[lord of tragedy]

that seems about right to me. its like watching an ingmar bergman slow motion potrait or something.

fuck all happens and noone cares.

[Salt-Man Z]

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 04:34 AM, said:

kevin anderson. worst sci fi writer of all time.

Disagree! His Star Wars stuff started out decent, and his X-Files books are actually pretty good.

[Lacedaemonian]

Eddings was great up until the last chapter of all of his series, where he would annihilate any good vibes you might have had for him. Always so convenient and dull. But he was a great read for me in my early teens.

I could never finish either Donaldson or Gene Wolf works, though I recognised their genius. They simply did not entertain me with their stories. I think I will try and read Donaldson again, in future.

To my shit list:

Terry Brooks is awful. God awful. Even as a child I knew he was loathsome dog shit.

I never had any time for Pratchett and always slate him, but I admit I have never really given him a chance.

The genre lends itself to crap, which is why I guess we celebrate the good writers more than perhaps we should. Erikson, Martin and Bakker - god sustain their health!!

[lord of tragedy]

Salt-Man Z, on Oct 16 2008, 04:47 PM, said:

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 04:34 AM, said:

kevin anderson. worst sci fi writer of all time.

Disagree! His Star Wars stuff started out decent, and his X-Files books are actually pretty good.

x files? did he write the movies? case closed.

only kidding. some of the x files was enjoyable your right. but seriously, the dune prequels? he should be drowned in his own shite for those. only a really bad writer coul ruin such fine world building......................................as we on these forums well know.

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 09:18 AM, said:

Salt-Man Z, on Oct 16 2008, 04:47 PM, said:

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 04:34 AM, said:

kevin anderson. worst sci fi writer of all time.

Disagree! His Star Wars stuff started out decent, and his X-Files books are actually pretty good.

x files? did he write the movies? case closed.

only kidding. some of the x files was enjoyable your right. but seriously, the dune prequels? he should be drowned in his own shite for those. only a really bad writer coul ruin such fine world building......................................as we on these forums well know.

I think the fact that of the three works of his mentioned, not one of them is an original work, is relevant. I've never read him, but have little respect for an author who can't come up with his own material.

@Councillor re:RJ: I've felt it more a case of not being able to see the forest for the bad prose, horrible pacing, unoriginal ideas, and mind numbing characters.

This post has been edited by Raymond Luxury Yacht: 22 October 2008 - 05:11 PM

[Salt-Man Z]

Raymond Luxury Yacht, on Oct 16 2008, 01:50 PM, said:

I think the fact that of the three works of his mentioned, not one of them is an original work. I've never read him, but have little respect for an author who can't come up with his own material.

KJA has written his own stuff, though I've not read any of it. I think there was a discussion of his Seven Suns series here not too long ago. But at the very least, he's written some entertaining media tie-in stuff. Surely then he can't be the worst author around.

[lord of tragedy]

eh i've read the first book of the new suns. and he just might be the worst. alongside gk wren for sword of the lamb.

[polishgenius]

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 11:03 PM, said:

eh i've read the first book of the new suns. and he just might be the worst. alongside gk wren for sword of the lamb.

The Book of the New Sun is ace, although it is initially very offputting.

[lord of tragedy]

bought a hamilton book this evening. pandoras star. let ya know how it goes. wasn't there some kind of transformer robot involved in new suns? and you have to admit polish, the dune prequels were an unforgivable cash in on a decent mans lifes work. a shameful experience for everyone involved.

[polishgenius]

Ah, I think you're confusing the titles... Book of the New Sun is the Gene Wolfe series. Saga of the Seven Suns is Kevin J Anderson's, and I've not gone near any of his series because of his less-than-stellar reputation...

[lord of tragedy]

true. could not get wolfe's book either. it was torture to read. did he do the lonewolf choose your own adventure books? they were great. first time i ever heard of a a whole tribe of people being killed. then i read "bury my heart at wounded knee". wonder if there's a link. fantasy taking the place of the unpleasant real history? one to ponder. goodnight polish.

[Malaclypse]

on the topic of Gene Wolfe, I heard good things about The Book of the New Sun and got that recent-ish duology of his from the library whose name has been mercifully scrubbed from my mind. Awful, awful stuff. Turned me off his writing entirely.

Also, I can't stand Pratchett or that guy with the little fluffy fantasy books, 'Taltos' was one of the titles I think. Cringeworthy.

edit: David Drake is another awful one, dunno if he's been mentioned. Also, while I enjoyed 'Initiate Brother' way back when, the last Sean Russel offering I tried was unfinishable.

[frookenhauer]

Malaclypse, on Oct 17 2008, 12:58 AM, said:

Also, while I enjoyed 'Initiate Brother' way back when, the last Sean Russel offering I tried was unfinishable.

Initiate brother! was a cool intro, but gatherer of clouds was an absolute shitpile. I paid a fair bit money for it too, shipped it in from the good old US of A.

Spoiler

And the fact that he did not in fact turn out to be the chosen one was poor

[Werthead]

lord of tragedy, on Oct 16 2008, 10:34 AM, said:

back on thread, kevin anderson. worst sci fi writer of all time.

This I'm 100% with you on. KJ Anderson sucks donkey bollocks.

I actually have read some of his own, early stand-alone stuff and it wasn't that bad. The second he started getting the green he stopped actually making any effort. His Star Wars books are utter shit. Darksaber is probably the worst Star Wars novel of all time. The Hutts build a Death Star-class superlaser but because they are so lame it blows up the first time they try to fire it without the Rebels doing anything to stop them. His X-Files books were crap, and we all know what an unholy mess he made out of the Dune books.

What really fucked me off with the Dune situation was KJA's bullshit about how they were basing everything off Frank Herbert's notes, so fair enough, the books may be utter crap but at least the events are canon and what Herbert wanted to happen. Then it turned out the notes were like 2 sides of A4 and didn't really tell them jack, so they just made half the stuff up. So it turned out that are lying, money-grabbing dickwads as well as being poor writers.

[Use Of Weapons]

Malaclypse, on Oct 17 2008, 12:58 AM, said:

that guy with the little fluffy fantasy books, 'Taltos' was one of the titles I think. Cringeworthy.

Um, Stephen Brust writes the Taltos books, but you may be confusing him with someone else. It's possible, though, that you've actually read his Alexandre Dumas pastiches in the same universe (_The Phoenix Guards_, et al), and I can understand someone not liking that particular style. But here is a classic example of an excellent author changing his style for a particular effect. The Taltos books themselves are completely different, much more modern stylistically and gritty, even gruesome at times.

And _To Reign In Hell_ is just a superb novel.

[MecnunK]

Michelle Sagara, cast in shadow..apparently first of a series...mind numbingly bad..picked it up on a whim..been regretting it since..

ROTCG - ICE. If there was a painless way to remove ROTCG from my memory cells I would pursue it...okay I will take a little pain too if it gets the job done...

RJ - Anything post book-6 is pure drivel and quite frankly malicious!

p.s gene wolfe is a genius!

[lord of tragedy]

agree with you on that wert. dune prequels were really shameful ripoff of herberts work. grubby.

and i think your right too munchunk. how could anyone fuck up the return of the CG to quon tali? it really should not be possible to write anything bad with dassem in it. but somehow he managed it.

[Terez]

lord of tragedy, on Oct 17 2008, 11:19 AM, said:

agree with you on that wert. dune prequels were really shameful ripoff of herberts work. grubby.

and i think your right too munchunk. how could anyone fuck up the return of the CG to quon tali? it really should not be possible to write anything bad with dassem in it. but somehow he managed it.

I'm scared to read it now, because I was disappointed in Night of Knives. And that was, according to munchunk, better than Return of the Crimson Guard?

[Wry]

Well opinions differ on Return so far. I thought it was good. Generally people seem to think it's not as good as Erikson at his best, but better than his worst. Really ICE doesn't have SE's way with prose, but it's definately a malaz book and better than the majority of work out there. It really does not belong anywhere on this thread but there ya go.




Read it!!

[lord of tragedy]

Spoiler

think about it. the crimson guard return to destroy the empire. the crimson guard. dassem searching for kazz davore, encountering kallor. yeah it wasn't bad objectively. its not godkind. but seriously with the riches at his fingers ICE should have done such a better job. i loved NOK. a really fantastic portrait of dancer and kellanved and the broiling hub bub of magic underpinning Malaz. ROTCG was really lacking.