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[Scrow]

i should read ender's game one day

 

[ZephyrFate]

Fully agree with this. I've found more intellectual merit in some of the sci-fi greats then in about half of the "literature" we read in high-school English. Fuck The Scarlet Letter

Hey now, let's not turn this into a bashing of classic novels. The Scarlet Letter has its time and place as being a book kids should read.

 

[The Technomancer]

i should read ender's game one day

Don't let people calling it "utterly fantastic" shape your preconceptions going into it (even though it totally is)
Do keep in mind that at its heart its about characters and relationships.

Hey now, let's not turn this into a bashing of classic novels. The Scarlet Letter has its time and place as being a book kids should read.

IMO Scarlet Letter belongs in a history or sociology course. English was much better when we were reading things like The Plague

 

[elrechazado]

i should read ender's game one day

Read ender's game, and nothing else after that, and you'll be good. And won't ruin ender's game with the retconned fanfic level garbage that comes after it.

 

[Esch]

i suppose neuromancer is alright then?

 

[besada]

Also, can I just say, if the only Herbert you've ever read was the Dune series, you're doing yourself an incredible injustice. I really enjoyed Dune, but I have a special love in my heart for books like Whipping Star, which feature Jorj X. McKie from BuSab (Bureau of Sabotage) without which, I suspect we wouldn't have the Culture books.

And his novel, White Plague is an emotionally devastating story about the dangers of tailored plagues, the damage terrorists do, and how rapidly we might descend into cultural madness.

 

[Freshmaker]

Hey now, let's not turn this into a bashing of classic novels. The Scarlet Letter has its time and place as being a book kids should read.

Nah.

Young Goodman Brown, yes.

Maybe add in The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym just for the sake of confusing high schoolers entirely.

 

[ZephyrFate]

Nah.

Young Goodman Brown, yes.

Maybe add in The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym just for the sake of confusing high schoolers entirely.

While we're at it, let's throw Infinite Jest at them.

 

[milkyjay20]

If you pick up dark tower you'll want to read 1-4 and then skip the rest....

you'll hear a lot of this, rando14, but judge it on your own. you have the benefit of not having hype build up for a decade. i hated 5-7 the first time i read it too, but after a second read, i genuinely adored them. king kept with the creative concepts that made me love DT in the first place, and character development is consistent throughout the whole series despite being written years apart.

Spoiler

king including himself left an incredibly sour taste in my mouth, but even though it *might* be narcissistic, it extends the scope exponentially. however, i still think the ending was a copout, epilogue and coda both. DT ends at the front door of the tower imo.

the wastelands is still the best volume, but that doesn't take anything from 5-7. wizard and glass didn't fare so well during the second read. you wanna talk about overwritten. :yawn: it's a story i can explain in three sentences dragged out for 500+ pages and the love story is the worst love story this side of final fantasy 8.

 

[milkyjay20]

While we're at it, let's throw Infinite Jest at them.

not before scissoring out the footnotes

 

[Margalis]

Horrible list of pop schmaltz.

 

[ZephyrFate]

not before scissoring out the footnotes

I'm sure the infinite acronyms will be totally understandable.

 

[ZephyrFate]

Wouldn't that be considered child abuse?

Only to the O.U.S.

 

[Ratrat]

Read ender's game, and nothing else after that, and you'll be good. And won't ruin ender's game with the retconned fanfic level garbage that comes after it.

So many people say this. Such should be ignored. At the very least read Speaker and Shadow. Maybe Exile.

 

[Dresden]

Well, it also has Gene Wolfe.

ba dum dum TSHHHHHH

You'll see the light one day, man.

 

[ZephyrFate]

You'll see the light one day, man.

Already have, ASOIAF.

 

[elrechazado]

So many people say this. Such should be ignored. At the very least read Speaker and Shadow. Maybe Exile.

And yet I slogged through that entire "from bean's perspective retcon of ender's game" bullshit book that retroactively destroyed the entire story of the only good book, ender's game. Get it out of my head

 

[Freshmaker]

And yet I slogged through that entire "from bean's perspective retcon of ender's game" bullshit book that retroactively destroyed the entire story of the only good book, ender's game. Get it out of my head

The really interesting concepts are in Xenocide. Ender's Game is fine for an introduction.

Piggies and trees though. That's a whole other level.

 

[milkyjay20]

Wouldn't that be considered child abuse?

they'll be fine as long as it's not hardcover

 

[iavi]

i should read ender's game one day

Do. Then, with all that context, move on towards Speaker for the Dead, which is the much better book. The fact that it isn't even on the list when Ender scored so high trips me up.

The really interesting concepts are in Xenocide. Ender's Game is fine for an introduction.

Piggies and trees though. That's a whole other level.

It's fun, but the stuff introduced in Xenocide feels so horribly ass-pulled. Children of the mind then takes that and fucks you royally. The series really does a HUGE dip after Speaker.

But at the least, they're still enjoyable reads. I'm trudging through Shadow of the Hegemon now, and this thing reads as rough as California freeway.

 

[Ratrat]

And yet I slogged through that entire "from bean's perspective retcon of ender's game" bullshit book that retroactively destroyed the entire story of the only good book, ender's game. Get it out of my head

You mean the ending? Yeah, that was spoiled for me so I never cared as much I guess.

 

[Dina]

No Bakker, no Abercrombie, no Richard Morgan and no Peter f Hamilton. Criminal.

 

[milkyjay20]

should i read ender's game, even if i think orson scott card's political opinion straddles the line between hysterical and despicable?

 

[Dead Man]

That too. There's every bit as much artistic merit in something like Thomas Disch's Camp Concentration, but because Orwell did it before we broke everything into convenient genres for easier marketing, and because Disch started selling books in the science fiction section, he gets shafted. Ursula K LeGuin has been fitting forever to be treated as more than a genre author, and she is, of course. Vonnegut hated the label, because it causes a certain sort of idiot to automatically tune your work out.

Some, even much, science fiction is cheap escapism, and there's nothing wrong with that, but science fiction at its core is a literature of ideas. It's a shame it's been so adulterated in movies that when people hear the term they think of summer blockbusters and special effects. Some of the most moving stories I've ever read were science fiction. And I've read a lot of short stories, including most of the work done by people considered masters of the short story.

Well said. No genre has a monopoly on artistic merit, and classification as a particular genre does not determine that fact either.

 

[Dina]

How is the Codex Alera series? Any fans of it here?

I liked it a lot and so did my ex. It's a fun read through. Interesting magic system as well.

 

[Dresden]

should i read ender's game, even if i think orson scott card's political opinion straddles the line between hysterical and despicable?

Ender's Game is long before he went full nutter.

 

[milkyjay20]

Ender's Game is long before he went full nutter.

good to know. what about the alvin maker series? i've always been interested in that series, but i'm hesitant.

 

[Dresden]

good to know. what about the alvin maker series? i've always been interested in that series, but i'm hesitant.

Alvin Maker is Card in his transitory period. It's also very Mormon, from what I've heard. I read the first novel and found it decent at best.

 

[milkyjay20]

hahah... i'll check it out if i find nothing better to read. sometimes i wish i was an indian ya know?

 

[coldvein]

i suppose neuromancer is alright then?

in my top 5 novels of all time anyway.

 

[Mumei]

Ender's Game is long before he went full nutter.

No, he was full nutter long before that. I still loved Ender's Game in high school despite it.

 

[bobnowhere]

Only one book from Philip K. Dick, what a terrible list.

The Man in the High Castle, Ubik, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch and Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said all belong on the list.

 

[Dresden]

Was he that bad in the 70's too? I thought he went full loon after his son died.

 

[Blackface]

The foreverwar is 56? It's easily the greatest Sci-fi book every written. Most Sci-fi writers even agree to this. WTF shit list.

 

[ZephyrFate]

The foreverwar is 56? It's easily the greatest Sci-fi book every written. Most Sci-fi writers even agree to this. WTF shit list.

I like it a lot. Can't wait for the film.

 

[Gaborn]

no Runelord though I recently read Wizardborn and now I need to read the rest also there's a character in there that shares our very own Gaborn name

And completely

Spoiler

Not

coincidentally.

 

[Tim the Wiz]

Wanted to post something like this (but I was beaten and brilliantly so):

That too. There's every bit as much artistic merit in something like Thomas Disch's Camp Concentration, but because Orwell did it before we broke everything into convenient genres for easier marketing, and because Disch started selling books in the science fiction section, he gets shafted. Ursula K LeGuin has been fitting forever to be treated as more than a genre author, and she is, of course. Vonnegut hated the label, because it causes a certain sort of idiot to automatically tune your work out.

Some, even much, science fiction is cheap escapism, and there's nothing wrong with that, but science fiction at its core is a literature of ideas. It's a shame it's been so adulterated in movies that when people hear the term they think of summer blockbusters and special effects. Some of the most moving stories I've ever read were science fiction. And I've read a lot of short stories, including most of the work done by people considered masters of the short story.

:lol @ Sanderson and Goodkind that high. Grudging respect to Card: Speaker and Xenocide were pretty good. Otherwise, Mieville and Le Guin and Wolfe and Kay and Stephenson and Simmons and KSR and Morgan and Stover and, well, too many got shafted.

Perdido had a lot of interesting ideas and a really flat execution. It needed about three passes by an editor and it could have left out a good 2-300 pages.

I can't get over the strong Communist influence of that book. I tried... but it's that and just how fucking weird it is that I can't get into it.

Eww.

The Scar > Dune

brofist.jpg

 

[Zzoram]

The Scar > Dune

Care to elaborate? You've piqued my interest.

 

[Salazar]

:lol @ Sanderson and Goodkind that high.

Goodkind is at present torn between elation at cultural recognition (however facile) and fury at being mistaken for a fantasy writer instead of the conduit for singular and eternal philosophical truth that he is.

It's like being slowly fucked with an agiel, to lapse into his own frame of descriptive reference (rape, pain, helplessness, humiliation, weirdness, cruelty, eventual tedium).

 

[Carcetti]

Of course this is gonna be a 'most popular book' instead of 'best book' list like any other vote list. I read assloads of fantasy and scifi, and I wouldn't exactly agree here but I won't shed any tears over the list anyway.

Haven't read back the whole thread yet but on this page:

Yes, The Scar is damn awesome stuff.

 

[Salazar]

Goodkind's thing is rising within him. Pray that there are no 8 year old children around to feel his wrath.

Yes, motherfuckers. This is a real shirt.

http://www.terrygoodkindstore.com/

Amir0x, when is your birthday ?

 

[Tim the Wiz]

Care to elaborate? You've piqued my interest.

The Scar by China Miéville

If pushed, I would describe it as a politico-fantasy thriller of mythic proportions. Mieville is an incredible fantasist, perhaps the best of his generation.

Goodkind is at present torn between elation at cultural recognition (however facile) and fury at being mistaken for a fantasy writer instead of the conduit for singular and eternal philosophical truth that he is.

It's like being slowly fucked with an agiel, to lapse into his own frame of descriptive reference (rape, pain, helplessness, humiliation, weirdness, cruelty, eventual tedium).

Ha, I'm somehow resisting the urge to post quotes of his most poignantly philosophical passages.

 

[Dresden]

Her power, her magic, was also a weapon of defense. But it would only work on people. It would not work on a chicken. And it would not work on wickedness incarnate.
Her gaze flicked toward the door, checking the distance. The chicken took a single hop toward her. Claws gripping Juni's upper arm, it leaned her way. Her leg muscles tightened till they trembled.

The chicken backed up a step, tensed, and spurted feces onto Juni's face. It let out the cackle that sounded like a laugh. She dearly wished she could tell herself she was being silly. Imagining things.

But she knew better.

 

[Salazar]

Omen Machine. Goodkind drops another banger August 16.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0765327724/?tag=neogaf0e-20

Hannis Arc, working on the tapestry of lines linking constellations of elements that constituted the language of Creation recorded on the ancient Cerulean scroll spread out among the clutter on his desk, was not surprised to see the seven etherial forms billow into the room like acrid smoke driven on a breath of bitter breeze. Like an otherworldly collection of spectral shapes seemingly carried on random eddies of air, they wandered in a loose clutch among the still and silent mounted bears and beasts rising up on their stands, the small forest of stone pedestals holding massive books of recorded prophecy, and the evenly spaced display cases of oddities, their glass reflecting the firelight from the massive hearth at the side of the room.

Since the seven rarely used doors, the shutters on the windows down on the ground level several stories below stood open as a fearless show of invitation. Though they frequently chose to use windows, they didn’t actually need the windows any more than they needed the doors. They could seep through any opening, any crack, like vapor rising in the early morning from the stretches of stagnant water that lay in dark swaths through the peat barrens.

The open shutters were meant to be a declaration for all to see, including the seven, that Hannis Arc feared nothing.

You got that excerpt for free. Terry doesn't give a fuuuuuck.

 

[Carcetti]

Terry Goodkind is the shittiest of shit writers of shitty brick fantasy.

Not only is he terrible, formulaic and illogical, he also injects his shitty nipple-slicing cheap-ass S/M fantasies into the books while driving his bizarre ultra-libertarian philosophy into the brains of poor teen readers.

I don't have any problem reading writers whose politics differ from my own usually, I've read even damn John Ringo since I enjoy my yearly dose of military scifi. Goodkind is just too terrible to stomach.

I don't also have a problem with S/M sex inserted into fantasy, as the Kushiel's Legacy series which made into the list is practically half bondage stuff. What sets it apart from Goodkind is that it's well-crafted and enjoyable reading.

Goodkind just can't get anything right. I hate the man with the force of ten thousand evil chickens.

Edit: reading back, noted this.

are the Kushiel books that good? the covers always seemed like softcore porn to me...

Rama should be way higher, as in top 10. "altered carbon" should be there.

Kushiel books are actual softcore porn, but they're also surprisingly good fantasy, bit like Guy Gavriel Kay's stuff in style.

 

[Tim the Wiz]

Terry doesn't give a fuuuuuck.

Never has a face fit a personality so well.

 

[Salazar]

Do I have permission to make the Omen Machine OT ?

Y'all can't pretend you don't have an interest in how Kahlan narrowly escapes (?) rape this time.

 

[Edmond Dantès]

Always meant to read 'The Silmarillion.'

Do it. The history of Arda is fascinating and of course the downfall of the original Dark Lord (Melkor), the ravager of Arda is in itself a sight to behold.

 

[Freshmaker]

John Gardner gets no love.

Grendel.

Heck, even his kid's stories like Dragon Dragon are awesome.

"Dragon, dragon, how do you do? I've come from the king to murder you. Say it very loudly and firmly and the dragon will fall, God willing, at your feet."

Tyrion would appreciate that story.

 

[Edmond Dantès]

Also surprised by the inclusion of Watership down, I didn't realise it was so well thought of. Warms my heart to know though.