February's Feast of Fantastical Fiction and Fact...

[Pyan]

Heigh-ho! Another month...

 

[HoopyFrood]

Finished The Secret Garden earlier this evening; halfway through Wuthering Heights.

 

[Pyan]

Starts humming Kate Bush...

That was one of my O-level set books, Hoops...and the one that made me start to question the validity of analysing books to the point that you lost the story...

Re-reading some later TPs...Thief of Time, and The Truth.

 

[DeepThought]

Still going through REH's Conan tales (ones that I've not read). Also reading:

Black Gods & Scarlet Dreams by C.L. Moore
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson

 

[murphy]

Well, it's 7:35 p.m., Jan. 31, here in S. California, but I'm still working my way through the Foreigner series (C. J. Cherryh). Now reading book 6 (out of 9) and 3 more to go.

 

[soulsinging]

I just finished "The Killing Kind" by John Connolly, the third in the Charlie Parker series. I didn't care for the first one, but the last two have been great... very creepy.

Now I'm either going to read the next Charlie Parker novel, the Watchmen, or Elantris. I can't make up my mind yet.

 

[J-Sun]

Still going through REH's Conan tales (ones that I've not read). Also reading:

Black Gods & Scarlet Dreams by C.L. Moore
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson

Never have read Conan but you should have a blast with Moore and Thompson.

 

[Allegra]

I'm reading Philip Pullman's The Ruby in the Smoke and enjoying every page of it. Not the same powerful stuff as his HDM trilogy but it's not supposed to. I got these Sally Lockhart books years ago but now hearing Pullman's The Book of Dust could be released this year, thought I should read these while waiting for the 'big, big book'.

 

[DeepThought]

Never have read Conan but you should have a blast with Moore and Thompson.

Thanks for the heads-up.

Hmm not a fan of Robert E. Howard then? If you enjoyed Moore 'tis quite probable you'll love REH; her Sword & Sorcery (Jirel of Joiry) was actually heavily influenced by Conan (if I'm not mistaken). That makes Conan the real deal.

 

[Nikitta]

Still reading Salt by Adam Roberts. It's very good, so far - especially with the switching of the narrator from one side of the conflict to the other, when their basic philosophies are so different from each other. It's also kind of sad and it makes me think a bit about different things.

 

[Connavar]

Pashazade: The First Arabesk by Jon Courtenay-Grimwood.

 

[ravenus]

Last couple stories left in Teatro Grotesco by Ligotti. Apart from The Town Manager, which I thought was a fairly lazy entry, this has been a collection of unmitigated and sometimes unbearable brilliance from a master of terror.

 

[ravenus]

If you enjoyed Moore 'tis quite probable you'll love REH; her Sword & Sorcery (Jirel of Joiry) was actually heavily influenced by Conan (if I'm not mistaken). That makes Conan the real deal.

Oh ya, having read both, the pick of the Conan stories rule in both imagination and prose over Jirel of Joiry...although the large number of scantily clad damsels that require to be rescued by Conan may irk the feminist minded

 

[J-Sun]

Thanks for the heads-up.

Hmm not a fan of Robert E. Howard then? If you enjoyed Moore 'tis quite probable you'll love REH; her Sword & Sorcery (Jirel of Joiry) was actually heavily influenced by Conan (if I'm not mistaken). That makes Conan the real deal.

No, it's not that I'm not a fan (well, I'm not literally, but I'm not an anti-fan, I mean) - I've just never gotten around to it. Part of the problem was never knowing what the real, right, and proper books were. A sort of definitive true-to-the-magazine-editions starting place. And part is that, while there's a lot of fantasy I do like, I'm not generally motivated to specifically seek it out. But I have felt like REH was "missing" and that I ought to give him a try. Someday.

 

[Ursa major]

The Complete Chronicles of Conan (see The Complete Chronicles of Conan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) contained REH Conan stories in the order that they were written/published, if I remember correctly.

 

[Connavar]

Oh ya, having read both, the pick of the Conan stories rule in both imagination and prose over Jirel of Joiry...although the large number of scantily clad damsels that require to be rescued by Conan may irk the feminist minded

Feminist ? Conan will irk anyone who expects to read a civlisied barbarian

How is Jirel of Joiry compared to S&S stories other than REH's ?

I wanted to read it simply because its seen as classic S&S.

 

[Nikitta]

I've decided to acquaint myself with Brave New World and find out what the fuss is all about

Well - one time has got to be the first, doesn't it?

 

[j d worthington]

The Complete Chronicles of Conan (see The Complete Chronicles of Conan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) contained REH Conan stories in the order that they were written/published, if I remember correctly.

Or, for those in the States, there's the three-volume set of Conan tales put out by Del Rey, though these go back to Howard's original mss. rather than the (often edited) magazine versions....

Del Rey Online

J-Sun: You might also take a look at some of the others on the list, as they, too, are some of the high points in heroic fantasy....

Oh, and yes, C. L. Moore was a correspondent of Howard's, and greatly enjoyed his Conan tales; Jirel was among the first "imitations" (as they were called then, though they are often vastly different in feel as well as orientation) to be published in Weird Tales (along with a few by Clifford Ball and the like....)

Connavar: I'd rank them quite highly, though they are a bit more slow-paced than some of the other "classic" S&S tales out there. They repay both with readings and re-readings, however....

 

[The Ace]

The Ghost Brigades and The Last Colony by John Scalzi. His first, Old Man's War, was the first decent new hard SF I'd read in years.

 

[GOLLUM]

Oh, and yes, C. L. Moore was a correspondent of Howard's, and greatly enjoyed his Conan tales; Jirel was among the first "imitations" (as they were called then, though they are often vastly different in feel as well as orientation) to be published in Weird Tales (along with a few by Clifford Ball and the like....)
Connavar: I'd rank them quite highly, though they are a bit more slow-paced than some of the other "classic" S&S tales out there. They repay both with readings and re-readings, however....

Moore's Jirel is very good albeit the heroinre can be seem a little daft at times. Kuttner, Moore's partner, is another S&S worth chasing up.