Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion

Spring may have officially started last month but I'm still waiting for the April showers to bring May flowers. In the meantime, what is everyone reading instead of watching their grass grow?

Completed:
Longs:
Shorts:

I am starting The Eyes of the Overworld by Jack Vance and We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor. Also, I'm about a third of the way through Armor by John Steakley.

I'm deep into Mistborn Era 2 right now. Finished Shadows of Self a few hours ago, and will shortly be starting The Bands of Mourning.

Really loved Shadows of Self! Have high hopes for Bands of Mourning.

I'm back to Pern again with Nerilka's Story by Anne McCaffrey. This is a short one. I had almost no reading time yesterday and still made it almost half way through.

Daughter of Dragons by Jack Campbell

I finished Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel. My review:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Finished the rest of Nerilka yesterday and had time to start Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison since I needed a Genre Blender with dragons so went with a paranormal romance since I usually don't read them (after all what's the point of a challenge if you don't try something different). I was a bit disappointed the library lost the original romance I wanted to read, it looked like it had a lot more humour in it, but at least stumbled across this one instead.

You know, the way a romance is written is not all that different from those pulp adventure stories like Conan, even though the gender of the target audience is different. Lots of rippling male muscles and lithe maidens that submit to them. In fact my dragon character might as well be Conan given his fight first think later attitude. The only difference is this book doesn't use the word "thews" ;)

On my eReader I finished Swords of Mars this morning on the way to work. I started on Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman since that's an upcoming group read.

Huh, I start reading Dragon Bound and it shows up as part of GR's Mystery Week, interesting timing!

https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/1...

A Slip of the Keyboard: Collected Non-Fiction by Terry Pratchett was excellent even though I've never cared for his fiction. I gave it a 5 star review here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Binary Storm by Christopher Hinz is a prequel to his Paratwa trilogy that was written & should be read afterward. It fills in some gaps & I really liked it. I was a bit surprised since often such additions are a let down. This wasn't. I gave it a 4 star review here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Six Wakes, one of this year's Hugo Finalists, was an engaging read... Six clones of the crew of a generation starship pop out of their tanks to discover their predecessors murdered and their memories out of date. Thus begins a murder mystery where even the (clone of the) murderer doesn't know who done it. Sort of Dark Matter meets Altered Carbon on Agatha Christie's space station.

G33z3r wrote: "where even the (clone of the) murderer doesn't know who done it"

That sounds really interesting, I'll have to keep this one in mind.

I enjoyed Six Wakes. A fun twist on a murder mystery that really could only have been told in a sci-fi setting.

G33z3r wrote: "Six Wakes, one of this year's Hugo Finalists, was an engaging read... Six clones of the crew of a generation starship pop out of their tanks to discover their predecessors murdered ..."

Sounds similar to Today We Choose Faces. That's a great book.

Finally received Binti on Inter-library loan. Looking forward to it. Saw Six Wakes at the library, thinking of that one for the future.

Six Wakes is so on my to read list. Glad to hear you enjoyed it.

Blood of Dragons by Jack Campbell

Burned through Binti in a day (only 90 pages); it was excellent. Now starting Darwin's Radio.

My review of The Body Library by Jeff Noon:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Waltz the Hall: The American Play Party by Alan L. Spurgeon

Finished Dragon Bound. I got pretty annoyed by all the "burning glances" and "muscled arms" and the random sex when the characters either just escaped being killed, or caused them to end up in situations where they were about to be killed. But otherwise I did start liking the characters and there was some decent urban fantasy world building that I might have read more to find out what happens to them but the library doesn't have any of the other books and I won't be buying them. This was just a random whim for the bingo challenge after all :)

Starting on Dragonsdawn by Anne McCaffrey

Finished The Bands of Mourning and just so very into Scadrial, the Cosmere and Sanderson as a whole right now lol Rated it 5/5.

Will be moving on to Secret History next for more Mistborn fun.

Rosemary wrote: "Burned through Binti in a day (only 90 pages); it was excellent."

Also read Binti recently and really liked it too. Read through the rest of the series and must say very solid trilogy! I think one of the biggest things for me was how vivid the descriptions were, just felt like such a visual read for me.

I knew whe I started that Nancy Kress's Tomorrow's Kin was the first book in a trilogy expanding on her novella Yesterday's Kin, so no shock that the first 1/3 was close to re-reading the novella. (Aliens make first contact.) The 2nd third reprises some themese Kress previously explored in Beggars in Spain (or Bear did in Darwin's Radio), and the final third gets a bit of action movie heroics.

Kress specializes in bio-scifi. I don't know if it's because I'd read the novella before or just a feeling of familiar themes, but the story didn't excite; I decided to put off reading the 2nd book for a bit and try something else.

I read All You Need Is Kill (Bingo'd as Translated work.) Since I'd seen the Cruise/Blunt movie (Edge of Tomorrow which the studio seems to have retroactively wished they'd titled Live, Die, Repeat) I knew it was a military SF alien invasion blended with Groundhog Day / video game inspiration. Not bad.

Then I re-watched the movie, noticed that despite westernizing setting & characters, the writers had dropped a number of little tidbits from the novel into it, proving at least one of them read the book. :) (Also, Hollywood Ending!)

I sure hope I have a ginormous life span because this group has given me waaay too many books to read that sound great. Don't think I've read any of Nancy Kress. *sigh*

Re-read Consider Phlebas. I think my original rating (4 *s) is right and it's a good introduction to the Culture books, though not among Banks's best novels.

Currently reading: Jade City, which I start with some trepidation since I'm not a big urban fantasy reader.

About half-way during the reading of The Final Empire which I started in March, I ordered the next 2 books of the Mistborn initial trilogy, thru Amazon. After a few days I got a 'shipping' note, and then.... nothing. The books never appeared the - alas unprotected by a lock - parcel box underneath my regular mailbox. Meanwhile I finished the first book and waited some more days. Finally today I went to the bookstore in my city that has the largest english book section, and purchased The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin, which I'll start later today. Who knows, the 2 Sanderson books may yet appear in my parcel box...

I finished Secret History novella last night and The Eleventh Metal short story today. I really enjoyed Secret History mostly for the great reveals and glimpses into the larger Cosmere and scale of everything going on. Had fun flipping back and forth between this novella and rereading certain parts of the original trilogy for clues and seeing how things came together haha. There were some points, more specifically towards the beginning, that did drag a bit/went on longer than they needed to for my tastes but overall liked it. Rated it 4/5.

Eleventh Metal on the other had was a bit dull but makes sense that it would be considering that it was basically just written as a background and magic system intro for the Mistborn RPG for players who never read the books. Rated 2/5 based on my own level of enjoyment.

Will soon be jumping into Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania.

Brendan wrote: "Re-read Consider Phlebas. I think my original rating (4 *s) is right and it's a good introduction to the Culture books, though not among Banks's best novels...."

This is the only Banks novel I've read, and it's also the reason why. I saw it as a bunch of unlikable characters doing a series of random things. On the plus side, I did like the little tidbit about the anti-gravity belts not being effective against pseudo-gravity, e.g. centrifugal force in a rotating space station. It made perfect sense and was a clever observation. So, there was that.

I wouldn't expect Banks is an author you'd like. His sci-fi features a hefty dose of horror and the humour is often very dark. If you do wish to try another one I'd recommend Excession. It's the most "fun" and most of the characters are AIs, which Banks makes much more likeable than his humans.

The Last Guardian of Everness by John C. Wright

Finished Dragonsdawn by McCaffrey, another solid installment in the Pern series.

Now for something quick and silly, How to Twist a Dragon's Tale by Cressida Cowell


On my eReader I finished Herland in advance of the group read, and now I'm back again to Barsoom with Synthetic Men of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

We'll Friday was a day of finishing up the Mistborn short fiction. Thoughts after reading Secret History (4/5), The Eleventh Metal (2/5) and Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania (5/5)?

First thought is I think Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania is very underrated. In fact I found it to be by far the best of the Mistborn short fiction. It kind of blows my mind to see such high ratings for Eleventh Metal (which I honestly found boring, not much action and without much in the way of interesting revelations or the like) vs such low ratings for Allomancer Jak.

Allomancer Jak is basically non-stop action, a fun side story addition to the Era 2 world (especially great for those who enjoyed reading the broadsheets), and the story itself and especially the footnotes are some great comedic fantasy. That said the type of sarcastic and silly humour in this story is pretty much right up my alley. Might not be for everyone but it's the type of humour I like best.

Anyway since Friday night I've since moved on to a detective mystery: Devices and Desires by P.D. James.

I finished my reread of The Hobbit, and in need of a standalone for the bingo card, Cindy suggested The Graveyard Book, so I started that one.

The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. was fun, mixing humor through government bureaucracy with some light time travel adventures.

I was going to Bingo it as Time Travel and use Space Opera for the Humor square; but based on 1st 3 chapters, I'm wondering if I can count the latter as Humor if I didn't laugh.

Mists of Everness by John C. Wright

So I wasn't joking that How to Twist a Dragon's Tale was going to be quick (if I pushed myself I could have done it in one day). The books are starting to grow on me and I must admit I want to find out how many more body parts the recurring villain can lose before they finally kill him off... :)

Started on The Renegades of Pern by Anne McCaffrey.

I was tempted to abandon Space Opera. I made my self finish it, mostly to claim a Bingo square (I'm still calling it Humor.). The attempt to become Douglas Adams seems to have forgotten character & plot in favor of run-on sentences that all too often failed to end in humor. The rare laugh wasn't worth sifting for.

Planetfall Origins is an independently published book by Christopher George Quick. It's his only book to date, just published last year. I have no idea why I bought it new through Amazon, but I did & I loved it. I gave it a 4 star review here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Jim wrote: "Planetfall Origins is an independently published book by Christopher George Quick. ..."

"If Battlestar Gallactica made love to Starship Troopers and had an illegitimate child... and that child was raised by the crew of Firefly,... Yikes!

G33z3r, and any other person, can you please recommend some good comedy science fiction to me please? Something like the The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, or like the Discworld books or the MythAdventures books. Something that you considered a great read.

I recently read What the hell did I just read and loved the humor in it and it had a great story.

I want to read something funny and preferably (but not necessarily) in the science fiction genre. Thanks in advance.

Asad wrote: "G33z3r, and any other person, can you please recommend some good comedy science fiction to me please?..."

Well, since I just suggested a couple in the BINGO topic: Scalzi's Agent to the Stars, The Android's Dream or Redshirts are snarky-dialog style humor. Willis's To Say Nothing of the Dog is more a comedy of manners via time-travel to Victorian England; Her Crosstalk & novella such as Remake & All Seated on the Ground are more SF-futurist humor. And Harry Harrison's Stainless Steel Rat novels are space adventure comedy.

Asad wrote: "G33z3r, and any other person, can you please recommend some good comedy science fiction to me please?"

Oh, if you like short stories, The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination anthology has some really funny stories in it.

G33z3r wrote:

Oh, if you like short stories, The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination anthology has some really funny stories in it. "

Thanks! I got its ebook. Looks good.

I've been reading Martin H. Greenberg edited anthologies. I really enjoyed If I Were an Evil Overlord and your recommendation seems like a better version of the same concept.

I just finished Devices and Desires by P.D. James. An enjoyable mystery, talented descriptive writing and loved the setting and atmosphere. Rated it 3/5 stars though it's closer to 3.5/5 in all actuality.

Am now moving on to a short anthology of Indigenous LGBTQ sci-fi writers, Love Beyond Body, Space, and Time. Have had it for a while but had to wait to be in the mood for an entire book of short stories, which I don't read often.

Back to Sci-Fi after one of my recurring diversions into British humor fiction, reading Thunder & Lightning by Christopher Nuttall. It reminds me a little of The Expanse.

Finished Renegades of Pern, didn't like it as much as the others. It was interesting that McCaffrey wanted to focus on another part of Pern society, but it kept trying to yank itself back to focus on the regulars. It was a bit like it was two novels, the first half was about the renegades and the second half nearly forgot about the first set of characters and returned to the regulars. It also recovered the timeline of previous books and jumped around in time so much that years would pass so I'd often get a little lost (needed to pay more attention to the chapter headings). Still good, just not as good as the others :)

Need to relax my brain from all that chronology tracking and read something that requires no brain power at all - How to Cheat a Dragon's Curse

Asad wrote: "G33z3r, and any other person, can you please recommend some good comedy science fiction to me please? Something like the The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, or like the Discworld books or the Myt..."

Keith Laumer's Retief series is also a classic humorous sf series. Also check out the short stories of Robert Sheckley.