Tony’s
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(group member since Dec 19, 2018)
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RJ wrote: "I really enjoyed the first film. I thought they nailed it, even down to the dwarves singing in Bilbo's home prior to leaving on their quest."That's fair. The first film was certainly the best of them. The second was terrible for the changes it made to soul of the book. The third was not great, but the Battle of the Five Armies was well done.
Journey to the Centre of the Earth and
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea are, IMO, his best works. I found
From the Earth to the Moon and 'round the Moon to be very slow. He certainly tries to put more science into his stories than H.G. Wells, but is not as good a storyteller.
Around the World in Eighty Days and
The Mysterious Island are straight adventure stories, not SFF. Around the World is a good story, but Mysterious Island I also found to be very slow - although if you ever find yourself shipwrecked on a deserted island, it's got a lot of useful survival tips :)

I have started on
The Distant Suns, the third book in
Sailing to Utopia. Although listed as volume 5 in the Tale of the Eternal Champion, neither of the first two books in this compilation had anything to do with the Eternal Champion - for this volume, at least, it was all marketing.

There is a LOT more in the books than was in the films. I am a huge Tolkien fan and I remember at the time of initial release a lot of people like me found a lot to criticise about the films. For me, however, I thought the films were great - I understand that you can't adapt books of that complexity into 2 or 3 hour films without making some sacrifices. Following the success of GoT, I wonder if Amazon Prime is considering re-adapting the books into 3 seasons of TV?
As for the film adaptations of The Hobbit - well, I think I'll just leave it as disappointing and not get into it :)

While still deciding what to start on next, I finished off the anthology I have been reading for over a year,
The Mammoth Book of Steampunk Adventures. The biggest problem with it, and the reason I kept putting it aside, is that far too many of the stories in here aren't steampunk - adding a few automata, or some steam-powered gadgets doesn't make a story steampunk.

Finished
Red Energy, the final book in the first Alex Cave trilogy. I had been planning to go straight on to
Gravity, the next book in the Alex Cave series, but Red Energy was relatively disappointing, so I'm going to give it some thought.

I finished off
Cold Energy and have now started
Red Energy, the final book in the first trilogy of the
The Alex Cave Series.

I finished
Dead Energy, which reads more like a geopolitical thriller than a science fiction novel. I'm about to start
Cold Energy, which is the second book in
The Alex Cave Series

Started on
Dead Energy, the first book in
The Alex Cave Series

I finished
The Black Corridor, which was surprisingly dark. I have started
Brian Lumley's book of Cthulhu Mythos novellas -
The Taint and Other Novellas: Best Mythos Tales No. 1

I finished
Where the Hell is Tesla?, which I enjoyed - it is lightweight, but funny. If you enjoy the Bill and Ted movies, you'll probably like this. I have started
The Black Corridor

I finished
The Ice Schooner by
Michael Moorcock - ok,but not one of his best. I have now started
Where the Hell is Tesla?

I've started
The Ice Schooner by
Michael Moorcock. Even when writing what is supposed to be science fiction, it reads more like fantasy.

The Last Starfighter is, IMO, a great film and well deserving of its cult status. Iron Eagle is the opposite (although I don't know of anyone who considers Iron Eagle a cult film).

I finished
Oceanworlds, which definitely classes as hard sci-fi, and I've read another couple of stories in the anthology
The Mammoth Book of Steampunk Adventures. I'm still deciding on what to read next.

I have finished
Path of the Bold: Superhero Anthology, which was a fun read. I have now started
Oceanworlds
Kivrin wrote: "Is it bad that when I saw the title of the book that I thought it was about Oak Island? I'm addicted to that stupid show."Hehe, I hadn't ever heard of Oak Island (or the show) until I looked it up after seeing your comment :)

For a superhero series, I think the Wildcards series edited by George RR Martin is pretty good. Certainly the first dozen books maintain a reasonable quality - I haven't read past that and I think it's up to 22 or 23 books now.

I finished
The Templars' Secret Island which, to my complete and utter lack of astonishment, didn't really shed any light on the Templars' secret treasure :) I have started
Path of the Bold: Superhero Anthology, which I expect to be a pretty light read.

Yeah, the tech levels demonstrated on Discovery are a bit of a problem, and I really, really don't know why they decided to redesign Klingons. And if they had the tech to build fleets of drone fighters - which is completely understandable, we have that tech now - where were they against the Borg or the Dominion?