Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books

[fishonjazz]

Sorry to colton and other fans of the wheel of time for bashing it. I can see why people liked it and i will stop bashing it.

 

[gregbroncs]

Am I the only one that really likes this genre but does not really like Tolkien? The Hobbit was a great book. But I thought the Trilogy was hard to read and a bit too long winded for me. Wheel of Time is great though. Just picked up the last book a week ago and am going to read it after A Dance with Dragons, which I am working on now.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

I liked Wheel of Time when I first read it, which was in high school. But I distinctly remember quitting in the middle of book 9 in disgust after it had all slowed to a crawl (it was all downhill after around book 5 or 6). A few years later, I tried picking them back up again and reading from the beginning, but I just couldn't do it. Halfway through the first book I wondered why I had liked these books in the first place. I may yet go back and try again, I think it's been more than five years now. But it ain't high on my priority list. I'd rather re-read Hobb, or Martin, Dan Simmons, or even Eddings.

As for Tolkien, I remember loving LOTR a whole lot more than The Hobbit. I read LOTR again six or seven years ago and didn't like it as well as I had the first time, but still enjoyed myself. But I can see why others might not care for it.

 

[gregbroncs]

It took me longer to read a LOTR book than any Wheel of Time or Song of fire and Ice book. And the WOT and Martin Books are 3X's as long.

 

[Hekate]

Wheel of Time is a lot better than A song of Ice and Fire. I can see how some people may get bored with latter books though.

What surprised me was that noone mentioned Ursula K. Leguin's Earthsea. Fantastic read. One of the best books I have ever read regardless of genre.

Another one I like is Michael Ende. The Prison of Freedom had splendid short stories. He also has more popular books you probably know. The Neverending Story and Momo.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

Wheel of Time is a lot better than A song of Ice and Fire. I can see how some people may get bored with latter books though.

What surprised me was that noone mentioned Ursula K. Leguin's Earthsea. Fantastic read. One of the best books I have ever read regardless of genre.

Another one I like is Michael Ende. The Prison of Freedom had splendid short stories. He also has more popular books you probably know. The Neverending Story and Momo.

Wow, I completely disagree. At least if we're talking about 1-3 of SOIAF... 4-5 weren't so hot (still better than books 8 and 9 of WoT). I'll take any one of those first three books over anything Robert Jordan ever wrote.

 

[colton]

I read the first few SOIAF books. They were great, but eventually the graphic sex & violence made me decide to give up on the series. Frankly I have no regrets.

 

[fishonjazz]

I read the first few SOIAF books. They were great, but eventually the graphic sex & violence made me decide to give up on the series. Frankly I have no regrets.

That makes sense.... they are pretty damn R-rated

 

[colton]

What surprised me was that noone mentioned Ursula K. Leguin's Earthsea. Fantastic read. One of the best books I have ever read regardless of genre.

I had to read A Wizard of Earthsea for 7th or 8th grade English. Loved the book. A few weeks later I discovered that there were two sequels in the school library, and read them both in the library that same day.

 

[Hekate]

Wow, I completely disagree. At least if we're talking about 1-3 of SOIAF... 4-5 weren't so hot (still better than books 8 and 9 of WoT). I'll take any one of those first three books over anything Robert Jordan ever wrote.

6-10 was bad especially 10(still better than some of the books I've read) but series pick up after that. While SOIAF is great I truly don't think it has the system/backstory/details Wot has. Jordan is a great world builder and I think it appeals to me more. Having a vast, lively world that is.

I had to read A Wizard of Earthsea for 7th or 8th grade English. Loved the book. A few weeks later I discovered that there were two sequels in the school library, and read them both in the library that same day.

It was the first fantastic fiction books I read. I am glad to stumble onto them. It has 6 books and every one of them is great.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

6-10 was bad especially 10(still better than some of the books I've read) but series pick up after that. While SOIAF is great I truly don't think it has the system/backstory/details Wot has. Jordan is a great world builder and I think it appeals to me more. Having a vast, lively world that is.

Again, perfectly legit for you to prefer the one over the other, but saying that Martin's series doesn't have "the system/backstory/details Wot has," and that it has a more "vast" and "lively" world, those to me just seem like a crazy things to say. There's all sorts of backstory, world-building, and ridiculous numbers of characters in ASOIAF. I mean, for one it so far has well over a thousand named characters (link). And there's all kinds of interesting backstory about the Targaryen conquest of Westeros, the history of the various religions, the rebellion, the history of the Night's Watch, history of the First Men, old conflicts and alliances between the great families, all that stuff. After reading nine books of WoT, I found Martin's books more fleshed out in terms of both the characters and the world.

I guess we just have to agree to disagree.

 

[Hekate]

Again, perfectly legit for you to prefer the one over the other, but saying that Martin's series doesn't have "the system/backstory/details Wot has," and that it has a more "vast" and "lively" world, those to me just seem like a crazy things to say. There's all sorts of backstory, world-building, and ridiculous numbers of characters in ASOIAF. I mean, for one it so far has well over a thousand named characters (link). And there's all kinds of interesting backstory about the Targaryen conquest of Westeros, the history of the various religions, the rebellion, the history of the Night's Watch, history of the First Men, old conflicts and alliances between the great families, all that stuff. After reading nine books of WoT, I found Martin's books more fleshed out in terms of both the characters and the world.

I guess we just have to agree to disagree.

Let's do that. It has been a long time since I read first 3 novels of SOIAF so I am going by the feeling I got when I was reading it. I shall do a reread when my books clear up just to have a better opinion.

BTW Texhnolyze is going great. Thanks again for that.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

Let's do that. It has been a long time since I read first 3 novels of SOIAF so I am going by the feeling I got when I was reading it. I shall do a reread when my books clear up just to have a better opinion.

BTW Texhnolyze is going great. Thanks again for that.

Maybe your opinion will change, maybe not, but there's also so much great stuff to read that re-reading something you were tepid about to begin with isn't always the best option. May as well just move on and chalk it up to different strokes for different folks. The only reason I'm even considering re-reading book 1 of WoT again is that I experienced two such different reactions to it... loved 1-5 on first read, then on second read was bored before I even finished the first one. I'm thinking there may be some middle ground for me there, maybe I was just in a bad mood, so probably I owe it to myself to give it one more shot to know for sure.

But glad you're enjoying Texhnolyze. Not many people do, it's about as niche as you can get. :-D

 

[Shaggy]

I will admit back in the day that if the art work sucked on the cover I wouldn't read the book so I probably missed out on some good books.

Has anyone read The Dragon Prince or The Dragon Star series by Melanie Rawn? I really like them back in the early 90's. I never read anything else from her though.

I really liked Sword of Shannara series up until I stopped reading them, the last book I read was The Talisman of Shanna. Ender's Game was one of my favorites, lost interst in it after speaker of the dead. I really got in to Wheel of Time, the last book I read was Lord of Chaos. I'm pretty sure that was the last Fantasy book I've read.


OT: Lower Lights BBS, anyone? TradeWars? Thinking about those books takes me back to that time period.

 

[AtheistPreacher]

I will admit back in the day that if the art work sucked on the cover I wouldn't read the book so I probably missed out on some good books.

Has anyone read The Dragon Prince or The Dragon Star series by Melanie Rawn? I really like them back in the early 90's. I never read anything else from her though.

I really liked Sword of Shannara series up until I stopped reading them, the last book I read was The Talisman of Shanna. Ender's Game was one of my favorites, lost interst in it after speaker of the dead. I really got in to Wheel of Time, the last book I read was Lord of Chaos. I'm pretty sure that was the last Fantasy book I've read.


OT: Lower Lights BBS, anyone? TradeWars? Thinking about those books takes me back to that time period.

I did read Sword of Shannara back in the day, but at the time it struck me as such a carbon copy of Tolkien that I resolved not to read any of the others. I have to admit it was compulsively readable, and I hear that the subsequent books aren't such blatant ripoffs. So it may be another series that deserves a revisit from me.

Ender's Game is still one of my very favorites. That and Watership Down are the two books that I recommend to anyone and everyone regardless of the genres they claim to enjoy or not enjoy. It's hard to go wrong with either of those.

Never read or even heard of Melanie Rawn.

 

[Shaggy]

I read Sword of Shannara in 5th or 6th grade. I'm pretty sure I had never heard of The Hobbit or LOTR until Jr. High or High School. I think that's why I'm so found of it. It was the coolest thing I had ever read, at the time.

 

[spycam1]

Lol @ fish for hating books he liked enough to read 7,000 pages of.

 

[spycam1]

I read the first 5 books in WOT back in high school, then gave up cause it was just so giant. I just started it up again and am in the middle of 7. No idea when I'll finish, though, school takes up any time I would have to read WOT. So does Jazzfanz.

 

[fishonjazz]

Lol @ fish for hating books he liked enough to read 7,000 pages of.

It was a chore
I VERY RARELY ever start reading something and then stop but reading wheel of time was something that i was just making myself do, i was not enjoying it.
i wish the characters were less predictable cause the idea of the story is really good.

I just couldnt take anymore of the stereotyping of men and women and nynaeve tugging on her braid.

Its funny cause when i finally decided to stop reading it i went to wikipedia to read summaries of each book to see how it ended...... i had guessed what i thought would happen and which characters would live through the story and whatnot, and i ended up being correct about nearly everything.
It was so predictable in terms of who would live and die and what was going to happen

Thats what i love about a song of fire and ice...... heroes change into villians, villians become heroes, you never know who will live or die, the bad guys actually win sometimes, bad things happen to good people quite often and good things happen to bad people. (Just like real life)

WOT is like how in action movies there can be 20 bad guys with machine guns vs 1 good guy with a knife and somehow all the bad guys cant shoot straight and the good guy seems bulletproof while managing to win the battle

 

[One Brow]

I had to read A Wizard of Earthsea for 7th or 8th grade English. Loved the book. A few weeks later I discovered that there were two sequels in the school library, and read them both in the library that same day.

Have you read 4 and 5 yet?