tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post1248827774534585274..comments2024-03-29T20:04:30.755+08:00Comments on Monsters and Manuals: Recommended ReadingUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-16961760672783526422011-10-18T08:37:59.960+08:002011-10-18T08:37:59.960+08:00I just don't agree that the language ever beco...I just don't agree that the language ever becomes interesting. I believe the self imposed narrative restriction is simply to provide a straight forward read for youngsters - mid teens - and say this only because I have seen what Wolfe can do with language in Shadow of the Torturer and some of his science fiction shorts.Kenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11165997449776226774noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-37955201418339450042011-10-15T18:25:53.307+08:002011-10-15T18:25:53.307+08:00Kent: I think you're making the classic mistak...<b>Kent</b>: I think you're making the classic mistake of confusing authorial and narrative voice. The Wizard Knight is written in the first person, and the main character is a boy who gains an adult's body. This is an opportunity for Wolfe to show what a stunning stylist he really is, because he is able to write profoundly poetic prose while never letting the reader forget that the narrator is an adolescent. It's a tour de force.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-69584064123202246812011-10-08T09:47:16.536+08:002011-10-08T09:47:16.536+08:00Tuf Voyaging by George R. R. Martin. 'Nuff sai...<i>Tuf Voyaging</i> by George R. R. Martin. 'Nuff said.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-64755263841781575802011-10-05T23:37:40.765+08:002011-10-05T23:37:40.765+08:00Ah, now I know why you like those books. I was sur...Ah, now I know why you like those books. I was sure it wasn't for the sub-adult prose style.Kenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11165997449776226774noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-90207619650593368122011-10-05T20:40:13.472+08:002011-10-05T20:40:13.472+08:00I've read MOST of Moorcock's work, definit...I've read MOST of Moorcock's work, definitely within the "experiment in masochism" camp, but there's an encapsulating context beyond the literal gibberish that's, at minimum, intriguing. At least, to me.<br /><br />At 40+ yrs old, I only just last year read Zelazny's Amber chronicles (both Corwin and Merlin cycles) and found plenty both to admire and to sneer at.<br /><br />At some vague point in the not too distant past (1990-ish? The Internet?) it seems like the fantasy fiction game changed. Before then, if your initials weren't JRR, your output had to largely approximate 'pulp' at first glance, and anything of deeper substance had to be a subversive addition. That's certainly my take on Zelazny, for example.<br /><br />But more recently it feels like all semblance of quality control has gone by the boards, allowing for both the truly excellent and the excruciatingly bad.<br /><br />Maybe it has to do with generations; the best stuff being written now is being written by those who grew up absorbing the best (and worst) of the, hurm, original masters.<br /><br />The worst is being written for the next generation down, apparently unable to defend itself from the imperative to dumb it down and make a breakfast cereal out of it...<br /><br />Somehow this turned into a rant. My apologies.MartinSzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10309988324743171703noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-7872908752873225872011-10-05T17:48:11.164+08:002011-10-05T17:48:11.164+08:00Joe Abercrombie's 'The First Law' tril...Joe Abercrombie's 'The First Law' trilogy is really good fun. I'd also recommend Michael Moorcock's 'The Warhound and the World's Pain'.<br /><br />I won a few of the Lone Wolf novels as part of a eBay job lot recently. I doubt I'd have even given them a second glance if you hadn't recommended them, but I might give them a bash.Andy Bartletthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06683770320671028815noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-92097974493960049012011-10-05T08:59:02.310+08:002011-10-05T08:59:02.310+08:00It's been a while since we had a good stoush, ...It's been a while since we had a good stoush, Noisms, so I'm going to try it on here with a controversial opinion: the <i>Dragonlance Chronicles</i> are actually excellent (the first three, I mean; I liked the next three a lot too but feel dirty recommending a series of six books). I don't just say this because I liked them when I was 12 (I did). I reread them as an adult, in what I thought would be an experiment in masochism, and they were great. <br /><br />Some "young adult"[1] novels I liked were anything by Robert Westall (particularly <i>The Cats of Seroster</i>) and <i>The Ring of Allaire</i> by Susan Dexter, which I'm about to reread out of interest. I also remember a series of books by Maurice Gee (a New Zealander), the first of which was televised in NZ when I grew up there. I think young adult novels can have a special power, because they can retain childish elements while tackling adult themes, and when they're done well they're really good. When they're done badly though, they're really, really bad.<br /><br />---<br />fn1: whenever I read this I think of that scene from the young ones. "I'm old enough to go to war but I'm not allowed to drink in pubs."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-49940290872987166352011-10-05T06:30:43.733+08:002011-10-05T06:30:43.733+08:00One book I always recommend on threads like this i...One book I always recommend on threads like this is The Dragon Never Sleeps by Glen Cook. It's a space opera trilogy boiled down into one novel. The plot is a bit labyrinthian, but there's just so much stuff going on in one novel with no fat at all. Great stuff, some of the best big smashy space battles I've read. Not high literature or anything, but my favorite bit of space opera.Boshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06908715118408289864noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-74629457656947419572011-10-05T06:04:05.617+08:002011-10-05T06:04:05.617+08:00HDA: Get reading then!
Brendan: I'm not a fan...<b>HDA</b>: Get reading then!<br /><br /><b>Brendan</b>: I'm not a fan of Earthsea. It didn't bore me, but nor did it especially grab me, either. <br /><br /><b>Kent</b>: I don't think it was written for children... At least, I don't imagine the sequence in which it describes how giants have sex with human women was written with children in mind...<br /><br /><b>Jesse</b>: Yes, I like Dunsany, but I figure everybody reading this blog has read him. (They've probably most all read Vance and Wolfe too, but I don't think you can ever recommend either highly enough.)<br /><br /><b>liza</b>: Glad I'm not the only one who's read them!<br /><br /><b>Beedo</b>: I'd say it depends on your 9-year-olds whether they'll like the books or not. The fight scenes are pretty graphic (eyes getting poked out, intestines spilling out on the floor, etc.) and there is a bit of very teenage-angsty romance.<br /><br /><b>Drance</b>: It's a genuine classic that gets oddly overlooked.<br /><br /><b>richard</b>: I've never even heard of Tim Powers - just goes to show!noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-2420522571767154242011-10-05T05:22:21.571+08:002011-10-05T05:22:21.571+08:00Julian May stuck in my mind, and I think your writ...Julian May stuck in my mind, and I think your write-up is spot on.<br />For some reason when I was 14 I read everything Stephen Donaldson wrote. I can't think why, now.<br /><br />OTOH, no Tim Powers? I confess, I haven't read much by him, but Anubis Gates deserves all the praise it got. Even if he's not such a literary stylist, the ideas fizz.richardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13517340075234811323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-91648389522449040642011-10-05T05:12:26.862+08:002011-10-05T05:12:26.862+08:00@brendan
I agree with you on Le Guin, although I ...@brendan<br /><br />I agree with you on Le Guin, although I think Tombs of Atuan is the best of the series. Left Hand of Darkness is her masterpiece in my opinion.deletedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14629023989035899992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-14520238932059500082011-10-05T04:06:52.467+08:002011-10-05T04:06:52.467+08:00YEAH, nice to see The Forever War get some props! ...YEAH, nice to see The Forever War get some props! That's a book that many hardcore science fiction fans let slip under their radar. Such a good book, really powerful. Highly recommend that people read that one! Great list!Anthony Simeonehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04312134763577949405noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-4120166214986256732011-10-05T03:01:32.478+08:002011-10-05T03:01:32.478+08:00I'm seeing MJ Harrison pop up here and there, ...I'm seeing MJ Harrison pop up here and there, and am intrigued enough to add him to my reading list, thanks!<br /><br />I read enough fiction to my 9 year old that I'll check out <i>Legends of Lone Wolf</i> as well. We're almost done with Lloyd Alexander's <i>Prydain</i> books.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18031181424520125213noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-12267851488621712542011-10-05T02:15:58.152+08:002011-10-05T02:15:58.152+08:00Praise to "The Pliocene Exile": when I w...Praise to "The Pliocene Exile": when I was kid I literally read the whole saga over and over. I always toyed with the idea of a D&D psionic-medieval campaign based on these books (and maybe the Darkover saga), but I never really liked the AD&D psionic rules. <br />(Mmm, I wonder why Darkover o The Exile never get one of those licensed-based GURPS campaign books...)lizahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09786809318270279916noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-75520154668813495552011-10-05T02:15:18.214+08:002011-10-05T02:15:18.214+08:00Ditto for Cugel's Saga. A great book, very uni...Ditto for Cugel's Saga. A great book, very unique, very funny. I agree about Eyes of the Overworld, mainly because Cugel is not just a scoundrel but actually sort of a horrible monster bastard in that one. However, the payoff for reading both is greater than for reading just the one. At the end of Eyes, when Cugel's dumped back on the beach where he started... Epic!<br /><br />Not a Lieber fan? How about Lord Dunsany?<br /><br />http://www.sff.net/people/doylemacdonald/l_wonder.htm<br /><br />If you haven't read his work I bet you'd love the shit out of it, just based on what I know from your OSR output. The man was a dreamer. Read Bride of the Man Horse (then Chu-Bu and Sheemish, then Thangobrind). Take you twenty minutes. This isn't the right format for it (the right format is a musty old book with Sidney Sime's illustrations*) so I recommend changing the font at least to something dignified...but I think the general majesty of the story still comes through.<br /><br />*Sidney Sime:<br /><br />http://monsterbrains.blogspot.com/2011/06/sidney-sime.html<br /><br />See the bottom of the page for links to scans of all of Dunsany's books, hosted at the Internet Archive.Jessehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12909909813154375839noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-31652058990898954302011-10-05T02:10:58.872+08:002011-10-05T02:10:58.872+08:00I believe The Wizard Knight was written for childr...I believe The Wizard Knight was written for children something which is evident when the prose is set beside the Shadow of the Torturer et al.Kenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11165997449776226774noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-72199034126742249332011-10-05T01:42:10.759+08:002011-10-05T01:42:10.759+08:00I would add the Earthsea books, especially the fir...I would add the Earthsea books, especially the first (<i>A Wizard of Earthsea</i>), by Le Guin. Also, <i>The Mirror of Her Dreams</i> and <i>A Man Rides Through</i>, by Donaldson (this two-part series is really good). +1 on anything by Gene Wolfe. <i>The Eyes of the Dragon</i>, by Stephen King (the only "fantasy" book he has really written), and the first Darktower novel, <i>The Gunslinger</i> (the other Darktower seemed too arbitrary and silly to me, but <i>The Gunslinger</i> is dreamlike and wonderful).<br /><br />I also liked the Death Gate cycle when I read it way back when; the setting and the rune magic is awesome, though I remember feeling like it didn't really have an ending. I also still love, for all their flaws, the Dragonlance Legends trilogy (as derivative as many of the parts are, Raistlin will always remain a special character, IMO).Necropraxishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12716340801054739658noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-52927716492307280312011-10-05T00:55:49.395+08:002011-10-05T00:55:49.395+08:00What I didn't realize as a teenager was that f...What I didn't realize as a teenager was that fantasy and SF get milled out just as readily as Harlequin Romances. Which of course leads to a lot of formulaic, derivative shit. I've honestly not encountered any of these (outside other blogs) except the Duncton books, so clearly I missed out on some good stuff while I wasted my life with the Wheel of Time books (everyone: don't fucking read them).HDAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13506175636615989219noreply@blogger.com