europe?
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Oct 13, 2025 04:32
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ulvir posted:can I compromise and give you Poirot in medieval europe? Sure!
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Oct 13, 2025 12:43
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BigRed0427 posted:Sure! the name of the rose by Umberto Eco
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Oct 13, 2025 15:57
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/\/\ Ooo good recBigRed0427 posted:Know what I wanna read? True Detective, but it's set in a fantasy world. That's pretty much exactly what Kraken by Mieville is, right?
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Oct 13, 2025 20:06
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There is also Hummingbird Salamander by Vandermeer
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Oct 16, 2025 01:29
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I just started getting into reading again. I like sci-fi. I read the mars triology by kim stanley robinson, and now reading aurora by him as well (going to just try to read everything interesting from one author, then go to the next). I definitely am into the whole "escape earth because it sucks and try to settle/terraform/etc. elsewhere" thing. what else would you recommend in this style? another author i wanted to check out was ursula le guin, i know she doesn't do as much spacy stuff (i think) but i've heard she's fantastic.
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Oct 18, 2025 23:14
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modern design slut posted:and now reading aurora by him as well (going to just try to read everything interesting from one author, then go to the next). I definitely am into the whole "escape earth because it sucks and try to settle/terraform/etc. elsewhere" thing. lol edit: more seriously Gypsy by Carter Scholtz and Aniara by Harry Martinson fez_machine fucked around with this message at 23:48 on Oct 18, 2025 |
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Oct 18, 2025 23:39
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modern design slut posted:I just started getting into reading again. I like sci-fi. I read the mars triology by kim stanley robinson, and now reading aurora by him as well (going to just try to read everything interesting from one author, then go to the next). I definitely am into the whole "escape earth because it sucks and try to settle/terraform/etc. elsewhere" thing. what else would you recommend in this style? Children of Time is really good. The whole series is good!
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Oct 19, 2025 01:24
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thank you
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Oct 19, 2025 21:55
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modern design slut posted:thank you I love a bunch of this type of book. Off the top of my head: Semiosis, The Stars Are Legion, Heart of the Comet, Rendezvous With Rama, Pushing Ice, Diaspora. Hard sci fi roughly about leaving the old earth and encountering new weird poo poo is so loving good.
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Oct 19, 2025 23:51
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i've heard the mars trilogy called hard sci-fi but i don't think the way they colonized, terrafromed, made oceans, etc. so easily was very realistic
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Oct 20, 2025 00:24
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Thanks for all the recommendations on my previous post - added lots of books to my list! I have another genre I'd love some help with if anyone has any recommendations: Sword and Sorcery. It's a genre I have always been interested in, but have never been able to find a good avenue into. I have previously tried some of the Conan, Thongor and Elric stories, but found them to either be too simple or strangely impenetrable. I'd not be opposed to trying them again, but perhaps I need to pick different stories to try? But I'm not even necessarily looking for the classics of the genre; I'm happy to try classics or more modern ones too.
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Nov 2, 2025 21:48
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The Witcher books are good and definitely in that vein. The first one is all short stories so a good way to test the waters
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Nov 2, 2025 22:22
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Chuf posted:Thanks for all the recommendations on my previous post - added lots of books to my list! Gareth Hanrahan is good (also does a good fantasy city) Karl Edward Wagner's Kane Michael Shea's Nifft is very horny for monster ladies
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Nov 2, 2025 22:24
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Chuf posted:Thanks for all the recommendations on my previous post - added lots of books to my list! That Soldier of the Mist book by Gene Wolfe is great. Whole trilogy is excellent. Kind of a sword and sorcery memento in the classical Mediterranean
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Nov 2, 2025 22:25
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fez_machine posted:Karl Edward Wagner's Kane I would have recommended Kane too. Also, perhaps Jack Vance's Dying Earth books (especially The Eyes of the Overworld and Cugel's Saga), or Charles Saunders's Imaro books. There's also Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser (Swords Against Deviltry et al), although the series declines in quality as you go on. There's also more to Moorcock than just Elric -- you might want to investigate the Hawkmoon books (The Jewel in the Skull et al) or the Corum series (The Knight of the Swords et al).
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Nov 2, 2025 23:31
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Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. Ok, so here's what I want. I'm looking for a vocabulary book. There's a lot of different kinds, as I recall. Dictionaries, for study, there's Word of the Day. What I really want is like, something that you found personally edifying and amusing (specifically without being too jokey or 70's cornball like something that would throw "disestablishmententarianism" I do not like those) like maybe a person sat down and compiled a list of vocab words that are a bit more college level or grad school that they liked and here's why they subjectively and biasedly liked it and here is their book. You know, vibes. "Cellar door." I don't know if such a thing has been published but I've often tried to do this myself, but I forget to keep working on the project after a week. Or maybe just anything you really liked that isn't merely opening up a Dictionary or a KJV Bible or something like that. I like words but I'm just some dipshit with a GED but also you're reading this and I wrote it without fancy autocomplete so there u go. 
wizard2 fucked around with this message at 01:23 on Nov 3, 2025 |
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Nov 3, 2025 01:20
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. I recommend someone who really overwrites like Cormac McCarthy or maybe China Mieville’s Perdido Street Station. Then just look up the words you don’t know in a dictionary.
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Nov 3, 2025 01:29
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. Moby Dick is the holy grail of this for me. A Confederacy of Dunces as well.
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Nov 3, 2025 01:37
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. If you have nothing against ghoul related rape then Throne of Bones. Lot of nice 25 cent words in that one
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Nov 3, 2025 01:50
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Just listen to The Decemberists imo But yeah Moby Dick is great for that. So is Shakespeare although that's a little more ye olden times. But Shakespeare is extremely good imo.
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Nov 3, 2025 02:11
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Kvlt! posted:A Confederacy of Dunces as well. Lol yeah but the character is an idiot, so the verbosity in that book is satirical
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Nov 3, 2025 02:19
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caspergers posted:Lol yeah but the character is an idiot, so the verbosity in that book is satirical So? Op asked for something edifying and amusing, and it certainly qualifies. It's a satire, but written by a very smart author so I dont think its "jokey". The type of words ops looking for are still in it. There's also a lot of OTHER characters in the book besides Ignatius.
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Nov 3, 2025 02:21
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. I collect writing books in the hopes that I'll one day knuckle down and improve my ability to write. So I have a few recommendations of books that directly address vocab building rather than the novels others have suggested (I'd add Pynchon to those lists, a lot of words you won't find even in dictionaries). The classic of vocabulary learning is Word Power Made Easy by Norman Lewis, but I really like Graham King's work from the United Kingdom. It's slightly dated but has a generally fun and inviting tone. The Collins Complete Writing Guide is the edition I have. There's also a couple of fun, unpretentious usage guides that will also broaden your vocabulary by having big lists of words accompanied by commentary. Dreyer's English by Benjamin Dreyer (ex chief copy editor at Random House). He also has a blog https://benjamindreyer.substack.com/. Very unpretentious, friendly, and gay. He recommends Theodore Bernstein's Miss Thistlebottom's Hobgoblins, "one of the charmingest, smartest, most readable books on the subject of language I've ever read". I really enjoyed it as well. There are also word origin miscellanea books, which more closely resemble the "cellar door" books you're asking for. I have on my desk Humble Pine and Cold Turkey: English Expressions and Their Origins by Caroline Taggart. I haven't read the Dictionary of Word Origins: The Histories of More Than 8,000 English-Language Words by John Ayto but it looks decent Edit: you might like the grammarphobia blog which is mainly about eytmology presented in the style of an advice column: https://grammarphobia.com/blog fez_machine fucked around with this message at 02:34 on Nov 3, 2025 |
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Nov 3, 2025 02:23
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. 
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Nov 3, 2025 02:23
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Kvlt! posted:So? Just saying so the satire is kept in mind, it seemed to me they wanted something with a more sincere use of words. Not a contradiction lol E: Also Ignatius is the only character who talks that way; the book's perspective is that big words are shallow and not an actual indicator of intelligence. caspergers fucked around with this message at 02:36 on Nov 3, 2025 |
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Nov 3, 2025 02:24
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FOR SALE. BIG WORDS. TEN DOLLARS. yes i know it wasnt actually him
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Nov 3, 2025 02:28
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wizard2 posted:Hello, Book Recommendations thread! or should I say................. "salutations"????? j/k, no more in-character poo poo. anilEhilated fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Nov 3, 2025 |
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Nov 3, 2025 11:53
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anilEhilated posted:It might be a bit too jokey but I always enjoyed The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. It helps that it's been published in 1911 so it's probably jokes you haven't heard. Yeah, that's a fun read. "DICE, n. Small polka-dotted cubes of ivory, constructed like a lawyer to lie on any side, but commonly on the wrong one."
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Nov 3, 2025 14:53
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