Spence Posted April 23, 2007 Report Share Posted April 23, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Right now' date=' ERB is hit-or-miss with me. When he concentrates on action, I can tear through the book, when he stops to build a scene (and engage in exposition) everything slows to a c r a w l .[/quote'] Sounds like ERB. But I always mark that down to the time he wrote in. Lin Carter and Alan Burt Akers are smoother reads, to me anyway. I don't really know any others that pulled off the "earthman" goes to alien world with flashing blades adventure story as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted April 23, 2007 Report Share Posted April 23, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Finished Sir Thursday by Garth Nix. Human boy in an alien world with flashing swords against a mad Pied Piper, and an army of almost human monsters. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted April 23, 2007 Report Share Posted April 23, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... . . . Why did they pie the Piper? He played that badly? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted April 23, 2007 Report Share Posted April 23, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... . . . Why did they pie the Piper? He played that badly? I'm assuming it's based on the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The character feels that all the children that he has brought in the house owe him loyalty as good servants. He has also uplifted rats and uses them as spies. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AliceTheOwl Posted April 23, 2007 Report Share Posted April 23, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... For those in the thread who liked the Southern Vampire series, there's a TV show in the works, based off the books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted April 26, 2007 Report Share Posted April 26, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Finished Lady Friday by Nix. The fifth trustee, lady friday tells Arthur, the Piper and Superior Saturday that she's abdicating and whoever finds her key and the fifth part of the will can take over her portion of the House. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 26, 2007 Report Share Posted April 26, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... No time for books. But just finished reading this: http://ericpoulton.blogspot.com/search/label/steampunk%20star%20wars Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted May 12, 2007 Report Share Posted May 12, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Finished Tim Lebbon's Hellboy: Unnatural Selection. Hellboy has to stop a ecoterrorist who has brought back monsters from Limbo. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted May 27, 2007 Report Share Posted May 27, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Finished Gate of Bones and Knuckles & Tales Gate of Bones by Emily Drake has moved the Magickers to a medieval world but the two sides are fighting, and the Dark Hand thinks it has the advantage when Jonnard discovers he is a gatekeeper and opens the Gate of Bones. Knuckles and Tales by Nancy A Collins has some offensive language and adult situations but the stories are generally pretty good. Billy Fearless comes off as a Jack Tale with a stupid Jack who succeeds anyway. Cancer Alley has a man deciding to bring his family to a public relations meeting. Of course he has to summon them from beyond. Junior Teeter and the Bad Shine has a small town murder mystery. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SKJAM! Posted May 27, 2007 Report Share Posted May 27, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Last week I read Lynn Flewelling's The Bone Doll's Twin. Back of the book description is that a female child is disguised as a boy by magic to avoid assassination and raised that way until further notice. Ala Ozma, for fans of classic fantasy. Interesting, though I was irritated when about 80% of the book was done, and I'm wondering how the heck the writer is going to wrap up the plot threads...and only then do I twig on that it's the first volume of a trilogy which came unmarked as such. One of the things I like about the book is that the antagonists don't just take over the country for the sole purpose of power-grabbing. The usurper feels that the divine mandate requiring a woman of a certain bloodline to rule has caused the system of government to break down. And when the god who made the mandate punishes the country for their unapproved ruler, the usurper and his minions struggle against the will of their god to break its curse. And I can follow, more or less, how ever more extreme measures come into place in an attempt to fix the problems their previous actions caused. I'm not quite as happy with how you can tell the bad folks by the simple litmus test of misogyny. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AliceTheOwl Posted May 27, 2007 Report Share Posted May 27, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I read The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley. It's YA fantasy, and a very enjoyable read, even for an adult. There were some things that seemed a bit obvious, plot-wise, but I thought it wrapped up nicely. It's a good, solid book. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted May 27, 2007 Report Share Posted May 27, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... . . . Finished Gaiman's Stardust the other day. Makes me wanna read more pre-Tolkien english fantasy. I hope the movie doesn't suck . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sundog Posted May 27, 2007 Report Share Posted May 27, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Yellow Eyes, by Ringo and Kratman. Part of the Posleen series, so you know it's going to be both pro-military and a tad right-wing, but an enjoyable story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
st barbara Posted June 6, 2007 Report Share Posted June 6, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... "The Boats of the Glen Carrig" by William Hope Hodgson. Language is somewhat archaic and formal (the book was written pre World War I) and it moves a tad slowly (again possibly a function of when it was written) but it's still a good, creepy novel. Of the four Hodgson novels that I have read ("Boats", "The Ghost Pirates", "The House On The Borderland" and "The Night Land") i'd rate it the best ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted June 7, 2007 Report Share Posted June 7, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Read The Unknown Soldier collection from DC: Wartime stories of the man no one knows but is known by all. Buso Renkin 1 by Nobuhiro Watsuki: The start of a manga story about a kid who has his heart replaced by a device that becomes a weapon to fight monsters. Working on Song of Susannah by Stephen King and The Spider: Robot Titans of Gotham by Norvell Page. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SKJAM! Posted June 7, 2007 Report Share Posted June 7, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I just finished Lynn Flewelling's Tamir trilogy (The Bone Doll's Twin, The Hidden Warrior and The Oracle's Queen.) It's a fantasy set in a country whose god has decreed that only women of a certain bloodline should rule. An ursuper has taken the throne and is systematically killing off all the potential rightful heirs. As a desperate measure, a spell is cast on the newborn princess, making her look like a boy until such time as she's ready to take back the throne. However, the magic goes horribly wrong in one respect, and creates a vengeful ghost tied to young "Prince Tobin." It's pretty good stuff, with some interesting ramifications. I was, however irked by one small thing about the ending. The reason the ursurper took over and the people let him is because there's no way in the system to replace a bad ruler (such as the previous rightful queen) short of assassination or civil war. The system is never fixed to deal with this problem--instead the ending implies that the problem of a bad ruler just didn't come up again for a few centuries. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iron Wallaby Posted June 7, 2007 Report Share Posted June 7, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I just finished re-reading a bunch of stuff. The Commonwealth Saga, by Peter F Hamilton. Great space opera science fiction with a decently convuluted plot. Would make a fanastic setting for a game. Imagine hundreds of worlds linked by a network of wormholes and trains... Perdido Street station and The Scar, by China Meiville. New Cobruzon is a nasty, nasty, but very, very cool city. World War 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3 by John Birmingham. Fun alternate history stuff. A CBG from 2020 goes back in time to 1940 or so... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwiggins Posted June 7, 2007 Report Share Posted June 7, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... "Old mans war" by John Scalzi http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Brigades-John-Scalzi/dp/0765354063/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_a/102-4674914-2836121?ie=UTF8&qid=1181243492&sr=8-1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SatinKitty Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Just finished the Betsy Taylor Vampire Series, as far as it has gone. Book 5 just came out and I got it on Release Day. Read it all on one day as there was suspense from book 4. See character sheet in "Champions" forum. This is Chick Lit, and meant for Women, but it is a good Champions-y Soapy adventure series and the author is good. There are no disappointments or extranious (sp ?) stuff like, say, Anne Rice. Betsy is a bit of an Airhead but you'd better not mess with her shoes. There is a large cast of interesting continuing characters including Betsy's Husband, the King, Jessica, the Billionare who finances everything, Marc, the Gay Paramedic who comes in very handy when hostile Creatures come around, Betsy's baby brother whom she gets custody of in book 5, Tina, the old Vampire loyal to the King who is Betsy's helper and protector plus an assortment of ghosts, werewolves and even one Zombie. Nothing too heavy and it is very well done. I'd give it 5 stars. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clonus Posted June 9, 2007 Report Share Posted June 9, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I was, however irked by one small thing about the ending. The reason the ursurper took over and the people let him is because there's no way in the system to replace a bad ruler (such as the previous rightful queen) short of assassination or civil war. The system is never fixed to deal with this problem--instead the ending implies that the problem of a bad ruler just didn't come up again for a few centuries. I'm not sure I see the problem. Situations like that crop up all through history Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sundog Posted June 10, 2007 Report Share Posted June 10, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I'm not sure I see the problem. Situations like that crop up all through history From the early Roman Empire to the rise of Democracy, usurpation and Civil War WERE the safety valve against a bad ruler. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SKJAM! Posted June 10, 2007 Report Share Posted June 10, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... I'm not sure I see the problem. Situations like that crop up all through history The problem is that once it's established that the divinely-appointed ruling bloodline also is prone to hereditary mental illness, which the new rightful queen is well aware of, that she'd take steps to protect her country just in case. Of course, this may just be my (and a couple of other people who commented elsewhere) belief that if something is broken, you should fix it, or at least figure out how to avoid breaking it again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
csyphrett Posted June 10, 2007 Report Share Posted June 10, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Read the Spider book. The Robot Titans of Gotham are three different novellas collected together. The first two feature the Spider, hunchbacked defender of justice, versus men in power armor and bats that kill with a bite. The third features another pulp hero, the Skull Killer, that uses disguises and brands his enemies with the mark of the skull as he battles the Octopus, a man intent on making monsters and using them to blackmail the city. CES Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
st barbara Posted June 11, 2007 Report Share Posted June 11, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Read the Spider book. The Robot Titans of Gotham are three different novellas collected together. The first two feature the Spider, hunchbacked defender of justice, versus men in power armor and bats that kill with a bite. The third features another pulp hero, the Skull Killer, that uses disguises and brands his enemies with the mark of the skull as he battles the Octopus, a man intent on making monsters and using them to blackmail the city. CES I've got this one on order from "Amazon" . Hasn't got to Australia yet (and may NOT get here until DECEMBER ! Grumble !) Sounds cool ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OddHat Posted June 11, 2007 Report Share Posted June 11, 2007 Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Two Steve Perry books, The Musashi Flex and The Omega Cage. Perry can turn out a darn good yarn when he's not doing Star Wars books. Limited range, but a fun writer in that range. Both are good afternoon time wasters. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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