What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it...

[Old Man]

Not me, I completely forgot it was Nanowrimo until Hermit mentioned it yesterday.  I still don't understand why November is the month.  November has to be one of the worst months to set aside time for nowri.  Why not March?  Or July?

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

It is baffling planning. But at least it's not February. 

[Hermit]

I changed the title of the old NANOWRIMO thread and resurrected it if folks want

[csyphrett]

9 hours ago, Old Man said:

Not me, I completely forgot it was Nanowrimo until Hermit mentioned it yesterday.  I still don't understand why November is the month.  November has to be one of the worst months to set aside time for nowri.  Why not March?  Or July?

That's why they did it. They run camps in April and July

CES

[MrWolf]

A reread I'm doing through is the Night Watch / Day Watch series of books by Sergei Lukyanenko

[DShomshak]

Black Sun, by Rebecca Roanhorse. I gave up reading Fantasy for a long time because so much of what was on bookstore shelves seemed very been-there-done-that. Fortunately, my local library had Black Sun on audiobook. It sounded especially interesting because I heard an interview in which Roanhorse said she drew inspiration from Pre-Columbian American civilizations, rather than the usual European myths and cultures. (She's Native American; I am not, but I share her boredom with Generic Fantasy Warehouse Quasi-Medieval.)

 

A noble goal does not itself a good book make, but I'd say the execution is worthy of it. The worldbuilding is excellent. Roanhorse shows her setting gradually, so while it's exotic it's never overwhelming.

 

Most importantly, it's a good story about interesting characters. It rotates through four viewpoint characters, all of whom I found sympathetic in their own ways. There's a female ship's captain whose not-quite-human heritage makes her the target of both greed and fear; she also has a self-destructive streak. She's rescued from jail to ttransport a blind young man to the holy city of Tova before the winter solstice, which this year coincides with a solar eclipse. He carries a god within him; his mission is vengeance for a great crime committed against his mother's people a generation before. In Tova, woman who rose from the lowest of low estates to become high priestess of the hierarchy that committed the crime believes they should make amends, but finds danger within the city and within her own order. And a warrior from the clan that suffered the crime comes home to find that his mother, the clan matriarch, was murdered. Their destiny is to converge in Tova beneath the Black Sun.

 

It isn't that simple. The resolution isn't; this is the first book of a trilogy, and I think the situation and story are strong enough to sustain it. I look forward to the sequels.

 

Dean Shomshak

Edited February 28 by DShomshak

[Old Man]

The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter. The story of a young man who embarks on a career as a warrior to facilitate his quest for revenge. It’s not the most original overall plot but it’s executed extremely well, and I found myself rooting hard for the protagonists. It reminds me strongly of a Sanderson book—focuses on a few well developed characters and a unique magic system. Kind of violent, though not GoT violent. African-themed, which is a nice change of pace, and deals more with class issues than race issues. Recommended. 

[Old Man]

The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie.  One of several loose sequels to the First Law trilogy.  Held in high esteem by fantasy fandom, this book does a great job of making antiheroes sympathetic, and it's off to the races about three chapters in with Abercrombie's gift for action sequences, witty dialogue, and unpredictability.  Note: this might actually be the most violent work of fiction that I have ever read.  Recommended unless you have deadlines for school or work in the near future.

[death tribble]

To End in Fire by David Weber and Eric Flint

This is the last, at present, Honor Harrington book. Well she is in it but it is more a part of the Crown of Slaves series with Zilwicki and Cachet doing their snooping bit. Trying to find where the Mesan Alignment went and how to stop them once and for all. However the baddies have a second hidden system and sacrifice one system to protect the second. The last part of the book covers this and it is the hope of the Alignment to throw off the Grand Alliance. There is room for a sequel as the baddies have infiltrators of their own but Honor is left to look after her kids and have a quiet life. For now. I like the book but you have to be heavily involved in the series so you just can't read this one as a stand alone. At least not in my Not So Humble Opinion.

[Grailknight]

23 hours ago, death tribble said:

To End in Fire by David Weber and Eric Flint

This is the last, at present, Honor Harrington book. Well she is in it but it is more a part of the Crown of Slaves series with Zilwicki and Cachet doing their snooping bit. Trying to find where the Mesan Alignment went and how to stop them once and for all. However the baddies have a second hidden system and sacrifice one system to protect the second. The last part of the book covers this and it is the hope of the Alignment to throw off the Grand Alliance. There is room for a sequel as the baddies have infiltrators of their own but Honor is left to look after her kids and have a quiet life. For now. I like the book but you have to be heavily involved in the series so you just can't read this one as a stand alone. At least not in my Not So Humble Opinion.

 

This book is good when it stays on point but too many pages are wasted on the Anti-Slavery League and there is a huge plot hole that all the military geniuses failed to notice.

 

 

Spoiler

At the "final" battle, the Alignment fails to use any Spider drive ships to defend their "home" planet. They find no shipyards capable of building them or even any destroyed wreckage to keep them out of their hands. There aren't even any Streak drive ships there, and the Alignment knows that the Grand alliance knows that secret.

 

[csyphrett]

Read Heroic Hearts edited by Butcher and Hughes. This is an anthology where people investigate crimes with magic like Toot Toot and Mister foiling an attack of Gremlins on Dresden's castle, Vincent Graves dealing with a murderous leprechaun, or the Moor dealing with a blind date and her Fae tormentor. I liked a lot of these stories even though I don't read most of the authors presented.

CES 

[csyphrett]

Read Dead Man's Hand by James J Butcher. A witch is killed for something she dug up. The hunt for her killer involves her old friend, a deadly witch hunter, and a former student who only knows three spells. They have to find the murderer, the artifact, and keep themselves alive from things that hunt in the night

CES

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

On 10/22/2022 at 10:29 PM, Logan D. Hurricanes said:

I started Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire in the airport. Still a long way to go, but I really like it so far. Will review when I finish. 

 

Finally finished this one. I didn't realize I started this so long ago. Geez. (I don't spend nearly as much time reading as I used to mainly due to physical discomfort of eyes... but that's a different story.) 

 

I really liked the central premise of this one and wanted to learn more about the world so I may have to explore the sequels. Imagine a boarding school of sorts for children that come back from different fantasy realms (i.e. Wonderland, Never-Never Land, Narnia, etc.) and have trouble coping with the idea that they can't go back and nobody in the real world--like their parents--believes them about what happened. In this story, not only does this happen all the time but each of these children goes to a completely different realm. (None of the trademarked ones, naturally, but there are some pretty obvious allusions.) They classify these realms with terms like nonsense and logic and say the students went to a "high logic" realm or "she was stranded in nonsense." That's what I wanted to see more of. 

 

The main character is Nancy who went to the land of the dead. The similarities to the Wednesday series on Netflix are pretty jarring, especially when her roommate is from Nonsense. Also like Wednesday, it finished up as a murder mystery that the main characters needed to solve. (A little disappointing.) It is clearly a YA novel, but it didn't really feel like it until the last half when they dove into the murder plot. 

 

My favorite character was Jack, one of two sisters that went to the same realm together (very rare) called The Moors. Jack (nee Jacqueline) became apprenticed to Dr. Bleak, an obvious Dr. Frankenstein homage, while Jill fell in love with her vampire master who was obviously Dracula. 

 

The story is really about acceptance; acceptance of what happened to you, acceptance of your current situation, and lack of acceptance from the real world. There are some heady themes that it starts to tackle (including a trans character that has that on top of everything else to deal with) but it feels like it stops short to start the action movie portion. The murder details are quite gory, too, so the author does not go into that part halfheartedly. 

 

Some of the details are great. Nancy is not morbid at all, and she learned an almost supernatural ability for stillness so that she would not disturb the dead when she was there. One realm is populated by skeletons, another by spiders, and we don't learn nearly enough about them. I'm hoping for more in later books. 

 

Overall I enjoyed it, but it showed so much more potential than it realized. 3/4

 

BTW: I hate the title, just horrible. I kept forgetting it because it doesn't really mean anything. Oh well, minor nitpick. 

[slikmar]

1 hour ago, Logan D. Hurricanes said:

 

Finally finished this one. I didn't realize I started this so long ago. Geez. (I don't spend nearly as much time reading as I used to mainly due to physical discomfort of eyes... but that's a different story.) 

 

I really liked the central premise of this one and wanted to learn more about the world so I may have to explore the sequels. Imagine a boarding school of sorts for children that come back from different fantasy realms (i.e. Wonderland, Never-Never Land, Narnia, etc.) and have trouble coping with the idea that they can't go back and nobody in the real world--like their parents--believes them about what happened. In this story, not only does this happen all the time but each of these children goes to a completely different realm. (None of the trademarked ones, naturally, but there are some pretty obvious allusions.) They classify these realms with terms like nonsense and logic and say the students went to a "high logic" realm or "she was stranded in nonsense." That's what I wanted to see more of. 

 

The main character is Nancy who went to the land of the dead. The similarities to the Wednesday series on Netflix are pretty jarring, especially when her roommate is from Nonsense. Also like Wednesday, it finished up as a murder mystery that the main characters needed to solve. (A little disappointing.) It is clearly a YA novel, but it didn't really feel like it until the last half when they dove into the murder plot. 

 

My favorite character was Jack, one of two sisters that went to the same realm together (very rare) called The Moors. Jack (nee Jacqueline) became apprenticed to Dr. Bleak, an obvious Dr. Frankenstein homage, while Jill fell in love with her vampire master who was obviously Dracula. 

 

The story is really about acceptance; acceptance of what happened to you, acceptance of your current situation, and lack of acceptance from the real world. There are some heady themes that it starts to tackle (including a trans character that has that on top of everything else to deal with) but it feels like it stops short to start the action movie portion. The murder details are quite gory, too, so the author does not go into that part halfheartedly. 

 

Some of the details are great. Nancy is not morbid at all, and she learned an almost supernatural ability for stillness so that she would not disturb the dead when she was there. One realm is populated by skeletons, another by spiders, and we don't learn nearly enough about them. I'm hoping for more in later books. 

 

Overall I enjoyed it, but it showed so much more potential than it realized. 3/4

 

BTW: I hate the title, just horrible. I kept forgetting it because it doesn't really mean anything. Oh well, minor nitpick. 

I am a fan of Seanan's writing (Cryptid and October Daye) and have read this series also. It is an excellent series exactly about what you say, which is accepting yourself regardless of what others think. I recommend you getting the rest. One book goes back to Jack and Jill and their story.

[assault]

Not books I've finished or even started, but I bought an entire shopping trolley of Fantasy/Sci-Fi books today.

 

There are duplicates of books I already own, and I think some duplicates even within the trolley, but I got a deal, and, oh my, the rarities!

 

I have my reading for the next year planned. Two years, counting my existing pile.

 

That's assuming I focus on reading, and don't start trying to write. Or do other stuff, like GMing a game or two or even playing. Or getting a life, but that's not terribly likely given that I haven't yet.

Edited July 3, 2023 by assault

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

I finally got around to reading We3, a 2004 Vertigo comic book series. Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely produced a beautiful book which combines classic sci-fi elements with The Incredible Journey. As a pet owner, this packed quite an emotional punch despite the sometimes-disturbing visuals.

 

Highly recommended. Not for kids.

[death tribble]

Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch

A probationary police constable stumbles onto a murder and then takes a witness statement from a ghost. He then finds out magic really exists and even his colleagues are aware of it but keep it quiet. This is an entertaining read. Could not put the book down and finished it in 4 days having received it on Monday. I have the next five in the set and look forward to the next.

[death tribble]

Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch

DC Grant is in nominal charge as his mentor recovers from the events of Rivers of London. He find himself investigating two separate cases, one where a killer is using an unusual method to dispatch victims and the other where jazz musicians are passing away prematurely. This is the sequel and it is good. I finished it in two days. That and the fact that we have a villain who will turn up again makes this interesting.

[death tribble]

Whispers Underground by Ben Aaronovitch

DC Grant finds as Christmas is about to dawn that a dead American found in the Underground is the son of a state senator which brings in the FBI. So in tracking down the killer who may have used a magical plate he has to avoid using magic in front of them. Again I finished this quickly. Fun.

[csyphrett]

Read Dark Side of the Road by Greene. Ishmael Jones is a faceless cog invited to his employer's family manor for Christmas for a killer holiday in the middle of a blizzard.

CES  

[slikmar]

20 minutes ago, csyphrett said:

Read Dark Side of the Road by Green. Ishmael Jones is a faceless cog invited to his employer's family manor for Christmas for a killer holiday in the middle of a blizzard.

CES  

I love Simon Greene's stuff from way back. Started with the Hawk and Fisher and have progressed through almost all of it (Nightside, Deathstalker, Secret Histories (Golden Torc), Ghost Finders). Problem I started having was every pairing he did became variants of Hawk and Fisher - same mannerisms, same attitudes, same sayings. I had high hopes for Jones, but halfway through the book he and the woman helping him morphed into the same characters. Again, I am a fan of his stuff and loved all I had read, just became too repetitive. Was hoping for more.

[death tribble]

Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovitch

Peter Grant gets drawn into murders committed some distance apart but which are linked and the theft of a magic book, a grimoire. And then there is something happening in a housing estate south of the river. He is till having problems with rivers and the Faceless Man Mk 2 is still up to no good. This was a little shorter than its predecessor but it is still fun. 

[csyphrett]

On 7/12/2023 at 11:51 PM, slikmar said:

I love Simon Greene's stuff from way back. Started with the Hawk and Fisher and have progressed through almost all of it (Nightside, Deathstalker, Secret Histories (Golden Torc), Ghost Finders). Problem I started having was every pairing he did became variants of Hawk and Fisher - same mannerisms, same attitudes, same sayings. I had high hopes for Jones, but halfway through the book he and the woman helping him morphed into the same characters. Again, I am a fan of his stuff and loved all I had read, just became too repetitive. Was hoping for more.

I never got that impression but if you read a lot of the stories back to back like I did, you could see that he cut pasted whole pages from earlier books to later books. Drake did that with the RCN books until he introduced his new point of view characters.

CES

[death tribble]

Foxglove Summer by Ben Aaronovitch

Peter Grant goes out of London to assist in an investigation into two missing children. And it gets weird. He was just checking to see if there was any supernatural involvement when he finds it.

It is a bit different to the others as Peter is outside of the capital.. The books are moreish. You can't put them down. 

[death tribble]

6 hours ago, hasser said:

The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter

Never heard of it. Care to give us a review ?

 

The Hanging Tree by Ben Aaronovitch

In which Peter Grant finally finds out the identity of the Faceless Man. It begins with Lady Tyburn calling Peter in to get her daughter out of trouble when a girl dies in an exclusive apartment complex. Then it gets complicated. You have to have read the other books in the series to understand what is going on and why but this is really good.