Josh's comments (member since Dec 10, 2008)

Josh's comments from the Fantasy Book Club group.

Eregon was awful, and the Golden Compass was okay, but not nearly as good as the book, and it seems like they're not going to make any more of those anyways.

Personally I'd like to see less family oriented fantasy novels being adapted. Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter both made great movie franchises, but something a bit darker and more twisted would be a breath of fresh air.

Barbm1020 wrote: "I loved Equal Rites! Granny is so cool!"

She was definitely the best part of the book, and I think Mr. Pratchett's favorite part of it as well. I looked into the character of Esk and I guess he never brings her back again, whereas Granny is a recurring character. Overall, the book was a little disjointed, but anything from Pratchett is funny and addicting.

Jason, if you enjoy Brent Weeks, check out Scott Lynch. His Gentleman Bastard series reads a lot like Weeks' but about theives rather than assassins, and while I really enjoyed The Way of Shadows, I think I like Lynch's work even better.
I still haven't read Feist, (although I do have a good number of the books in his series) but Robin Hobb is a must for any fantasy fan, I'd recommend her series starting with Assassin's Apprentice.

Read Equal Rites, from Terry Pratchett. Just finished The Way of Shadows (started it before I even realized it was this month's book), and now I'm rereading A Shadow in Summer by Daniel Abraham so I can finally read the sequels.

Just finished it today and loved it. I'm already eager to get and read the next two.

Almost done with it. Actually had no idea we were reading this book this month, so that works out. Very enjoyable so far.

I read this whole series and absolutely love it. It's dark and twisted and very atypical. Those who choose to go to the end should keep an open mind, however. It's definitely not a conventional ending.

Possibly one of my favorite fantasies, I love this book. I look forward to the discussions (and the 3rd book!)

Thanks for the input Marc. Is "Chasing His Own Tail" your story or the name of the collection? I'd like to get into writing some humorous sci-fi of my own, so I'd love to read anything I can get my hands on.

I want to start getting into Terry Pratchett, so I've picked up the first few Discworld Books. I also found 5 Xanth books on the dollar rack at Half Price so I grabbed those. Just read the first one and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. I guess I'm in the mood for light humorous fantasy at the moment. Also on that note, I'm grabbing all of Robert Asprin's Myth books that I come across.

After reading LOTR, Shannara was my first foray into fantasy. I enjoyed them when I was young, but I can't really get into them anymore. For some reason they have this made up as you go kind of feel, and I really hate how the formula is pretty much the exact same in every book. They're just not very high quality writing.
However, those books don't speak for Terry Brook's writing talent as a whole. I read his Word and Void series (starting with Running with the Demon) and I really enjoyed it. It was more consistant, less formulaic and had interesting characters.

I just got done with my Christopher Moore kick, now I'm finally starting on the Xanth series. I just started A Spell For Chameleon and I'm enjoying it so far.

I'm on a Christopher Moore kick (probably the funniest author of all time) and I just bought A Dirty Job and You Suck: A Love Story.

I've read all 9 book by Hobb in this series. Bring it on!

I had a hard time with that book. It had an interesting premise but I couldn't get involved in any of the characters and something about the world seemed unrealistic, as if I could tell that Tad made it up and wasn't able to get immersed in it. Perhaps the way he set up all the information in the prologue kinda put me off.
I can't say the same about William's Otherland series. That series was engrossing, finely written, bizzare and just a lot of fun.

Otherland was the first thing I read by Tad Williams, and I found it much more engrossing than his fantasy series. I read the first of Memory, Sorrow and Thorn and wasn't compelled enough by any of the characters to continue. Shadowmarch I didn't care too much for.

As for Otherland, the series is really well done and has some very interesting concepts. The characters are great too. If you compare it to M,S & T, you can't even tell it's the same author.

My one complaint about Otherland was the ending. Some of the resolutions were unsatisfying considering the four dense books you have to read to get to them. But at least it wasn't a "I don't know how to end this" kind of ending, as with Dark Tower. (shudder)

The Rules of Ascension looked interesting, but Children of Amarid just wasn't a good book in my opinion. The characers were just too unbelieveable and the dialogue was pretty bad. I barely made it through that one.

Another author you might dig is David Farland, his Runelords series. As far as quality of writing, he's not my favorite, but his books are filled with action and the character count isn't too high. The concept of how the "magic" works is very unique too.
My personal favotire authors are George R.R. Martin (perhaps too many characters and too much politics for your taste though) Joe Abercrombie (for those who like their fantasy gritty and very unconventional) and Scott Lynch. Lynch's Lies of Locke Lamora I think you'd like quite a bit.

If you're into Goodkind, the other massive doorstopper fantasy series, Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan would probably appeal to you. I prefer it over Goodkind actually. If you'd like a series with much better writing and character development than Goodkind, but perhaps a bit less action, I'd recommend Robin Hobb's trilogies, starting with Royal Assassin. She's an amazing author.

I just finished today. Took me a while, heh, but it was worth it. Justin, I do have to agree with you on some points. The ending wasn't a happy one, and a lot of the characters were sh** on pretty bad, but I still loved the ending as a whole.

As far as the characters reverting back to their pitiful states before becoming better people in book two, I think there are a couple things to be said about that.
Jezal- I think he really did change. He completely became a better person, more courageous and he showed himself to be a fully capable king. The only thing corwardish about him was the fact he learned that Bayaz controlled him utterly and was his puppet. But he had no choice in that matter, did he?
Logen- I think with, Ninefingers, Abercrombie is saying that some things will never change. While Glokta went from a crippled servant to the most powerful man (or puppet rather) in the Union, Logen is still a killing machine even after aspiring to be something better for so long. How the book ends with him jumping in the river is how the first book began. I am dissapointed like you though, that Abercrombie didn't delve into his split personalitly. I was hoping maybe for a flashback scene that would explain the point that Logen and The Bloody Nine became one person, but oh well. Maybe we'll read about him in the next book. I'm sure he's still alive after all.

What I liked most about the ending though, was how everything came together, even if it wasn't necessarily happy. Bayaz who at first seemed to be the Gandalf figure turned out really to be more of a Sauron figure, and I thought that was just awesome.
Overall, the series is one of my favorites of all time.