Deities Edition>Old:>>25072147>Recommended reading charts (Look here before asking for vague recs):https://mega.nz/folder/kj5hWI6J#0cyw0-ZdvZKOJW3fPI6RfQ/folder/4rAmSZxb>Archive:https://warosu.org/lit/?task=search2&search_subject=sffg>Goodreads:https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/1029811-sffg
>last book you’ve read>current read>next book you plan to read
>>25085571>low effort post>ai slopfuck off
>>25085571The curse of the mistwraitThe darkness that comes beforeProbably the warrior prophet. Depending on the 1st book ending. Otherwise probably men at arms
>>25085581>low effort postIt’s a staple and regular post of /sffg/ newfag
>>25085590the last person who posted it at least contributed to discussion
>>25085581last/current/next predates /lit/and /lit/ definitely predates your newfag ass
>>25085570i love me some ascendant gods
Is this any good?
>>25085571>Gardens of the Moon>Deadhouse Gates>Dunno yet, maybe take a break from Malazan and read Between Two Fires.
>>25085693Take malazan breaks when you feel a burnout coming. They’re heavy books and easy to get exhausted with them if you’re doing them one after the other. I did one Malazan book, one standalone/short story, one Malazan book, one standalone/short story and repeat.
Reading this and hyerfocusing on the Epstein files is really bringing my mental illness to a breaking point
>>25085571Oponn edition>last book you’ve readRobert E. Howward - Hour of the Dragon>current readSarah J. Maas - A Court of Mist and Fury>next book you plan to readEither more Acotar, Conan or Dark Tower
>>25085706Why are you reading prime romantasy slop?
>>25085712Fantasy in general is a very slop genre.
>>25085555>Are the Felisin chapters in DG misery porn all the way through? God damn.Yes.
>>25085730Is that the bit from house of chains where tavroe kills felsin and doesn’t even know it’s her. To be a Paran is to know suffering
>>25085692Yes, if you don't mind having a sassy not!Jew doctor as the heroine of your medieval fantasy novel. Kay is really good at this whole writing business.
>>25085692It's incredibly good. One of the best I've read in recent years.
Why is Malazan so controversial?
>>25085746It’s not user friendly and doesn’t hold your hand. You have to adapt or quit
>>25085746Idiots that want to know EVERYTHING get angry when the author treats his characters as human beings and NPC narrators that lore dump info to the reader.
>>25085746GotM is the mother of all filters. DG would have been a MUCH better first novel as it's not only better written, but has a more concise story.
>>25085756and not NPC narrators that lore dump info to the reader*
>>25085746>KruppeAlways found it funny he's almost 1:1 copy of Mocker from Dread Empire, but so few have read the damn thing to pick up on it. Erikson was indeed heavily inspired by Cook.
>>25085771Erikson might be the only person to have read any Cook outside of Black Company
>>25085760I've said it before in these threads but I didn't appreciate or care for it until I read the later books. Only now do I see the groundwork and fine details Gardens was setting up for the rest of the series
>>25085771I mean it’s not a secret or anything. He’s said that Glen Cook and Stephen R. Donaldson are his biggest influences
May as well repost here since people are talking about Malazan. This is the best sense publically about the relative quality of individual books in the series:- Memories of Ice slightly edges out the rest in being considered the best. - Deadhouse Gates, Midnight Tides, The Bonehunters, Toll the Hounds, and The Crippled God are all considered very close in quality to one another and slightly below Memories of Ice. - House of Chains, Reaper's Gale, and Dust of Dreams are in the next tier below, generally liked but not considered as good as the previously mentioned six.- Gardens of the Moon is the clear consensus for weakest book in the series.Personally, my top three are Dust of Dreams, Reaper's Gale, and Midnight Tides.>>25085746People start reading it with the expectation that it's going to be structured similarly to other epic fantasy series, but it isn't. They also expect to be spoonfed lore at the beginning, which is something Erikson doesn't do.>>25085799I read Thomas Covenant right after finishing Malazan and I was surprised at how much of it Erikson used as direct inspiration. Everybody mentions Cook as his biggest inspiration and I couldn's disagree more.
Funny how there was a r*ddit thread in /Fantasy the other day "shitting" in Malazan with 1.000 upvotes. Then you see their top 5 series and has First Law and Stormlight Archive in it.
>>25085852It's Reddit, bro.
>>25085852About what I expected lol
>>25085746Overrated by most that make it past the filter.
>>25085493
I started A Cavern of Black Ice today. So far enjoying it, really liking the atmosphere a lot and it's pretty fast paced for the most part. What's the consensus on this series around here
Heya boys I'm desperately looking for a recommendation and this is my last bastion. What I'm looking for is something similar to Robin Hobb's works (yes, even Soldier's Son except the overabundance of sex scenes)What I like about them the most is the way characters feel like real people. Every character is very much a trope, but I just like the execution (e.g. Burrich being a drunk and an asshole while still being the father/mentor figure)I'm not that much into the wholesome chungus stuff or the way people gush over her villains (almost all of them are utter shit). Problem is, all recommendations I get are either: a) the popular fantasy book of the day, b) wholesome chungus fest or c) edgelord shitWhat I've tried and disliked:>ASOIAFCool idea, but the characters are pretty 1 dimensional. Plus I'm not interested in everyone being a fucker for no reason>The Name of the Windkys to the fag that recommended this piece of shit to me>The Wheel of Time and other Brandenson stuffWay too formulaic and worldbuilding focused for me>The Curse of ChalionWould've liked it if it spent enough time with its characters. I didn't manage to get attached to them in a single bookThings that worked for me:>The First Law Not that good, but the characters were interesting>The Wire yes the TV showand no, im not a tranny
>>25085852as an aside, can someone explain why they are so into bingo?
>>25085571>>last book you’ve readDracula (don't know if it fits)>>current readI don't know>>next book you plan to readeither Elric or The Hobbit or something else idk
>>25085914These series are fairly commonly recommended in these threads so there's a good chance you'd run into them, I'll just get ahead of everyone else and post them:>Memory, Sorrow and Thorn by Tad WilliamsThis one was a direct inspiration for Hobb's work. Different aspects of it inspired ASOIAF, but Tad is not the edgelord GRRM is.>Wars of Light and Shadow by Janny WurtsThis is a long fantasy series by a female contemporary of Hobb's, very underrated series.
>>25085914Read Gormenghast, Titus' life in the castle is a lot like Fitz's childhood
>>25085914Throne of Bones by Brian McNaughton
>Save the world fantasy of our generation.>Tinker with machines by yourself.
>>25085571A Song for ArbonneLanarkDon't know yet
>>25086001crazy how the trailer spoils the entire movie
>>25085020>I couldn't really accept that premise from the start, which is probably why I didn't enjoy the series that much - the stuff I liked best was all the crusade politicking where Kellhus *wasn't* involvedHeres the thing. I can accept the premise. I just dont accept how its depicted. I am somebody who is staunchly of the opinion that most people are retards and severely unselfaware.But no matter how true that is, even if people arent "complicated" (however that can be defined), the conditions of life are complicated. Heres what I mean: Even somebody who has zero self awareness, is guided by a unique "darkness that comes before".A simple example. When I was in highschool and was dating a girl, she was very insecure about her weight. I have no shame in saying I liked how her weight looked on her and thought she had a very pretty voice and face. No matter how honest and open I was about this, she didnt believe me for a very long time. There are some things that run so much deeper than simply being "self aware". It doesnt matter whether she was self aware or not about why she was insecure, and it didnt matter that I was aware of why she was insecure. I couldn't appeal to her in such a way, despite the fact that she liked me alot.The way Kellhus interacts with characters can either only be called magic. OR the characters can only be considered "fake" or "hollow" or "shallow". You know how she came around to believing me? Because I talked with her nearly every day, and we grew closer, and I repeated my honest feelings constantly. Until eventually she trusted me and my feelings enough.Kellhus woos characters almost IMMEDIATELY with almost zero need for extended interaction beyond maintaing the already established relationship, he doesnt need to break any barriers.The obvious exceptions (according to book 1 and 2) is Cnauir and Conphas. Cnauir is a retard though, who is still wooed because he doesnt understand himself, but he has an instinct that hardens him against Kellhus. Conphas doesnt trust him because hes not religiously inclined, and is an egomaniac. Neither of these characters are particularly complex (maybe Cnauir, definitely not Conphas) but it doesnt matter because theyre simply "made" to not be wooed by Kellhus.It makes character interactions a bit arbitrary and contrived.The premise the books want you to carry on with, arent strongly established enough. They dont engage enough with the foundations of human psychology. I'm not even talking about real world psychology, just any proposed psychology with foundational principles.Instead it appeals to the intuition which is enough for simple minded individuals that: Give somebody something they like/want, and theyll like/want you.
I've been reading a bit of reddit on thousandfold thought, to get an idea of how its recieved, and whenever the book is criticized youll get an "Erm you didnt understand the Moenghus conversation, the complex metaphysics are explained in the next series" I have no idea what the Moenghus convo is about, so I expect the series later establishes a basis for Kellhus to be able to do what he does, but I dont believe it can be anything but effectively magical, because even with zero psychological framework, the example I gave about the highschool girl remains true. Character interactions arent even shown to be that complex, and by complex I mean: Not one sided in Kellhus' favour. Even with somebody like Cnauir and Conphas its one sided. Its not that Kellhus' magic doesnt work, its that they ignore it rather than engage with it. Thats a one sided relationship, if youre too weak to fight back. Its like coming to a fist fight with a knife. Just because youre more "dangerous" doesnt mean that youre stronger.
Just started The Name of the Wind. What am I in for?
>>25086050a neckbeard's self insert being a mary suenot in a fun way
>>25085746Don't like fat fetishists trying act like they don't have a fat fetish and then trying to trick me into vicariously watching them jack off to their fat fetish through their writing. Simple as.
>>25085570I'm almost finished with Gardens of the Moon and honestly the way the setting depicts gods kind of puts me off. They're kind of lame.
>>25086138He does spend a lot of time talking about women being pudgy doesn't he? Never really strung them all together until right now tbqhf.>>25086140They're more deity than God™. Honestly the ascendant/god thing is one of the cooler parts of the setting.
>>25085909Not sure what others think, but this is one of my all-time favorite series. And the author has completed the next book and is trying to find a publisher.
>>25086140There are some really cool god moments in the later books
>>25086050I haven't read the book and don't plan to. Why did Elon mention it here?
>>25086033>Kellhus woos characters almost IMMEDIATELY with almost zero need for extended interactionYeah, this is my main problem with it.Some of it can perhaps be handwaved as "well, the crusade took a while, there were a bunch of campfire talks off-screen (or off-page I guess)", but even stillI guess this might be one of those "you can't write a character smarter than you" moments, you'd need to actually be a pretty decent psychologist (or highly manipulative narcissist I guess) to convincingly write this stuff.And like, you just finished the 2nd book, but the sheer heights of "oh yeah the Dunyain can just do that btw" that await you... I mean, if anything a monastic order of guys who've been autistically hanging out in the mountains and contemplating the soul for centuries would be *really bad* at social interaction, and just, most things in general! But nah, Dunyain conditioning you see.
>>25086050He might genuinely be the lamest man in modern history.
>>25086281It's hard to take the Dunyain seriously when you realize they're basically the INTJ meme. They just reek of a power fantasy designed by shut-in incels who think despite having their perception of reality and human nature warped by living on the internet, they're autistic savants of how clueless normies work (I don't actually know any normies besides my mom, but t-trust me bro)
>>25086050>I have known her longer, my smile said. True, you have been inside the circle of her arms, tasted her mouth, felt the warmth of her, and that is something I have never had. But there is a part of her that is only for me. You cannot touch it, no matter how hard you might try. And after she has left you I will still be here, making her laugh. My light shining in her. I will still be here long after she has forgotten your name.romantasy for men
>>25084147
I've just read Egan's Quarantine and there's a bit that is killing me. The high concept stuff was surprisingly straightforward and digestible, but for the life of me I cannot work this out.When he's on the heist, and continually checks his odds to see if he's on the "right" eigenstate, why come when he flips the battery, he fails, yet presses onward as though he is successful? I mean we know he's the narrator of the surviving eigenstate. Is it like a no-collapse thing where now the reader sees that all versions persist?
>>25086289What kind of hyperbole is this. Even if you dislike him (which I do) that's a retarded and factually wrong take.
>>25086375https://www.gregegan.net/QUARANTINE/QM/QM.htmlhttps://www.gregegan.net/QUARANTINE/Runs/Runs.html
>>25086388Thanks, that's the first thing I checked but it didn't answer the question. The runs article is under normal probability, but he needs 5 plus signs or else he's not in control by the story's own logic. He even shits a bit at the minus on the third flip.
>>25086407I can't honestly pretend to understand it well enough to provide an adequate answer.
>>25085746>first book is shit>rest is overrated>women are physically equal to men with no explanation>malazanfags are insufferable redditors
>>25086050Bro tried to romanticise his years spent in the friendzone and was rightfully mocked. He was so embarrassed that in the second novel, he dramatically increased the amount of women the main character slept with in a hilariously transparent attempt to make him seem like less of a cuck. The author was again rightfully mocked and, as the protagonist was a self insert mary sue, it completely destroyed all his motivation to continue the story.
>>25086378>Even if you dislike him (which I do)You're awfully defensive about somebody you say you dislike, weird nerd.
>>25085746Filters people used to being handed the entire setting in two pages of exposition.
>>25085571>LastBlood Pact by Dan Abnett>CurrentDeathstalker Rebellion by Simon R. Green>NextNot sure. I'm checking out one of the Lensmen anthologies from the library, so probably that. In related news I'm forcing myself to not buy any more Warhammer novels until I've finished the ones I own.
>>25085571- Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke (5 stars)- The Best of It, by Kay Ryan- The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story, by Stephen Donaldson>>25085692Yes, extremely. Just bear in mind that it is LITERALLY a retelling of the Reconquista with swapped around names (and barely), it's actually a little disorienting if you know a lot about the time periodBut that's ok because that era fucking rules and we need more fiction from then anywayThat's GGK's gimmick, historical fictional masquerading as fantasy, and this is his best
Anybody read the books that new Korean chicken action game is based on?
>>25085571>Dungeon Crawler CarlWhat a weird book. Idk if I'm going to keep going on with the series, the setting was interesting, but the characters were pretty dry and the writing was a bit too crass for me.3.5/5>Seven SurrendersLiking it so far.>The Will to Battle
>>25085571The Last Quarter of the Moon (not SFF)Memories of IceEither Princess of Mars or House of Chains
>>25086711Im fucking tired of historical fantasy wars. War might just be the most boring fucking thing to read ever. History itself can be interesting for the disputes, but how much does "They raped, they looted they killed" need to emphasized before it becomes fucking hollow.If this Kay book is worth something it better be on merits other than war history "but fantasy"
>>25086033>>25086281>>25086299I mean he spent months worming his way into their heads, faking miracles, fighting battles, and he still had to yolo it with the circumfix. If you compare him to other false prophets/cult leaders it's not that far fetched. As to people thinking Dunyain should be autists with no social skills, I think it's a case of selection bias.
>>25085571I've finally read enough recently to answer this>Last BookDarkness that Comes Before>Current Read (Technically finished already)Warrior Prophet>Next BookThe Thousandfold Thought. This makes or breaks the series for me, on whether I continue with the Aspect Emperor Trilogy.I'm at a point where Malazan almost interests me more, but I don't want to feel commited to ANOTHER long ass series that I have to trudge through to get to the good parts.
>>25086748War is secondary or even tertiary, as is the case with the actual Reconquistain short, Muslims from Africa take over much of southern Spain, and they run it far better than the natives did. "Spain" at this point is handful of petty kingdoms in the north and east that are always fighting and aren't all that interested in taking the territory backand so centuries go by. it very nearly solidifies, but the right mixture of political and religious goals align that reignite the idea of taking the land back, and at that point the Muslims are infighting themselves and have a very weak graspanyway, it's a setting with a lot of very complicated relationships. you have Christians living in Islamic lands and vice versa in peace, Christians at war with other Christians, Muslims using Christian mercenaries, bothers betraying brothers, Jews converting to anything other than Judaism because everyone hates them, famous heroes being exiled for being too good and joining the other side and then back againwhat I'm saying is it's a very rich setting full of strange alliances and bedfellows and GGK captures it wonderfully
>>25085571> lastThe Halfling's Gem (Icewind Dale Trilogy #3)> current and next (starting on Sunday)The Legacy (Legacy of the Drow #1)I am six books (of forty total) into the Drizzt saga. So far I think my favorite characters, aside from Drizzt, and Wulfgar and Regis. Also I liked Dove, though she has so far only appeared in one book.
>>25086752Can you remind me why Achamian changed his mind on Kellhus being part of thr Consult to Kellhus being the saviour? I was going to say something about Achamian, but I honestly dont remember the finer details as to why Achamian changed his mind, just that Kellhus kept doing his mindreading thing until Achamian was ready to give up the gnosis, before getting captured and tortured
>>25086138Erm, achkually that says a lot more about than it does me, bucko
>>25087140A lot of words to just say yes.
>>25086797Man, I remember reading Drizzt as a young man. Good times.
>>25087140Coward.
Finally got around to reading the new Dresden book. Is there an in-universe reason why the white court vampires couldn't do the magic feeding through a circle thing themselves? I'm guessing it's as simple as "because harry is starborn and they aren't, standing in for meta level reasons to do with the symbolism of vampirism, avoiding having the story devolve from overpoweredness, and contriving the situation Jim wants between Harry and Lara.
>>25087146He's not a true architect because he's a coward that denies it.
>>25087140He's got it all, the faux-uncertain "umm" from a professional writer, the male feminist virtue signalling, the subtle put-down formed by a halfhearted "but to each his own!" repeated twice.
Can somebody recommend me fantasy with a psychopath or evil main character?
>>25086304This internal monologue is like 3 pages long. Immediately after he goes into the magic forest to find the sex fairy who fucks people so hard they die
>>25087439Prince of Thorns trilogy
>>25087470Even when I read this part over a decade in college it was gigacringe and the only way I could justify it to myself was that Kote was an unreliable narrator. Wise Man's Fear is wall-to-wall lame teenage wish fulfillment fantasy. The only way to make sense of the Kingkiller Chronicles is to assume Kote is just a crazy old man who is a pathological liar (like Rothfuss). He isn't actually the Kingkiller and is just making stuff up that he thinks the guy interviewing him will want to hear. At some point the guy interviewing him catches on and tells him that this random forest spirit he talked to is some super powerful demon that will doom you if you ever listen to his words and Kote is too embarassed in being caught in a lie to admit it didn't happen, so he has to play along with it. The reason the series ends so abruptly is that Kote falls asleep and the narrator leaves.>>25086138>fat fetishistsThick women are not fat women. Know the difference.
>>25087439>The Gap Cycle by DonaldsonDoesn't really have a main character but a lot of the major characters are psychopaths.>Ice by Anna Kavan>The Engineer trilogy by K. J. ParkerNot exactly but close enough.>The Second Apocalypse by BakkerLots of psychopaths.>Beyond Redemption by Michael FletcherThe main guy isn't a psychopath, just evil, but basically everybody else is a psychopath.>Peace by Gene WolfeLess obviously and more borderline than the others, very different.
>>25087535>Thick women are not fat women. Know the difference.
>>25087538>this guy has a fat fetish because...there are like 3 of them in whole series and one of them could not survive past 1/3 of book 1
>>25087536>The Engineer trilogy by K. J. ParkerDo you have any other specific impressions you could share on this? I enjoyed walled city but his scavenger series turned into one of the most 'huh?' books I've ever read. Man sets up the invasion of the sea people, forgets about it, goes home, story becomes completely unhinged from here.
>>25087535That's a nice head canon you've developed to protect your feelings.
>>25087538Nevermind, you are right about Erickson. That's just gross. I was thinking dangerous curves, not stacked folds. >>25087579Spoken like a true homo. I don't discriminate when it comes to pretty women.
>>25086847He was outing the skin spies
>>25087558Silverfox inherited Tattersail's fat ass tho.
>rapeThe villain of the story was revealed to be not just a homosexual, but a religious homosexual who was indoctrinated into an esoteric mystical homosexual satanist cult.
>>25087762Lame.
Large sections of text rendered in italics makes me drop books, even if I was somewhat enjoying them. Just felt I needed to get that off my chest.
>>25087912Sissy.
>>25085571>last book you’ve readWhole? Stray Cat Strut 7>current readI have tons of stuff reading on RR.But no finished novel.>next book you plan to readNot sure. I'm getting burned out and finding interesting stuff is difficult. Two last books I've seen recommended were bust.
>>25086741>3.5/5Mongo is appaled!>a bit too crass for me.I can see why that would be an issue. I like to interpret it as the crassness being mirror into our own media. Where manufacturing outrage is great way to farm attention. I don't take it at face value.
>>25087630He learned that AFTER he got tortured did he not? Or else Achamian would have known that Sarcellus was a skin spy. I mean this is literally the "climax" of the Warrior Prophet, and where it ends, Achamian realizing Kellhus could always see them. Or am i confused.
>>25087439The Kane series by Karl Edward Wagner
>>25087536is the Gap Cycle worth reading?
>>25087439One of the few times I'll recommend Prince of Nothing, since the MC is a literal sociopath master manipulator self-styled as a Nietzschean übermensch whose mission is of such cosmic importance that he is not bound by the petty moral axioms of normies. It is an incel coomer power fantasy that makes GRRM look tactful.
>>25088139No, it has RAPE in it. Though what would you expect from Stephen "Rape" Donaldson? It's all he knows. It consumes his every waking moment. It fuels all his writing efforts. This desire to ravage and defile a woman. To have and to hold power over womanhood.
For the past few weeks whenever I read, I find it hard to stay focused on the actual text I'm reading and not going into a mental exercise of how I would've written this or that passage or dialogue. It's getting to the point where it's taking an hour to read like 20-30 pages though. Why am I becoming like this?
>>25088265>Why am I becoming like this?Have you considered that youre mentally ill?
>>25088265Try to write and see how difficult is. That may get it out of your system.
>>25085852Went to r/fantasy for the first time of my life because of your post. I don't know what I expected
>>25088139>Without transition, his body passed from movement to poised stillness>Without transition, he shifted into his emergency mode – the state of whetted creative concentration on which his reputation rested >Almost without transition, however, his scars had gone as pale as his face
>don't give a fuck about the fantastic literature written in the last 40 years>start buying classic books on the genresFeels good, man.
Someone a thread or two ago brought up the Lensmen novels and they seemed interesting. Just brought home the first volume of the Lensman Chronicles from the library. >>25088300You could literally recommend any book and the odds are it would be better than Name of the Wind.
>>25088300Sometimes I think about going back and reading my childhood favorites but I worry about tarnishing their memory like this. Sorry, Percy. You'll stay a based memory.
Got Station Eleven yesterday since I've been looking for some post-apocalypse reads lately. How do we feel on this one
Any fantasy novel that has white supremacist undertone/overtones. Something like the turner diaries but with swords and magic
>>25088546https://www.goodreads.com/group/show_book/1029811-sffg?book_id=20170404
>>25087558Tattersail's soul was so thicc that she get stuck in the doorway to death like a stepsister inside of a washing machine or window and that's how Silverfox was born. this is canon.
>>25088558Legends and Lattes
>>25088546if you want the goat of post apocalypse stories read Swan Song. It's like if The Stand was good.
I didn't start reading Stormlight Archive until after I heard about the "I'm his therapist" line but The Way of Kings has this line:>"Er, sure," Kal said quickly. "I'm not saying he's lying, Jost. He just might have some trauma-induced hallucinations or something like that."And this is a flashback chapter, where Kaladin is TWELVE YEARS OLD.Both lines are bad, but why do you guys act surprised about the dialogue of W&T when this book came out in 2010?
>>25088797Because they may been much younger when they read it and thought nothing of it at the time.
>>25087993desu I don't even remember Achamian ever thinking Kellhus was a part of the Consult. I thought he was always just fretting about the Celmomas prophecy, betraying the Mandate by teaching Kellhus the Gnosis, and the fact that the Mandate would capture Kellhus. Then when he returns after his torture he hates Kellhus for cucking him but still teaches him the Gnosis due to him undeniably being the saviour.
>>25088846Im like 90% sure Achamian thought Kellhus was like some part of the consult in someway because of the prophecy...but also because of something else that I cant remember.Anyway I asked because I wanted to test if Achamian actually changed his mind for a complex enough reason, or if it was just Kellhus' persistent magical mind reading powers just slowly opening up an Achamian that didnt truly have any reason, not arbitrary, to take so long to be opened up.
i thought the second apocalypse is edgy devoid of humor type of shit but the book is surprisingly funny. A few chapters in and it's pretty enjoyable so far. Achamian is my nigga
>>25087140I was thinking about picking up GotM. Seeing this has changed my mind.
>genuinely believe there are other lifeforms out there (my theory is that space faring civilizations have some kind of special technology, and if this technology isn't detected, they avoid the planet)>also love fictional alien films and books>tfw these two things are constantly conflated and I keep seeing recs for alien books written by schizo con artists
>>25088871It's been a while since I've read the books, but I could have sworn Achamian was physically incapable of teaching the Gnosis because of Seswatha's influence, and Kellhus had to speak to Achamian while he was sleeping to break him open.
>>25089063whaaaaat? i dont remember this at all, maybe this happens in the 3rd book, but before he even gets tortured hes already convinced himself that kellhus is the saviour and that hed teach him the gnosisthe seswatha influence stuff, only really becomes relevant during his torture, so thats why its important to highlight he already decided before the torture
>>25087559The Engineer books are very much in the style of Walled City, and a lot of people say it's his best trilogy so you'll probably enjoy them more than Scavenger. And you're right, that series is a major mind-fuck where you are left with no idea what really happened or why... or even how.
If someone recommends Dungeon Crawler Carl to me one more time I will go insane. If people want to enjoy absolute bottom of the barrel undiluted Reddit slop, ok fine, whatever, I can deal with it. But the extent to which its fans feel the need to evangelize is absurd, I don't think I've ever experienced a fanbase so persistent in the face of disinterest — not even the Malazan people are this desperately determined to force everyone to like what they like.
>>25089295You should read Mother of Learning, The Perfect Loop and Beware of Chicken instead!
>>25089295>not even the Malazan people are this desperately determined to force everyone to like what they like.Filtered.
>>25089295Of course popular series get recommended more often. What were you expecting?
>>25088009Great series. Karl Wagner was probably the closest author to Robert E. Howard since he died.
>>25089309Also, Chrysalis, He Who Fights With Monsters, The Wandering Inn, Heretical Fishing, Azarinth Healer, 1% Lifesteal
>>25089316>Of course popular series get recommended more often. Then why does Prince of Nothing get recommended so much?
>>25087140Meanwhile GRRM makes sure we know that Dany is skinny with a modest bust on her very first page. All the Arya-expy characters too, even Lyanna. based fatman
>>25089336To create the illusion of popularity, in the hopes that a publisher will answer Bakker's calls and we can finally get No-God: Reign in Hell.
>>25089336Every general has their resident schizo.
>>25089295The worst is many of them pretend it's actually quality fiction rather than litrpg slop from RR. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy slop from time to time. But I also don't pretend it's actually good.
>>25089369But DCC is not on RR?
>>25089378Maybe not anymore. But it started as a RR book.https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/29358/dungeon-crawler-carl-book-6-the-ghosts-of-earth
>>25089295Is there anything else that puts you away from reading it? Other than it being a Redditslop?
>>25089406The weird sex stuff.
Yeah see, Kellhus explicitly doesnt let Achamian know he can see the skin spies before fully convincing the retard Achamian that hes a philosopher, so he should give up the Gnosis.
>>25089384DCC started as serialized elsewhere and then was later added to Royal Road. It didn't start there.
lol
>>25089512Everything I've seen says it started on RR. But, it doesn't really matter if it actually started there or some other website like AO3 or patreon. It's still all the same serialized garbage. .
Getting through multiple chapters of Achamian knowing that hes a cuck and everybody thinks hes a cuck is going to be a rough slog of a read.
sigh
>>25089406Well "Redditslop" encapsulates a lot about my issues with it. For instance, from the wiki:"Grand Champion, Breed Winner Regional, National Winner Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk is the deuteragonist of Dungeon Crawler Carl. A tortoiseshell Persian cat, she is the party leader of the Royal Court of Princess Donut."This by itself indicates that reading the book would be only marginally better than gouging out my own eyes. I have nothing in common with someone who can read that description and go "Yup that's a book I want to read and recommend to people." Everything else I've heard or seen re: the tone of the books comes across as the purest safe-edgy Redditor material imaginable.Then there's the simple fact that I think litrpg is an inherently bad genre. Anything in the genre that has redeeming qualities would be better if it was not litrpg. Given the choice between the best litrpg of all time and some licensed shit like Star Wars books, or a slightly above average YA romantasy? I wouldn't pick the litrpg.
>>25089551To be fair, there's some pretty good Star Wars books
>>25089369yeah it's like if I spent my time telling anyone who might listen that random Warhammer space marine books are ackshually super amazing top tier fiction, not guilty pleasure pulp
>>25089490Esmenet did a pretty job calling his ass out so it's hard to feel bad for him getting cucked.
>>25089556I guess I could have specified "a random star wars book" because sure, while most aren't good, there are a few standouts. Traitor is probably the best, but it's in the weird position of being a genuinely good book which won't make much sense unless you've read several much less good books. Actually, speaking of Stover, the whole Actor system in Acts of Caine is about as close to litrpg as I can stomach — no stats bullshit, but people dropping into a parallel fantasy world and livestreaming as they do RPG player character type shit for the entertainment of their world's masses (to the detriment of the fantasy world's natives).
lol oh boy, the beginning of this book is going to be an extreeeeme slog, an unfathomable slog. i can already imagine the abundance of ego elevated esmenet chapters
>>25089563>Esmenet did a pretty job calling his ass out when? about what?
>>25089570She points out, though he claimed to love her, he never:>made her his mistress despite it being common among mandate schoolmen>never asked her to stop using contraceptivesAnd some other stuff. Basically telling him that his love was always a bullshit fantasy that he never took seriously.
>>25089551>This by itself indicates that reading the book would be only marginally better than gouging out my own eyes.By what logic?
Is there anything like Muv-Luv but in a fantasy setting? Humanity has to unite to fight a desperate war against a looming mysterious threat or something like that. The White Walkers would count but unfortunately 99% of the books focus on human factions backstabbing each other
>>25089551>Then there's the simple fact that I think litrpg is an inherently bad genre. Anything in the genre that has redeeming qualities would be better if it was not litrpg.Funny, as some do not consider DCC as "archetypical" LitRPG. Most of the fights rely on Carl figuring the "gotcha" of the fight. Not on his stats.
>>25089590Anon I'm sorry but there's literally nothing else in the history of human artistic expression (trust me, I'm a lit major) that does the exact thing Muv-Luv does.If all you're looking for is the desperate war part, you can find that in any number of places though. In Viriconium, for example, you have the army of invading bugs in a fantasy setting.
>>25087140Whatever floats except thin or small breasted women?
>>25089587If you don't see the issue, like I said, we have nothing in common.>>25089591Ok then, so why have them? What is improved by including stats? What you're saying basically just reinforces my "any litrpg with redeeming qualities would be better if it simply was not litrpg" attitude.
>>25089598>Ok then, so why have them? What is improved by including stats?Read the fucking book?The stats are part of death game the aliens forced on Earth. It is intended to be a RPG. It is the setting. But Carl is an MC and he breaks tons of stuff because he doesn't play by the rules.>If you don't see the issue, like I said, we have nothing in common.Your serious lack of any attempt at explaining yourself gives me impression worse than a redditor.
>>25089587Taste isnt logical, no matter how much rationalization you stick onto it after the fact.Giving titles to cats to glorify nothing at all seems like something incapable of looking at the world without irony or some other sad modern lens.
>>25089604So. Book talking about real thing is somehow bad?https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_showhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Show_cathttps://cfa.org/all-about-cat-shows/Donut having titles and stuff is a real thing. There are people who take their cats to be judged and receive titles. The book just emphasizes how arrogant and vain Donut is. It is core of her personality.I would say criticizing a book you haven't read is sign of even worse incapability.
>>25089602"Explain yourself" lmao, see this is exactly what I'm talking about with DCC fans. The Donut stuff is unfathomably cringe reddit chungus shit. Once upon a time not a single person in /sffg/ would need that spelled out for them.re: the stats, I don't mean in-universe, obviously. I don't care what in-universe justification an author comes up with for an out of universe moronic decision. Tragic that this kind of nonsense escaped the containment zone of manga.
>>25089607>So. Book talking about (frivolous thing) is bad?Yes, are they not fighting for their lives?>I would say criticizing a book you haven't read is sign of even worse incapability.I haven't criticized the book as I would actually need to read it as you say. I explained my point of view when confronted with a singular element of that book. Nonetheless I'm thoroughly unsure what you expect to come from this conversation, the inital post was even complaining that they didn't want to be advertised to about something they had already made their mind up about. I am not that anon but absolutely nothing I have heard about the book makes me want to read it.
>>25089623>Yes, are they not fighting for their lives?Yes? The show cat thing is Donut's backstory.>>25089619>The Donut stuff is unfathomably cringe reddit chungus shit.You mean as a writing element or as a person?You mean that it is bad to write about character who has negative personality traits, but grows out of them as story progresses?>re: the stats, I don't mean in-universe, obviously.You are not being obvious at all. It is a writing element. It is a setting. It forces characters to act in specific way. What the fuck do you not understand, on /lit/, about writing a setting?
Any recommendations of creepy novels where the main villain is an actual skeleton? But not a comedy or funny book, a serious story where the main antagonist is a skeleton.
>>25089859Haha, as if anyone would ever do that.
>>25089859THEY GONNA GETCHA Sadly no, you'll have better luck with the LN crowd.
>>25089926Yes
>>25089295>>25089551I rec'd DCC to a friend because I figured it'd be his style of humor (it's not for me but even I admit there were a few parts I did found funny. I still DNF'd book 1). I was surprised when he came back to me 4 weeks later saying he had listened to the entire series though.I think LITRPG is low effort, much like isekai, but has potential. I think it'd make more sense in a "characters are playing in an MMO but also do things in real life" drama. I grew up playing WoW and Guild Wars though and liked .hack as a teenager though. But no one wants to do that, they just want the character permanently in the gamified part of the story because then otherwise they'd have to write actual literature.
>>25089945I really hate people recommending DCC as a "comedy" book.It is not. At best it is a dark comedy.It is a action thriller with huge anti-capitalist and anti-media message. If you consider DCC funny, it means you are part of the problem.
>>25089949when I say "his style of humor" I literally mean he's a tankie so I don't think I'm off reccing it to him.
>>25089949>anti-capitalisticStill with this nonsense. Don't confuse anti establishment or anti corpo with anti-capitalistic. You will find that 95% of fantasy novels are anti-capitalistic, despite a good portion of them being written by right wing leaning writers.
Just finished the Mistborn trilogy. To be honest I was impressed that Sando had it in him to brutally kill Elend and then Vin as well. I wish the three books were shorter, don’t think Sando needed three 200k word books to tell that story
>>25089945>"characters are playing in an MMO but also do things in real life"That's Shangri-la Frontier.
>>25090019>Don't confuse anti establishment or anti corpo with anti-capitalistic.I think you are talking semantics here. But I guess your words are more accurate.
2/3 through Memories of Ice and damn is it good. Don't know what Reddit's whining about...
>>25090029I dropped it at about halfway, I think. Every single chapter for the past three books I have randomly been seeing humans ascending or getting bombarded with ancient memories. Every single mage uses THAT forgotten ancient warren, and it all came to a head when I'm reading about some randoms about to try and fight undead velociraptors and the priest goes “sorry, I worship an ancient PRIMAL ELDER GOD and I have no idea what magic he will give me.”Love the writing, love the world, love the prose, but even as they’re bringing in these new Pannion Domin guys and you already have them setting up the next set of seafaring raiders? Even people who j think are supposed to be normal like Toc at getting bombarded by memories from ancient direwolves and then in the same chapter also bombarded by memories of some tiger soletaken ascendant. When every single chapter has three world-shaking revelations I begin to roll my eyes.As it stands I was reading for Kruppe and the hope of another chain of dogs, but it now in the back of my queue
>>25090029but that's plebbit's favorite one?
>>25090042nah, they hate everything now
>>25090035I guess the High Fantasy aspect of the series is either 'make it' or 'break it' type of deal
>>25090035>nooo why is magic mysterious and unknowable to me noooooo
>>25089859I only know about protagonists as skeletons, sorry.
>>25090152There’s like a dozen normal gods and a dozen normal warrens and you see like, three of them in the span you see a dozen ELDER ANCIENT MYSTERY GODS with their MYSTERY WARRENS
>>25090186"Normal gods" are just more recent ascendants. You see people ascend even during the series.
>>25090186my man. never look up how many real life religions, beliefs and aspects of gods are out there. especially don't get into folk saints.
>>25090022Use spoiler tags bro
>>25090211sanderson doesn't deserve spoilers
>>25090022The Mistborn books are quite succinct compared to his current novels. Stormlight Archive in particular is bloated with superfluous point of view characters whose personal histories and character developments eat up hundreds of pages. If you ever branch out from Mistborn to Sanderson's newer bibliography, you'll look back on those books fondly for their comparatively sparing word counts and more focused narratives. Though it's not as though Mistborn is the only decent thing he wrote. Elantris is also enjoyable and positively brief by Sanderson's standards, and can be enjoyed as a stand alone novel despite his intention to expand upon it as he does with everything else.
>>25090194>>25090191I’m just saying the newer gods and ascendants and the more common warrens in magic are not as common as the amount of extreme ancient warren and ascendants forgotten by both history and ice and the thoughts of men and yada yada yadaMagic is mysterious. You don’t need to cuck your own magic by introducing more mysterious special magic >>25090211Most books I do but the way I see it, anyone who has read Sanderkek’s entry trilogy at this point isn’t going to
>>25090301thanks for the graphic, this is somewhat helpful
>>25088797because most of his fans were brought in during Covid during an advertising push, so they’d ignore the very blatant problems with the writing because “it’s the bestest heckin’ story ever!!!1!”now that the high has worn off, and they’re starting to redevelop a more objective lens, they’re realizing it’s been shit the whole time, but much like any other cult, it’ll be a an incredibly slow decline
>>25090301I’mPartly through malazan and this pic still makes no sense to me
So pic related's trailer has now 16 million views and everyone in the comments seem to have read the book. They are all sharing inside jokes and scenes and book spoilers. I feel left out that so many YT normies have actually picked up a book for once in their lives. Should i read this?
>>25090389Depends, did you like The Martian but feel it needed a little more millennial humor?
>>25090389it's reddit: the novel, but not really BAD. hope you like zingers and smartass protagonist.
bazinga! *smirks*
>>25088797"Trauma" is a medical term that essentially just means "injury". Psychologists appropriated the term to describe mental issues along medical lines, to frame their clients as "patients" and their work as "healing". This is something that people born in the latter 20th century take for granted, but psychology is a very new field compared to traditional medicine. It has had to stand on the shoulders of the medical profession to gain respect and even legitimacy, and adopting medical terminology is part of that.So Kaladin's usage here is informed by his training as a physician. His father was a physician. Not merely a "healer" with recourse to superstitious folk remedies, but an actual scholar of anatomy and some chemistry, and he trained Kaladin in the same learning he had. So I read it more as Kaladin using the opportunity to show off his education and obscure vocabulary, which is believable for a 12 year old boy who otherwise doesn't get many chances to show off.
>>25088797>>25090449I mean, people knew what a crazy person was in the middle ages. I can't imagine humanity didn't discover head trauma can make a person crazy until the last few hundred years.
Redditors read Mistborn Era One and come out believing the Lord Ruler was an evil unforgivable racist chud
What was his fucking problem?
>>25090453While there was ample anecdotal evidence to suggest head injuries could cause madness, nobody understood why, because madness also appeared in people who had sustained no physical injury. It was mysterious, and therefore treated with superstition by most people. Commonly thought of as a spiritual affliction rather than a physical ailment. The difference between the mind and the spirit were vague at best for most people outside a limited educated class. But returning to the observation that sometimes head injuries can make people crazy: to form this observation you'd have to have many examples on which to base it. You'd have to see a lot of head injuries, and enough of them result in addled wits to comfortably assert it as an explanation. In Kaladin's world, only a physician or a soldier would have such familiarity with head injuries. A farmer or other rustic laborer would be no stranger to injury, anybody who works with livestock would have stories of broken bones and even deaths caused by unpredictable animals, and they might even know a person who went funny after a knock to the head. But would they have enough examples to establish a clear pattern? In a small rural community?
>>25090459He was an evil racist chud, but he also saved the world. These two things aren't mutually exclusive. I'm certain that if he could have found a way to save the world only for himself and his chosen people, he would have, but as he did not have the knowledge or time to formulate such a solution he saved everybody then later used his powers to brutally oppress the unworthy.
>>25090449>It has had to stand on the shoulders of the medical profession to gain respect and even legitimacy, and adopting medical terminology is part of that.Such a simple thing you said, and yet, it explains so so much about my problems with modern psychology as a discipline
>>25090510nta but your problem is looking at "modern psychology" as you probably mean it as a discipline. It's a literal pseudoscience cash cow. Return to Jung.
>>25090514>It's a literal pseudoscienceThats my exact problem with it. The exact fact that it, and many other art subjects are so insecure about not being a science. I dont care much about Jung or Freud. But actually taking a psych class, I could not believe how much wasted time was spent on just consuming information. How much more I learned about what I consider to be "representations" (after reading some bergson) Vs the actual process of the human mind and behaviour.In other words. I was being fed the technicals, things I will almost never remember, things that only have value and meaning technically, to be used, not to be understood.The best analogy, is that, it would be as if you went to school to learn about grammar, and punctuation, rather than to learn about how language actually works, how writing derives its meaning.This is a phenomenon that occured with almost every single subject I took. And yes I understand introductory subjects are maybe deliberately supposed to be like that, but due to some personal issues of my own, this revelation almost completely killed my interest in school.The desire to be "objective" and scientific is so strong. The desire to be "descriptive". That it ends up feeling like none of these subjects are actually saying anything, actually understanding anything.But I obviously MUST be wrong. They have to be understanding something. Or else so much money wouldnt be dumped into them.Either that, or im confusing USEFULNESS with UNDERSTANDING and Value. But when you dont need to really understand something to use it. It becomes very obvious why usefulness would triumph, if you just need to produce a populace, that produces and produces and produces things to be used, so that more can be produced, with no purpose, no value, just consumption and extension of life.
>>25090301Your main mistake is thinking the old magic is more special, better, or rarer than the new magic. It's not. It's just a different way to do magic.
>>25090514Psychology is a nonesense field. Math is the most purest form of science.
>>25090545>Psychology is a nonesense field. More basic to the point of being trivia.>Math is the most purest form of science.Mostly. Fuck negative numbers. All my homies hate negative numbers.
>>25090514The main issue with modern psychology is not that it lacks scientific rigor (that was actually even more true in Freud's and even Carl Jung's day after all) it's that psychology has a great deal of unwarranted influence on public policy, and authorities will either ignorantly or knowingly conflate the various, different disciplines within psychology into a homogeneous blob for the purposes of lending credence to the least credible people within it. Basically, psychology today encompasses hard sciences like neurochemistry and the softest of soft sciences like psychoanalysis. A neuroscientist who has a meticulous knowledge of hormones and neurotransmitters and how they work on a physical level is given the same weight as dream interpreter who is basically an up-jumped fortune teller. This is used simultaneously to elevate charlatans above their station and to discredit actual scientists, depending on political expediency. Psychology is a very politically fraught scientific field even compared to most others, I think only climatology is more politically charged these days, but it is not nearly as institutionally entrenched. The more you learn about psychology the less you trust it. If you put any faith at all in what the APA says or recommends, you're not literate enough on the subject.
>>25090555>Basically, psychology today encompasses hard sciences like neurochemistry and the softest of soft sciences like psychoanalysis.checked but that's exactly why I clarified "as you probably mean it." too many uppity faggots trying to piggyback. that said fuck you, psychoanalysis is the only real form of the "psychology" we're colloquially referring to. the subconscious is literally the only thing that matters in this area.
>>25090564Psychoanalysis as practiced by Freud and Jung is pure bunk. The only useful aspect of it is talk therapy, which has been spun off into better disciplines. Psychoanalysis has too much cultural baggage and is rooted in arbitrary interpretations of opaque symbolism that Freud and Jung insisted were the internal language of the mind. Therapy is useful. Interpretation is not. The vast majority of writings by psychoanalysts are interpretive, and therefore garbage nobody wastes their time on anymore.
>>25090573>The only useful aspect of it is talk therapyoh so you're just one of the faggots piggybacking. cool beans.
>>25090576I find it baffling how somebody can call modern psychology pseudo-science then turn around and defend actual pseudo-science like psychoanalysis. Have you actually read anything written by Jung or Freud, or do you merely cling to the past due to being frustrated with the present? I assure, Freud and Jung's ideas are discredited for a good reason. If it was useful it wouldn't have been discarded. To be clear: useful does not mean true or good. It means it can be exploited, for good or ill. Therapy is useful. It's not necessarily GOOD.
>>25090579>If it was useful it wouldn't have been discarded.Tesla called and he said>lol>lmao even
Nevermind ignore my entire post. Its clear nobody in this thread has ever read philosophy. Your fundamental capacity and scope for understanding anything outside your bubble is narrow.
>>25090587mad cuz bad
>>25090582Tesla wasn't useful to the people with power and money, he was a threat. Psychology WAS useful to the people with power and money, so they became its patron. Psychology was a new field that could replace religion as a tool of social regulation. Not in the overt sense, with a powerful Church presiding over society, but in a more subtle, insidious method. Masquerading as science in the 20th century had a far more potent effect than claiming to have divine authority. People increasingly trusted science. Making broad claims about human behavior and identity with the backing of "science" carried weight with the public far more than "god told me to". It also helps that "science" was a lot less rigorous back then, and by the time serious scrutiny was applied to psychology too many laws were based on its early findings to publish any serious criticism.
>>25090601>Tesla wasn't useful to the people with power and money, he was a threat. Psychology WAS useful to the people with power and money, so they became its patron.You are so fucking close anon. Make the connection with what I said before. I believe in you.
>>25085571>Last Book: Jurassic Park - Michael Crichton>Current: The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress - Robert Heinlein & The Tank Lords - David Drake>Next: Canticle for Leibowitz
>>25090587Because Philosophy is one of the lowest of "sciences" there is.
>>25090389>Should i read this?Start with the Greeks.
Reading Blindsight right now. It's enjoyable. But I'm also realizing now how so many authors (Bakker being a good example to) are so incredibly spooked by empiricist psychology that it has basically blinkered their imagination. They can only imagine thought as calculation over sense data, and consciousness as a sort of uncomfortable spooky extra thing that doesn't actually do anything. So when they want to write superhumans they are all Cartesian homunculi watching data streams. Man is just a computer with some inconvenient (for their assumptions) extra factor floating behind the eyes.I wonder if "AI" having so much access to data and computational power but remaining dumb will ever shift the needle on this dogma.
>>25090671holy fucking shit...true asf....
>>25090637>The Tank Lords - David Drakethis sounds epic wtf
When does it get good?
>>25090723It's pretty awesome. It's a collection of short stories and novellas from David Drake's Hammer's Slammer's series or "Hammerverse". It's about a Mercenary Tank Regiment in the future that travels the stars accepting contracts to fight for local planetary governments/rebels/whoever is paying. David cut his teeth as a Tank Commander in Vietnam and it very much shows in his writing. He wrote the series to help him "get his head straight" after he got out of Vietnam. He also was also a bit of a prophet where he managed to predict modern tank combat in the 2020's almost to a T as early as the late 60's early 70's. It's /k/ certified.
>>25090713>(Bakker being a good example to) are so incredibly spooked by empiricist psychology that it has basically blinkered their imagination.It shouldnt have been that way for Bakker. He reads philosophy, he should understand how many things science (empircism, same shit) assumes for the sake of usefulness.The way he treats characters is too simple/straightforward
>>25086050A Mary Sue bard goes on Mary Sue adventures.
Way of Kings is unreadable. Based on reputation I figured Sanderson would at least be fun slop. Not so! How disappointing.
I finished blindsight. I thought it was pretty good. It has cool aliens, its an interesting first contact story, but more importantly, I like how its not just a scattershot of neat speculative fiction ideas, but everything presented in the book does end up being tied together thematically at the end.
>>25090029They whine about the tenescowri. Like, I do think Malazan does a good job at avoiding going over the top with edgy / grimdark stuff (even though it is often quite bleak), but the tenescowri really stick out as something obscenely over the top in terms of how awful they are.
Is Three Body Problem really that good? I keep seeing it recommended
>>25091049Its absolute midwit core to the max
>>25091049cool ideas here and there but the story is absolutely all over the place (not in a good way).
>>25090637You're gay.
>>25090921The explanation behind them at least made sense. I couldn't accept them as a naturally occurring phenomenon, they were too horrible, too evil to ever be a natural social development. Because they weren't. They were a deliberate creation of Pannion trying to inflict as much suffering as he possibly could on the mortal descendants of the Imass, in retaliation for what was done to him and his sister. There wasn't any higher purpose than to cause as much pain and suffering as possible, and in that he succeeded.
>>25085570Is "The Grasshopper Lies Heavy" just a literary MacGuffin or is it a literary parallel, trying to comment on the impossibility of any alternate history?
>>25091049It's not well written but it has some interesting ideas. It did not need to be three books. Typical sci-fi experience honestly.
>>25090470He was too based.
>>25085692I'll have to go against the grain here because my experience with this book is far more negative than the other three. Kay, despite being a very good writer capable of capturing the texture of historical cultures, falls on a series of points that ruin the story in my eyes:1-The female jewish doctor, our main character, is ultimately inconsequential for the plot and seems to exist for no other reasons besides being sought after and fucked by powerful men. That's mostly what her contribution ultimately amounts to: She gets herself in a triangle between our two far more relevant and competent warlord protagonists while fucking an emir on the side and being the object of desire for some teenager in the warband. What should've been the moment that justifies her existence and role as MC (performing a complicated brain surgery) is instead given to her father, and she's left as a passive POV of the stuff that happens, all while being a fairly uninteresting character without real ambition.2-Kay's view of medieval Spain is painfully, agonizingly naive: He believes in the myth of the Andalusian Paradise, which is this idea of an hyper-tolerant iberian muslim society rather popular in american circles. His portrayal of the conflict does a disservice to both the Christians and the Almoravids, and completely defangs Andalusian society into some kind of exotic proto-urbanite modernity. This wouldn't be a problem in other fantasy novels, but it's difficult to ignore when part of the point of the book is the nostalgia for the passing of that pleasant, cultured, tolerant civilization... That mostly never existed.
I miss how old scifi writers like Jules Verne and HG Wells at least made an effort to make their science as rigorous as contemporary understanding allowed for. The former was so good at it that he actually managed to predict many future technologies.
>>25090909I liked that the gaggle of mentally ill weirdos in Blindsight at least have various transhumanist advantages to compensate for their obvious deficiencies. The crew in Starfish just had the mental illnesses with no upside, and it was hard to take seriously.
>>25091411The issue is that science has made lot of the fun and interesting stuff impossible.FTL? Impossible.Space travel? Difficult and expensive.AIs? Sure, but don't expect anything ground-breaking.Nuclear Fusion? Fucking hard.I've been meaning to watch Expanse, but when I think about it, the hardness of it's sci-fi makes it sound like not that interesting.>The former was so good at it that he actually managed to predict many future technologies.Sounds like a survivor bias to me.
>>25091446>Sounds like a survivor bias to me.He wasn't a prophet, he just understood science. It's not like our macroscopic understanding of science has changed all that much over the last two centuries.>The issue is that science has made lot of the fun and interesting stuff impossible.Point. Einstein took all the fun out of science.
>>25091446Expanse uses unobtrusive space magic(the Epstein drive) to make the setting possible and then uses overt space magic later on to spice things up. The only thing "hard" about it is the visual aesthetic which tries to be as toned down and gritty as possible.
>>25091489>Epstein driveOof. That did NOT age well. Yikes!
>>25090389>I feel left out that so many YT normies have actually picked up a book for once in their lives. Should i read this?you're an npc
>>25091489Expanse just uses the aesthetics of realism.
>>25091446> The issue is that science has made lot of the fun and interesting stuff impossible.The Three Body Problem and it's sequels would disagree with you.All the best sci-fi writers knew/know to have a foundation of scientific realism but also what to ignore make a story entertaining i.e. space magic.
>>25085730How did he stab through his bones and armor?
>>25091521That just means ignoring science, which makes his complaint just as valid. You just can't make a fun scifi story these days because modern science has made the world banal.
>>25091526Otataral sword
>>25091534You are speaking as if every sci-fi book has to rigorously adhere to the laws of physics. They don't. Even then there's work-arounds. If an author want's FTL in the story? Use wormholes or an Alcubierre drive. Those might not be scientifically possible, but they are scientifically maybes.
The bar for "hard" scifi is so low that Expanse is given the pass just because they remember that conservation of momentum exists.
>>25091557Are you claiming it's not hard scifi?
>>25091548What's wrong with expecting supposed science fiction to care about science?
>>25091559Yes, of course I am. Look at the Epstein Drive, the Protomolecule, the lack of automation etc
>>25091566>Epstein Drive
>>25091564>>25091566The clue is in the name anons.It's called science *fiction*, not science facts.
>>25091572And yet if the science part isn't given enough deference, it's just fiction without the science.
>>25091572Jules Verne never needed to violate the laws of physics to make his stories fun.
>>25091579> Journey to the Center of the EarthNever?
>>25085570I've been reading, or trying to read, Conan to figure out why Dark Fantasy appeals to far right extremists. My hypothesis is that it's because DF posits a lawless, amoral worldview where violence and selfishness are the only "correct" option and only might makes right.That's naturally appealing to people who are fundamentally sociopathic thugs that cannot into basic social norms. I'm not saying the government should ban it or anything, of course. Normal people can enjoy DF just for the thrill of an amoral world without affirming its amoral cosmology.
>>25091548>but they are scientifically maybes.No, they are not.Both are just mathematical anomalies in our models. The moment you start to study their plausibility, they turn out to be impossible.
>>25091585impossible "for now"
>>25091588No, just impossible.
>>25091588No. Ignoring the need for negative mass, which is impossible, and energy needs of antimater-anihilation of mass the size of jupiter, which arguably is possible.Last time I've read about Alcubiere drive, the math says that while the "shape" of the space while in motion is possible, it is impossible to "transform" the space from normal flat space into the alcubiere-drive space. Meaning, it is impossible to "turn on" the drive.
>>25091585> just mathematical anomalies in our modelsEinstein said the same thing about blackholes. He didn't believe they existed or were possible.>>25091594Recent work on the Alcubiere drive means it no longer needs negative mass. So yes, it's still currently impossible and may always be, but the point is that science always progresses. What is impossible today may not be in the future.
>>25085570>Deities EditionWho are some of your favourite fantasy gods /sffg/? Malazan has interesting ones, I liked the whacky and more metaphysical ones from the divine cities trilogy but Rymrgand from Pillars of Eternity is one of my favourites. He's a dispassionate force of nature, he presents an honest cosmic truth in the setting and isn't an attention seeker like the other gods on his pantheon. He's philosophically interesting regarding his domain of entropy but very pragmatic in how he deals with it and the player.
>>25091597>Einstein said the same thing about blackholes. He didn't believe they existed or were possible.And how is that relevant? Einstein was wrong on many things. But not because there was solid math behind them.>but the point is that science always progresses. What is impossible today may not be in the future.Wrong. Science has reache the point where there is little we don't know. We might be scraping for details. But the speed of light is hard limit. Breaking it breaks the core laws of physics.
>>25091495In-universe Epstein was a retard that tied a space ship tier engine he made in his backyard to a boat and got himself killed with its first firing. But yeah the naming is pretty inconvenient.
>>25091602>Science has reache the point where there is little we don't know.we can't even cure the common cold dude
>>25091601goated purely for actually just disintegrating the player and giving you a game over if you talk shit to him.
>>25091602> Einstein was wrong on many things.And you can't be?> Science has reache the point where there is little we don't know.Oh look, is it the late 1800's all over again?
Erikson bros, the counter-jerk didn't work...
>>25091602> Science has reache the point where there is little we don't know.Dark MatterDark EnergyNeutrino MassesQuantum GravityInflationMatter–Antimatter AsymmetryThe Hierarchy Problem...I could go on.
Relatively new reader here. What are your favorite sf/fantasy/horror short stories? I've been reading a lot of them lately and must admit that the whole category has hooked me, but I'm not sufficiently experienced to know what's what yet. Recommendation for authors and specific titles appreciated. Links to places where I can get some for free in text or audio form would be very helpful as well.
>>25091663> Links to places where I can get some for free in text or audio form would be very helpful as well.There's this thing called a public library where you may take out books for a time free of charge
>>25091663It's an incredibly large genre with thousands of sub genres. Name a theme or something you like eg. magic, knights, aliens, grimdark, thieves, arthurian etc and then once that's tailored down you may get some recs
>>25091625it's not that surprisingit has been for years that malazan fans become the most oppressed class in r/fantasy. There are some very dedicated haters there just like in this place
>>25091625Isn't that just Malazan in a nutshell though? Readers have always either loved it or hated it.
Need some fiction to clear the palate, I think. Might see if I'll bounce off Malazan again. Pic related was a frankly enraging read.Mother of Learning is hands down my favourite fiction of all time. Any suggestions for similar fantasy?
>>25091568He wanted to run a breeding program based on himself with ivf implantation. Mass epstein breeding. He spent his time trying to get 'new science' ideas with university academics. You know damn well he had a child rape scifi drive writeup somewhere.
>>25091686If it's the time-loop part you liked then The Years of Apocalypse. It starts out with a similar premise to MoL but soon goes in it's own direction. It's still ongoing but has the potential to be even better than MoL if it keeps up the high standard.
Is Greg Egan the hardest sci-fi author out there? Sometimes i feel like i need to have a Phd in Physics and Math for me to understand half of his work.
Books for this feel?
so is Cnaiür a faggot or not? Or is he just manipulated by Moënghus like the guy in the prologue
>>25091559NtaHard sci-fi as a concept is cope. It doesn't exist now and has never existed. There is only sci-fi that is less "soft" than others.
>>25090804Bakker strikes me as very naive about his own position in his blog and Neuropath. He seems to think that because he can associate it with "what science says," and technological progress, it is immune from any argument from historical contingency, the fact that many of its core suppositions have their roots not in science, but in early-modern Western Christian theological ideas, and from post-modern critiques. Basically, it is "adaptive" so it is true. It doesn't help though that his particular view isn't even that popular among scientists and philosophers in the relevant areas themselves though.So everyone else is involved in psychological coping projects and controlled by history, "scientific" views are not, because they are adapting. Or something like that.I do wonder how he'd respond years later now that eliminitivism and related thought has nose dived in popularity under withering critique and its emerged that its core secular demographic has fertility rates that will reduce its population by 98.8% in just four generations. It doesn't seem adaptive at all now.And this is the problem with swapping out a thick metaphysical notion of truth and the normativity of reason for purely descriptive "adaptation." If your ideology isn't winning, it's simply a dysgenic mutation. You can't then claim "not fair" and appeal to it being *really* true, because your dogma had already closed off that avenue.Alasdair Reynolds characters are written like this too. I guess it is a trope going back to Ender's Game and Dune, but those lean into it way less hard. The idea of the wise person having intuition, *understanding*, and virtue, versus just ultra fast processing and data collection is under utilized.
>>25091671I've started out with Lovecraft and got into Poe through that. Since then I've been looking mostly for short stories from authors I already know like Jack Vance, HG Wells. It seems that the general category of "weird fiction" applies (it's new to me). I am open to basically anything that ties into themes from Lovecraft and Vance, where I really liked Rhialto the Marvellous as a longer work. In other media I really like twilight zone and black mirror for the same reasons I am getting into short stories. Short, punchy stories that mostly revolve around some interesting idea or just describes weird shit and leave you with that ethereal feel. I guess I especially appreciate a general sense of melancholy, fear or unease.Idk I'm probably talking nonsense, but an attempt was made.
>>25091813Robert E. Howard
>>25091723He's a hard gay.
>>25091689Epstein basically had a Dûnyain breeding program planned. He was going to recruit high IQ poor women and pay them to be bred with billionaire and scientist seed. Then raise the kids in a conditioned environment. I don't think he ever got too far with the plan but based on their ideology you can be sure others will try and will also try to hide it.The idea of recruiting high IQ third world women to use as disposable Whale Mothers in particular is on point.You now realize the Dûnyain would have been neoliberals.
>>25091723I don't think we ever see him lusting after men, but that might just be repression. When backed into a high tension cat and mouse later he decides to shift the paradigm by asserting dominance and gay raping his opponent and then he spends the next decades raping dick girls.
>>25085746>it gets good after 700 pagesIt's fans are the same people that drop books before chapter 2. The first book was dogshit and I don't trust their opinions to continue.
Is there name for a trope where story we are watching is last loop from perspective of non-time-looper of time-looper story?Or are there any stories like that?Only one I know is Madoka.
>>25091625I've never read Malazan series, but what's up with this passionate hate towards it? One guy wrote:"I will hold this grudge against him until the end of my days" wtf? Whose dog did Erikson ran over?
>>25091995It’s just not newbie friendly. You’re thrown into a world at war with gods, countries, characters and magic systems without context. You learn things over time and it can be hard to understand initially. Some people think the pay off is worth it, some don’t. Regardless it has a truly autistic level of worldbuilding which I appreciate
>>25092006You've used "autistic" to mean passionate and dedicated.
>>25092014Yes. It’s the good kind of autism
