Gardens of the Moon down, really enjoyed that. It reached right down into my soul and gave my inner dungeon master a hug. If I read 9 more of these things I'm gonna have to be careful not to taint the two home brew campaigns I run. I think my only complaint story wise was
The Azath showing up as an answer to the Jaghut Tyrant was kinda deus ex machina-y, just pops right outta left field. Also he really likes to describe demons as being "able to destroy the entire city" but unlike the Tyrant they dont really seem like they can. They almost get answered too quickly.
But otherwise, good stuff. I liked that even with a large cast enough focus was given to each character to let them shine. Only really had to go back and check the dramatis personae once. Especially enjoyed every bit with Kruppe, he was a delight.
Now I'm into the prologue of Deadhouse Gates and already sold.
Suppose itll take me 2 months to finish the 10 books. I've got vacation starting next week timed with Nona the Ninth dropping, then Scholomance #3 The Golden Enclaves lands on the 20th, so that'll punctuate it a bit.
Edit: looks like local bookstore did an oops cause I got Nona now. Fuck.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I read it back in HS college, and it was amazing. The Azath get a little bit more of an explanation later on, but all of it is buried in years of their in game exploration of an unbelievably dense history. It probably doesn't help the Erikson is an archeologist.
Edit: Also, reading The Poppy War, and I'm reminded of how insufficient American history classes are. I can tell a lot of this is allegorical, but it's hard to tell if it's all WWII, or some earlier conflicts mixed in, since my knowledge of history for the East is sorely lacking.
A lot of specific events in Poppy War are analogous to historical events but the story as a whole isn't supposed to represent a single specific conflict. Think of it more as allegory of Chinese/Japanese/European relations over 19th century to maybe a bit after WW2, with individual pieces all jumbled up.
Saint Death's Daughter: had a really hard time getting through this. Not because it's necessarily bad, it's just the kind of 500-page book that has 200 pages of plot, and the rest is world-building and not much happening.
Gardens of the Moon down, really enjoyed that. It reached right down into my soul and gave my inner dungeon master a hug. If I read 9 more of these things I'm gonna have to be careful not to taint the two home brew campaigns I run. I think my only complaint story wise was
The Azath showing up as an answer to the Jaghut Tyrant was kinda deus ex machina-y, just pops right outta left field. Also he really likes to describe demons as being "able to destroy the entire city" but unlike the Tyrant they dont really seem like they can. They almost get answered too quickly.
But otherwise, good stuff. I liked that even with a large cast enough focus was given to each character to let them shine. Only really had to go back and check the dramatis personae once. Especially enjoyed every bit with Kruppe, he was a delight.
Now I'm into the prologue of Deadhouse Gates and already sold.
Suppose itll take me 2 months to finish the 10 books. I've got vacation starting next week timed with Nona the Ninth dropping, then Scholomance #3 The Golden Enclaves lands on the 20th, so that'll punctuate it a bit.
Edit: looks like local bookstore did an oops cause I got Nona now. Fuck.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I read it back in HS college, and it was amazing. The Azath get a little bit more of an explanation later on, but all of it is buried in years of their in game exploration of an unbelievably dense history. It probably doesn't help the Erikson is an archeologist.
Edit: Also, reading The Poppy War, and I'm reminded of how insufficient American history classes are. I can tell a lot of this is allegorical, but it's hard to tell if it's all WWII, or some earlier conflicts mixed in, since my knowledge of history for the East is sorely lacking.
In the introduction to my copy he says as much. That the option was explain too much or let the reader learn to swim. Absolutely prefer the learn to swim style. I think the best advice he gave in the intro was along the lines of "you will want to go fast but I advise you to go slow". With that in mind.
The only reason the Azath stands out is that given you know you're being thrown smack dab into the middle of A LOT everything else seemed to have some grounding in conversation or events that take place in novel or are alluded to.
At the end of the novel when the tiste andii talk about the house and Rallick entering it, they tell you "oh yeah. This is where these things are and who has gone in before". I feel like anyone making a comment about the Emperor having gone into one at any point in the story before it showed up would have been enough grounding for me. Everything else in the novel gets a little of this. Even Crokus' protectors being from the crimson guard is kind of implied by Caladan Broods talk with the Crone.
Anywho, as a criticism it only stands out to me because I dont have a lot of criticisms of the work. To criticize myself though; I love almost everything I read.
I personally really enjoy how he layers the combat narrative. The same event taking place across 4 or 5 different characters POV and plots is really fun and he executes it well.
Deadhouse Gates is on hiatus as I read Nona. No spoilers. Only hype.
Edit; I dont wanna double post. But Nona the Ninth completed. Hypity hype hype. Loved it. Nona loves me and you.
Automautocrates on
The dictum that truth always triumphs over persecution is one of the pleasant falsehoods which men repeat after one another till they pass into commonplaces, but which all experience refutes.
-John Stuart Mill
Yeah I mean more the actual action in the books. There are a lot of scenes straight out of the second SinoJapanese war/WW2 (flooding the dam on purpose, a lot of the post-battle atrocity scenes, etc,) but there is one point they straight up have a reenactment of the battle of the Red Cliffs. Its clearly on a broad scale supposed to be representative of the lead up to the WW2 and postwar communist takeover but theres a lot of completely random stuff pulled in.
Stephen King's latest, Fairy Tale, is pretty solid. It's not anywhere in my top favorite King books but it's a solid story and a fun read. Would recommend. Much like his other recent books, it's not really horror, per se. I'd call it fantasy with some occasional horror elements.
I kind of wish King wouldn't try to write books set in the modern day. The man is 75 years old and while he's still an avid consumer of modern media, his references and mindset just don't feel authentic for someone 3 generations separated from him. The main character of Fairy Tale is a 17 year old kid in 2013, but is regularly referencing books and media more fitting for someone either a lot older or a lot further back in time. I mean, I know people do watch TCM, but I'm probably about the same age as the father of the kid in the book and watching old movies on TCM all the time is the kind of thing that my parent's generation would do. I dunno. It's not a big deal, really, but given King's age his work always just sort of feels eternally set in some period between the late 60's and 80's. It's almost more distracting from the story when someone uses a cellphone or social media than when kids talk to one another about actors who'd been dead for decades before they were born.
I started Nona the Ninth but realized on the first page that I couldn't remember anyone's names except Harrow, Gideon, and John, so I stopped and started re-reading Gideon. It's still great.
The final book in Naomi Novik's The Scholomance trilogy - The Golden Enclaves - is officially out.
I just finished it. Yes, yes, I know, it released like 6 hours ago, I had other shit to do okay?
Anyway, why the fuck are you all still here listening to me talking about it? It's so fucking good! Go read it right now. Right now. It's a stunning work, and it's just masterful in how it builds on and expounds things.
Happy to hear it finishes strong. I was a bit worried it would lose focus after how the second book ended.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
So, I realized A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet was free for prime members, and I'm really kicking myself on having not read it before. That was a truly delightful book. Some parts are definitely sad, but just the overall picture of the crew was so wonderful.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Dracula is written as a series of journal entries, letters, and newspaper clippings, taking place from May to November. This website sends you the parts of the book on the dates they take place. So if you had signed up in advance, then on May 3rd you'd get an email with Jonathan Harker's journal entry at the very beginning of the book, on May 4th you'd get his next journal entry, and so on. Some days nothing happens, some days have several pages of text across multiple journals or letters.
The Patrick Tull readings of the Aubrey & Maturin books are just ~250 hours of pure delight. He captures the humour perfectly, reads the drama with an economy of tension and gives a sufficiently distinct voice to all the characters. It is a masterly work by Tull as well as by O'Brien. I've heard other readings but these are unquestionably the Platonic ideal, the reading against which any others will be measured.
It's going to be a cold grey winter in the UK, but being able to cosy up in my armchair and listen to these whenever I choose will make it a great deal more bearable.
So I think it was a PA "news" post, or possibly this thread? which convinced me to read the first book of the Horus Heresy series (which, and I didn't know this when I bought the audiobook, has fucking fifty volumes in the last decade). Now I own the 9th edition Warhammer 40k rule book and am contemplating plastic mans. So. Don't do it, people. In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only spending money on tiny mans.
So I think it was a PA "news" post, or possibly this thread? which convinced me to read the first book of the Horus Heresy series (which, and I didn't know this when I bought the audiobook, has fucking fifty volumes in the last decade). Now I own the 9th edition Warhammer 40k rule book and am contemplating plastic mans. So. Don't do it, people. In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only spending money on tiny mans.
Don’t read the Gaunt’s Ghost series especially with their rule book on the horizon.
I've been playing a lot of Cyberpunk 2077 lately, and for some reason I got a sudden hankerin' to re-read some classics, such as Walter Jon Williams' Hardwired from 1986.
The Orbital Corporations won the Rock War, and now they control America. Cowboy, one of the protagonists, is a smuggler who can control an armored hovertank using a neural interface. The other protagonist, Sarah, is a prostitute turned mercenary assassin; she and Cowboy end up teaming up to fight the Orbitals.
Ex-fighter pilot Cowboy, "hardwired" via skull sockets directly to his lethal electronic hardware, teams up with Sarah, an equally cyborized gun-for-hire, to make a last stab at independence. Cowboy is hired by a Russian named Arkady to transport medicine across "The Line" while Sarah takes a seduction and assassination job for an Orbital agent named Cunningham. Both of them find themselves betrayed by their employers and soon are forced into hiding, driving them together.
The original cover is hella cheesy cyberpunk, which was the style at the time.
Yeah cyberpunk absolutely borrows its hovertank panzers from Hardwired.
Iirc the hardwired novel is canon to the cyberpunk universe, since it kinda fills out some more of the world that's between the big cities.
A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
Iain Banks's Complicity was a nastily effective piece of work.
The Last Wish, the first collection of short stories in the Witcher series, is decidedly mediocre. Is this the only book series where both the TV and videogame adaptations are superior?
Nona The Ninth is as infuriatingly opaque as some parts of Gideon and Harrow, but I'm still enjoying the ride. I feel like I won't be able to really speak to how much I like it until I finish it and then read it again.
Nona The Ninth is as infuriatingly opaque as some parts of Gideon and Harrow, but I'm still enjoying the ride. I feel like I won't be able to really speak to how much I like it until I finish it and then read it again.
I'm currently re-reading Harrow for the first time (preparatory to reading Nona) and it certainly is a different experience knowing what the hell is going on.
Iain Banks's Complicity was a nastily effective piece of work.
The Last Wish, the first collection of short stories in the Witcher series, is decidedly mediocre. Is this the only book series where both the TV and videogame adaptations are superior?
It wasn't called Complicity for no reason!
Tangentially: I re-read Surface Detail recently and boy howdy, Banks just nailed everything about Elon and other Musks didn't he?
Nona The Ninth is as infuriatingly opaque as some parts of Gideon and Harrow, but I'm still enjoying the ride. I feel like I won't be able to really speak to how much I like it until I finish it and then read it again.
I'm currently re-reading Harrow for the first time (preparatory to reading Nona) and it certainly is a different experience knowing what the hell is going on.
I've listened to some Harrow after Nona and a whole lot more makes sense than before.
I've been playing a lot of Cyberpunk 2077 lately, and for some reason I got a sudden hankerin' to re-read some classics, such as Walter Jon Williams' Hardwired from 1986.
The Orbital Corporations won the Rock War, and now they control America. Cowboy, one of the protagonists, is a smuggler who can control an armored hovertank using a neural interface. The other protagonist, Sarah, is a prostitute turned mercenary assassin; she and Cowboy end up teaming up to fight the Orbitals.
Ex-fighter pilot Cowboy, "hardwired" via skull sockets directly to his lethal electronic hardware, teams up with Sarah, an equally cyborized gun-for-hire, to make a last stab at independence. Cowboy is hired by a Russian named Arkady to transport medicine across "The Line" while Sarah takes a seduction and assassination job for an Orbital agent named Cunningham. Both of them find themselves betrayed by their employers and soon are forced into hiding, driving them together.
The original cover is hella cheesy cyberpunk, which was the style at the time.
As someone who lived through the 80s, I can confirm that the aesthetic was all about style and nothing about taste.
I enjoyed Hardwired very much, and Voice of The Whirlwind too.
Iain Banks's Complicity was a nastily effective piece of work.
The Last Wish, the first collection of short stories in the Witcher series, is decidedly mediocre. Is this the only book series where both the TV and videogame adaptations are superior?
It wasn't called Complicity for no reason!
Tangentially: I re-read Surface Detail recently and boy howdy, Banks just nailed everything about Elon and other Musks didn't he?
Also for classic cyberpunk before cyberpunk was invented, John Brunner (Shockwave Rider) and Alfred Bester (Tiger, Tiger). Pat Cadigan (Synners). Or read the Mirrorshades anthology for other names like Lewis Shiner etc. and also to re-read Red Star, Winter Orbit to be reminded of what a really really good short story writer can do.
Nona The Ninth is as infuriatingly opaque as some parts of Gideon and Harrow, but I'm still enjoying the ride. I feel like I won't be able to really speak to how much I like it until I finish it and then read it again.
I'm currently re-reading Harrow for the first time (preparatory to reading Nona) and it certainly is a different experience knowing what the hell is going on.
I've listened to some Harrow after Nona and a whole lot more makes sense than before.
I should probably go back and read all three now that I've read Nona. I think I really enjoyed Nona, but it can be a bit difficult when every books is such a massive tonal shift.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Just started The Goblin Emperor, got about 3 letters into the dramatic personae, got bogged down, skipped to the first chapter, immediately regretted skipping the dramatis personae.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Ahh you got me thinking about it again! I have too many other things to read. To me goblin emperor was like clockwork orange in the sense of the most a book has ever gone “gonna dunk you in this language, anyway see you later” to me.
you just eventually understand it mostly through context. Most all the titles are compound parts off of a base so you got like “room” “royal room” “church room” “tomb room” “royal tomb room”
I think it works much worse in the follow up novels because we go from a pov character who also doesn’t know all of these things, to a pov character that spent his whole life a part of those systems and takes it for granted. Maia really helps us to be lost together and slowly figure it out
Don't sweat it too much, you're basically intended to be overwhelmed by the names in Goblin Emperor
A trap is for fish: when you've got the fish, you can forget the trap. A snare is for rabbits: when you've got the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words are for meaning: when you've got the meaning, you can forget the words.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
Don't sweat it too much, you're basically intended to be overwhelmed by the names in Goblin Emperor
Yeah, I'm about 50% through and it makes more sense now. Part of it has been trying to go into more books as blind as possible. I knew a lot of people here had spoken well of it, but I couldn't remember where, and I didn't read the description or anything.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
I started Artemis by Philip Palmer and.. abandoned it. I read it because I very much enjoyed his Version 43. But this book just seemed kind of laughable. It was over the top, self-aware and pulpy, but for all that it just seemed tiresome.[1] Okay, we get it, the antagonist is the best Mary Sue ever, and also a psychopath. I finished up to the breakout and that was enough. It makes me wonder about Version 43. Perhaps it didn't grate on me the same way because the protagonist was an actual robot, so being an mostly-indestructible resurrecting badass was actually a good thing. I also think from reading some reviews that it was one his less pulpy books.
Instead, I switched to Tim Pratt's Axiom trilogy. Much better! It was almost like cozy sf of The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet in terms of the characters, but with higher stakes. I was afraid I was going to be disappointed at the ending as I was getting close, but it actually turned out well. I thought the main crew were all pretty well fleshed out and unique, with none of them kind of blending together and being forgotten.
It's also interesting to compare to what I read of Artemis. Both had a main character who was a tough bi woman, picking up a girlfriend along the way early in the book. But even though both were written by men, there just seemed more believability in Pratt's. Likewise with the other characters that spanned the spectrum of human variety (though I can't say as much about that in the book I abandoned). I'll leave this bit Pratt wrote in an AMA:
I'm bi, lots of my friends are various flavors of queer, and I've had lots of romantic relationships with people who identified as bi/pan/queer/heteroflexible/etc. It's natural for me to write about characters who don't get hung up on the divisions all that much. In a future where there are heavily augmented cyborgs and various flavors of posthumans and genetic modification and so on, it seemed to me that being 100% straight would be kind of a niche kink and one difficult to adhere to strictly in practice. Sexuality is a spectrum, etc. Since fiction is still pretty dominated by cis male characters, I often try to write about women (or other people who don't identify as male), because I think representation is important.
So, yeah, you could kind of feel the difference. In Artemis, I just got this feeling that her sexuality was more because she would be even more of a Badass Cool Chick if she was seducing women just like the Badass Cool Dudes. Or maybe Palmer has the same sort of backstory, but just can't write characters as well.
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A lot of specific events in Poppy War are analogous to historical events but the story as a whole isn't supposed to represent a single specific conflict. Think of it more as allegory of Chinese/Japanese/European relations over 19th century to maybe a bit after WW2, with individual pieces all jumbled up.
In the introduction to my copy he says as much. That the option was explain too much or let the reader learn to swim. Absolutely prefer the learn to swim style. I think the best advice he gave in the intro was along the lines of "you will want to go fast but I advise you to go slow". With that in mind.
At the end of the novel when the tiste andii talk about the house and Rallick entering it, they tell you "oh yeah. This is where these things are and who has gone in before". I feel like anyone making a comment about the Emperor having gone into one at any point in the story before it showed up would have been enough grounding for me. Everything else in the novel gets a little of this. Even Crokus' protectors being from the crimson guard is kind of implied by Caladan Broods talk with the Crone.
Anywho, as a criticism it only stands out to me because I dont have a lot of criticisms of the work. To criticize myself though; I love almost everything I read.
I personally really enjoy how he layers the combat narrative. The same event taking place across 4 or 5 different characters POV and plots is really fun and he executes it well.
Deadhouse Gates is on hiatus as I read Nona. No spoilers. Only hype.
Edit; I dont wanna double post. But Nona the Ninth completed. Hypity hype hype. Loved it. Nona loves me and you.
-John Stuart Mill
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WW2 was the culmination of a good century plus of Japanese colonialism and adventurism in China.
I kind of wish King wouldn't try to write books set in the modern day. The man is 75 years old and while he's still an avid consumer of modern media, his references and mindset just don't feel authentic for someone 3 generations separated from him. The main character of Fairy Tale is a 17 year old kid in 2013, but is regularly referencing books and media more fitting for someone either a lot older or a lot further back in time. I mean, I know people do watch TCM, but I'm probably about the same age as the father of the kid in the book and watching old movies on TCM all the time is the kind of thing that my parent's generation would do. I dunno. It's not a big deal, really, but given King's age his work always just sort of feels eternally set in some period between the late 60's and 80's. It's almost more distracting from the story when someone uses a cellphone or social media than when kids talk to one another about actors who'd been dead for decades before they were born.
I started Nona the Ninth but realized on the first page that I couldn't remember anyone's names except Harrow, Gideon, and John, so I stopped and started re-reading Gideon. It's still great.
I just finished it. Yes, yes, I know, it released like 6 hours ago, I had other shit to do okay?
Anyway, why the fuck are you all still here listening to me talking about it? It's so fucking good! Go read it right now. Right now. It's a stunning work, and it's just masterful in how it builds on and expounds things.
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/TheZombiePenguin
Stream: https://www.twitch.tv/thezombiepenguin/
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The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Daily dracula updates?
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
https://draculadaily.substack.com/about
Dracula is written as a series of journal entries, letters, and newspaper clippings, taking place from May to November. This website sends you the parts of the book on the dates they take place. So if you had signed up in advance, then on May 3rd you'd get an email with Jonathan Harker's journal entry at the very beginning of the book, on May 4th you'd get his next journal entry, and so on. Some days nothing happens, some days have several pages of text across multiple journals or letters.
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
It's going to be a cold grey winter in the UK, but being able to cosy up in my armchair and listen to these whenever I choose will make it a great deal more bearable.
Don’t read the Gaunt’s Ghost series especially with their rule book on the horizon.
Time for a re-read of the series.
The original cover is hella cheesy cyberpunk, which was the style at the time.
Iirc the hardwired novel is canon to the cyberpunk universe, since it kinda fills out some more of the world that's between the big cities.
The Last Wish, the first collection of short stories in the Witcher series, is decidedly mediocre. Is this the only book series where both the TV and videogame adaptations are superior?
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
I'm currently re-reading Harrow for the first time (preparatory to reading Nona) and it certainly is a different experience knowing what the hell is going on.
It wasn't called Complicity for no reason!
Tangentially: I re-read Surface Detail recently and boy howdy, Banks just nailed everything about Elon and other Musks didn't he?
I've listened to some Harrow after Nona and a whole lot more makes sense than before.
As someone who lived through the 80s, I can confirm that the aesthetic was all about style and nothing about taste.
I enjoyed Hardwired very much, and Voice of The Whirlwind too.
They're all just Surface Detail
Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/id/TheZombiePenguin
Stream: https://www.twitch.tv/thezombiepenguin/
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Also for classic cyberpunk before cyberpunk was invented, John Brunner (Shockwave Rider) and Alfred Bester (Tiger, Tiger). Pat Cadigan (Synners). Or read the Mirrorshades anthology for other names like Lewis Shiner etc. and also to re-read Red Star, Winter Orbit to be reminded of what a really really good short story writer can do.
Snow Crash.
It is parody but it is that style of parody that is the genre it is parodying.
I should probably go back and read all three now that I've read Nona. I think I really enjoyed Nona, but it can be a bit difficult when every books is such a massive tonal shift.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
you just eventually understand it mostly through context. Most all the titles are compound parts off of a base so you got like “room” “royal room” “church room” “tomb room” “royal tomb room”
I think it works much worse in the follow up novels because we go from a pov character who also doesn’t know all of these things, to a pov character that spent his whole life a part of those systems and takes it for granted. Maia really helps us to be lost together and slowly figure it out
Yeah, I'm about 50% through and it makes more sense now. Part of it has been trying to go into more books as blind as possible. I knew a lot of people here had spoken well of it, but I couldn't remember where, and I didn't read the description or anything.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
And pick up Diamond Age while you're at it.
I think of Snow Crash less as a parody and more of a proto-Meta take on cyberpunk before Meta was a thing?
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Instead, I switched to Tim Pratt's Axiom trilogy. Much better! It was almost like cozy sf of The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet in terms of the characters, but with higher stakes. I was afraid I was going to be disappointed at the ending as I was getting close, but it actually turned out well. I thought the main crew were all pretty well fleshed out and unique, with none of them kind of blending together and being forgotten.
It's also interesting to compare to what I read of Artemis. Both had a main character who was a tough bi woman, picking up a girlfriend along the way early in the book. But even though both were written by men, there just seemed more believability in Pratt's. Likewise with the other characters that spanned the spectrum of human variety (though I can't say as much about that in the book I abandoned). I'll leave this bit Pratt wrote in an AMA:
So, yeah, you could kind of feel the difference. In Artemis, I just got this feeling that her sexuality was more because she would be even more of a Badass Cool Chick if she was seducing women just like the Badass Cool Dudes. Or maybe Palmer has the same sort of backstory, but just can't write characters as well.
[1]And the footnotes were pointless and unfunny.