[QuickTidal]

Chance, on 11 December 2013 - 08:32 PM, said:

Going through the Winter King by Bernard Cornwall not certain about this one yet I like the premise but the way it is being told is decidedly unimpressive so far which however is just at the begining.

I'm in the minority here, but one of the main reasons I like SHARPE and the SAXON books more than his Derfel / Arthur books is that I read Jack Whyte's Camulod Chronicles first...and it's such a masterpiece that I could never read another Arthur series and get into it.

The Derfel books are decent...but the first is the best of the three IMNSHO, making books 2 and 3 a little meh.

[End of Disc One]

Take a break and come back to it later. You can't get into a book on 3 pages/night or 50 pages in 2 weeks. You're probably burnt out on reading at the moment.

[dietl]

I finished The Idiot by Dostoyevsky last night and although it dragged a bit towards the end it was really great. Definitely one of the best things I read in a while.

[McLovin]

Finished my re-read of the first BLACK COMPANY trilo, forgot how great those were.

Now onto THE BOOKS OF THE SOUTH.

[Chance]

Brujah, on 12 December 2013 - 10:45 AM, said:

Also, I've been cleaning out closets and rearranging old books on even older bookshelf, and dusted off The Coldfire Trilogy by C.S. Friedman. I just wanted to point out that it was one of my favorite series back in the day, in case anyone is interested. And I'm hoping my fondness for the series is genuine and not based on how much easier it was to please myself when I was younger.

However, it does begin with the main character sacrificing his own wife and children for greater power on like the very first page or so. It's been a long, long time, but I believe I would still recommend.

It is one of the truly great trilogies out there your probably not going to be disappointed.

QuickTidal, on 12 December 2013 - 11:33 AM, said:

Chance, on 11 December 2013 - 08:32 PM, said:

Going through the Winter King by Bernard Cornwall not certain about this one yet I like the premise but the way it is being told is decidedly unimpressive so far which however is just at the begining.

I'm in the minority here, but one of the main reasons I like SHARPE and the SAXON books more than his Derfel / Arthur books is that I read Jack Whyte's Camulod Chronicles first...and it's such a masterpiece that I could never read another Arthur series and get into it.

The Derfel books are decent...but the first is the best of the three IMNSHO, making books 2 and 3 a little meh.

That sounds pretty damn bad...the first one just caught my imagination halfways in and closing towards the ending but still Cornwalls storytelling leave a lot to be asked for he's really good at some details and absolutly abhorrent with others .

This post has been edited by Chance: 12 December 2013 - 11:48 PM

[Morgoth]

I found a short story Collection by Peter Watts in the store yesterday. I know he publishes his stuff free online, but I enjoy his writing and like to own his books.

The collection is pretty great. Hard sci fi, focusing on intelligence, consciousness, religion, immortality. It's like he tailor made the collection to my interests.

[Kruppe's snacky cakes]

259. Worldweavers: A Gift Of The Unmage by Alma Alexander - YA fantasy, sort of like Harry Potter, but with some Native American mythology thrown into the mix, as well as interdimensional travel...or something. Anyway, sounded way more entertaining than it actually was.

260. Changeling by Delia Sherman - Parallel Manhattans; human girl now lives in the "New York Between" because she was replaced with a changeling in the real world...hence the title of the book. Blah. Aside from The Last Apprentice series, I can't seem to find much current YA fantasy that I like.

261. Vampirates: Black Heart by Justin Somper - Ditto above. I loved the first book in this series, which is why I snagged the next three during the Borders going-out-of-business sale. But they've disappointed.

262. Drawing A Blank by Daniel Ehrenhaft - YA fiction about a teen comic book artist who goes to Scotland to save his kidnapped Dad. It would take several paragraphs to try to explain it in any more detail than that. I enjoyed this for the most part, but did get kind of bored with it about halfway through.

263. Under The Dome by Stephen King - First of all, I will admit to enjoying the 1st season of the CBS TV series based on this book (in a guilty pleasure sort of way). My problem with King's stream-of-consciousness writing style is that it results in a (probably good) 300 page story interspersed with 700 pages of mostly extraneous detail that pretends to be character building, but fails dismally. Good grief, at one point there are a couple of pages spent describing what a dog is thinking. Add 349 additional unnecessary tangents, and the result is this book. For the love of Pete, man, get an editor. Or at least make some sort of outline before you start writing.

264. Number 13 graphic novel by Robert Love and David Walker - About a cybernetic boy who wanders the apocalyptic wasteland inhabited by warring factions of "fecteds" (i.e. mutants, or infected humans) and "munes" (i.e. immune humans). Loved loved loved this book. Great art, heartwarming/heartrending story, just a great book all around.

265. X-Men Primer graphic novel by Brian Wood - I am a fan of the X "women" characters, Kitty Pride, Rogue, etc. This was a cute story. Fun to see Jubilee carrying around a baby for the whole book. But it was just okay, not great. I'm having trouble finding X-Men comics that wow me...

[JPK]

Time for me to start Crack'd Pot Trail.

[Ukjent]

Then you are in for a hard treat.

[T77]

Finished The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian by Robert E. Howard. I liked it and will probably read more Howard, but I feel he's a bit overrated. Surprisingly what I liked the most about it was the world-building and some of the incredible scenes. He sort of reminds me of Glen Cook - who is at the top of my list of authors One thing is I think I will read him a short story at a time between other books. Having read it in one big chunk, I craved for other things as I read it as his stories are very similar.

[McLovin]

Yeah, nowadays I appreciate Howard more for historical value than anything else. Without Conan, we might not have gotten a lot of great fantasy. But the Conan stories themselves...meh, compared to other stuff out there now.

[Salt-Man Z]

I really enjoy the Conan stories, but they are best in small doses. The thing that gets me is, they don't feel like they're 80 years old.

[D'rek]

Since I haven't had much time to read the last couple weeks, I decided not to pick up anything I would get too sucked into, so I've been working through the second of Flewelling's Nightrunner books - Stalking Darkness. It's not quite as bad as the first one, which isn't saying much. The structure/pacing is still very uneven, but the bad guys are slightly less nebulous and the protagonists have an actual sort of goal this time that they work towards a little every other chapter or so.

This post has been edited by D'rek: 16 December 2013 - 07:49 AM

[McLovin]

Brent-Man Weeks, on 15 December 2013 - 08:56 PM, said:

I really enjoy the Conan stories, but they are best in small doses. The thing that gets me is, they don't feel like they're 80 years old.

That's the genius of fantasy as compared to SF. It can be timeless.

[Serenity]

Finished up Kidnapped, then read Gemmell's The Legend of Deathwalker (not one of his best, imo), and now reading Into the Deep by Ken Grimwood.

[Abyss]

Still working my way thro DANGEROUS WOMEN.


Carole Spector's WILD CARDS story was better than i expected. SM Stirling's CHANGE story was surprisingly engaging (i frequently react that way to his stories... they start slow and draw me in even while i'm finding them slow).

I'm procrastinating on some of the less known authors, but overall i've been pretty impressed with the quality of the anthology so far.

On deck... not sure... EDINBURGH DEAD lies unfinished, and i've got the next SHADOW OPS, the entire KETTY JAY series, and Campbell's second LOST FLEET series all at the top of the TRPFH, with a few other items drawing my eyeparts...

[amphibian]

I too an going through Dangerous Women. My thoughts:

Abercrombie - pretty good. There appears to be a gap of years between Red Country and this.

Megan Abbott - incredible. Best short story I've read in a long long time. Spooky, heart rending and very powerful.

Cecilia Holland - blah. it's a quick take on British stuff tgat few care about.

Melinda Snodgrass - good in a pulp sci fi way, while still having layers

Butcher - pretty good

Carrie Vaughn - eh. Kind of a not great exploration of a more interesting area of history than Holland's.

Joe Lansdale - brilliant. This could be a movie.

Megan Lindholm who is Robin Hobb - extremely good.

Laurence Block - pretty good

Brandon Sanderson - best thing he's ever written. The criticism I have for his other works goes away here. But I suspect he won't write more like this, which is a shame.

Sharon Penman - much better than Holland's or Vaughn's.

[Tiste Simeon]

Finished BH! Onto RG!

[Solidsnape]

Brent Weeks, on 17 December 2013 - 01:45 AM, said:

Finished BH! Onto RG!

Stop catching up!!
Lovin RG right now too.
Want to finish it before Xmas.

[Tiste Simeon]

I'm think RD is one of my least favourites but I'm still excited!