[QuickTidal]

Finished BRIMSTONE ANGELS by Erin M. Evans. It's solid, but a LOT of it feels like setup for future stories. It also mixes a LOT of narratives into one with not just the sisters and the Cambion, but a civil war in the hells, and the Aboleth Sovereignty in Neverwinter....so it feels like too much, while also setting up the Teifling sisters and their Dragonborn "dad".

The book I read of hers before this (THE SUNDERING: THE ADVERSARY) felt like it was firing on more cylinders. But I still really enjoyed this book, even if it felt like "Intro To Teiflings and the 9 Hells" and I feel like since it was one of her first standalone's with these characters, she needs time to grow.

Moving on to more FR with a continuation of my first time reading all the Drizzt novels, I'm at book 7 THE LEGACY. Always fun to read about Drizzt and co.!

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 26 July 2022 - 12:27 PM

[Aptorian]

Sort of stalled on the last third of Unsouled by Will Wright. The premise is cool but the book went into the YA underdog in a school setting and I just don't care.

Picked up the Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu instead. Tried it out a few years ago in Danish but it didn't grab me. English version seems better.

This is an interesting beginning to a scifi book. To my ignorant Western imagination, it seems pretty ballsy to write something so critical about the Chinese Revolution during the mid 1900s. You'd think it would be censored. But a bit of googling suggests that it's accepted to be critical of the ideas and attrocities of this era of China now.

Boy am I happy to not have lived in that era and location.

[Gwynn ap Nudd]

Just finished Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer.

I enjoyed the early set up and some of the world building, mostly in terms of how the futurist political society worked as there is little discussion of future tech. But, it started going off the rails somewhere close to halfway through. The last third was way off the rails in a bad way.

I came close to DNFing a couple times, but read to the end to see if the ending was pulled off. Didn't realise it is book one of a series.

Minor

Spoiler

The ending resolves nothing and is a slow burn cliff hanger for the next book, which I will not be reading.

Not sure what I will be reading next.

[T77]

Gwynn ap Nudd, on 29 July 2022 - 05:03 AM, said:

Just finished Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer.

I enjoyed the early set up and some of the world building, mostly in terms of how the futurist political society worked as there is little discussion of future tech. But, it started going off the rails somewhere close to halfway through. The last third was way off the rails in a bad way.

I came close to DNFing a couple times, but read to the end to see if the ending was pulled off. Didn't realise it is book one of a series.

Minor

Spoiler

The ending resolves nothing and is a slow burn cliff hanger for the next book, which I will not be reading.

Not sure what I will be reading next.

I DNF'd it.

[Mentalist]

Working my way thru the 3rd "Worldbreakers" book by Cameron Hurley.

The "1 year later" timekip from the cliffhangers of Bk2 is... a choice.

Hoping to get through a good chunk of it this long weekend, because I have the 3rd "Poppy War" book on standby.

[Gwynn ap Nudd]

I decided to go with Amongst Our Weapons by Ben Aaronovitch as my next read for something I expect I will greatly enjoy, after the last two books I read were okay and then pretty bad.

[Whisperzzzzzzz]

Gwynn ap Nudd, on 30 July 2022 - 01:59 AM, said:

I decided to go with Amongst Our Weapons by Ben Aaronovitch as my next read for something I expect I will greatly enjoy, after the last two books I read were okay and then pretty bad.

I'm halfway through this in audiobook!

[Aptorian]

Loved Amongst our Weapons. Low stakes but really important setup for future books.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 30 July 2022 - 04:14 AM

[James Hutton]

Dawn of Everything by Wengrow & Graeber, after reading this article: https://www.wired.co...-of-everything/
It's hella interesting, was thinking of SE and ICE immediately.

[Imperial Historian]

T77, on 29 July 2022 - 03:08 PM, said:

Gwynn ap Nudd, on 29 July 2022 - 05:03 AM, said:

Just finished Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer.

I enjoyed the early set up and some of the world building, mostly in terms of how the futurist political society worked as there is little discussion of future tech. But, it started going off the rails somewhere close to halfway through. The last third was way off the rails in a bad way.

I came close to DNFing a couple times, but read to the end to see if the ending was pulled off. Didn't realise it is book one of a series.

Minor

Spoiler

The ending resolves nothing and is a slow burn cliff hanger for the next book, which I will not be reading.

Not sure what I will be reading next.

I DNF'd it.

I also DNF interesting premise but didn't grip my interest and was a very slow burner.

[Aptorian]

Finished The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu.

Liked the first half but the second half disappointed me. I feel like the book sets up a premise that it doesn't deliver on. It's a book series, so obviously you need to read the rest of the books to get a conclusion but I sort of got blue balls by the end of this first book.

Anyone else read the series? Do the other two books deliver? Especially if I'm not sold on the antagonists and their depiction?

Spoiler

The discussion I'd seen on the internet led me to believe that the aliens were more mysterious and frightening than what was depicted. Instead we just got a mostly recognizable alien civilisation with a typical Militant species and social structure.

I was expecting something really alien and incomprehensible. And how Mankind faces that. Instead we just got a slow moving plot that's not really focused on the aliens but is really about the past and how our decisions haunt us.

Also I find the possibility of the Trisolaran species surviving and rebuilding their world hundreds of times silly. Maybe most of it is meant to be allegory but their planet wouldn't be habitable after being frozen or scorched over and over. Life certainly wouldn't have time to rebuild that fast.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 30 July 2022 - 07:16 PM

[Aptorian]

Started Alastair Reynold's Revelation Space, the first book in the Inhibitor Trilogy.

I realized I haven't read much Sci Fi, proper sci-fi that is, the past decade. I should get around to reading some of the established authors.

So far, 30 pages in, Revelation Space seems promising. Good setup so far, lots of history and advanced tech being presented but not quite revealed yet.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

James Hutton, on 30 July 2022 - 11:11 AM, said:

Dawn of Everything by Wengrow & Graeber, after reading this article: https://www.wired.co...-of-everything/
It's hella interesting, was thinking of SE and ICE immediately.

'Citing this existing research, and more from a range of social scientists, Wengrow and Graeber [...] represent prehistoric societies as “a carnival parade of political forms,” a profusion of rambunctious social experiments, where everything from kinship codes to burial rites to gender relations to warfare were forever being conceived, reconceived, satirized, scrapped, and reformed. [...]

[...] the book makes quick work of maxims by domineering thinkers like Jared Diamond and Steven Pinker. Chief among these is the idea that early humans, bent on nothing but the grim chores of survival, led short and dangerous lives chasing calories and subjugating others for sex and labor. By the research, many or even most premoderns did none of this. Instead, they developed expressive, idiosyncratic societies determined as much by artistic and political practices as by biological imperatives. For instance, while the Kwakiutl practiced slavery, ate salmon, and maintained large bodies, their next-door neighbors in latter-day California, the Yurok, despised slavery, subsisted on pine nuts, and prized extreme slimness (which they showed off by slipping through tiny apertures).'

Humans Have Always Been Wrong About Humans

[amphibian]

Aptorian, on 30 July 2022 - 07:02 PM, said:

Finished The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu.

Liked the first half but the second half disappointed me. I feel like the book sets up a premise that it doesn't deliver on. It's a book series, so obviously you need to read the rest of the books to get a conclusion but I sort of got blue balls by the end of this first book.

Anyone else read the series? Do the other two books deliver? Especially if I'm not sold on the antagonists and their depiction?

Spoiler

The discussion I'd seen on the internet led me to believe that the aliens were more mysterious and frightening than what was depicted. Instead we just got a mostly recognizable alien civilisation with a typical Militant species and social structure.

I was expecting something really alien and incomprehensible. And how Mankind faces that. Instead we just got a slow moving plot that's not really focused on the aliens but is really about the past and how our decisions haunt us.

Also I find the possibility of the Trisolaran species surviving and rebuilding their world hundreds of times silly. Maybe most of it is meant to be allegory but their planet wouldn't be habitable after being frozen or scorched over and over. Life certainly wouldn't have time to rebuild that fast.

The Dark Forest is one of the greatest books I've ever read. The entire series works very well, even if the rebuilding is a wee bit silly.

[polishgenius]

Three Body Problem genuinely made me angry because

Spoiler

the idea that most scientists would respond to their theory being proven wrong by comitting suicide over it was frankly offensive. It also rubbed me wrong though because, while not a Hard SF piece really, it presents itself like one and that made it harder for me to let go the manifest nonsenses it uses. Like using the sun as an amplifier, with detailed explanation that I understand just enough physics of to know was rubbish. But the biggest thing was that they called it the Three Body Problem when there isn't one in the book, since the planet makes it four bodies.

There were some terrific concepts in there though. I did quite enjoy it despite the daftness apart from that first point I mentioned which soured the entire thing.




I think you'll enjoy Revelation Space from the perspective of what you didn't get from TBP in your spoiler. Though it's not just the aliens that are eerie and frightening in that series...

[Aptorian]

polishgenius, on 31 July 2022 - 06:16 PM, said:

Three Body Problem genuinely made me angry because

Spoiler

the idea that most scientists would respond to their theory being proven wrong by comitting suicide over it was frankly offensive. It also rubbed me wrong though because, while not a Hard SF piece really, it presents itself like one and that made it harder for me to let go the manifest nonsenses it uses. Like using the sun as an amplifier, with detailed explanation that I understand just enough physics of to know was rubbish. But the biggest thing was that they called it the Three Body Problem when there isn't one in the book, since the planet makes it four bodies.

There were some terrific concepts in there though. I did quite enjoy it despite the daftness apart from that first point I mentioned which soured the entire thing.




I think you'll enjoy Revelation Space from the perspective of what you didn't get from TBP in your spoiler. Though it's not just the aliens that are eerie and frightening in that series...

Oh, you just reminded me what also really confused me at the end:

Spoiler

The reason I thought the scientists were killing themselves was because it was implied that the laws of physics weren't true outside earth and the entire universe didn't actually work the way we understand. That's what theoretically made the aliens scary.

When the three body game began I thought it was teaching Wang and the reader,that planets and suns can move at random and that physics can be altered at will.

But by the end of the book as I understood it, it's just the Alien Scooby Doo villains playing tricks on humanity. Which is super lame.

[Mentalist]

All right, wrapped up "Broken Heavens".

Proper grimdark series. Maark should like this, lots of innocents getting casually murdered, and no true "good" characters. Hurley in general is a very difficult read.

Gonna be moving on to Burning God , the 3rd "Poppy War" book tomorrow.

[Gwynn ap Nudd]

Finished Amongst Our Weapons and loved it. Interested in seeing how the various schemes put in motion in the late stages of the book come to fruition, and glad as those make it sound like the series will continue for a fair length.

[T77]

Science fiction is dominating most of my reading lately. I believe it was Abyss who posted about Jack Campbell's Lost Fleet series recently. I've never heard of it. I just finished book 1, Dauntless, and enjoyed it. I've got book 2, Fearless, queued up.

[Abyss]

Just finished Rebecca Roanhorse's PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS. It's the sequel to her debut TRAIL OF LIGHTNING, which was a fun post apocalyptic urban fantasy engaging Native American myths and fun characters w guns. TRAIL was more of the same, very enjoyable, fast, great action scenes.

polishgenius, on 28 February 2019 - 11:27 PM, said:

polishgenius, on 23 February 2019 - 12:29 AM, said:

Now starting Ruin of Kings by Jenn Lyons, a much-hyped recent debut.

Getting towards the end of this and it's really very good. Some of the plotting is contrived in ways that would normally bother me but it's so engaging I'm not fussed. A chap over on the aSoIaF boards described it as a mix of Locke Lamora, Name of the Wind, Malazan and Chronicles of Amber and it's kinda hard to put it better than that (maybe chuck in a slice of Abercrombie as well). Really confident debut.

Also got a couple of great baddies in it. One character in particular, though their part is not that huge so far, I think will go down really well with the denizens of this board.

And now have started RUIN OF KINGS. It's pretty good so far. I really enjoy the story within a story style and the earbook makes excellent use of the format.