[Saidin]

Evening. I would appreciate it for anyone who is interested to give me there scifi/ fantasy top ten list (authors included). Entire series can be treated as one. Also, if there are books that do not make your top ten, please list them as well. Both lists should be in order of caliber. I do this to get some ideas for new books to read. Please be aware that I am not looking for black and white easy reading. I really want to find some new page turning authors who do not disappoint. I am interested in writing that is provocative. Please include must reads.

It would be nice if this does not get off topic with discussion but remains a post in list form like this:


Top 10
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

Others:
1.
2.
...

Comments:

................



Thanks everybody. Peace.

[amphibian]

Why should anyone on this forum do anything for you?

You show up, make a ton of negative posts, refuse to engage in reasoned discussion of your statements, completely missed the NPR Top 100 thread, blanked on the Other Authors forums that the forum has kept lively and your primary criteria for the list is "authors who do not disappoint". What the scumsuckin' lizard-belching heck does that even mean?

Fucking Eric Hill, author of books like Where's Spot? and Who's There Spot?, could be viewed as an author who delivers crushing disappointments to babies worldwide for the book ending too soon and without answering the question of why Spot's mother is so incompetent as to completely lose track of her infant son or whether or not she could use her nose to follow the doggie scent trail instead of that of a purple hippo hiding behind the fucking blue curtains.

It would be thundercuntin' awesome if you grow up some and actually try to have a conversation with people on here, rather than treating us as near-automatons who aren't as good/smart/worldly as you and/or supply you with passable/great/not-awful books to read according to your two exceedingly vague criteria. Go browse the forum and read the dozens of threads in which many, many people here recommend some staggeringly powerful books that have the power to change mindsets and lives. And they put in a bunch of goddamn awesomely fun reads too. Put a lil elbow grease in - it'll pay off...

If you consider responding with "Well, you're an armchair warrior who doesn't know shit/hasn't done anything in life, and I am way more awesome than you," I strongly suggest you try a different tack.

/End Rant.

[HoosierDaddy]

Over the top, Amph.

You are asking for a very concerted effort here, Saidin. To separate many layers of reading to give you a top ten of measured quality genre takes a LOT of effort that frankly, many of us here have already done a multitude of times.

I'll give you 5 sans MBotF (and WoT due to your name).

1. Hyperion Cantos by Dan Simmons
2. The Psalms of Issak by Ken Scholes
3. ASoIaF by GRRM
4. The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch
5. The Dark Tower by Stephen King

(Take out the "Black/White easy reading" which is subjective as hell and I'd throw in Jim Butcher's Dresden Files and Codex Alera as well as the Harry Potter series.)

[Puck]

I strongly agree with amph. There are about five such threads floating around the Other Lit forum, all of them including very good suggestions.

What you ask for requieres a commited effort and considering the way you have behaved so far I doubt many people will want to make it for you. Use your brain and read through some of the aforementioned threads.

If you love lists so muc, try this one: http://forum.malazan...showtopic=20701
D'rek made an awesome effort to make this happen and a scroll through the Other Lit forum could have brought you there on your own.

[Saidin]

amphibian, on 20 August 2011 - 05:30 AM, said:

Why should anyone on this forum do anything for you?

You show up, make a ton of negative posts, refuse to engage in reasoned discussion of your statements, completely missed the NPR Top 100 thread, blanked on the Other Authors forums that the forum has kept lively and your primary criteria for the list is "authors who do not disappoint". What the scumsuckin' lizard-belching heck does that even mean?

Fucking Eric Hill, author of books like Where's Spot? and Who's There Spot?, could be viewed as an author who delivers crushing disappointments to babies worldwide for the book ending too soon and without answering the question of why Spot's mother is so incompetent as to completely lose track of her infant son or whether or not she could use her nose to follow the doggie scent trail instead of that of a purple hippo hiding behind the fucking blue curtains.

It would be thundercuntin' awesome if you grow up some and actually try to have a conversation with people on here, rather than treating us as near-automatons who aren't as good/smart/worldly as you and/or supply you with passable/great/not-awful books to read according to your two exceedingly vague criteria. Go browse the forum and read the dozens of threads in which many, many people here recommend some staggeringly powerful books that have the power to change mindsets and lives. And they put in a bunch of goddamn awesomely fun reads too. Put a lil elbow grease in - it'll pay off...

If you consider responding with "Well, you're an armchair warrior who doesn't know shit/hasn't done anything in life, and I am way more awesome than you," I strongly suggest you try a different tack.

/End Rant.

Your looking at this post the wrong way. Why should anyone do anything for me? For me? Like I need it? Please dude, lets be real. Easy to see by my recruit status that I don't blog every day so excuse me if I missed the other lit category. I have been in that topic without realizing it by searching through forum topics either way, looking for other books, does that mean I shouldn't make this post? Sorry dude thought it would be fun to keep it just at lists and not trail off.

My other posts have not been negative and I do not see the point of having to always have to explain yourself to a t in a flowery disposition. It is silly how easily provoked you are Mr. Frog. Just because I am saying something you do not like, does not mean its wrong and it does not mean I am not saying certain things on purpose to gauge the responses. Why would I want to commit to joining a community before I see reactions? You did not disappoint. It is nice to know how someone at top level ribbit status would treat someone who is new, not impressed sorry.

As for the dreaded post that got you upset with me (only one post ever keep in mind). It's just an opinion that CG did not do it for me. I gotta tell you I don't think it completely did it for most people. Is this awful to say as well, most people? Perhaps. Everyone I know was somewhat disappointed and I have read only a handful of reviews on this site that completely back up CG. Just didn't do what everyone wanted it to. Facts are not subjective, they re real. Is this a fact? Obviously not, take it easy, just for fun the first time.

Anyway, here's my list:

1. Lord of the Rings- Tolkien

2. Hyperion Cantos-Simmons
3. Malazan Book of the Fallen- Erikson
4. The Dark Tower- King
5. Song of Ice and Fire-Martin
6. Name of the Wind-Rothus
7. American Gods-Gaiman
8. Thomas Covenant- Donaldson
9. The Wheel of Time- Jordan
10. Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy-Adams

Notice some are "black and white" and I am sorry how subjective that is but please, lets not take it over the top here, not an impossible task. I love the wheel of time and its as black and white as it gets, I am not hurt by this. I am also not hurt by your comment, just not impressed. Not disappointing is subjective as well, I know, welp my top ten did not disappoint for me at least so forgive me if that is as good as a response as I was looking for.

Reptiles are cooler than Amphibians. Fact. Everyone knows that.

[Saidin]

I have been through the other lit categories through searching. I was looking for just a list without a trail, it was for fun, keeping it simple. Doesn't need to be taken so intensely and upset anyone based on my "behavior" which is not required to satisfy everyone. Very emotional round here.

[Solidsnape]

Why would you want a list without a 'trail' ???
Surley you'd want some kind of background info or even some opinions?

There's a whole thread on 'what to read next' or something.
I happen to find the 'trail' very informative.
The people on this forum are some of the most switched on people I have ever conversed with when it comes to sci fi/fantasy literature.

Why wouldn't you want to hear what they've got to say?

[Solidsnape]

Or,

1. The bible
2. Ikea Catalouge
3. Spot
4. Billy blue hat
5. The Koran
6. A to Z (of my local area)
7. Yellow pages
8. Radio times (don't really need it with sky+)
9. Pizza menu
10. The Gruffalo.


Hope you enjoy.

[QuickTidal]

Saidin, on 20 August 2011 - 11:29 AM, said:

Your looking at this post the wrong way. Why should anyone do anything for me? For me? Like I need it? Please dude, lets be real. Easy to see by my recruit status that I don't blog every day so excuse me if I missed the other lit category. I have been in that topic without realizing it by searching through forum topics either way, looking for other books, does that mean I shouldn't make this post? Sorry dude thought it would be fun to keep it just at lists and not trail off.

My other posts have not been negative and I do not see the point of having to always have to explain yourself to a t in a flowery disposition. It is silly how easily provoked you are Mr. Frog. Just because I am saying something you do not like, does not mean its wrong and it does not mean I am not saying certain things on purpose to gauge the responses. Why would I want to commit to joining a community before I see reactions? You did not disappoint. It is nice to know how someone at top level ribbit status would treat someone who is new, not impressed sorry.

As for the dreaded post that got you upset with me (only one post ever keep in mind). It's just an opinion that CG did not do it for me. I gotta tell you I don't think it completely did it for most people. Is this awful to say as well, most people? Perhaps. Everyone I know was somewhat disappointed and I have read only a handful of reviews on this site that completely back up CG. Just didn't do what everyone wanted it to. Facts are not subjective, they re real. Is this a fact? Obviously not, take it easy, just for fun the first time.

Anyway, here's my list:

1. Lord of the Rings- Tolkien

2. Hyperion Cantos-Simmons
3. Malazan Book of the Fallen- Erikson
4. The Dark Tower- King
5. Song of Ice and Fire-Martin
6. Name of the Wind-Rothus
7. American Gods-Gaiman
8. Thomas Covenant- Donaldson
9. The Wheel of Time- Jordan
10. Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy-Adams

Notice some are "black and white" and I am sorry how subjective that is but please, lets not take it over the top here, not an impossible task. I love the wheel of time and its as black and white as it gets, I am not hurt by this. I am also not hurt by your comment, just not impressed. Not disappointing is subjective as well, I know, welp my top ten did not disappoint for me at least so forgive me if that is as good as a response as I was looking for.

Reptiles are cooler than Amphibians. Fact. Everyone knows that.

Newflash chuckles: the way you went about your post(s) IS wrong.

Hey, who the flying hell are you to go ordering people around and telling them they are "looking at something the wrong way"? In fact, why the hell should someone else's SUBJECTIVE opinion be in line with yours?

you want to get real? how about you show a MODICUM of respect. It's not that hard to do. In my eyes Amph was well within his rights to have taken you down a peg (in fact I think he took it easy on you), since you clearly decided that (a) your post is worthy of its own thread in a section of the forum where (Puck is right), there are like 20 other top ten/best threads MINIMUM that you could have a look at first. There is a search feature....you know that right?

Secondly, "trail off"? WTF? No, sorry I'm certainly NOT going to just make a pointless fucking list that has no info about the why or the how of my liking it....that doesn't help ANYONE. This is a discussion forum...we are here to discuss, not lay out a list for you with a strict rule of no further discussion.

Third. What the hell DOES "authors who don't disappoint" mean? How the hell do we differentiate between books that we like that you might not or books that you think are great that I might think are piss. That's just this side of ridiculous. Cordoning forumites off into those specific parameters is a super dick thing to say. You are basically saying that we can't judge for ourselves (with our puny minds) what we should list in a top ten of stuff THAT WE FUCKING LIKE...and tailor that into what YOU think is worthy. Well excuse me, but that is the behavior of an elitist, and it's NOT going to fly with me.

Let's do a little speculating shall we? In real life if you went up to someone and asked them to tell you what they think are the top ten movies, but that they'd better not mention fluff movies, or guilty pleasure movies cause you are only looking cerebral, serious drama....they'd look at you and probably say something like "THEN HOW IS THAT MY TOP TEN LIST?!"...to which you would add "Oh and don't talk about it beyond the titles, I only want the titles not the why or how of you liking it......It would be at this interval that any sane human would pop you in the nose.

Do you see how asshat-ish that sounds now?

do you see how it applies to the sillyness of your post?

Amph's right, try a new tack, cause this one is not gonna work.

And don't come at me with the I'm a newbie and this is how you treat us speech...cause we treat newbies well most often. Go and look in the newbie thread and see the one about Abstruse. Read that thread through and see how she responded and took everything in stride, and is glad to be posting here. Cause she didn't act like she was better than everyone and she took her time to read threads and get a feel.

Just because you felt the need to come off in a strongly elitist way doesn't mean we shouldn't call you out on it even though you are a newbie. You effed up. people eff up all the time. This is a forum and we all have our opinions. Oh, and the "Why should I bother joining until after i see reactions" comment...that makes me think you were purposely trolling to get a reaction and see who'd come down on you (which is douchy)...or you feel that we MAY be beneath you and not worthy of your company (Super Mega Douchy)....so which of these people do you want to be?

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 20 August 2011 - 02:45 PM

[Grief]

Pretty harsh reaction. He's hardly the first to ask for recommendations. Oh no, he wants them in form of a list!
The terms he used that are apparently so vague are used constantly here.

1. Perdido Street Station - China Mieville, must read.
2. Prince of Nothing trilogy - R. Scott Bakker
3. The Scar - China Mieville
4. The Lies of Locke Lamorra - Scott Lynch
5. Ender's Game -Orson Scott Card
6. Gormenghast - Mervyn Peake
7. Dune - Frank Herbert
8. Whitechapel Gods - SM Peters
9. Felix Castor books - Mike Carey
10. Anasi Boys - Neil Gaiman

The last few are more black and white than the rest, but still worth reading.

[QuickTidal]

Oh and as to your "most people didn't love TCG" comment:

http://www.goodreads...he-crippled-god

Go ahead, check out good reads...where out of 406 review, over 350 are either 4 or 5 star reviews...

does that sound like people don't like it?

or how about amazon? .com, .ca, .co.uk....check those out too.

How are those for FACTS?

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 20 August 2011 - 02:40 PM

[Whiskey Bass]

he asked, i read no demands, so why the huge reaction?

bad day?......chill

[bubba]

.........Drama is a dried red smear on the pitted and cracked face of a Mod hammer..........just sayin.......

[Saidin]

QuickTidal, on 20 August 2011 - 02:29 PM, said:

Saidin, on 20 August 2011 - 11:29 AM, said:

Your looking at this post the wrong way. Why should anyone do anything for me? For me? Like I need it? Please dude, lets be real. Easy to see by my recruit status that I don't blog every day so excuse me if I missed the other lit category. I have been in that topic without realizing it by searching through forum topics either way, looking for other books, does that mean I shouldn't make this post? Sorry dude thought it would be fun to keep it just at lists and not trail off.

My other posts have not been negative and I do not see the point of having to always have to explain yourself to a t in a flowery disposition. It is silly how easily provoked you are Mr. Frog. Just because I am saying something you do not like, does not mean its wrong and it does not mean I am not saying certain things on purpose to gauge the responses. Why would I want to commit to joining a community before I see reactions? You did not disappoint. It is nice to know how someone at top level ribbit status would treat someone who is new, not impressed sorry.

As for the dreaded post that got you upset with me (only one post ever keep in mind). It's just an opinion that CG did not do it for me. I gotta tell you I don't think it completely did it for most people. Is this awful to say as well, most people? Perhaps. Everyone I know was somewhat disappointed and I have read only a handful of reviews on this site that completely back up CG. Just didn't do what everyone wanted it to. Facts are not subjective, they re real. Is this a fact? Obviously not, take it easy, just for fun the first time.

Anyway, here's my list:

1. Lord of the Rings- Tolkien

2. Hyperion Cantos-Simmons
3. Malazan Book of the Fallen- Erikson
4. The Dark Tower- King
5. Song of Ice and Fire-Martin
6. Name of the Wind-Rothus
7. American Gods-Gaiman
8. Thomas Covenant- Donaldson
9. The Wheel of Time- Jordan
10. Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy-Adams

Notice some are "black and white" and I am sorry how subjective that is but please, lets not take it over the top here, not an impossible task. I love the wheel of time and its as black and white as it gets, I am not hurt by this. I am also not hurt by your comment, just not impressed. Not disappointing is subjective as well, I know, welp my top ten did not disappoint for me at least so forgive me if that is as good as a response as I was looking for.

Reptiles are cooler than Amphibians. Fact. Everyone knows that.

Newflash chuckles: the way you went about your post(s) IS wrong.

Hey, who the flying hell are you to go ordering people around and telling them they are "looking at something the wrong way"? In fact, why the hell should someone else's SUBJECTIVE opinion be in line with yours?

you want to get real? how about you show a MODICUM of respect. It's not that hard to do. In my eyes Amph was well within his rights to have taken you down a peg (in fact I think he took it easy on you), since you clearly decided that (a) your post is worthy of its own thread in a section of the forum where (Puck is right), there are like 20 other top ten/best threads MINIMUM that you could have a look at first. There is a search feature....you know that right?

Secondly, "trail off"? WTF? No, sorry I'm certainly NOT going to just make a pointless fucking list that has no info about the why or the how of my liking it....that doesn't help ANYONE. This is a discussion forum...we are here to discuss, not lay out a list for you with a strict rule of no further discussion.

Third. What the hell DOES "authors who don't disappoint" mean? How the hell do we differentiate between books that we like that you might not or books that you think are great that I might think are piss. That's just this side of ridiculous. Cordoning forumites off into those specific parameters is a super dick thing to say. You are basically saying that we can't judge for ourselves (with our puny minds) what we should list in a top ten of stuff THAT WE FUCKING LIKE...and tailor that into what YOU think is worthy. Well excuse me, but that is the behavior of an elitist, and it's NOT going to fly with me.

Let's do a little speculating shall we? In real life if you went up to someone and asked them to tell you what they think are the top ten movies, but that they'd better not mention fluff movies, or guilty pleasure movies cause you are only looking cerebral, serious drama....they'd look at you and probably say something like "THEN HOW IS THAT MY TOP TEN LIST?!"...to which you would add "Oh and don't talk about it beyond the titles, I only want the titles not the why or how of you liking it......It would be at this interval that any sane human would pop you in the nose.

Do you see how asshat-ish that sounds now?

do you see how it applies to the sillyness of your post?

Amph's right, try a new tack, cause this one is not gonna work.

And don't come at me with the I'm a newbie and this is how you treat us speech...cause we treat newbies well most often. Go and look in the newbie thread and see the one about Abstruse. Read that thread through and see how she responded and took everything in stride, and is glad to be posting here. Cause she didn't act like she was better than everyone and she took her time to read threads and get a feel.

Just because you felt the need to come off in a strongly elitist way doesn't mean we shouldn't call you out on it even though you are a newbie. You effed up. people eff up all the time. This is a forum and we all have our opinions. Oh, and the "Why should I bother joining until after i see reactions" comment...that makes me think you were purposely trolling to get a reaction and see who'd come down on you (which is douchy)...or you feel that we MAY be beneath you and not worthy of your company (Super Mega Douchy)....so which of these people do you want to be?

There is nothing forcing you to comment on this page. Don't like it? Solution-get angry and flip out? You embarrass yourself and solve nothing.

I am not angry, I do not feel taken down a peg, I do not feel censored, and I do not need to take harsh words in stride like being a newbie means anything (laughable).

You cannot be a newbie in a place where opinions rule, sorry. I would not have asked had I known the awful reactions I would have gotten. Let me repeat myself again: I have been in the other forums and seen the info (not saying its worthless-good resource). I thought it would be fun to post just a list to see where everyone gauges there favorites without pages upon pages of points of view. Obviously points of view matter, not saying they don't, just didn't want to see them this time. I understand this is a forum where opinions rule, turns out lists take away most of the messy opinionated stuff-simplicity. Never the intention to put unwanted pressure on people to rank novels, never the intention to upset. If you were perhaps its your own fault. Negative opinions are still only opinions. Think this request (keep in mind it was a request) is sacrilege-quick fix- no need to post.

Stop putting words in my mouth
Stop telling me what I think

Attack on character remains a fallacy of argument.

[Trull's son]

Someone mentioned that there has been a drop in drama on the forums recently. Time to vent. Let's get it all out, before there's no-one left to target! /endsarcasm

This post has been edited by Trull's son: 20 August 2011 - 07:06 PM

[Illuyankas]

Saidin, on 20 August 2011 - 07:05 PM, said:

Stop putting words in my mouth
Stop telling me what I think

Yeah, stop telling me what to think! Unless it's that TCG was a satisfactory ending to the series, then I'll tell you what to think.

[Jade-Green Pig-Hog Swine-Beast]

Saidin, I'm not trying to be funny or anything, this is an attempt at constructive criticism so please don't take it any other way:

You use hyphens as though they're dashes, which makes reading your posts rather confusing at times. Dashes are actually longer than hyphens and there probably is a keyboard shortcut for them but I don't know what it is. When using a program that doesn't alter it automatically, I tend to use a double hyphen (--) but even if you choose not to, it's best to leave a space before and after the punctuation so that it's clear what you mean -- it appears as though you're hyphenating random words, otherwise. It took me a couple of moments to understand what 'solution-get', 'stuff-simplicity' and 'sacrilege-quick' were.

Aye, that's all.

This post has been edited by Jade-Green Pig-Hog Swine-Beast: 20 August 2011 - 07:41 PM

[stone monkey]

Would it not have simpler for everyone concerned just to ignore him/her? Which would have dropped this request down the thread list pretty fast and no-one would have gotten aereated (that's Northern UK slang btw; it means upset and/or over excited)

I mean, so what if the original post was somewhat prescriptive and self important, I don't think the rest of you have covered yourselves in glory either.

[dktorode]

And here i was looking forward to browsing yet another one of the plethora of top 10 lists we have here and i get this?

tsk tsk tsk...

[Loki]

Saidin, on 20 August 2011 - 11:29 AM, said:

Reptiles are cooler than Amphibians. Fact. Everyone knows that.

Wisest comment made so far.


You're not going to like my list:

1. Malzan Book of the Fallen - Steven Erikson
2. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
3. World War Z - Max Brooks
4. Ranger's Aprrentice - John Flanagan
5. The Reclue Series - L.E. Modesitt Jnr
6. Quicksilver Triology - Stan Nicholls
7. Bartimaeus Triology - John Stroud
8. Dark Tower series - Stephen King
9. Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
10. Rowan of Rin - Emily Rodda

Other:
1. The Road to Mars - Eric Idol

Yep, I had to use young adult fantasy and zombie lit. to round my list out.......I love fantasy but there are very few authors that I actually enjoy reading - I don't like authors who over-describe situations to me and most fantasy (non-urban) authors tend to do that. Modesitt Jnr is my token windbag - I like his take on magic much better than Jordan's.
And I prefer my sci-fi on the big screen.

This post has been edited by Loki: 21 August 2011 - 03:56 AM