What fantasy/science fiction book are you reading RIGHT NOW?

A place for anything *not* Donaldson.

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inkinen
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Post by inkinen »

Farseer trilogy. Currently close to ending Royal Assassin. Really like them even there is a lot of misery.. guess I was prepared by having read Donaldson prior
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Post by Fist and Faith »

He's back!
All lies and jest
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest
-Paul Simon
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Welcome back inkinen. :D
I'm Murrin wrote:I just finished Lord of Chaos.

It's interesting; you can see this is where Jordan's overwriting began to take over the series for real. There are storylines he's setting up that he barely begins in this book - and this is the longest book in the series. He manages to give it an arc insofar as it becomes about Rand and his relationship with the Aes Sedai culminating in Dumai's Wells, but every other plotline is left hanging mid-story.
Yep, this is the start of increasingly multi-book and open plot lines that drag on and on but go nowhere (or almost nowhere). It's not until book 11 that a lot of them start to clang shut, many with almost indecent haste, as he started to come to his senses. :D
It also has the problem that Jordan absolutely wrote this book meaning to do one thing with Mazrim Taim, then changed his mind later in a way that leaves everything about his character in LoC not making sense.
LOL, that never occurred to me. You haven't read the last 3 so I won't spoil his arc, but I was always a bit disappointed with him.

--A
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Post by I'm Murrin »

Oh, I don't care about spoilers much. I've been looking stuff up on the wiki to remind me of things I've forgotten and read plenty of stuff from later on, including what happens with Taim. But he was 100% meant to be Demandred in Lord of Chaos - he's constantly saying things that no one from the Third Age would say.
Yep, this is the start of increasingly multi-book and open plot lines that drag on and on but go nowhere (or almost nowhere). It's not until book 11 that a lot of them start to clang shut, many with almost indecent haste, as he started to come to his senses.
Yeah, it really started to come back to me when they were setting up the characters going to Ebou Dar, and I was pretty certain Mat leaving Ebou Dar with Tuon happens in book 10, so... more than three books between arriving and leaving? Now I'm remembering that the attack on the Black Tower by the Reds, being set up early in book 7, is still a very recent event by book 10 too, and of course Egwene and her Aes Sedai take from LoC to CoT to travel from Salidar to Tar Valon. So what the heck even happens in books 7 and 8?
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Uh, 7 is lots of angst and we meet Moridin for the "first" time, and Nynaeve [spoiler]marries Lan and finally breaks her block.[/spoiler]

8 is Seanchan mainly. :D

It really never occurred to me that Taim might have been meant as Demandred. Wouldn't have thought one of the Forsaken would set themselves up as a false Dragon. (Yes, it would fit the "let chaos rule" thing, but that happened well before that particular instruction was given.)

--A
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Post by I'm Murrin »

I finished A Crown of Swords a couple days ago. That book... had no plot. The climax of the Bowl of the Winds storyline happens in the first 6 chapters of the next book; the climactic final chapter of ACoS is the ending of events set up in Lord of Chaos that were not touched or changed at all in ACoS.
You could lift the entire final chapter of the book and insert it before Rand's capture by the Aes Sedai in LoC, and it would still make sense and fit with very minimal changes.
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One of my least favourite, but superseded by 9 and 10. (8 (and even 7 actually) wasn't as bad as I remembered...but 9 and 10...

Anyway, I'm on The Player of Games, 2nd Culture novel, not that their order is usually particularly relevant, so I'm just going by publication date.

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Use of Weapons, Iain M Banks.

--A
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Post by I'm Murrin »

I finished rereading Winter's Heart. This and book 8 before it are pretty decent! They've got some solid plot movement going on, things actually happening, a lot better than A Crown of Swords.
At this point I'd say the real dip in the series is around books 5-7, and book 10 of course is the worst, though I'm still about to reread it to confirm that.
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Maybe it's down to the re-reading multiple times, but I find Winter's Heart unutterably boring. :D Perrin's pursuit of Faile and the Shaido is just painful. It's better than 10, but only just. (Although more happened in 10 than I had remembered.) 11 was where it really picked up for me again.

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Post by I'm Murrin »

The Perrin/Berelain stuff in Crossroads of Twilight is, so far, much worse than it was in Winter's Heart. Though really whenever Perrin/Berelain gets focus things take a dip regardless of the book.
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Post by Spiral Jacobs »

Continuing the Laundry Files series with Charles Stross' The Nightmare Stacks. Missing Bob, but he's supposedly coming back in the next book.
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Post by inkinen »

Started on Janny Wurts - The Curse of the Mistwraith a couple of days ago. Enjoying it so far!
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Never read anything of hers except the collaboration with Feist on the Empire books (which I absolutely loved).

(Gaming a bit again so neglecting my Banks reread. :D )

--A
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Post by SoulBiter »

inkinen wrote:Farseer trilogy. Currently close to ending Royal Assassin. Really like them even there is a lot of misery.. guess I was prepared by having read Donaldson prior
Some of my favorite books!!! Good enough that I did a re-read recently and enjoyed it the second time as much as the first.
We miss you Tracie but your Spirit will always shine brightly on the Watch Image
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Post by inkinen »

SoulBiter wrote: Some of my favorite books!!! Good enough that I did a re-read recently and enjoyed it the second time as much as the first.
Loved them! Only read the first three but will read the rest in the future. Her writing style is just so great.
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Post by inkinen »

Avatar wrote:Never read anything of hers except the collaboration with Feist on the Empire books (which I absolutely loved).

(Gaming a bit again so neglecting my Banks reread. :D )

--A
I’m gonna check out that Feist collaboration, but I changed my mind regarding the mistwraith book. The characters are just very flat and the writing style is not to my liking.

Did you also buy Elden Ring? :)
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Post by Avatar »

Haha, no, no I didn't. :D Might at some point, but not a big fan of the "Souls" franchise so in no particular rush.

If you read the Empire books, I strongly recommend reading Feist's "Riftwar" trilogy first, as they run in parallel to a large extent.

Don't have to worry about all the subsequent Feist books unless you really enjoy the Riftwar books, (Magician, Silverthorn, and A Darkness At Sethanon) but the Empire books with Janny Wurts are definitely a high point of that "universe."

--A
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Post by Spiral Jacobs »

I've now finished the ninth book in Stross' The Laundry Files series and am done with it for a while. I really like these books and the way he keeps integrating elements from previous installments. Also enjoyed recognizing the offhand nerdy references to games and stuff...but what does that say about me ;-)

Currently reading Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky.
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Finished State of the Art, (only read the 2 Culture stories though) and now busy on Inversions which I'm enjoying more than I did last time.

Mostly done with it, so Look To Windward will be coming up shortly. :)

--A
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