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Haystack posted:So, what have you folks read lately? Any gems? Turds? I-enjoyed-reading-it-but-I'm-exactly-singing-its-praises? I went on vacation and decided to subscribe to KU and load my kindle up with free books to minimize the risk I would spend my vacation doing anything actually enriching. Blessed Time: Protagonist goes through mandatory adulthood system initialization and gets an ability that lets him go back in time 5 years. Decides not to use it because he doesn't want to go through childhood again, fate laughs and his city gets razed by an invading army a year later. In my experience there's really two kinds of time loop stories, the Mother of Learning type where it's all about the protagonist becoming more powerful and learning about the world, and the Re:Zero type where it's all about the the timeloop being an excuse for the protagonist to suffer. This one was more the former, and really just dissimilar enough to MoL to not feel like it's the same story with different names. I found it inoffensive enough (though I often wanted to yell at the protagonist for stupid choices) to read the first two books, which finished off the story neatly, then book 3 jumps way into the future with a completely new plot, which makes me suspect the author exhausted their original concept but the series was successful enough to want to keep writing. If you read MoL and wanted more, this might be worth checking out. If you haven't read MoL, it's much better than this was. Nice Dragons Finish Last: Shadowrun style near future "Magic Returns" story where the protagonist is a dragon (I like dragons and MCs who are them). I was a little worried about the title but it is in fact a reference to almost all dragons in the setting being complete assholes, while the protagonist is actually the odd one out by being nice. And not just normal human nice, either, at one point he starts working a magical pest control job but struggles for money because he keeps releasing the animals somewhere safe instead of turning them in for the bounty (since they'll be killed for their magical parts) because sure, that magic dire badger tried to gnaw his arm off, but it really just wants to live a normal magic dire badger life. Despite this all he manages to succeed and become important, eventually saving the world as protagonists do. Or I assume he will since after four and a half books I temporarily set it aside to read something else, as the end was in sight and I was no longer kept curious about where things were going. I was somewhat annoyed by the books having a device where he is being (knowingly) lead by the nose by a character that can see the future and thus it's pretty obvious things will always work out in the end, but I suppose that's just an in world justification for plot armor. Overall a pretty good series if you want Urban fantasy dragons in a Shadowrun style setting. This Quest is Bullshit: A very lighthearted LitRPG series about a character with a quest to go buy a loaf of bread, only to find that bakeries burn down and flour stockpiles vanish whenever she enters a town. The first three books in the series are honestly quite enjoyable banter and hijinks, then the fourth book appears to remember there was supposed to be a plot and races to finish everything up (which it does relatively neatly, if hastily). Despite the short description this was probably my favorite of the three, it very much feels like the adventures of a RPG campaign party, except more witty. Possibly my favorite part was the MC managing to join the super elite guild so exclusive they haven't accepted any new applicants in 50 years only to find it's now a retirement home for elderly but overpowered adventurers. And if you're going to write a LitRPG you might as well take advantage of it for cool powers and explosive growth. Next on my list, Gods of Blood and Bone by Azalea Ellis. I may report back. Bremen fucked around with this message at 23:47 on Sep 7, 2022 |
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Sep 7, 2022 16:08
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Bremen posted:This Quest is Bullshit: Yeah. This is a good fun quick series.
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Sep 7, 2022 16:33
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nice dragons finish last has a second series set in the same world after the events of the first that does much better because there's no seers involved. it even has a similar but different romance dynamic happening. dragons are less of a focus but only a little less of one, though.
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Sep 7, 2022 16:52
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I released my ebook on Kindle Unlimited this week, my writing group said you guys might enjoy this one: The Badger Company And the blurb: If I die, you’d better come back and avenge me, you goddamn ghost in the machine." Malcolm Parker was poised to make history as the habitation engineer who made his country's colonization initiatives possible—until a stealth missile strike destroyed the U.S. moon base. All that’s left of him is his A.I. clone, who must carry on both his fantasy tabletop campaign and the original mission: find and secure the closest habitable system. Trapped inside a space probe with a computer for a brain and other AIs for company, Malcolm and his crew face hostile spacecraft alone. The same assailants in pursuit or an opportunistic third party—either way they seem intent on wiping out the last remnants of America’s space program. Artificial intelligence isn't recognized as people under U.S. law, so as far as the top brass in the U.S. military is concerned, the crew is on their own. Or are they? I'm really happy with the blurb and I hope it does well. Or well enough for me to continue writing.
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Sep 8, 2022 01:46
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Happiness Commando posted:Yeah. This is a good fun quick series. Agreed - biggest issue was how everyone's dialogue seemed pretty anachronistic to the world where the books are set. They were funny but seemed out of place.
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Sep 8, 2022 03:28
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Gods of blood and bone was strange but not bad. I liked a lot of the things it did, but wanted it to focus on different things than it eventually settled on. Looking forward to trip reports.
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Sep 9, 2022 19:11
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Anias posted:Gods of blood and bone was strange but not bad. I liked a lot of the things it did, but wanted it to focus on different things than it eventually settled on. Looking forward to trip reports. I just finished it and odd describes it well. I'm not sure I'll finish the series - it's not that it's bad but I have so many other KU books competing for my interest. I picked it up because I've greatly enjoyed the webserial A Practical Guide to Sorcery by the same author, but Gods of Blood and Bone didn't hook me like that story did.
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Sep 9, 2022 22:08
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Bremen posted:I just finished it and odd describes it well. I'm not sure I'll finish the series - it's not that it's bad but I have so many other KU books competing for my interest. I read Gods of Blood and Bone et al first, and avoided APGtS based on that, I may have to give APGtS another look. Guess it goes on the "to be read in the future" pile.
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Sep 10, 2022 20:56
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Anias posted:I read Gods of Blood and Bone et al first, and avoided APGtS based on that, I may have to give APGtS another look. Guess it goes on the "to be read in the future" pile. Here's what I said about APGtS in the webserial thread. I don't know if it's for you, but it's definitely very different from Gods of Blood and Bone: quote:So, for a completely different take on broke mage with financial trouble, I've recently been catching up on A Practical Guide to Sorcery (not to be confused with that other Practical Guide).
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Sep 10, 2022 22:44
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I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. The main character gets sucked into a weird game-y world when they die on Earth and it's not supposed to be actually inside a video game but instead a world where people have stat screens they can access for unexplained reasons. I found the dump of stats very awkward but despite that I enjoyed the book quite a bit and continued on with the series. After the first two books there is no more survival stuff as the mc is established with towns and people, but it continues to be interesting and I'm excited to learn more about the large well developed world in further books. I actually read these before Cradle but having since read the Cradle books I realize it steals a few elements and is somewhat similar except with a more explicit rpg framework. Warning: the start of the book on Earth is a bit rough but its brief. If anyone has suggestions for other KU wilderness survival that are not zombies, mad max, or literally taking place in a video game I'm still looking for more.
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Sep 13, 2022 00:04
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FuzzySlippers posted:I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. Not really wilderness survival, but you might give "Oh, Great! I was Reincarnated as a Farmer" a shot. MC's gets murdered by a newbie Priestess doing a reincarnation ritual incorrectly in another universe, basically sucking his soul over. Said universe has a stat system that people actively study looking for ways to optimize and exploit it. MC finds out he's starting with the farmer class, hates farming, and can't get another class till he levels the class to 100. So he starts trying to find ways to not be a farmer.
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Sep 13, 2022 00:17
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.Z. posted:Not really wilderness survival, but you might give "Oh, Great! I was Reincarnated as a Farmer" a shot. MC's gets murdered by a newbie Priestess doing a reincarnation ritual incorrectly in another universe, basically sucking his soul over. Said universe has a stat system that people actively study looking for ways to optimize and exploit it. MC finds out he's starting with the farmer class, hates farming, and can't get another class till he levels the class to 100. So he starts trying to find ways to not be a farmer. This one's not very good but it kind of saves itself with a 7/10 by committing to it's bit extremely hard.
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Sep 13, 2022 01:50
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FuzzySlippers posted:I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. This story is ongoing on Royal Road if you want to go past what’s on KU.
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Sep 13, 2022 02:40
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.Z. posted:Not really wilderness survival, but you might give "Oh, Great! I was Reincarnated as a Farmer" a shot. MC's gets murdered by a newbie Priestess doing a reincarnation ritual incorrectly in another universe, basically sucking his soul over. Said universe has a stat system that people actively study looking for ways to optimize and exploit it. MC finds out he's starting with the farmer class, hates farming, and can't get another class till he levels the class to 100. So he starts trying to find ways to not be a farmer. Sounds a bit too game-y but I'll give it a shot. It kinda reminds me of a book I stumbled into ages ago that pitched itself as survival, but I quickly realized was actually erotic Minecraft fan fiction. Probably one of the weirder things I've found because of how closely it stuck to Minecraft mechanics and how sociopathic the farmer was. Hopefully this is better. I'm actually surprised there isn't lots of thinly veiled Fallout fan fiction but most of the survival I've seen on KU lean towards Ringo style special forces badass masturbatory stuff so there's not much actual survival since mere nature can't compare to their badassness and that'd take time away from the racism and sexism. navyjack posted:This story is ongoing on Royal Road if you want to go past what’s on KU. I guess if there's a backlog that explains why the sequels are coming out so quickly. I only read on an e-ink kindle so I'll wait.
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Sep 13, 2022 03:18
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Listening to the Titan series by Seth Ring. It's a reasonably competent (although not exceptionally so) VRMMO litrpg. It's a lot more fun than ascend online imo. It has the serial-to-book problem of the author not being able to keep his own story straight at all, which is tbh galling when you're listening to an audiobook of the dang thing (although it didn't cost me an audible credit so I guess I got what I paid for). I give it points for having the most completely batshit setting of any VRMMO I've ever read. This game makes no loving sense. Every VRMMO has an element of "ok but nobody would ever play this" combined with the book insisting "EVERYBODY LOVES THIS GAME" combined with the mc being somebody special somehow despite the massive population. This book takes that to 11. 4 billion people playing a game where you can only get stronger by working out in real life and the mc chooses the name "thorn" which is somehow unclaimed. There's a supporting character bitching that he got saddled with a class he hates and can never change. Quitting, I guess, never occurs to him.
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Sep 13, 2022 07:58
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My favorite is when the only job anyone can have is gold farming and it never really brings up the concept of whales. Usually the game company just runs what is basically a crypto market for basically no reason and somehow doesn't have any investors freaking out about liquidity.
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Sep 13, 2022 09:50
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FuzzySlippers posted:I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. The first book of the Defiance of the Fall series is pretty nearly a wilderness survival story. No small amount of litRPG DNA in it, but not literally in a videogame. The rest of the series moves on from the survival aspects, but is a solid read.
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Sep 13, 2022 12:21
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The only "sucked into an MMO" I've come even close to tolerating is forever fantasy online, which at least engages with the premise in a meaningful way and isn't just pages of stats and level ups. Still not the greatest, but I actually managed to finish all three books which for that genre is a major distinction
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Sep 13, 2022 15:42
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FuzzySlippers posted:I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. The first book of Eight might work for you. Plus it has the added benefit of the main character actually going through the process of slowly learning the local language.
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Sep 14, 2022 01:45
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FuzzySlippers posted:I read way too much KU when I'm depressed since I can go into a semi fugue state and burn through books without having to ponder whether to spend any money on each book. I mostly avoid litrpg stuff since I hate the idea of a novel taking place inside of a game. However, when looking for fantasy survival books (books focused on people surviving in the wilderness that aren't mad max style post apocalypses) I stumbled onto Dissonance by Nicoli Gonnella which fit the bill better than most anything I've found. Does it have to be purely survival to hold your interest? There's a ton of stuff with characters who start from nothing and have to build their own thing up, but most have a surrounding world of interactions and grow past the "I'm just trying to scratch out a life here" phase.
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Sep 14, 2022 02:23
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Man I take it back, Titan sucks. MC literally tripped over a UNIQUE ONE OF A KIND OVERPOWERED BATTLE PET. He tripped and fell and found it. It wasn't even a part of some other thing, it was just like "thorn was walking along to the next part of the story when he fell down". There has been exactly one thing in the entire story that happened as a result of his own wherewithal, everything else has just been tremendous luck and then him using the incredible advantages he got to easily overpower all resistance. The one scene where he had a hard time and was smart, won, and got a nice reward was relatively early in the first book and I kept thinking the book was still finding its feet, but man it's just going nowhere fast.
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Sep 14, 2022 02:58
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30.5 Days posted:Man I take it back, Titan sucks. MC literally tripped over a UNIQUE ONE OF A KIND OVERPOWERED BATTLE PET. He tripped and fell and found it. It wasn't even a part of some other thing, it was just like "thorn was walking along to the next part of the story when he fell down". Lol Titan is the dopiest bit of nerd wish-fulfillment ever. He’s the richest person in the world. The one time it looks like there might be “real world” shenanigans, it gets shut down fast by the threat of illegally using his immense wealth and corporate power to “keep the game in game.” He’s 16, but the corporation he owns and his aunt runs, get the compressed virtual time to count for inheritance and age-of-consent purposes so he can have full control of his immense wealth and bang his college-age super-hot girlfriend. It’s real bad.
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Sep 14, 2022 03:41
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navyjack posted:age-of-consent purposes New thread title just dropped
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Sep 14, 2022 03:48
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Gwaihir posted:Does it have to be purely survival to hold your interest? There's a ton of stuff with characters who start from nothing and have to build their own thing up, but most have a surrounding world of interactions and grow past the "I'm just trying to scratch out a life here" phase. Doesn't need to be pure survival but the emphasis on exploring and surviving an interesting threatening world. Like I love Cradle but once they get to the camp of the five alliances the world is mostly no longer a dangerous or interesting place. They just zip from place to place training and facing cataclysmic threats and the world itself fades to the background. In progression fantasy that's somewhat inevitable but I'd like the survival phase to last longer at least.
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Sep 15, 2022 01:43
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Chapter three and a half of Waybound (Cradle 12) here, read aloud by the man himself at Dragoncon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdks6AGoXkwFuzzySlippers posted:Doesn't need to be pure survival but the emphasis on exploring and surviving an interesting threatening world.
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Sep 15, 2022 01:58
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Was rereading a bit of Dreadgod, and man, Wight is basically a tier of his own when it comes to punchy dialogue in this subgenre:quote:"So you came to attack me," Malice said heavily. Also, I want to note that a less confident author, especially in the web serial space, would've put "pieces" in italics. They like to do that, to use italics to try and emphasize certain words to amp up the cool factor (TWI was very guilty of this at times). Letting the line simply speak for itself is so much better.
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Sep 15, 2022 07:23
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I've been slowly reading through this thread and I've seen Glynn Stewart mentioned a few times but only in connection to his Duchess of Terra novels. I thought the Terra novels were kinda bad, but I enjoyed most of the Starship Mage books. They eventually kinda peter out and they vary in quality (the first couple are some of his earliest books), but I enjoyed them well enough for a while in a KU reading haze. It's decent space fantasy with a fairly cozy vibe which is somewhat unusual for that kind of novel. Things tend to work out for people and villains realize their mistakes and repent. The only thing to happen near as grimdark as 40k is met with universal condemnation and has repercussions across novels as a major war crime (as opposed to just another day at the office in 40k). I found the phrase "Mage King of Mars" inherently amusing so I might've been prejudiced to like the books.
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Sep 16, 2022 00:35
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Cicero posted:Also, I want to note that a less confident author, especially in the web serial space, would've put "pieces" in italics. They like to do that, to use italics to try and emphasize certain words to amp up the cool factor (TWI was very guilty of this at times). Letting the line simply speak for itself is so much better. At least it's not comics, where for some reason even the good writers have this weird compulsion to bold every other word sometimes.
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Sep 16, 2022 01:26
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FuzzySlippers posted:I've been slowly reading through this thread and I've seen Glynn Stewart mentioned a few times but only in connection to his Duchess of Terra novels. I thought the Terra novels were kinda bad, but I enjoyed most of the Starship Mage books. They eventually kinda peter out and they vary in quality (the first couple are some of his earliest books), but I enjoyed them well enough for a while in a KU reading haze. It's decent space fantasy with a fairly cozy vibe which is somewhat unusual for that kind of novel. Things tend to work out for people and villains realize their mistakes and repent. The only thing to happen near as grimdark as 40k is met with universal condemnation and has repercussions across novels as a major war crime (as opposed to just another day at the office in 40k). I found the phrase "Mage King of Mars" inherently amusing so I might've been prejudiced to like the books. Agreed, these are great. I’m reading his Duchy of Terra series now and 5 books in the setting is clearly just the Starship Mage series if magic didn’t exist. The plotting feels way too close to Starship Mage as well, down to specific beats repeating across both series. Even the space combat stuff feels similar, with an obsession with long range missile combat, lightspeed limiting sensor data, etc. Without the magic and the deliberately fantastical stuff (and the Mage King of Mars is an amazing goddamn concept) the Duchy books just feel a bit less fun.
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Sep 16, 2022 01:57
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Glynn Stewart absolutely CRANKS out books so it's not too surprising that a lot of his stuff is very similar. I do agree the he generally has a pretty pleasant vibe for his worlds, even if bad stuff happens. I do really enjoy that while he's certainly cranking out mostly milsf stuff, he always makes a point of explicit inclusive diversity in his cast of characters and makes the importance of mental health A Thing.
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Sep 16, 2022 02:11
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Menocht Loop book 4 is out. I like the series quite a bit. Book 2 was meh, but 1 and 3 were good.
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Sep 22, 2022 21:44
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Cicero posted:Menocht Loop book 4 is out. I like the series quite a bit. Book 2 was meh, but 1 and 3 were good. Book 2 was so boring I never started 3. Does stuff actually happen in it? I'm currently reading the Mage Errant series, and I have really enjoyed it. Book 1 was a bit generic-feeling, "oh another magical school where the MC is terrible at magic until he finds he really has a rare skill", but the series really picks up and goes its own way from there. I did find book 2 dragged a bit in the middle, but aside from that it's great. I'm currently on book 6 and the 7th and final book should be out soonish. There's a number of discworld easter eggs which I apricate as well.
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Sep 25, 2022 15:54
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I had a pretty similar experience with Mage Errant. Magic school stuff in book 1 felt formulaic, and the overall story/character writing came off as serviceable but not that compelling. Once they got into dungeon delving I had some fun with it, but most of the kids were not enjoyable as point of view characters. I liked the burly earth elementalist guy tho, he was pretty chill. I put off picking the series back up for like a year even though I had gotten the first five books in a kindle sale of some kind. I decided to try book 2 last month, and it's been a much better time so far. The kids still aren't super likeable, but I find them less annoying, and the sand-sea exploration has been fun.
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Sep 25, 2022 21:46
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Darkrenown posted:Book 2 was so boring I never started 3. Does stuff actually happen in it? My experience was similar. Except that while it did get better, it didn't get enough better for me to want to buy new ones when they came out. I was disappointed by how they taught the kids to do magic. They have these awesome weird powers, and 90% of the time they use them in really straightforward ways to kill people. I was really expecting more outside-the-box thinking after they talked up how awesome the training they were getting was. More stuff like the storm mage learning to redirect lightning near them would be great. Less of the bone girl making boring bones to stab people with.
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Sep 26, 2022 03:06
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Cicero posted:Menocht Loop book 4 is out. I like the series quite a bit. Book 2 was meh, but 1 and 3 were good. I really liked book 4, I was disappointed when it finished because I want more.
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Sep 26, 2022 16:41
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First three books of Arcane Ascension series by Andrew Rowe are free. Sufficiently Advanced Magic (#1) - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XBFD7CB/ On the Shoulders of Titans (#2) - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07D3C3RX4/ The Torch that Ignites the Stars (#3) - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08HKV8LPV/
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Oct 2, 2022 15:55
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They're free because book 4 is out (The Silence of Unworthy Gods).
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Oct 3, 2022 07:58
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Oooh, cool. I remember book 3 ended on a pretty interesting cliffhanger. I think I'll pick it up. Thanks, Cicero!
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Oct 3, 2022 22:34
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Started AA4 and I'm not enjoying all this interpersonal drama and dialogue. Reminds me yet again of why Cradle is so great.
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Oct 4, 2022 10:00
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I have also started it... and oh no. They completely deflated the fun setup from the end of the first book and have the main character proceed to go back to magic school and spend at least the first quarter of the book obsessively minmaxing his character build. Very disappointing. Especially when there a bunch of more interesting characters around him doing stuff while he broods in his room about how to get moar experience points. There's like half a dozen people I would rather be following than this nerd. Hopefully the story picks up and stuff starts happening, but AA4 does not make a good first impression.
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Oct 4, 2022 21:17
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