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Hellraiser97

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THUJONE

THUJONE 4550

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On 12/19/2021 at 4:25 PM, atomheartbevo said:

Strong words.  Two of those are my wheelhouse.

Then check this out. Starred review just came out from Publisher's Weekly. 1/20 books they review get a star. I'm pretty jacked.

https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-85766-962-9?fbclid=IwAR2vR6l7OHUEzdO24Cg82AxrGMtG09fCe9_m_Xwmy-47XtvOuPehGNqUsdw

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Hellraiser97
Hellraiser97

Since there is no book forum yet, figured this is the closest fit. The master  list courtesy of Texas Town:  

TexArcher
TexArcher

Stranger in a Strange Land is a damned good read.

Grippe
Grippe

Popped your cherry eh?  Try these: The Forever War: Joe Haldeman Old Man's War: John Scalzi (it's a short series)

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After irth

After irth 1243

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Just finished Jonathan Maberry’s first attempt at a Fantasy series. 
 

Kragen The Damned.

Kinda uneven, but a lightweight, but feisty, tale of revenge. 
 

i’m glad I stuck with it. I enjoy his Joe Ledger books (which are fun and crazy in their mayhem), and I will gladly pick up his 2nd Fantasy novel when it releases in January. 

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Apep

Apep 645

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I’ve been re-reading Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn series to prep for the release of the seventh, (and last Wax and Wayne), book. Does anyone else get the feeling that the Wax and Wayne series slipped into a weird YA rut. I mean all of the Cosmere is kind of YA-ish, but I really have to struggle to get through W&W books despite the plot advancement. 

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 89500

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On 11/28/2022 at 10:37 AM, BTW said:

Man, Greg Bear was my introduction to "Hard SciFi"

I read plenty of hard sci-fi growing up, but never really recognized it as such (Clarke, Niven, Bear, etc.), but it was Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy in the 1990s that really made me go "okay, I really liked this, I need to look at more of this stuff".  Granted, we didn't have the internet telling us the difference, and in Walden Books or B. Dalton, it was just "science fiction".

On an unrelated note, if any of you have Apple TV, watch Mythic Quest.   It's extremely well-written, and while it's overall a love letter to video games, there's a very nice/touching storyline revolving around sci-fi writers of the 1970s, and those who found success early on (for various reasons) who couldn't match it later in the 1980s and 1990s.  For those that have watched, I got the impression that C.W.'s work was along the lines of Piers Anthony and the erotic-sci-fi stuff of the 70s/80s.

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Sam Lin

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Just read the first 3 of Scalzi's "Old Man's War" series and really enjoyed it. Fairly easy read, quite human story. Bought the fourth but it's stylistically different enough I'm not sure I want to continue (I only just started it, but the first 3 books were such a nicely finished trilogy that I'm not sure what the rest of the series can add.)

Currently reading Hamilton's "Pandora's Star" - definitely harder sci-fi, goes into probably too much detail describing just about everything. I find myself skimming over paragraphs at a time where it's just description that doesn't have any affect on plot (but at the same time I'm incredibly impressed at the amount of detail that he's thought through in creating his worlds). I'm 80% through; will see what I think when I finish. Do find the writing to be very clever, this is almost a grand epic of a book; so many different but converging plot lines, such diversity in imagination of worlds, species, motivations, and some fun humor tucked in there. I'm enjoying it, just need to decide if it's good or great.

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Sam Lin

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1 hour ago, Sam Lin said:

I'm 80% through; will see what I think when I finish. 

Welp, that was an underwhelming finish, it's very clearly half of a 2part story and not intended to stand as its own book. Onward, now starting "Judas Unchained" - the second half of the story.

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atomheartbevo

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3 hours ago, Sam Lin said:

Just read the first 3 of Scalzi's "Old Man's War" series and really enjoyed it. Fairly easy read, quite human story. Bought the fourth but it's stylistically different enough I'm not sure I want to continue (I only just started it, but the first 3 books were such a nicely finished trilogy that I'm not sure what the rest of the series can add.)

I don't want to spoil Zoe's Tale, but it's partly a retailing of the third book from a different POV, and it also clears/resolves up some subplots from the third book.  Scalzi was wanting to do something a little different and get out of the mold of the first three books, and show that things aren't always what they appear to be....and yeah, that's vague as hell, but again, no spoilers.

You need to finish it, and you will most likely enjoy the last two (which were originally published as serialized editions, like you used to get in sci-fi magazines).

 

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gyroprotagonist

gyroprotagonist 2591

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On 9/29/2022 at 8:01 AM, BTW said:

Over the summer I enjoyed the "Cradle" series by Will Wight.  It's apparently known as "progression fantasy" a genre that I was unfamiliar with until this series.  There is a 12th and final book due out early next year.

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his other series Traveler's Gate trilogy is really good too.  i am big fan of WW

 

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Sam Lin

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On 1/24/2023 at 10:18 AM, Sam Lin said:

Welp, that was an underwhelming finish, it's very clearly half of a 2part story and not intended to stand as its own book. Onward, now starting "Judas Unchained" - the second half of the story.

Finished book2. The two books together definitely qualify as "grand epic" and are great. Skimmed more than I should have as the plot kept pulling me along. Doing a detailed re-read now of book 2; really should re-read both, and probably will, in reverse order.

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MadTrapper

MadTrapper 150

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Anybody mention Adrian Tchaikovsky yet? Just started the Final Architecture series and the first book is excellent. Well developed characters, slight twists that don't feel cheap, believable tensions, all in a rich, detailed space opera setting.
I just finished the second book in that series, Eyes of the Void. It was excellent and I enjoyed the character development, particularly of Ollie and Kris. Looking forward to when the third book comes out in I think May.

Have you read his Children of Time series? Completely different style but still excellent. I still need to read Children of Memory.

In the meantime I'm finally getting around to reading some of Alistair Reynolds' stuff.
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Js1

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On 3/4/2023 at 7:06 PM, SilasCoade said:

Anybody mention Adrian Tchaikovsky yet? Just started the Final Architecture series and the first book is excellent. Well developed characters, slight twists that don't feel cheap, believable tensions, all in a rich, detailed space opera setting.

I like this series a lot 

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SilasCoade

SilasCoade 2622

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The OG Dune books are all great, though some better than others. Been years since I read them though. I don't recommend any of his other stuff though. I read a book he wrote with his kid outside of the Dune universe where these aliens came to Earth and got high on basil. It was just a 300 page allegory of teenagers smoking weed. Terrible.

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NeverMarryAStripper

NeverMarryAStripper 21784

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The book never explains it other than to say that the Emperor was forced into a compact to place a Bene Gesserit on the throne.  The implication seems to be that the agreement was in return for the Bene Gesserit somehow placing, or aiding in placing, Shaddam on the throne, but that is not really spelled out.

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Rimbo

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On 1/21/2021 at 5:56 PM, THUJONE said:

I finished the first book of the Bobiverse Trilogy by Dennis Taylor. Very quick, smart, pretty funny. Will eventually get to the other two. 

Just started this. It's different. Fun, fast moving. The guy's writing skills are okay, but the originality of his voice carries you through. He got a lot of help in the edit to make it work, and we benefit.

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Rimbo

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On 8/3/2023 at 2:42 PM, SimonBolivar said:

I'm a bit embarrassed to say that I've never read Foundation until now. I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would and will finish all of them if they keep up this way (which is still shorter than a single book in the Expanse series)

The first three books are amazing. Foundation's Edge was even better. Foundation and Earth... gets weird and a little disappointing.

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Chewbacca

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Wanted to re-read Dune before the second movie comes out.  So I do, I love it (again) and decide to keep reading (last time I only read book 1).  Book 2 is good, but not quite there.  Book 3 is worse again, but still decent.  Then book 4 rolls around.  What in the ever loving fuck did I just read?  I should have just stopped, but I'm strange that way.  I don't like to read books half finished, but I might need to revisit that policy.  It was just terrible.  How did the same author write all those books?

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Rimbo

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37 minutes ago, Chewbacca said:

Wanted to re-read Dune before the second movie comes out.  So I do, I love it (again) and decide to keep reading (last time I only read book 1).  Book 2 is good, but not quite there.  Book 3 is worse again, but still decent.  Then book 4 rolls around.  What in the ever loving fuck did I just read?  I should have just stopped, but I'm strange that way.  I don't like to read books half finished, but I might need to revisit that policy.  It was just terrible.  How did the same author write all those books?

Sometimes, an author has just the one for book in em. Sometimes that author more or less stops with that book (see JRR Tolkien, Harper Lee). And sometimes they just keep writing successively shittier novels. Usually it's a long slow decline (JK Rowling, John Grisham, Tom Clancy) where subsequent books are generally readable... until one day, they aren't.

Herbert was more "fall off a cliff" bad.

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 89500

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Expanse authors have a new book/universe coming out...in August of 2024

https://www.crowdcast.io/c/newcorey-reveal

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“I pitched Daniel an idea a couple of years ago....It might have even been like 10 years ago. But I pitched him this idea of the Book of Daniel, from the Old Testament, but as a science fiction story. That’s ultimately what it is. At some point when I was pitching him the idea, he pointed out that there was a little touch of Ursula Le Guin in it, a little touch of Frank Herbert in it. So we started describing it as the disappointing love child of Frank Herbert and Ursula Le Guin as a retelling of a biblical myth.”

1e39d5cf52bb143fdaf76f86ffa0b841.jpg

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How humanity came to the planet called Anjiin is lost in the fog of history, but that history is about to end.

The Carryx—part empire, part hive—have waged wars of conquest for centuries, destroying or enslaving species across the galaxy. Now, they are facing a great and deathless enemy. The key to their survival may rest with the humans of Anjiin.

Caught up in academic intrigue and affairs of the heart, Dafyd Alkhor is pleased just to be an assistant to a brilliant scientist and his celebrated research team. Then the Carryx ships descend, decimating the human population and taking the best and brightest of Anjiin society away to serve on the Carryx homeworld, and Dafyd is swept along with them.

They are dropped in the middle of a struggle they barely understand, set in a competition against the other captive species with extinction as the price of failure. Only Dafyd and a handful of his companions see past the Darwinian contest to the deeper game that they must play to survive: learning to understand—and manipulate—the Carryx themselves.

With a noble but suicidal human rebellion on one hand and strange and murderous enemies on the other, the team pays a terrible price to become the trusted servants of their new rulers.

Dafyd Alkhor is a simple man swept up in events that are beyond his control and more vast than his imagination. He will become the champion of humanity and its betrayer, the most hated man in history and the guardian of his people.

This is where his story begins.

 

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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 89500

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For those looking for some sci-fi to read, or trying to get back into it, or just wanting to look at older/classic sci-fi (in addition to current), this guy has a lot of good stuff

https://www.youtube.com/@MediaDeathCult

His book discussions (more discussion than review):

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL61qL6xT89rbDv8VCf-iNmllkfV8oXDLA

His reviews can be spoiler-filled but he notes when that's the case.  For whatever reason, what he likes overlaps with what I like (and he's around my age, so he came into sci-fi when I did).

You may have seen him around YouTube - British guy dressed like some guy out of a 1930s pulp magazines.

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atomheartbevo

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Oh, and I finished The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, a few weeks ago.  I've read plenty of time-travel books, and it's been on my to-do list for a while, and finally got around to it.

Fuck, that's some good time travel.

 I never quite needed a spreadsheet to track things, but I need to check out anything the author mentioned about how it was written, because it had to involve spreadsheets.

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Doc Sam Beckett

Doc Sam Beckett 5785

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On 11/20/2020 at 9:20 AM, gyroprotagonist said:

stumbled on to this series

91qk7JU15QL._AC_UY218_.jpg

The Powder Mage trilogy.  Already finished so you can zoom through the entire thing.  Very well written and interesting concepts.  highly recommend.

 

This is a great recommendation. I just started the third book, and plan on starting the next trilogy after. Thank you. 

Spoiler

I want Tamas to get to the battle to handle these fucking generals and it's taking forever 

 

On 11/20/2020 at 9:24 AM, TKthunder2 said:

Great recommendation. The audiobook is good too.

 

The audiobook is good? Bruh, this Christian Rodska dude is the best narrator I've come across yet, and I was making a list of my favorite Stephen King narrators. He's so good, I'd rather listen than read, which annoys me 

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