[Serenity]

Briar King, on 05 July 2013 - 08:22 PM, said:

Serenity, on 05 July 2013 - 11:57 AM, said:

Finished The Technician and made a start on Blood Song by Anthony Ryan. Read four chapters and so far it's bloody good. Kind of Gemmell-esque I suppose - traditional heroic fantasy in many ways, but really well written, with excellent characters.

I just mentioned this in the has anyone read this thread a few days ago. Let me know how it goes!!

I'm about 350 pages into it now. If you like Gemmell I suspect you will love this. It's old school, and there's a certain amount of seen-it-all before in the plot, but somehow he's made it really compelling, and that's down to the characters, I think />

yuna_anomander25, on 07 July 2013 - 06:18 AM, said:

100+ pages in The Heroes, but i'm having a hard time getting to like this one, after Best Served Cold, which i loved, i'm getting cold on this one, there's no one for me to like in this one, and since this one have Bayaz in it, i'm not keen on this and Shivers, who was one of my favorites in BSC, isn't much of a character here,,

Shame! I loved both those books, but The Heroes just about came out on top for me />/>

[Obdigore]

Just finished Wicked Bronze Ambition by Glen Cook, which is the most recent Garrett P.I. book. I was pretty frustrated with it since he killed off one of my favorite characters in the first twenty pages, and I'm used to this series being much more Noir/Comedy than serious/melancholy. That said, Cook is still an excellent author and the book was good for what it was.

[Stalker]

Morgoth said:

I'm reading River of Stars by G.G.Kay, and it's another beautiful read. I simply love Kay's style, and his prose is perfect. Subtle, lyrical and.. well, perfect. He writes tragedies so well, and every page, every story is both sweet and bitter in equal amounts (more or less). There are happy endings, though often not where you'd expect to find them, and tragedies, though in unexpected places.

I did not care for Tigana that much, probably because my expectations were too high based on all the hype, but everything GGK that I have read since has been exceptional. I just finished the Sarantine Mosaic duology yesterday, and you are so right about his style. My favorites, though, remain Under Heaven and River of Stars. The pervasive sense of loss throughout River of Stars is one of the strongest features of the book, made all the more powerful for having read Under Heaven. These two books are on my shortlist for best reads this year.


I'm not sure what's next for me, after the GGK books. I tried starting Greg Bear's Hull Zero Three and William Gibson's Neuromancer but wasn't feeling either at the time. Maybe I will start the new Garrett P.I. Novel that Obdi mentioned. I hadn't realized that was released yet.

[Morgoth]

If you still want to ride on that wave of melancholy you should read the Quarry by Iain Banks, although my impression might've been coloured by recent events.

I agree with you though, the sense of melancholy is at times almost overwhelming, especially I thought upon the visit to the old capital. I could see it as it was in Under Heaven, and how far Kitai had fallen.

[D'rek]

A little while ago I finished the Long Price Quartet. I really liked seeing the course of the quartet spread across the whole lives of the two main characters like that, and I don't know about anyone else, but the fact that that was what Abraham was doing only really sunk in for me at the start of the 3rd book, which pushed the emotional impact up a big notch for books 3 and 4. Not the sort of shouting or weeping emotional impact, just like a really nice meditation on life and the world, underscored by some cool worldbuilding.


With that done, I didn't want to try for anything too emotional or weighty, so I started reading The Cold Commands, and am liking it a lot so far. But holy crap is it explicit! The first chapter just has off-hand references to stableboys and the fight with the zombie-worms is pretty straightforward, so I was not at all prepared for the extremely detailed fight and sex scenes that came afterwards!

(some of Ringil's encounters are pretty hot, though )

[Mentalist]

Breezed through the 300-odd pages of "The Warhound and the World's Pain". The book is tropetastic, being a textbook hero's journey, but the underlying concept's outlandish enough to keep my interest.

WHile the power was out tonight, I've started "Age of Aztec". This one's quite typical Lovegrove so far (Aztecs rule the world. Use futuristic super-technology. There is one protagonist who resists), But there's an element of a cop story thrown in. I'm not hooked enough to stay up all night (could be due to the fact that Lovegrove's Godpunk books have proven to be essentially one-trick ponies up to now), but I'll probably be done in a day or so.

[QuickTidal]

About 25% into HAMMERED by Kevin Hearne.

This series is easily the closest one can get to Dresden and Butcher with another series. They operate on the same level of badassery/comedy/interesting plotlines/gods/monsters ect.

And basically Granuaile = Molly.

[Ukjent]

Didn't feel up to my planed reread of Covernant, so going for Under Heaven instead.

[Ukjent]

Saving them for when I'm back to studying and got some payrolls. Its only a month..

[Overactive Imagination]

Read The Hedge Knight today and it was pretty good! I liked how it was obviously in Westeros and lots of families and areas and everything from the main series were mentioned. Great stuff!

Started Death Masks today as well - it has the best first chapter of any of the Dresden books so far! Part of me wants to listen to the audiobook because the Dresden ones are so good, but that's like an extra 5-10 hours.. not sure if it's worth it.

anyone know how many Dunk & Egg stories GRRM has planned, and whether there will ever be an omnibus of them similar to the bauchelain and broach novellas?

This post has been edited by Overactive Imagination: 10 July 2013 - 06:04 AM

[worry]

There are three D&E novellas out there already. Last I heard, he said he had ten or so stories flying around in his head. From wikipedia: "Martin has said that he would like to write a number of these stories (varying from six to twelve from interview to interview) covering the entire lives of these two characters. Martin announced on his 2011 national book tour that the Dunk and Egg series will be collected into a book and published by Bantam Spectra after the fourth novella is first published in an original anthology he and Gardner Dozois are editing."

Now there's also conjecture that the prequel series mentioned when his recent HBO development deal was announced could be D&E focused (rather than young Eddard/Robert stuff, or more ancient stories), but there's basically no definitive information out there yet.

[Tiste Simeon]

About 3/4 of my way through Altered Carbon. Loving it so much!

[Serenity]

Briar King, on 09 July 2013 - 07:13 PM, said:

Graablick, on 09 July 2013 - 06:28 PM, said:

Didn't feel up to my planed reread of Covernant, so going for Under Heaven instead.

Go order Calibans War and Abaddons Gate!

I went on Amazon yesterday to get Caliban's War for my Kindle and found it's £9.17, over £3 more than they want for the paperback. What are the publishers playing at? />

[End of Disc One]

Overactive Imagination, on 10 July 2013 - 06:00 AM, said:

Started Death Masks today as well - it has the best first chapter of any of the Dresden books so far!

Butcher keeps getting better at first chapters as the series goes on. Just wait.

[QuickTidal]

Having long ago read and enjoyed the 1st book, but never having gone on to read the rest I have re-picked up Conn Iggulden's EMPEROR: THE GATES OF ROME with the intention of continuing with the story this time. So far it's as enjoyable as I remember!

[Salt-Man Z]

Taking a little break from The Third God to start Prince of Thorns. The first couple chapters were pretty brutal, in a "Why am I reading this again?" kind of way (not helped by the fact that I was eating at the time.) But it quickly became impossible to put down.

[QuickTidal]

Salt-Man Z, on 10 July 2013 - 04:18 PM, said:

Taking a little break from The Third God to start Prince of Thorns. The first couple chapters were pretty brutal, in a "Why am I reading this again?" kind of way (not helped by the fact that I was eating at the time.) But it quickly became impossible to put down.

Totally. Lawrence is king of the inexorable anti-hero story. I found the damn thing impossible to put down!

[Ukjent]

And King is even better, Emperor is going to be epic!

[Salt-Man Z]

It's surprising how similar it feels to Paul Hoffman's The Left Hand of God--while being less irritating in almost every aspect. In fact, I'd assume Lawrence's book was a response to Hoffman's, were it not for the fact that Prince was published only a year and a half after Left Hand.

[Tiste Simeon]

Finished Altered Carbon. Marvellous stuff! Straight onto Broken Angels now. Kovacs is just a superb creation!