-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
Books: What are they?
- Thread starter Stagnant
- Start date
I've so been meaning to pick up the Dresden files but have been putting it off. I hear it's a good series, though if you haven't heard, it actually ran as a series on Sci-fi, but unfortunately got cut. So the only knowledge I have of the Dresden files is from the few episodes that actually ran... it was enjoyable.
I have no idea when the last one's coming out. I'll keep you posted if I find out, though.
Yeah, there are a lot of elements from a lot of different sources in the Inheritance Cycle, but they are put together very well. My favourite book series, IMO. As for the Farseer Trilogy, I've never read them, but from how you described them they sound like something I'd enjoy.
I just remembered another series I should finish sometime: the Pendragon Series. I've only read the first book in the series, but it was really good. It's my kind of thing. I hope to finish the series one day.
Another really good book is the Transall Saga. It is about a teenager who travels through the desert by himself, when he sees this tube of light that takes him to the future, but the future is like a rebirth of the world. The vegetation is different colours, and there are different animals. The people are different as well. It is also in a medieval style setting. It is a bit confusing at first, but really good.
I've heard of the Dresden Files too, have been meaning to buy the first for some time. I buy a few new books every couple of weeks and Dresden would've been one this week but I found a page listing books/series with transgender characters and bought a bunch of those instead. Kind of backfired, because none of the books I got other than On A Pale Horse was good enough to interest me in the rest of the series, but meh, can't win them all.
Anyway, for Dresden fans, Lev Grossman's "The Magicians" seems a similar kind of deal - magic in the modern world, etc. It's Harry Potter meets Narnia, basically. If you like to like your characters, don't read this: every character is a dick. Still, it was an amusingly ham-fisted attempt by the author to plagiarise without being too obvious about it (he fails).
Anyway, for Dresden fans, Lev Grossman's "The Magicians" seems a similar kind of deal - magic in the modern world, etc. It's Harry Potter meets Narnia, basically. If you like to like your characters, don't read this: every character is a dick. Still, it was an amusingly ham-fisted attempt by the author to plagiarise without being too obvious about it (he fails).
I saw the show first, the books are a million times better.
Anyway, I got 3 of them from the library, unwittingly reading book 12 (of 13 so far) first, so I got spoiler'd. Then I read 1-3 so far, pick up Storm Front, the first book. It really sets the tone for the rest of them, but the 12th book, Turn Coat is absolutely freaking amazing.
Also, Zombie T-Rex.
What about Harry Potter?
I am a big fan of the Harry Potter series (check sig, and avatar)
It really is a good book, if you want to get into reading, or if you want something a bit, more adultish, with more adults as the main characters, then how about,
Mathew Reilly's Seven Ancient Wonders, it has a lot of science to it to
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is about an orphan boy, who has to defeat, the darkest wizard of all time, it literally is do or die, you wont be able to hide, becasue he has accomplishes everywhere
I am a big fan of the Harry Potter series (check sig, and avatar)
It really is a good book, if you want to get into reading, or if you want something a bit, more adultish, with more adults as the main characters, then how about,
Mathew Reilly's Seven Ancient Wonders, it has a lot of science to it to
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is about an orphan boy, who has to defeat, the darkest wizard of all time, it literally is do or die, you wont be able to hide, becasue he has accomplishes everywhere
I actually saw the movies Day Watch and Night Watch, it was pretty cool. I'm not sure, but I believe there's a third one out or coming out.
Currently reading Mistborn book one, by Brandon Sanderson. It was recommended to me as a book outside the usual, boring invincible protagonist crap, and I've wanted to look into Sanderson's work for some time anyway. I did intend to force my way through Wheel of Time at some point before the author died, but I tend to dislike reading continuations by other authors. If it turns out Sanderson is competent, I might continue the plan to check out WoT some day.
Was enjoying Mistborn up until almost the final chapter, and like an idiot ordered the rest in the trilogy (paying full price to take advantage of Amazon prime's fast delivery) then the last few chapters ruined it for me.
Part of what appealed all the way through was the slow but sure descent into messiah-complex-hood by the protagonist's mentor figure which is what's implied to have turned the Big Bad the way he is - starting off well-meaning but letting power and adulation go to his head.
Anyway, it turns out
Besides the disappointing ending, throughout the book there were a few annoyances in Sanderson's personal style. Quite often he'd start using a word outside of dialogue that we haven't been exposed to yet and won't have explained for a few hundred pages. It's fine if it's a couple of characters who both know what the word means using it with no Mr Exposition nearby to ask "what's that?" so we can hear too, but it's not good practice to do it outside of dialogue.
I feel in the hands of a better writer - Raymond Feist, perhaps - this could have been a favourite book. As it stands, the anticlimax of an ending and the generally poor writing drag it down.
Part of what appealed all the way through was the slow but sure descent into messiah-complex-hood by the protagonist's mentor figure which is what's implied to have turned the Big Bad the way he is - starting off well-meaning but letting power and adulation go to his head.
Anyway, it turns out
that the Sauron guy isn't actually the guy whose journal we've slowly been reading to discover a pretty thoughtful, moral man who became the Sauron-style tyrant. It's one of his Fellowship, from a thousand years ago, who betrayed him at the last minute because he felt one of his kind should be the "Hero of Ages", not some foreigner.
Besides that, at the last minute it's revealed that the Lord Ruler isn't a demigod powered by the tears of forsaken children, he just won the superpower lottery twice, having all the powers the protagonists do plus the ancient forgotten equivilant-exchange style alchemical powers.
Besides that, at the last minute it's revealed that the Lord Ruler isn't a demigod powered by the tears of forsaken children, he just won the superpower lottery twice, having all the powers the protagonists do plus the ancient forgotten equivilant-exchange style alchemical powers.
Besides the disappointing ending, throughout the book there were a few annoyances in Sanderson's personal style. Quite often he'd start using a word outside of dialogue that we haven't been exposed to yet and won't have explained for a few hundred pages. It's fine if it's a couple of characters who both know what the word means using it with no Mr Exposition nearby to ask "what's that?" so we can hear too, but it's not good practice to do it outside of dialogue.
I feel in the hands of a better writer - Raymond Feist, perhaps - this could have been a favourite book. As it stands, the anticlimax of an ending and the generally poor writing drag it down.
Started reading the Dresden files today, and they're really interesting...haven't looked back since I turned the first page. Enjoyable read.
I finished up The Belgariad last summer, and I plan on reading through The Malloreon, Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara The Sorceress this summer.
During the school year I discovered "The Legend of Drizzt" and while the first three books (Homeland, Exile, Sojurn) were mediocre, everything else has hooked me, despite the fact that Salvatore seems to think that happy endings are required for some reason...
I'm also planning on re-reading one of my favorite series of all time this year since the prequel is coming out next year. Has anyone read "The Old Kingdom" by Garth Nix? I've read through it several times so far, and I love it every time. The setting is really unique, the characters are interesting and the story was great in my opinion.
During the school year I discovered "The Legend of Drizzt" and while the first three books (Homeland, Exile, Sojurn) were mediocre, everything else has hooked me, despite the fact that Salvatore seems to think that happy endings are required for some reason...
I'm also planning on re-reading one of my favorite series of all time this year since the prequel is coming out next year. Has anyone read "The Old Kingdom" by Garth Nix? I've read through it several times so far, and I love it every time. The setting is really unique, the characters are interesting and the story was great in my opinion.
Night Watch, the movie, changed the plot a huge amount from the book. "Loosely based on" or maybe "Inspired by" is how it should be described. The books are much better.
@Iggy: Actually, I really enjoyed Garth Nix's work. I just finished reading his Keys to the Kingdom series, which was mainly for younger children but incorporated a lot of homage to various mythologies quite well.
He wrote a 4th book that was loosely for the Old Kingdom books, it was a short novella about one of the mundane nonmagical characters, but it also had a series of really interesting short stories. One I particularly liked was told from the perspective of a sea monster who forges magical artifacts for a tribe of primitive men...
The monster turns out to be The Lady of the Lake, and makes Excalibur, the scabbard, and the Holy Grail for Merlin, and they're much more macabre than the standard King Arthur tale
I'm finishing up the Eye of the World series. It starts of relatively strong, yet sharply declines in quality after the 4th or 5th book. I mean sharply. There are points where you think that the author was incoherently scribbling down random words onto the paper with the main characters' names in the midst of them. However, Robert Jordan redeemed himself with the 10th & 11th books, both of which were comparable to the earlier books in the series. Too bad he died, some Brandon Sanderson guy is writing in his stead.
I recently finished the Electric Church as well, weird little book.
I also finished The Children of Hurin yesterday. It's a great little book if you've read the Silmarillion.
I recently finished the Electric Church as well, weird little book.
I also finished The Children of Hurin yesterday. It's a great little book if you've read the Silmarillion.
I just finished The Dark Tower series by Stephen King. It is a very long series (with the last of seven books being over one-thousand pages), but is also extremely good. He considers it his magnum opus and it is his only fantasy series.
It's about the tale of a gunslinger (a sharpshooting group of cowboyish knights) on his quest to find the nexus between worlds, the dark tower. The stories never got dull and the characters were enchanting. A must read.
I'm currently reading Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk. Thus far it seems like leftwing satire about America from the perspective of a Chinese spy who pretends to be a child foreign exchange student to the United States. The dialect can be pretty annoying to read. He writes it in English, but with Chinese grammar. It's pretty standard (good) Chuck Palahniuk to me, though.
It's about the tale of a gunslinger (a sharpshooting group of cowboyish knights) on his quest to find the nexus between worlds, the dark tower. The stories never got dull and the characters were enchanting. A must read.
I'm currently reading Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk. Thus far it seems like leftwing satire about America from the perspective of a Chinese spy who pretends to be a child foreign exchange student to the United States. The dialect can be pretty annoying to read. He writes it in English, but with Chinese grammar. It's pretty standard (good) Chuck Palahniuk to me, though.
A Dark Tower TV series could be awesome. While Wizard and Glass was very informative, I feel like it is the weakest link of the series. I'll probably change my mind whenever I get around to rereading the books, though.
Writing himself in was very pretentious and the epilogue didn't really do much to mitigate that. It's almost as if he wants us to think his ego is that inflated.
I didn't expect the ending at all, but it fits. I found the final showdown with the Crimson King to be disappointing, though.
I think there's potential for an eighth book if King ever decides he wants to write one.
Have read a lot of stuff since last post, but meh, it's no longer fresh in my memory.
Currently on the second book of "The Night Angel trilogy". It started off quite interesting; the protagonist was borderline sociopathic in book one. Then he obtained a morality pet for a girlfriend and now he's an annoying, generic hero who constantly angsts about being a virgin. Actually, so does one of the secondary characters. Author projecting his woes on to the characters? Hmm...
Anyway, it starts off as something new and degenerates into a generic fantasy. Still worth reading if you're into that, it's a decent generic fantasy, it's just no longer anything special by the second book.
Currently on the second book of "The Night Angel trilogy". It started off quite interesting; the protagonist was borderline sociopathic in book one. Then he obtained a morality pet for a girlfriend and now he's an annoying, generic hero who constantly angsts about being a virgin. Actually, so does one of the secondary characters. Author projecting his woes on to the characters? Hmm...
Anyway, it starts off as something new and degenerates into a generic fantasy. Still worth reading if you're into that, it's a decent generic fantasy, it's just no longer anything special by the second book.
I am not into reading very much, but my favourite book series is definitely the Pendragon series from D.J. MacHale. If I were too sum the series in a sentance, it would be, "It is a Fantasy/Adventure series that revolves around a boy who travels to the 10 territories of Halla in an attempt to prevent the evil Saint Dane from pushing all 10 territories into chaos and rule over all of Halla." I would recommend this series to any who are into Fantasy/Adventure, and I can say that a number of my friends, myself included, have all greatly enjoyed these books. (If I piqued anyone's interest, it is a 10 book series and the first one is called the Merchant of Death)
I think that might be out of Farhrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury. A classic if ever I've read one.
I recently finished The Circle Cycle/circle by Ted Dekkar. If you haven't read anything by him and like philosophical thrillers, I'd strongly recommend them.
Besides that, I actually haven't read a ton of book series lately. But some good ones were the 'Ender' and 'Bean' sagas by Orson Scott Card. Also the Alvin Maker series is really good.
I found Dune and its continuations, as well as its spinoff series to be really good.
I've also read nearly anything pertaining to the LOTR universe, including Silmarion.
And if you like any sort of Alternative history, the 'World War' series by Harry Turtledove is excellently written, if a bit redundant and slow.
I'll have to give Lolita a read, as so many of you guys recommend it. I do enjoys comedy in my novels, such as anything by Kurt Vonnegut.
Spinoffs of Star Wars, Halo, etc. also intrigue me and I have read a lot of those. As well as many "movie" books like Jurassic Park, and co.
If you like Ted Dekkar, read Thr3e. My favorite novel by him, although I've only read 2 or 3. Finished Dresden Files, the last book has probably one of the most epic battles in any media I've ever seen.
I don't know if any of you guys have read The Guns of the South. Probably the best Alt history story i've ever read.