Kevin's Watch

Reading all of that criticism about Covenant just pisses me off.

dlbpharmd wrote:Hmmmm, I wonder what SRD would have to say about this.

He's probably seen the list by now (I saw it on their website a couple of years ago, I think). I would guess that he's happy to be considered in the top 50.

Being in the top 50 of anything is *amazing*. We consider people successful if they do something *well* - and doing something well might land a person a spot in the top 10,000.

dlbpharmd wrote:Reading all of that criticism about Covenant just pisses me off.

Grr!

Edit: But some of it's kind of funny. I especially liked "Donaldson creates beautiful noble characters that you adore and then cruelly slaughters them". And "Hurtloam! Hurtloam! Hurtloam! Argh." could only have been written by Jay... explain yourself, Jay!

I can't believe Terry Goodkind's "Wizard's First Rule" didn't make the list.

NA-scooby wrote:I can't believe Terry Goodkind's "Wizard's First Rule" didn't make the list.

(...Erm, that is, I hope you're joking.)

WFR was OK, its the next 4 books that were increasingly awful. Sword of Shannara was barely a step above "the eye of the gorgon" if any of you have read that jewel.

I was laughing out loud in public while reading Wizard's First Rule. Until Paolini came around, the Terrible Terry's were dual "Razzie" winners for worst novel disguised as serious fantasy. (No offense intended...)

Then came self-publishing and publish on demand - and whoo-boy, there are some new records being set for world's worst.

Nice to see you around Burgs. Personally, I think the list nailed the top ten, or would have if the chrons were up there. Mists could have been dropped to make room for it...but then, it's the only one of the top ten I haven't read, so maybe I'm wrong.

Amusing to see the crit...this is why I say watchers are already self-selected.

--A

The only thing I can conclude from the TC criticism is that those people are morons.-jay

kevinswatch wrote:The only thing I can conclude from the TC criticism is that those people are morons.-jay

Amen to that!

Tolkien derviative? Grrrr......

Avatar wrote:Mists could have been dropped to make room for it...but then, it's the only one of the top ten I haven't read, so maybe I'm wrong.

I don't understand why the Mists of Avalon is so significant. Is it significant because it was the first of the ten billion Arthur books out there?

A couple of my favorites...

one of the few novels where I had absolutely no empathy with the main character - indeed, I spent most of the book hoping that he'd get squashed or eaten or meet some suitably bloody end.

No real argument there. Thomas Covenant is not why I fell in love w/ the series. On the other hand, why is it assumed that we must like and have empathy for the main character of a story?

I find the clunkiness of the sentences, the repetitious malapropism of the adjectives quite distracting; but the first trilogy reliably gave me nightmares on each reading, so the story itself is powerful.

Gotta give the guy credit. If I found the writing clunky, obnoxioux and distracting, I certainly wouldn't have kept reading. And the nightmares wouldn't have helped either

#48 has to be a joke, surely...

The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks?

If there was ever a wholly derivative steaming pile of manure passed off as an original work, then that was it.

Terry Brooks makes David Eddings look like Shakespeare...

And Paolini has made Terry Brooks read like Donaldson.

Well...

Takes a certain kind of flexible mind to figure out exactly what an 'anti-hero' is--maybe it's called a compassionate and intelligent mind? Oh yeah, I forgot some people actually experience the hard-edged realities of life rather than sit all day at the comp in their mom's basement and meet at coffeeshops to whine about their pampered little lives...

danlo wrote:Takes a certain kind of flexible mind to figure out exactly what an 'anti-hero' is--maybe it's called a compassionate and intelligent mind? Oh yeah, I forgot some people actually experience the hard-edged realities of life rather than sit all day at the comp in their mom's basement and meet at coffeeshops to whine about their pampered little lives...

it reminds me of what my sister calls an immature reader -- people who want the story neatly tied up, pristine hero, virtuous maiden, evil dragon lying dead at the end, and no thought and no grey lines. If it is not so, then they cant enjoy the book because they have no imagination, no ability to anaylyze and project. comes from basement living i think.

I would put The Chonicles at the top of the list- yes # 1! Tolkien's books and world were more intricate/weighty/massive/developed true but The Chronicles(especially the First) were the most intense I've ever read

That would be assigning personal choice - and I don't think that's what the list was going after.

Without Tolkien, we might not have Donaldson. If we did, it would be a VERY different Donaldson.

And let's be honest, on the surface the Chrons can look like a Tolkein derivative. Very easy for me to see why people think that.

--A