Stand Alone's

rune

rune
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Has Williams written a lot of stand alone books?

I read War of the Flowers last year and thought it was one of better works. His series tend to be very heavy going :(
 
TailCatcher's Song....came out many years ago and may be his first published book. It was about a cat.
 
Its true, Otherland is certainly over-long;)

I liked War of the Flowers, though not as much as Otherland... some of the ideas where a bit cringeworthy.
 
I'm reading War fo the Flower's at the moment and enjoying it. The character's seem funny, the writing style is fairly smooth and the ideas are quite original.
 
I have read both Otherworld and War of the Flowers. Unhappily I really didn't enjoy either book and yet I thoroughly enjoyed the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series.
 
Is that a more typical fantasy-type series?

Just read a gory bit in War of the Flowers, brrrr.
 
'Memory Sorrow Thorn' is indeed an epic fantasy, Esioul. I've tried to get into it a couple of times but failed to get past the fifty to a hundred page mark. I did like 'Otherland', though, and I loved War of the Flowers. Of his other standalones I've only read Child of an Ancient City, which is a slim little volume retelling the Arabian Nights myth as a vampire story. Very interesting but pretty lightweight.
 
Esioul said:
Is that a more typical fantasy-type series?
Just read a gory bit in War of the Flowers, brrrr.
Like Culhwch says it's very much more traditional fantasy and a very good EPIC series. The first couple hundred pages are pretty slow moving but after that M,S,T shapes up as an excellent read.

I've read just about everything by Tad and certainly his more traditional fantasy stories include his orginal M,S,T and current Shadowmarch series.

War Of The Flowers is more similar to his ambitious Otherland series.

His other books are Tailchaser's Song about a cat on a journey and quite wonderfully written, more fantasy per se plus his interesting adaption or rather extension to Shakespeare's famous play "The Tempest" which deals with the characters x years after the events of the original play called Caliban's Hour.
 
GOLLUM said:
War Of The Flowers is more similar to his ambitious Otherland series.

Now there's an interesting comparison... I guess as far as 'the stranger in a strange land' set-up they are vaguely alike, but beyond that, I couldn't think of two more different works.
 
Culhwch said:
Now there's an interesting comparison... I guess as far as 'the stranger in a strange land' set-up they are vaguely alike, but beyond that, I couldn't think of two more different works.
AHA very astute of you to notice that was a bit of a stretch I admit but what I was basically alluding to.
So you read the other books I listed??....:confused:
 
Only the Otherland books. I've looked for Tailchaser's Song but haven't seen hide nor hair of it here. Same with Caliban's Hour. I started Shadowmarch but I was in a bit of reading slump and gave up on it. Looking to buy it now it is in mmpb.
 
Culhwch said:
Only the Otherland books. I've looked for Tailchaser's Song but haven't seen hide nor hair of it here. Same with Caliban's Hour. I started Shadowmarch but I was in a bit of reading slump and gave up on it. Looking to buy it now it is in mmpb.
Yes not sure if they printed a lot of copies of those 2 books seeing they were early in his career. Maybe you can pick up a copy from the library. Our public libraries here have copies plus I've seen one or two copies of each book in second hand shops over the years.

Shadowmarch is quite good and I enjoyed M,S,T probably still in my top dozen fantasy EPIC series. I know it's a little dull for the first few hundred pages but after that it's a well written affair.....:)
 
Culhwch said:
'Memory Sorrow Thorn' is indeed an epic fantasy, Esioul. I've tried to get into it a couple of times but failed to get past the fifty to a hundred page mark. I did like 'Otherland', though, and I loved War of the Flowers. Of his other standalones I've only read Child of an Ancient City, which is a slim little volume retelling the Arabian Nights myth as a vampire story. Very interesting but pretty lightweight.

You might try a different approach. What happened to me with the Memory, Sorrow, Thorn series was I got To Green Angel Tower, parts one and two and read them and I found getting into those books as easy as eating candy! Since then I purchased The Dragonbone Chair and while I admitt it was not as good as the last two books in the series I really enjoyed it because it explained a lot of things I was missing in the story. I still plan to get The Stone of Farewell because I have come to think of this series as one of my all time favorites!

Rahl
 

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