John's recent posts

Recent public posts (showing 181-186 of 186).

The style, I thought, owed a lot to the fairy tale tradition. I often felt, as a consequence, that we were just skimming over Ged's life, dipping down for a scene here or there to catch the important plot points. As a consequence of this, I found it hard to really care about Ged.

That said, the style seemed in some ways to fit the character. Ged seemed so focused first on his own development and later on his quest to defeat his shadow, that he didn't seem particularly engaged in the world or the people around him, except by fits and spells.

The other side of this style is that it gives the whole story a certain archetypal quality. It also has the feel of a storyteller telling a story rather than a novelist writing one, if you see the distinction I'm trying to get at.

I've posted a couple times in other discussions, but it occurred to me I hadn't actually introduced myself.

I'm 31, living in RI, teaching English. I'm a once-and-future music teacher as well--my fiancee and I are moving to western PA for the next school year. Originally from Ohio, I started reading fantasy in 4th or 5th grade with Tolkien and Lewis, and gradually branched out from there. I was a voracious reader of fantasy and sci-fi up through high school and nursed dreams of writing in those genres. I went to college, majored in English (and music) and put aside sf and fantasy as somehow inferior to "real" literature.

Thankfully, while doing graduate work in music, I happened to pick up some of my old fantasy novels (I think it was Zelazny's Amber chronicles, but perhaps not) and realized that just because I enjoyed it as a kid didn't mean the genre was a bunch of fluff. I've been voraciously reading and re-reading sf and fantasy ever since.

On the whole, I lean more toward fantasy, and that more on the "epic" side of things, though I'm not tied down to that and appreciate other kinds of fantasy and sci-fi as well.

I read 32 books last year, but rather than list them all, I'll just share some of the series that have stood out for me. In no particular order: R. Scott Bakker's Prince of Nothing, Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen, Sherwood Smith's Inda series, and George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. Only the first of those has actually been completed, and even that one *really* has a whole follow-up series that hasn't even started. I'm just hoping none of them go the route of Robert Jordan.

Arctic, I'm in the middle of A Song of Ice and Fire right now, so that sounds like a great suggestion to me. :) Everyone else may have other feelings about committing to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pages, though.

Just quick comments on some things that people have thrown out. I think Robin Hobb's doing excellent work--Assassin's Apprentice, the rest of that trilogy, and the other two trilogies in that world were all very good. I think Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen (first book is Gardens of the Moon, which someone mentioned) is some of the best epic fantasy being done right now. Another epic fantasy to consider is R. Scott Bakker's Prince of Nothing Series that begins with The Darkness that Comes Before. It's a bit dense to get into, but once you do there's a lot to it, and a lot to talk about.

Now, in the realm of the more quickly read... someone mentioned Steven Brust--rather than diving into one of his series, what about Agyar? I would also put out there either This Immortal or Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny. The former won the Hugo once upon a time and the latter is a pretty cool sf borrowing from Hinduism and exploring some interesting ideas.

Speaking of sf, what about Dan Simmons duology Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion? It's been years since I read it, but I remember it being quite excellent.

I would also be interested in the digital version...

Full disclosure here from a first-time poster: I haven't read SH5 in about a year, so my comments will be distinctly lacking in specifics at times.

Re: time travel and aliens. When I first read this, back in college I think it was, I read this as science fiction. Re-reading it, I don't think it's science fiction at all. He doesn't travel through time, there are no aliens. Billy Pilgrim is so overwhelmed by his experiences in the war that he creates a fantasy world and finally breaks from reality. Notice how the aliens owe so much to pulp sf, to the Kilgore Trout type of sf Billy reads. Notice how the Trafalmadorian view of time is very useful to Billy in dealing with the horrors of war: don't worry about death, it's not real anyway. That, at any rate, is my take on it.

Here's the funny thing: I thought it was GREAT... I own the next two books in the series... and haven't even cracked them.

Can't explain it.