[DarkGothicGirl]

Now reading A Drop of Red by Chris Marie Green.

[QuickTidal]

Okay, I have now tried twice to get into HEROES DIE by Matt Stover...and can't do it. I don't care much for the overt cursing that seems, like Richard Morgan, to be at times gratuitous. I don't care much for the earthbound Actor stuff. The Overworld stuff is a little more interesting, but it get's to be a tad pedestrian for me. Maybe the middle of the book is more interesting and I'll give it another try later on (back into the to-read pile it goes), but for now not so much.

My girlfriend got me FIRST LORD'S FURY by Butcher for my b-day and so I am starting PRINCEP'S FURY today and I can finish this awesome series!

[Lord Gordonis]

the novice - trudi canavan

[QuickTidal]

Lord Gordonis, on 06 February 2010 - 09:18 PM, said:

the novice - trudi canavan

Let me know how that one is, I've heard varying reviews, but I'd like to give it a shot.

[Aptorian]

Lord Gordonis, on 06 February 2010 - 09:18 PM, said:

the novice - trudi canavan

QuickTidal, on 06 February 2010 - 09:25 PM, said:

Lord Gordonis, on 06 February 2010 - 09:18 PM, said:

the novice - trudi canavan

Let me know how that one is, I've heard varying reviews, but I'd like to give it a shot.

Let me save you some time.

It is, as far as I can recall, the worst fantasy I have read. It is worse than the Sword of Truth. The Sword of Truth at least has some original ideas and good fight scenes in between all the bullshit story telling and megalomania.

Basically it is the Harry Potter books, only instead of being fun, imaginative, blessed with original world building, believable characters, etc., it is instead horribly generic, painfully shallow, tedious and makes no attempt at reinventing the old tropes. Young urchin girl is actually a very talented mage, there is a magical boarding school, but only the rich and powerfull may enter, there are bullies at the school, there are the aristocrat bad guys and the socialist goodies, which of course makes for some painfully annoying stories of the little girl who just wants to be loved and have friends, then there is some evil mages who are up to no good and start making trouble in their neighbourhood.

The End.

I read the whole trilogy because I bought it as a bargain, but man was I not pleased.

EDIT: Just googled her to see if she died lonely and impoverished. But lo and behold:

Quote

In 1999, Canavan's writing career took off when she won the Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Short Story with Whispers of the Mist Children.^[1] In 2001, she further established herself with The Magicians' Guild, centering around Sonea, a slum child who is hunted for her rogue magic. The novel, which was the first of three books of The Black Magician Trilogy, brought her widespread acclaim, and the second book of the trilogy, The Novice (2002), was nominated for the Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Novel. The third book, The High Lord, was released in January 2003 and was nominated for the Best Novel Ditmar category. All three books entered Australian top ten SF bestseller lists. The trilogy is now rated by Nielsen BookScan as the most successful debut fantasy series of the last 10 years, and in 2006 had sold over 275,000 copies in all editions.^[1] The trilogy has been translated into German, Dutch, Italian, Polish and French.^[3]

What in the hell is the matter with people!?

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 06 February 2010 - 09:42 PM

[Lord Gordonis]

Yeah I only bought this as the only thing on the market so I picked up the trilogy and so far the first book was good, ive only just started reading the second book.
If this trilogy of books on market/cheap book shop pick it up just for something to read personnally.

LG

[stone monkey]

Currently reading The Strangest Man by Graham Farmelo, which is a biography of Paul Dirac (the famously reticent, even by British standards, Physicist)

Up after that I have all of The Long Price series by Daniel Abraham, which have recently been published in a pair of UK paperback editions.

[Dag]

QuickTidal, on 06 February 2010 - 09:25 PM, said:

Lord Gordonis, on 06 February 2010 - 09:18 PM, said:

the novice - trudi canavan

Let me know how that one is, I've heard varying reviews, but I'd like to give it a shot.

I got the whole trilogy from a friend who told me the books were a "must read". (Btw, it's the same friend who made me read Goodkind...) I only managed to get through 2/3 of the first book (at my 3rd desperate attempt to read it) and, to be honest, even though it was just a few months ago, I can't really comment, since I don't remember a thing that happened in it. I guess it was just too much of the standard "been there, read that" stuff to keep me interested. Mind you, my friend still thinks it's one of the best novels she read in the past few years, soooo...

On topic: Just finished Ian Buruma's brilliant "A Japanese Mirror: Heroes and villains of Japanese culture", and after a brief (and up to now failed) attempt to understand why everybody finds Christoph Neumann's humourless "Why Japanese Are Annoying" so funny, I'm looking forward to start a re-read of Theodore Sturgeon's "More Than Human". I wonder if I'll like the book as much as I did when I first read it 15 years ago...

This post has been edited by Dag: 07 February 2010 - 07:45 AM

[caladanbrood]

Elephant Tamer, on 06 February 2010 - 12:27 PM, said:

Ian M. Banks Matter. Have to say, rather disappointed till now. Hope it pans out.

It's not his best book, but it does improve. There is a lot of the quasi-medieval stuff though...

[Yellow]

Wasn't a fan of matter. Waited so long for a Culture book, and got that. Sadness.

I've just started Anathem by Neal Stephenson. I'm only about 80 pages in so far, but I'm loving it. It's a really refreshing change from what I've been reading recently. I haven't read a really great book since The Judging Eye last February (and yes, I'm including DoD). Read a couple of Winston Churchill's books - interesting, but not thrilling in any sense of the word. Tried to get into Adam Thorpe's Hodd (also an interesting idea, but 50 pages in and I just didn't care enough to continue). Got half way through Northern Lights but I'm really not a fan of children's/YA books. Good story, but too simplistic. I even went back and re-read TJE, and damn, it was great again.

So anyway, I decided I hadn't read any SF in ages, and Terminal World is still weeks away... when I remember that Anathem has been sat on my shelf for bloody ages. I bought it while I was reading the Baroque Cycle and I was too Stephenson'ed-out. But so far it's a great read and I actually want to come home and read a book, which I haven't felt since TJE.

Yay!

[Grief]

Just finished Turn Coat and am currently reading American Gods.

Very good so far.

[teholbeddict]

I'm on another huge historical fiction kick, haven't really been feeling in the mood for fantasy as of late. I tend to go in cycles with these things, no idea why. Finished When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman, which was excellent. That's not at all surprising though as she's never written a bad book, or at least not that I've read. I'm now continuing on with more SKP and reading Here Be Dragons, which is the first book of her Welsh Trilogy. No complaints so far, she really is a fantastic author.

[LadyMTL]

teholbeddict, on 08 February 2010 - 08:24 PM, said:

I'm on another huge historical fiction kick, haven't really been feeling in the mood for fantasy as of late. I tend to go in cycles with these things, no idea why. Finished When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman, which was excellent. That's not at all surprising though as she's never written a bad book, or at least not that I've read. I'm now continuing on with more SKP and reading Here Be Dragons, which is the first book of her Welsh Trilogy. No complaints so far, she really is a fantastic author.

I've read Here be Dragons, I really enjoyed it, but for some reason I never got around to finishing the trilogy. Now I feel like I ought to run out right now and buy them, . But I know what you mean about cycles, I'm the exact same way. A few months ago it was a lot of history (especially Tudor history) and also what I call "modern fiction", stuff like The Outcast, The Meaning of Night, One Hundred Years of Solitude, and so on. I seem to have swung back to fantasy lately, though, go figure.

I'm currently reading R Scott Bakker's The Judging Eye, which I'm enjoying a lot more than I thought I would.

This post has been edited by Maia Irraz: 08 February 2010 - 10:39 PM

[kcf]

I finished up Spiral Hunt by Margaret Ronald. It's new urban fantasy and OK - I liked it well enough and got what I expected. (full review)

Now I'm reading The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin which I've been looking forward to. It's good so far.

[masan's saddle]

Pootling through the Bauchelain and Korbal Broach novellas at the moment. Blood Follows was good and the Lees of Laughter's End was excellent. Should finish the Healthy Dead sometime tomorrow and then go on the hunt for Crack'd Pot Trail.

[MTS]

Started my re-read of the series the other day. About halfway through Gardens of the Moon now. It reads very much like a script for a D&D game sometimes with the titles and stuff, but it's still as awesome as it ever was. Some interesting tidbits in there as well.

[murphy72]

teholbeddict, on 08 February 2010 - 08:24 PM, said:

I'm on another huge historical fiction kick, haven't really been feeling in the mood for fantasy as of late. I tend to go in cycles with these things, no idea why. Finished When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman, which was excellent. That's not at all surprising though as she's never written a bad book, or at least not that I've read. I'm now continuing on with more SKP and reading Here Be Dragons, which is the first book of her Welsh Trilogy. No complaints so far, she really is a fantastic author.

The followups to When Christ and His Saints Slept are Time and Chance and Devil's Brood. It's a trilogy.

Now reading Moonshine by Rob Thurman. It's the second in the Cal Leandros series and a pretty good urban fantasy.

[Use Of Weapons]

I loved SKP -- she's the only author of historical fiction I've read though. Any recommendations in this area peeps? May make a new thread for this.

[teholbeddict]

murphy72, on 09 February 2010 - 04:04 AM, said:

teholbeddict, on 08 February 2010 - 08:24 PM, said:

I'm on another huge historical fiction kick, haven't really been feeling in the mood for fantasy as of late. I tend to go in cycles with these things, no idea why. Finished When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman, which was excellent. That's not at all surprising though as she's never written a bad book, or at least not that I've read. I'm now continuing on with more SKP and reading Here Be Dragons, which is the first book of her Welsh Trilogy. No complaints so far, she really is a fantastic author.

The followups to When Christ and His Saints Slept are Time and Chance and Devil's Brood. It's a trilogy.

Right, I know. I actually read that trilogy completely out of order lol. I picked Time and Chance up in the bargain section of Chapters, then bought Devil's Brood, and later bought When Christ and His Saints Slept. So I read 2-3-1. When I started Time and Chance I had no idea it was part of a trilogy or I would have bought the other two right away.

@Maia Go buy them! Right away!!! Sorry couldn't help but encourage you, she's one of my favourite authors. This one has a bit more of a romance element to it, in comparison to her other books, but still good.

@Jitsukerr Well as far as historical fiction goes, if you like SKP you will probably also love Colleen McCullough. Her Rome series is fantastic, she is right up there with SKP as far as quality of writing. I can never decide which of the two of them I like more. McCullough's works are a bit longer, but they never drag and there's no filler despite the length. If you are looking for some more SKP to read I'd go with the Sunne in Splendour, that for me is her best book. You could also try Michelle Moran and her Nefertiti series. The first book of that series is definitely the strongest imo. Adelle Geras is good as well. I would say Troy is probably the better of her two books. Really though I think for anyone who likes SKP you have to go for McCullough

This post has been edited by teholbeddict: 09 February 2010 - 03:16 PM

[Use Of Weapons]

With SKP, I've read 'The Sunne in Splendour' (my favourite of the ones I've read), 'Here Be Dragons', 'When Christ and His Saints Slept' and 'Falls The Shadow' (the first one I ever read). Must get the rest of the Stephen/Maude trilogy, didn't realise she'd written any sequels!