NOT recommended reading!

[tonic]

Well ever since I started reading Fantasy I would look up people's comments ask around on message boards and make sure what I was going to read was good. I have read most epic series and did like most of them and I really haven't found a truly bad book.Though I am running out of known series so soon I might have to start experimenting. That could turn nasty.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Experimenting with what you read can be the best part - a lot of talented authors out there remain to be discovered/redisocered.

Of course, there may well be a few turkeys on the way - but every author you enjoyed started out with people taking a risk and reading the works of an unknown.

 

[Esioul]

Except you do end up wasting money on them. That's happend to me- I've read a few dud Cherryhs. Or started them.

 

[littlemissattitude]

Except you do end up wasting money on them. That's happend to me- I've read a few dud Cherryhs. Or started them.

That's what libraries are for. Sometimes I'll go out and buy a book after I've read it out of the library and really liked it, but I hardly ever buy a book - especially fiction - unless I know ahead of time I'll like it. There are certain authors I'll buy without knowing much about a particular book, but there aren't many of them. I just don't have much book money right now.

 

[tonic]

I'm the exact same way. The last boook I bought was the last Robin Hobb book because I knew I would enjoy it. I don't usually go out and spend money on a paperback or hardcover when I know I can get them in my library. When I can't I ry to discover ways to get it without paying but Im a members to three different library branches so there usually isn't a book I can't find.

 

[polymorphikos]

Most classic sci-fi can be bought in paper-back reprints for five dollars from the second hand-book shop. I like to hang on to things so that's generally the route I take.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Ah, another second-hand collector. I have a large and growing collection of classic sf in old second-hand paperbacks that I am inordinately proud of.


nemogbr, Dracula wasn't written as a script - it was written in a from that used to be fairly popular in literature at one time, the epistolatory novel. The whole thing is told to us in the form of various character's diaries and letters. I actually found the device effective because it helped build up that aura of subjective, nebulous horror.

 

[Lacedaemonian]

Good to see Terry Brooks and George lucas get a good hammering. Terrence penned one of the Star Wars novels, I believe. Shat recognises shat it would appear. I read three of the Shannara books when I was at the tender age of twelve, and even then could recognise crap materials. It seemed like a shoddy Hawk The Slayer take. Correct me if I am wrong (I am stepping back some thirteen years) but wasn't everybody taciturn? Do you think that he just found the word in the dictionary and fell in love with it. His fat druid character was also very poor. Was he called Allon or something? My personal hate at the minute is Robert Jordan. The book starts grim and then nose dives into the deepest realms of depression. He is obviously talented, but that is no excuse. Stephen Lawhead is also bankrupt of novel ideas, though I do remember getting a morsel of pleasure from some of his works. It goes without saying that Terry Pratchett is completely slated. Though his books are the most shoplifted in the UK. David Eddings is great but always finished his epic works very poorly. I also dislike him for the views he shares on other (more talented) authors in the Rivan Codex. JV Jones early works were also very poor but she has improved vastly with her last two series. All sci fi is rubbish.

 

[Brian G Turner]

LOL! What Spartan opinions.

 

[Hypes]

Brian, I hate you now. The Night's Dawn trilogy is one of my favourites.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I'm right, though, aren't I?

http://www.chronicles-network.com/b...-f-hamilton-reality-dysfunction-reviews-1.php

OR if you disagree, why not write up some reviews and I'll post them up in opposition?

http://www.chronicles-network.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=32

I really want to get multiple perceptions of different works, so I'm glad to see diversity of opinion in what goes up.

Also - yes, I've been slow - I had planned to finish off that section with the new reviews before now, but I've just been so squeezed between work and exhausting baby. Back on the case...

 

[Hypes]

I might go ahead and do that at some point. Need some practice writing reviews. Been an awful long while since I've read it, though.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Don;t worry about how "official" they look - I tride to call them "personal appraisals" because I wanted to get away from the formality of it. Basically, think in terms of how you'd describe any of the books on these forums. I just want to be able to put up opinions for other people to reference, rather than make any official judgement of any work.

 

[Lacedaemonian]

Book reviews on the web have proven invaluable to me over the last two years. I've been writing a lot of my posts after I've been on night shift and may at times have been a little strong with my views. Still though, when I looked for reviews of books I looked for people who hated the books as well as those who loved them. I could not find a bad review of George RR Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, or Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game. In my search, which resulted in the discovery of this site, I was looking for top ten and top one hundred rankings of heroic fantasy novels. I would like to see a ranking on this site of best and worst fantasy and SF, voted by the registered users. I know that the usual names will be there for all to see but there are always the suprises, plus not everybody shares the same reading.

I'm sure the Spartan reference was a reference to my nick and not my political opinions. lol

Hypes has already crossed swords (lightsabers) with me a few times about our differing opinions, which is great. He has recommended some SF works, which I will read and hopefully enjoy. I don't just hate SF, I also hate Horror. Maybe that will change in time. I get paid next week so I'll be lingering around the SF section in Waterstones looking for your recommendations Hypes.

Has anybody read any Nancy Springer novels? I would not recommend her fantasy works. They made me feel ill whilst reading them. I distinctly remember feeling particularly ill reading White Hart. I don't know if she is popular writer or not, as I got the books from a car boot sale.

 

[Brian G Turner]

A top ten would certainly be an interesting idea - I certainly need to develop the section first, though.

And if you have any reviews of your own to put forward you are certainly welcome to. I'm going to make a general call for these from members once I get the erst of the site properly up and running again.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

Brian, I hate you now. The Night's Dawn trilogy is one of my favourites.

I didn't do to well with The Reality Dysfunction either. I loved the hard-sf concepts but I actively disliked the characters. I'm afraid that ruined it for me. Maybe I'm just a prude but those sex bits put me off too. Having said that, I see that he has a new stand-alone novel out and would be willing to give it a shot.

 

[Brian G Turner]

The sex only bothered me in that it seemed a case of wish-fulfillment by proxy, and otherwise irrelevant to the plot.

 

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy]

The sex only bothered me in that it seemed a case of wish-fulfillment by proxy, and otherwise irrelevant to the plot.

Yes they seemed totally gratuitous. By way of contrast, I think Ken MacLeod handles sex scenes admirably in his novels - they seem to fit in seamlessly with the ongoing development of both plot and characters. I hate it when sex bits are just bunged in to add another element of appeal to a story.

 

[Lacedaemonian]

The Cenedra and Garrion sex scenes in the Belgariad by David Eddings are the worst I have ever come across (No pun intended, I assure you). The worst of it is, David truly believed he was crossing barriers with his sex scenes. I remember thinking, 'Surely a woman wrote this rubbish!!" Turns out a few years later that his wife, Leigh, helped him write the series. He also comments on the lack of sex in the Tolkien books, which I do not believe required any, although I am sure there was an incestuous fumble in the Silmarillion.

 

[rune]

I seem to be very difficult to please I have tried so many authors and fortunately liked most but I have quite a list of authors I just couldnt get away with. I found their stories boring, slow and had nothing in them to hold my attention.
I'm sure there will be authors in this list that others love, but like I say I must be difficult to please

Alice Borchardt

Celilia Dart-Thornton

Chris Bunch

David & Leigh Eddings

David Drake

David Eddings

David Gemmell

Fritz Leiber

George RR Martin

Jacqueline Carey

James Barclay

Janny Wurts

Jennifer Roberson

Jude Fisher

JV Jones

K.J Parker

Kate Elliott

Kristen Britain

M Weis & T Hickman

Marion Zimmer Bradley

Mercedes Lackey

Neil Gaiman

Niven & Pournelle

Raymond Feist

Richard Lee Byers

Robert Newcomb

Stephen King

Steven Erikson

Terry Pratchett

Tom Arden

Tom Holt

William Hornwood