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gohmak posted:Slow Bullets, that is some vile writing. AR is my favorite scifi writer and I enjoyed Poseidons wake but Slow Bullets was painful to get through. I ripped through Slow Bullets. Didn't love it, but I did enjoy it. It was definitely a story that worked best at the 200 page threshold, though.
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Jul 21, 2015 18:13
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Clancy went off the deep end wayyy before 9/11.
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Jul 21, 2015 18:43
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Koesj posted:Clancy went off the deep end wayyy before 9/11. No later than 1996 with Executive Orders and Clancy jerking off about how he'd love to redesign the US government along right-wing lines, but arguably no later than 1987 with sending US troops into Colombia to fight the War on Drugs.
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Jul 21, 2015 18:50
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Eh, I must have confused him with all the authors who got 9/11 Derangement Syndrome.
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Jul 21, 2015 19:01
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gohmak posted:Slow Bullets, that is some vile writing. AR is my favorite scifi writer and I enjoyed Poseidons wake but Slow Bullets was painful to get through. I would say the opposite. Slow bullets is AR doing what he does best, while the poseidon series was pretty meh.
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Jul 21, 2015 20:44
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Antti posted:Eh, I must have confused him with all the authors who got 9/11 Derangement Syndrome. No, you're not mistaken. Some people complain about his earlier stuff but there's a rather huge leap to Teeth of the Tiger. Clunky writing to keep it ostensibly in the same world as the earlier Ryan books, too.
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Jul 21, 2015 20:50
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rchandra posted:No, you're not mistaken. Some people complain about his earlier stuff but there's a rather huge leap to Teeth of the Tiger. Clunky writing to keep it ostensibly in the same world as the earlier Ryan books, too. Isn't Tom Clancy a franchise these days? I seem to recall he stopped writing his books and they're done by ghost-writers these days, although I'm not sure when the cutoff was.
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Jul 21, 2015 20:56
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Darth Walrus posted:Isn't Tom Clancy a franchise these days? I seem to recall he stopped writing his books and they're done by ghost-writers these days, although I'm not sure when the cutoff was. I mean he's dead so yeah, he's not writing books anymore. According to his bibliography he did decide to start farming out his books to other people in 2010. vvv HA HA IN YOUR FACE NERD
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Jul 21, 2015 21:02
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You're right, but he's also been dead since 2013. Efb Prolonged Panorama fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Jul 21, 2015 |
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Jul 21, 2015 21:03
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Darth Walrus posted:Isn't Tom Clancy a franchise these days? I seem to recall he stopped writing his books and they're done by ghost-writers these days, although I'm not sure when the cutoff was. Well, Tom Clancy is dead, so yeah probably franchised these days. EDIT: WOW, gently caress me for not refreshing before replying.
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Jul 21, 2015 21:18
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tonytheshoes posted:Ah, thanks for the recommendation, but unfortunately I've already read that one. Anyway, I'm going to re-read a couple of old books that I might have missed things in--The Books of the New Sun, etc... Have you read any Robert Holdstock? He got the whole Wolfe-like open ended mysterious, layers-upon-layers thing going on in his Merlin Codex.
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Jul 21, 2015 21:25
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Tom Clancy's life was long and bad, much like his books. Thankfully he is now dead. bug-eyed with glasses phase of his life  'bug-eyed without glasses' phase..."maybe they don't really look so bad? also, i'm rich, who cares what I look like?" said Tom  'actually, yeah, they look bad, and this looks badass naval style' phase of his life
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Jul 21, 2015 21:39
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 oh wait, he's still alive as a ghost now, piloted by 'david michaels' which sounds like a fake name
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Jul 21, 2015 21:41
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That cover is like the ultimate "I don't want to loving read this" thing I've ever seen. I'd rather read a book with six-pack abs and a wolf/bear/dragon in the background than that book
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Jul 21, 2015 21:43
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ulmont posted:No later than 1996 with Executive Orders and Clancy jerking off about how he'd love to redesign the US government along right-wing lines. Clinton getting elected broke Clancy's brain.
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Jul 21, 2015 22:44
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angel opportunity posted:That cover is like the ultimate "I don't want to loving read this" thing I've ever seen. I'd rather read a book with six-pack abs and a wolf/bear/dragon in the background than that book who says you can't have both  I think that's based on the prerelease art style for Ghost Recon Future Soldier which works far better as a videogame than a novel, most notably because a bunch of that got changed in the six years of development hell that ended up spitting out a finished product. The little dinky over the shoulder triple missile launcher is a dead giveaway if you're a giant nerd like me
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Jul 21, 2015 23:52
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Psion posted:who says you can't have both I love video game dev hell stories, where can I read up?
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Jul 22, 2015 00:03
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Help me out a bit, Dune fans... (couldn't find an actual Dune thread, or I'm just blind or something) Way back in the long time ago, I read the first 3 or 4 books but I ran out of gas on it. Then about 8 or 9 years ago I heard that his son actually ended up finishing the series but I just never got around to it. Well, these Malazan books aren't gonna last forever, and I could go for something huge to read once they're done. I refuse to pick up Jordan or Goodkind again. Just... no. I'd have to start over with Dune since I don't remember a whole lot anymore, but that's not really a problem. I just want to know if the ending is worth doing it, and if the writing is still decent.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:32
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Fenrir posted:Help me out a bit, Dune fans... (couldn't find an actual Dune thread, or I'm just blind or something) The advice on dune is always this: Start with Frank Herbert's books. Stop when you feel like it, or when you finish all the books he wrote. Under no circumstances should you read the Brian Herbert books, even if you finish all 6 his dad did.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:37
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That is objectively the best advice. There's just no solid consensus on when/if the series gets unsalvageably bad, but it will never, ever improve from where you decide to leave off.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:41
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Yikes... that bad, huh? Hell, I might just scrap that idea and look elsewhere. I already got 3-4 books in once and decided to quit. Maybe 15 year old me knew what he was doing.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:44
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I actually really like books 5 and 6 of Dune. They're slower, but not necessarily bad - I do think the series as a whole gets worse as you go through it, but Herbert's worst is still pretty good. It's just that Brian Herbert should never be allowed near a keyboard again for his crimes against Dunanity.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:49
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Fenrir posted:Yikes... that bad, huh? Nothing you can imagine is as unfortunate as the way Dune ended up.
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Jul 22, 2015 00:49
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I hated Dune and couldn't finish it so I guess I dodged a bullet.
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Jul 22, 2015 01:12
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Megazver posted:I mean he's dead so yeah, he's not writing books anymore. According to his bibliography he did decide to start farming out his books to other people in 2010. Actually the rumor is that he didn't even write his last two books with Red Rabbit and Teeth of the Tiger actually being ghostwritten. Which makes sense as one of them is a story he didn't feel like telling in the first place and the other a weirdly racist piece of poo poo.
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Jul 22, 2015 01:23
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muscles like this? posted:Actually the rumor is that he didn't even write his last two books with Red Rabbit and Teeth of the Tiger actually being ghostwritten. Which makes sense as one of them is a story he didn't feel like telling in the first place and the other a weirdly racist piece of poo poo. If "The Bear and the Dragon" didn't earn this label from you I shudder to think how bad "Teeth of the Tiger" must be.
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Jul 22, 2015 01:27
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thehomemaster posted:I hated Dune and couldn't finish it so I guess I dodged a bullet. I started reading and gave up on it twice; once in the 90's and once in the 2000's. Nothing interesting seemed to happen. Last year one of my Dune-fan friends couldn't get into Anathem, so we made a deal where neither of us would give up on the other's favorite book. He got the better end of that deal. Dune turned out to be okay but nothing spectacular IMO. The multi-year jump in the narrative that skips a lot of the main character's development was rather disappointing (He was unsure and untested X, but now he's badass and beloved Y!). I'd love for someone to explain to me what's so magic about Dune. I kid you not, some guy walking past my lunch joint saw me reading it and shouted "That book will change your life!!"
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Jul 22, 2015 01:36
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That's a much better story than mine. People are weird with their obsessions sometimes. It didn't help I listened to the audiobook, what with all the head jumping.
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Jul 22, 2015 01:43
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Funny thing, I started re-reading the Dune series the other day. I'm halfway through Messiah (Book 2) right now. It's still really good. I like the richness of it, though. Gonna take a break and read the new Stross once I need a breather. DEFINITELY ONLY STICK WITH 1-6 (the actual real Dune books by Frank Herbert). The BH/KJA books are stunningly bad. Even if you're like 'Well, BH/KJA did do a direct sequel, Dune 7/8' JUST DON'T. The prequel books are even loving worse.
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Jul 22, 2015 02:35
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thetechnoloser posted:Funny thing, I started re-reading the Dune series the other day. I'm halfway through Messiah (Book 2) right now. It's still really good. I like the richness of it, though. No, the prequels are not worse than the "ending" they wrote. Make no mistake, the prequels are bad, but the last two books are a special kind of terrible.
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Jul 22, 2015 02:38
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neongrey posted:That is objectively the best advice. There's just no solid consensus on when/if the series gets unsalvageably bad, but it will never, ever improve from where you decide to leave off. I half agree in that i feel like you should just stop wherever you feel like stopping, but i do think heretics is better than children, for example.
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Jul 22, 2015 02:56
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Darth Walrus posted:I dunno, a fair number of villains are treated as products of a profoundly hosed-up system. Basically, nobles are people and everyone else isn't, so, say, if your cousin's a serial killer, it's just a funny little peccadillo provided they restrict themselves to peasants. It's the Westminster paedophile ring (don't google that if you want to sleep at night) writ large. The second book in particular goes into this with the prison hostage situation sequence. I just finished Traitor's Blade about 20 minutes ago (which I got because of this thread), and I haven't been so amped by a fantasy book since Lies of Lock Lamora. I immediately purchased Knight's Shadow. There was talk of a "twist", and about half-way through I'm thinking "feh, some twist. I've already figured it out." Nope. He walloped me with not one, but two twists in the plot I hadn't seen coming. And I love that he rope-a-doped me by dangling the obvious in front of me. I can't wait to start on the next one.
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Jul 22, 2015 03:04
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Fenrir posted:Yikes... that bad, huh? I didn't really find the Black Company all that compelling. It read like some nice AD&D books and while that doesn't make it bad, after the first three or four I didn't care to read any more - especially once the characters/writing changed. I get that Erickson was influenced by them, though. It's not a series, but read Cook's The Dragon Never Sleeps once you finish Malazan. Great book. And then you could also read Joe Abercrombie's whatever his first couple of books were. Something Law. And then check out The Long Ships by Bergtsson, fo ra little older Viking flair.  There're a lot of great books out there and I could definitely just keep posting random good stuff, but unfortunately Malazan is rather unique.
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Jul 22, 2015 03:08
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savinhill posted:Have you read any Robert Holdstock? He got the whole Wolfe-like open ended mysterious, layers-upon-layers thing going on in his Merlin Codex. I haven't! I'll check it out. Thanks!
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Jul 22, 2015 03:20
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This fantasy talk reminds me that I need to finish up the second Locke Lamora book.
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Jul 22, 2015 03:24
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Looks like I'll hit Greatcoats before Malazan (might re-read Stormlight before it too).angel opportunity posted:
I really liked the first Ghost Recon game on PC. Get a bunch of people together for multiplayer, carefully move in to position to take out the hosti-oh one of them cast Detect Life 500' Radius and now an army's tearing right towards us.  Kalman posted:I actually really like books 5 and 6 of Dune. They're slower, but not necessarily bad - I do think the series as a whole gets worse as you go through it, but Herbert's worst is still pretty good. Did he figure he could just get things in order because Tolkien's son did or what? How many of the books does the Dune movie's plot go through?
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Jul 22, 2015 03:53
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Evil Fluffy posted:How many of the books does the Dune movie's plot go through? Only the first one, in a maximally confusing fashion. (You're talking about the de Laurentiis/Lynch one with Sting, right?)
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Jul 22, 2015 03:58
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angel opportunity posted:
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Jul 22, 2015 03:59
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Sometimes I feel like I've misjudged God Emperor of Dune because I wasn't old enough to get it and think I should maybe go back to read it but then I'd have to read through the first three books again and while there's really nothing wrong with that I don't especially want to. But in my memory that book was profoundly hosed up and I just can't quite remember which part of it (and have a feeling the answer is more than one part). Though I totally do remember which part of Heretics got me to stop. I'm still mad that my friend forgot to return my copy of Destination: Void for 8 years and then he did return it and I lost it. 
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Jul 22, 2015 04:11
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Just got my copy of Poseidon's Wake in the mail and I know it kind of goes without saying considering how widespread it is in the SFF genres, but UK covers are stunningly superior to their NA counterparts. Really wish I had the UK versions of the first two books in the series to complete the set but oh well.
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Jul 22, 2015 04:13
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