[Mentalist]

April?
where'd you get that info?
and don't tell me that it's Amazon, because they absolutely cannot be trusted.

[Icarium Kalam]

it was already said above but i would have to go with <h1 class="parseasinTitle">Wayfarer Redemption series by sara Douglass
</h1>This whole series was crap and I really can't believe I made it thought the whole thing....

[Mentalist]

on topic: did I not mention John Marco's "Tyrants and Kings?" I though I did. May have been the worst author thread.

but yeah, anyway.

"Tyrants and Kings":... is crap. seriously, if you read the blurb at the back youll save yourself A LOT of time. especially book 2.

now, I pushed my way thorugh the books, because, hell I bought them and if I didnt' read them it would've cause well, a helluva lot of cognitive dissonance (psych major hre, forgive the lingo). So I read all three. since i'm a psych major, I managed (painfully) to salvage something to like about each book --there's an abundance of characters described as "mad" or recovering from said madness. but that's me.

but yes, the book s are pretty much horrible. Linear and predictable in the worst way. the main protagonist is supposed to be flawed--the big attraction of the series. but OH MY GOD, the author doesn't just make him flawed. he makes him a complete retard (forgive the laguage), because of his tragic flaw.
and did i mention that the books follow the blurb in the back to the letter and are horidly, horridly linear?
I mean (there are some spoilers ahead, but you really don't want to read these series, so it shouldn't matter)

Book 2 is called "the grand design: and it's about how this supposedly antagonist has a big super-duper master plan that involves ALL other main characters in the world. so throughout most of the book, he sits and plots and waits for his "grand design: to come to fruition. whilst, I, the reader, read through, the book, expecting it to fail spectacularly and blow up in his face at some point, because that's what a good book is supposed to do--surprise you, make oyu think that the blurb is wrong.


SPOILERS, DON"T READ the next paragraph IF FOR SOME ODD REASON YOU DO WANT TO READ THE SERIES




okay, I warned you

well, guess what? IT DOESN'T!!!!!!!! Every single character (and some of them can even be passably likeable) does EXACTLY waht the antagonist expects them to do. I mean EXACTLY! and his "grand design" ends up working PERFECTLY. I don't think I was ever more astounded after finishing a book. Sure, one can say that in a way, it's unpredictable, but I say it's just lazy and boring.

So yes, do NOT read "Tyrants and Kings". it's horribly bad.
while I find myself tempted to try his second series, that's supposed to be more magic intensive and boasts some 3 thick books, I am at the same time very fearful. I will probably buy volume 1 at SOME point in a VERY distant future, but it will not be for a while.
As for "Tyrants and Kings"-- once again, stay the hell away fromthat series. I warned you.


ETA: Re: Above and Farland
I am not a native english-speaker, nor am I an english (or any other language) literature major. As such, I'll freely admit to not understanding people when they complain about "poor writing" and such. so that is never a criterion for me when judging a book, and it may quite likely that something that's superbly well-written, but that I don't find interesting, I will label as "bad" while others will defend it, and vice versa
so, in regards to Runelords: I read them out of sequence, and the first time I encountered them, I read "Brotherhood of the Wolf" and "Wizardborn" back to back in Russian. And i really liked both, possibly because of translation, possibly because I was just lost half the time, and I always sorta like that, because it means there's a bigger story out there that I don't know yet.
I then (several years later, after reading ASOIAF, MBOTF, and a lot of other fantasy proceeded to buy the first four Runelords books in English.
I read them, and they were alright, but i was not impressed, and book 4, just got waaay too convoluted nad confusing, and the ending was just odd.
I have book 5 sitting on my shelf, and I may read it at some point, but I feel no hurry to do so, whatsoever.

I do believe the first 3 books are a good enough read by themselves, however, it really was book 4 where farland had to SPOILERS, HERE THEY ARE IN BOLD BECAUSE I ACTUALLY CARE ABOUT THIS SERIES

Spoiler

where he had to introduce the Air people's runes of willpower, and even more so the whole concept of the master runes that can destroy the world, where the story kind of lost it. prior to that point, the actual battles and the faceoff with that insect race (forget the name, and Raj ahten himself--all of that was pretty cool. but once he started making it "go global", Frland kind of lost it.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 19 December 2008 - 03:33 AM

[Macros]

i'll save you some time and tell you not to bother reading any further Ment, it gets worse
and worse
and worse

and wait for it.........
WORSE
one stroy line that relaly pissed me off

Spoiler

the boadygaurd and his wolfbitch going to the air peoples realm to find delan blackhammer or whatever his name was. it reminded me some what of a condensed (but equally as pointless) as failes abduction in wot.

Out of series I have actually finished, the runelords = worst series ever

(and YES I finished the Mallorean AND TAMULI series by eddings)

[Mentalist]

Maccy, I read the original 4, including the thing you mention.
like I said, the fourth one was where it got nedlessly convolured and bad.

I have the fifth one sitting at home (the one about gaborn's son), and i MAY read it at some point--I ahve this thing where I must read it if I paid money for it,

[Macros]

Consider the money you spent on it like that ten pound note htat went through the washing machine and its lost.
forver
for the sake of your soul and your eyes, dont do it

[Camel]

Surprised terez hasn't commented on the Wheel of Time yet. I personally think it's one of the best series out there, along with Malazan. I don't really feel like laying out all the reasons, but suffice it to say that I still don't get tired of talking about it, and I've been reading the series for 10 years now.

Series that I think suck...

Sword of Truth, but that's been beaten to death.
Eragon, also beaten to death.

Melanie Rawn wrote a book years ago.. Dragonhold or Stronghold or something like that. I never finished it.

Anything by R.A. Salvatore, with the exception of the first six Drizzt books and any books containing Artemis Entreri. After that, it's pretty much pointless drivel. I mean, Drizzt's the most badass fantasy character ever, with the exception of Rake, and what does he do? He whines and mopes and pouts because... well, he's long-lived and they're not. Whoop-dee-frickin-doo.



Other series that I like:

The Recluce series by L.E. Modesitt, Jr. Actually, anything by Modesitt, Jr. I'm kind of surprised nobody mentioned him as sucky, because I can see why people would dislike his stuff, but I love it.

Terry Brooks' other stuff. Not the Shannara drivel (Sword of Shannara was probably the only good one), but I'm talking about the "A Magic Kingdom For Sale (Sold!)" series. Good stuff.

Gregory Maguire's "Wicked" and "Son of a Witch".

Any series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, especially the Dragonlance Chronicles (the rest of the Dragonlance books that weren't written by them are mostly crap)

Just about anything by Orson Scott Card except the original Ender's Game sequels (not the Bean parallel series, that was good)

[ObsoleteResolve]

Paolini.

Anything he writes.

Thread done.

[Terez]

 Camel, on Dec 19 2008, 11:13 AM, said:

Surprised terez hasn't commented on the Wheel of Time yet.

I think they get tired of hearing me pontificate about WoT.

Glad to see you made it over this way, btw...

OR said:

Paolini.

Anything he writes.

Quite agreed.

[detritus]

 Terez, on Dec 20 2008, 03:39 AM, said:

 Camel, on Dec 19 2008, 11:13 AM, said:

Surprised terez hasn't commented on the Wheel of Time yet.

I think they get tired of hearing me pontificate about WoT.

Glad to see you made it over this way, btw...

OR said:

Paolini.

Anything he writes.

Quite agreed.

I've not heard your thoughts on WoT, and I would love to. I'm always entertained by a bit of vitriol.

[Terez]

Ha...if you heard my thoughts on WoT, vitriol is not what you would get.

[HoosierDaddy]

My definition of a bad book is a book that I couldn't use my +100,000 will to finish. That list is short:

The Eldest, Paolini
The Lord of the Isles series, stopped in book 2
Stopped about 100 pages into the last PoN Bakker book. Might pick that back up at some point, but I got so tired of Kelhus' Jesus act and the Beatle mania that I couldn't take it anymore.
Stopped reading Farland after 4th book... why did that series continue?
I didn't finish Lustbader's "The Pearl" series... it got increasingly stranger.
Didn't finish the Narnia series, and now I never will.
Didn't finish The Sword of Shanara... should I?

I DID finish Badkind. It got so awful, that I became a glutton for punishment. I think i litterally just browsed the last 150 pages of Confessor honing in on dialogue. There wasn't a lot.

I wouldn't recommend the Soldier Son series....
As for Feist... I actually really enjoy the Serpent War series, and I enjoyed the first series as well. It did steadily degrade after that, but I kept on reading.

However, I will always love this forum for introducing me to Lynch and Abercrombie. I love those guys.

@Mandog: You want Vitriol? Read the Goodkind thread.

This post has been edited by HoosierDaddy: 21 December 2008 - 09:27 PM

[Camel]

I loved the Narnia series, but mainly because the first couple times I read through them I didn't make the connection to Christianity and all the other Biblical allegories. Also, I was maybe 10 when I read them the first time.

The first Paolini book was okay. Let me emphasize the okay part. It wasn't original at all, but most authors' first novels aren't really any good either. Granted, most authors original novels aren't even published, they're that bad. Paolini got published because he was 16 at the time and his parents sunk a shit ton of money into it. If not for that, we'd never have heard of the kid.

But as far as Eragon was concerned, it was written well (all things considered).

The sequels sucked ass and should never have made it to publication.

One of the things that bugs me about novels like Paolini's and Goodkind's are the total lack of continuity. A good fantasy world isn't a world where just any random thing can happen. A good fantasy world follows rules and laws just like ours does. When you drop a rock, it falls to the ground. When you shoot an arrow at someone, it pierces their neck. In a fantasy world, they should follow their own rules. They can be different rules, certainly -- that's what makes it fantasy! But it should follow rules nonetheless.

For example, if you have established that there is no god or prophecy or any sort of fate-type-thing that determines peoples' lives, and then the "hero" (your average random country bumpkin) goes along and a series of incredibly fortunate and convenient events occur to allow him to succeed, that's a huge stretch and I won't buy it. If you've established that magic can only be cast by swallowing metals and "burning" them, and then some undead dude in black armor comes along, points at you, and says "Die" and you die... I won't buy that.

Paolini basically does the same thing... or rather, he doesn't follow any obvious rules.

Read Tolkien. Elves have names like Galadriel and Legolas and places like Lothlorien... long, elvishy names with lots of soft sounds. Dwarves have names like Bombur, Gimli, Thorin.. short, concise names with harder, more bassy sounds. Then you've got the Rohirrim, with names like Eowyn, Eolas, etc.

Paolini's characters' names seem to have him mashing buttons on a keyboard until he comes up with something that's remotely pronounceable. He's got dwarves with names similar to elven names, he's got dragons with similar names to humans. When his characters speak in "foreign tongues" they read like "piohnn najigopa egqog" (in case you didn't figure it out, i smashed my hand on the keyboard a couple of times).

Goodkind's got some decent names out there, except for his main character. Richard. Who, incidentally, is a giant dick. I mean, c'mon, idiot! You're in a fantasy world! You can make your own rules, make your own races, and you come up with RICHARD?! Gimme a break. And then there's the plot. Richard's father makes him memorize this book, which just happens to contain the secret to Life, the Universe and Everything, and he just happens to see this woman who just happens to be looking for HIM, and his mentor just happens to be the only wizard left alive, and his best friend just happens to be the only one who knows where the path through the Void is, and when they get there, they just happen to run into this witch who knows how to get through the path... I mean, c'mon. There's no conflict here! This is like if Tolkien had decided to have the Eagles fly the hobbits to Mordor to drop the ring in the volcano. Yes, it's easier, but it's NOT INTERESTING. Argh!#!%^!^&@#%&!@

Paolini, I hope, will become a better writer in the future. He certainly has the potential. He just needs someone to say "Okay, we gave you a break when you were a kid, but now you're in the real world, and writing like that won't cut it anymore."

And someone needs to stab Goodkind in the neck with a really dull spoon. Repeatedly.

[Macros]

Hosier, I thought I had +100,000 will, but in finishing badkind you out do me. I couldn't make iot past book one of the drivelfest that is SoT
My will (depressingly) saw me get through all 3 (yes three) of the eragon series (if my sister buys the 4th one I will be forced to euthanasia) and my god it just got worse and worse and worse. I know my writing when I was 16 wasn't shit hot, but come on!
Great post By Camel ~resists urge to make toe joke~ and it really is very true, when people just crop up breaking all the rules it really pisses me off and hurts a book big time (not that badkind or paolini could have been saved but still).

Really going to go out on a limb here and push forward my dislike for the dark tower, I have yet to push myself to finish the gunslinger, I jsut can't enjoy it.

[Camel]

Agreed. I read the Gunslinger and I was bored to tears. I hear the later ones get better, but I'm gonna see if I can find someone who actually owns the later ones. I'm not buying them and, sadly enough, i hate libraries. They're like movie rentals.. I never take them back until someone calls and says "hey, you owe us $35 in late fees." Oops.

[Terez]

I read everything King wrote up until about 1996-8 or so, which means I read Wizard and Glass, and nothing else came out until long after I'd moved on to other authors and gotten frustrated with King's deadline books (not that there weren't quite a few peppered into the pre-90s mix).

I did enjoy the series, though...it started to get good as it progressed...so I've tried re-reading the books (because I don't remember ANYTHING) so that I can read the last three. And I just can't do it. I can't get into The Gunslinger again.

[The Tyrant Lizard]

I've read all of them, I managed it by some mammoth effort and read them all back to back. I was expected Jon Shannow with a King twist, but didnt really get it. To be honest I was almost browsing the last book. The final chapter is a big fucking bucket of water in the face though, it almost made up for readign the whole thing.

I see a pattern developing here, which may suggest I'm glutten for punishment. I also finished the SoT series.

[detritus]

In reguards to the whole rules discussion. Do you think that with the way the reader is thrown into Gardens of the Moon, and left to figure all out, that there is a potential for SE to hurt his "world building" because the rules of the world are never really established until the reader puts away a big chunk of book. So, while putting away that big chunk of book the reader really doesnt ever have a complete sense of the world they are in and what is within its boundries. For example I'm about halfway through the first book, and I dont really have a clue as to what the magicians are fully capable of.

[Salt-Man Z]

Eight books in, there's a ton that's still unknown regarding the "rules" of the world. I like to say that SE's world has the illusion of depth; that is to say, the richness of the surface details seem to imply a well-defined underlying structure to the world and how it operates -- we just haven't been shown that structure. I'm not sure that it necessarily "hurts" the series; on the one hand, apparent contradictions can be explained away by saying we don't really know 100% how things operate. But then again, on the other hand, it can make it seem like he's just making this stuff up as he goes.

[detritus]

 Salt-Man Z, on Dec 24 2008, 02:28 AM, said:

But then again, on the other hand, it can make it seem like he's just making this stuff up as he goes.

This is one of the arguments i had in mind that detractors could point to, and I dont see much one could say to dispute it.