Which is the best Gap book?

[Loredoctor]

Your opinions?

[I'm Murrin]

I'm a big fan of The Real Story, which is hard to compare to the others because of the change in format; of the remaining four, A Dark and Hungry God Arises is perhaps my favourite. I'm not sure which of those two I'd vote for.

Edit: Voted for Dark and Hungry...

[wayfriend]

Dark and Hung. I like the action at Billingsgate.

[MsMary]

I read them so long ago, I don't remember well enough to vote.

[Zarathustra]

Got to agree with the rest of you, though This Day is a very close second. That's how you end a series. No sprawling 10-book excursion to nowhere. You can definitely tell he had a plan, and stuck to it. I've never read a conclusion to a series like that. It was one long 500 page climax. Fantastic.

But the tension of Billingsgate and seeing Angus in action was the best part of the series. Watching Nick come apart was grueling.

(KiGirl is finally reading this, after 10 years of trying to persuade her. She is on book 2 and loving it.)

[Holsety]

Dark and hungry for me too. I was actually expecting chaos and order to be everyone's favorite, interesting.

[Cail]

Dark and Hung. I like the action at Billingsgate.

Wayfriend, I think you're confusing your adult DVD collection with SRD's sci/fi epic.

>snort<

I agree Dark and Hungry God is the bomb.

[Nathan]

Dark and Hungry for me as well. The action on Billingsgate is my favourite part of the whole series.

[Waddley]

The one with Warden's letter to Morn, which was that? The last one, right?

That one.

[Relayer]

Coincidentally I started re-reading FK yesterday

I'll vote later...

[Cshaw71]

I just finally read the entire series. I personally didn't like Real story or Forbidden Knowledge and thus didn't read the series when it originally posted. But the recent release of Fatal Revenant got me hungry for SRD's writing. After completing FR I went back and read The Gap Cycle and after getting past those two books I was very thrilled with the remainder of the series. I voted for This Day all Gods Must Die: Because in my opinion it is one of the best conclusion books written for a series.

[ItisWritten]

I prefer Chaos.

The Massif V sequence is tops, and I've read a lot of space action sequences. Nothing comes close to maintaining the tension for as long as SRD did here. If I had any complaint, it's that it wasn't the conclusion.

The drama of This Day and Dark and Hung was better, but I felt exhilarated after reading Chaos.

[Mortice Root]

It's hard for me to remember exactly what happened in each book, but Billingsgate and all the scenes between cyborg Angus and Milos were in Dark and Hungry, right? I'm voting for that one.

[Cshaw71]

I think that the final three Dark&Hungry, C&A, and This Day can make a case for being the best book. I don't want to completly write off RS and FK but they are nothing more than set-up for the other three. In any terms taking all 5 books togather I would argue that is one of the best space SCI-FI's written I would even rank it with Foundation.

[danlo]

Hey Cshaw71! I chose C & O-tension, oh the amniotic tension!

I'd rank The Gap Cycle above Foundation and put it up with Zindell's "Neverness" books , Daniel's Metaplanetary & Superluminal and three or four specific Ian M. Banks books.

[kevinswatch]

It's been a couple of years (edit: well, more like 4 or 5 years now...jeez...) since I've read them. Plus, I read them all right after the other in one summer, so they blur together right now in my mind. And they're all so awesomely powerful.

All I remember now is that the ending of book 4 made my head explode. At least from what I remember.

And the title of the last book, "This Day All Gods Die", is still the best book title I've ever seen.

-jay

[danlo]

the ending of book 4 made my head explode

Mine too!

[The Dreaming]

Got to agree with the rest of you, though This Day is a very close second. That's how you end a series. No sprawling 10-book excursion to nowhere. You can definitely tell he had a plan, and stuck to it. I've never read a conclusion to a series like that. It was one long 500 page climax. Fantastic.

But the tension of Billingsgate and seeing Angus in action was the best part of the series. Watching Nick come apart was grueling.

(KiGirl is finally reading this, after 10 years of trying to persuade her. She is on book 2 and loving it.)

I agree completely. The GAP is one of the most overall satisfying stories I have ever read. It's amazing how it grows so organically from a little story about a few petty people, to an epic tale involving, literally, saving humanity. I voted book 3 personally, but it's really hard for me to divide the gap into different parts in my mind, it's such an organic story. (And I read them after all 5 were out.) Definitely my favorite Donaldson, and maybe my favorite science fiction series. (Dune tapered off to craziness, The Ender saga got a little meh, the first 3 foundation books are awesome, the rest...) I simply remember book 3 as being where I fully comprehended exactly how awesome these books really were, and I would definitely ask anyone trying to read this series to read *at least* to Dark and Hung before giving up!

[Cshaw71]

I'd rank The Gap Cycle above Foundation

I loved Foundation, I tend to be one of those that add credence to age. IA to me is the Father of Space Sci-fi so I tend to let that show in my BIAS. Something to do with Dwarfs standing on the shoulders of Giants. IOW would SRD's Gap Series even been written without IA? But Hey, that is just my opinion.

[danlo]

Man, point taken...Foundation is great and the Mule is one of my favorite Sci-Fi characters of all time...but these five books are a hell of a lot more intense.