February's Febrile Focus For Finding Fulfilling Fiction

[Fried Egg]

One word of warning: Unless memory fails me, the first of this set is the weakest (as far as holding reader interest), yet it lays the groundwork for things later. After that point, they improve.

Indeed, the first part wasn't even published first. Personally, I would suggest starting with the second volume and then seeing whether you want to go back and get some back story or else plough on with the others.

 

[The Judge]

What did you think of Kraken?

I was going to add a bit to your review, but then got called away before I could get my thoughts together.

I can't say I actually enjoyed it, but it wasn't as bad as I'd feared. I could admire the cleverness of his writing, with all the long complicated sentences and the made-up words, and I could also appreciate the sheer fecundity of his imagination. But I never warmed to it or to any of the characters. And I guessed who was behind the end-of-the-world stuff so even the denouement was a bit of a damp squid. ( )

 

[Vertigo]

One word of warning: Unless memory fails me, the first of this set is the weakest (as far as holding reader interest), yet it lays the groundwork for things later. After that point, they improve.

Indeed, the first part wasn't even published first. Personally, I would suggest starting with the second volume and then seeing whether you want to go back and get some back story or else plough on with the others.

Yes I think you are right, as I recall the first one is actually set before the Cities take flight (and was published later - an early prequel) and has a totally different feel to the rest of them. Looking at my database I scored the first one the lowest and they got steadily better after that. The fourth one - The Triumph of Time - was my favourite.

 

[AE35Unit]

One word of warning: Unless memory fails me, the first of this set is the weakest (as far as holding reader interest), yet it lays the groundwork for things later. After that point, they improve.

Thanks JD, thats good to know!

 

[j d worthington]

Good to know senility hasn't completely set in.... It has been... nearly 40 years since I read Cities in Flight, so I wasn't by any means certain of such an old impression being accurate.

Getting close to finishing off The Genocides, and my impressions remain pretty much the same, though I will say that it is a quite uneven book; at times very well done, at others more than a bit shaky, yet still holding the interest. And yes, it remains (with about 30 pages to go) an extremely grim vision.

 

[Grunkins]

Lost power for two days in a blizzard, but it gave me a chance to do nothing but read (power is back now, yay).

Finished Stephen R Donaldson's The Real Story, the first book of his Gap Cycle. Very interested to see how he parlays a short (twisted) character study into a sweeping space opera in the future books. This was very well written and very disturbing. He handles omniscient POV beautifully. It's my first Donaldson book and I look forward to reading more of him.

Then I read part 2 of Peter F Hamilton's The Reality Dysfunction (the American mmpb was split into two books, annoying). It was much more fun than part 1. The story finally got going. I have to note that his handling of omniscient POV was very awkward and jarring.

Now I"m on to the last book in John Ringo's Posleen War Hell's Faire. I'm enjoying Ringo books thus far.

I am also thrilled to have heat again!

 

[Southern Geologist]

Getting close to finishing off The Genocides, and my impressions remain pretty much the same, though I will say that it is a quite uneven book; at times very well done, at others more than a bit shaky, yet still holding the interest. And yes, it remains (with about 30 pages to go) an extremely grim vision.

Who could guess that a book titled The Genocides would be extremely grim.... Sorry, I had to.

I'm about fifty pages into The Martian Chronicles and really enjoying it. The story of the second visit to Mars is brilliant. My understanding is that these were a collection of short stories in the pulp magazines that were stitched together into one longer work; if so I can just imagine the joy people would get from reading short stories in a pulp magazine that were so damn clever.

Finished Stephen R Donaldson's The Real Story, the first book of his Gap Cycle. Very interested to see how he parlays a short (twisted) character study into a sweeping space opera in the future books. This was very well written and very disturbing. He handles omniscient POV beautifully. It's my first Donaldson book and I look forward to reading more of him.

I'm glad to see that you enjoyed it and that it didn't put you off the series. Sheer brilliance awaits. Make sure to keep reporting back when you start on the next volumes in the series.

 

[j d worthington]

Who could guess that a book titled The Genocides would be extremely grim.... Sorry, I had to.

Yep. Sounds a bit silly, doesn't it? However, given sf's tendency -- at least up to that point, and even to some degree long after -- to neatly resolve such horrific situations into a (relatively) happy ending, I'm glad Disch seems to have avoided this pitfall... though perhaps I shouldn't say so until I have finished the entire novel....

 

[Lord Captain Woden]

Yes I think you are right, as I recall the first one is actually set before the Cities take flight (and was published later - an early prequel) and has a totally different feel to the rest of them. Looking at my database I scored the first one the lowest and they got steadily better after that. The fourth one - The Triumph of Time - was my favourite.

I'm just over half way through the first and although it drags quite often its actually quite good. If the others steadily improve then I'll probably end up enjoying the omnibus as a whole.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Then I read part 2 of Peter F Hamilton's The Reality Dysfunction (the American mmpb was split into two books, annoying). It was much more fun than part 1. The story finally got going. I have to note that his handling of omniscient POV was very awkward and jarring.

My brother recommended these books to me, but he accidentally gave me the third book to start with. Since I didn't know that, I read it and it made no sense to me and I didn't enjoy it. Oh well, perhaps I would have liked it better if I got to start from the beginning.

I finished How It Began by Chris Impey. I want to like his books, I just can't seem to do it. I have seen him talk numerous times, and always enjoyed them and found them informative. Apparently it doesn't translate into the written word (at least for me).

Now I am reading The Mystery of Marie Roget by Edgar Allan Poe. Between books I am trying to read a couple stories/poems from his Collected Works which I have had sitting on my shelf for quite awhile. I am enjoying these little mysteries so far, which are just like Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories. Although I believe Poe's were written first, so Doyle's are like Poe's than.

 

[j d worthington]

Yep. Poe came roughly fifty years before. In fact, Holmes turns his nose up at Watson's interest in Poe's tales in (if memory serves) "A Study in Scarlet"....

Finished The Genocides. While Disch kept to the logical conclusion, the book does suffer from other problems toward the end, making it a rather disappointing ending, writing-wise. Still, as a first novel, not really bad; in fact some fine stuff, as well as some rather more wobbly....

Now back to Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century....

 

[biodroid]

I dropped The Name of the Wind, too much awesomeness in the character got to me, but started reading The Black Prism by Brent Weeks, I can already see it's better than the Night Angel trilogy, it flows better and the characters are more grey than the plain old good vs bad guy. Plus he explains the magic system very well and it's quite an interesting system and the plot sounds cool as well.

 

[Lady of Winterfell]

Interesting JD, I may have to go look that up.

 

[Lord Captain Woden]

Finished the first two novels in Cities In Flight, first one was Okay although it definitely read like a prequel and it did seem to ramble a bit at times. Second one was a big improvement in both story and writing but I still wouldn't say it was anything more than good. I've decided to leave the other two for another time and move on to Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep, I've heard great things about this novel and because their is so much Philip K Dick in the SF Masterworks series I really hope I enjoy it.

 

[Southern Geologist]

Finished with The Martian Chronicles. A lot of fun and interesting stuff in there. Definitely something I'll be returning to in the future. Onto Asimov's Foundation trilogy now.

 

[Grunkins]

Finished John Ringo's Hell's Faire, and with it the end of his main sequence of Posleen War books. A good story all in all, though this last book was not quite up to snuff compared to the earlier books. A few promises remain to be delivered upon, but I guess the other eight or so books in the larger series will handle that. I think in retrospect reading this book immediately after When the Devil Dances is best, seeing as they are basically two halves of the same book.

On to another alien invasion story, and my first Greg Bear novel, Forge of God.

 

[Bugg]

Finished A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge. Found it very hard going at first, wow, am I glad I hung in there. Amazing book.

Totally agree

I'm about two thirds of the way through The Coldest War, the second book in Ian Tregillis's 'Milkweed Tryptich'. I liked the first book, Bitter Seeds, but thought there was room for improvement, and he seems to have taken the aspects that worked best in that one, developed them, and got rid of the clunkier parts. Enjoying it a lot

 

[Lord Soth]

I dropped The Name of the Wind, too much awesomeness in the character got to me, but started reading The Black Prism by Brent Weeks, I can already see it's better than the Night Angel trilogy, it flows better and the characters are more grey than the plain old good vs bad guy. Plus he explains the magic system very well and it's quite an interesting system and the plot sounds cool as well.

Yes I admit that was the most annoying thing for me too, didn't stop me reading the next in the series though.

Totally agree

I'm about two thirds of the way through The Coldest War, the second book in Ian Tregillis's 'Milkweed Tryptich'. I liked the first book, Bitter Seeds, but thought there was room for improvement, and he seems to have taken the aspects that worked best in that one, developed them, and got rid of the clunkier parts. Enjoying it a lot

I really couldn't get on with this - after reading the synopsis somewhere I thought it sounded really cool and managed to bag a bargain cheap (brand new, hardcover shipped from America for about £6). However it really didn't live up to that promise and I gave up half way through.

 

[Bugg]

I really couldn't get on with this - after reading the synopsis somewhere I thought it sounded really cool and managed to bag a bargain cheap (brand new, hardcover shipped from America for about £6). However it really didn't live up to that promise and I gave up half way through.

Shame! I feel the set up in the first book is really paying dividends in the second

 

[AE35Unit]

On to another alien invasion story, and my first Greg Bear novel, Forge of God.

Feel free to skip the sequel