Tony’s Comments (group member since Dec 19, 2018)

Tony’s comments from the Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy group.

Andrea has started a thread to discuss the categories for next year's Bingo

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

A bit of spam here - for those who are interested in the SFF Bingo challenge, Andrea has started a thread where we are discussing the themes for next year's Bingo

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Old West would give me a reason to read Cowboys and Aliens, which I have a copy of floating around somewhere.

Barbara wrote: "Run by Blake Crouch

This is Blake Crouch's debut novel from 2011, re-released in 2024.

In this thriller, a good portion of the American po..."

I have a few Blake Crouch novels in my TBR list. I haven't read any of his stuff, but I did enjoy the Wayward Pines TV series, based on his trilogy.

It probably doesn't have to be based on a board game - I think any game would do, and there are plenty of books based on role-playing games like D&D. Or even based on a wargame, like the Warhammer 40K or Warhammer fantasy novels

My suggestion for next year would be Atlantis and perhaps a non-fiction book about SFF - we haven't done that one for a few years.

I had completely missed the start of the new month. Work is - as always at this time of year - stupid busy. I finished At the Earth's Core and have started the next in the series - Pellucidar. I'm also slogging my way through The Last Dark - almost a third of the way.

Robin wrote: "that 'everybody' (the universal arbiter of good taste) says that 'he's very good and a bit like Douglas Adams.'"

What 'everybody' means by that is that Tom Holt writes funny SF, more than that he is stylistically like Douglas Adams 😝

I have finished At the Earths Core, which I found to be a pretty standard Burroughs tale, and quite enjoyable. It's one of the stories in The Ultimate Sci Fi Collection, which is one of the collections of sci fi stories that are in the public domain, that are regularly found on Amazon - I think I paid 99 cents for it.

I think, by the 10th book, that Thomas Covenant has actually undergone considerable character growth, and I don't dislike his character nearly as much as I did in the earlier books. Linden Avery, however, seems to get more unlikeable with each appearance.

Stephen Donaldson is clearly a very talented writer. The world-building that he has put into The Land is exceptional, and I quite enjoyed his Power series - no doubt, in some part, because he chose to leave his thesaurus on the shelf when he was writing those books 😆

I'm not sure I'd consider 200 pages a novella at all - I read a lot of novels in the 60s and 70s that weren't 200 pages.

I have started reading The Last Dark, which will finish my read through of the complete Thomas Covenant series. It has certainly been a slog for the last few books, hopefully the series ends on a brighter note - but I'm not holding my breath.

Summon the Keeper completes my Bingo card for this year.

B1 - Female Leader - The Legend of Bold Riley
B2 - Published 2024 - Eulogy of Planet Earth
B3 - Published before 1960 - Childhood's End
B4 - Steampunk - The Difference Engine
B5 - Features an Animal - Summon the Keeper

I1 - Author new to me - Sarah Lotz (The Three)
I2 - Based on a Game - Wrath of N'Kai (Arkham Horror)
I3 - Dystopian - The Chrysalids
I4 - Indie author - Emergent Mars
I5 - Spinoff Series - Once Dead

N1 - Ghost Story - Spirit of Cahir Mullach
N2 - Located in Asia - The Three-Body Problem
N3 - Free - Wolves of the Northern Rift
N4 - Military SFF - The Forever War
N5 - Anthology - Wild Cards VIII: One-Eyed Jacks

G1 - 1,000+ pages - Complete Stories of Oz
G2 - Arthurian - The Follies of Sir Harald
G3 - Alternate Form - Sherlock Holmes and the Shadwell Shadows (audiobook)
G4 - Magical Building - The Perfect Brew
G5 - Title Contains a Colour - Little Green Men

O1 - Translated - The Dark Forest
O2 - Features a Performer - Nightingale's Lament
O3 - Time Travel - The Ottoman Secret
O4 - Award Winner - Death's End
O5 - Alternate History - Red Inferno 1945

I have finished Summon the Keeper, which was a quite enjoyable, and often funny cross between an urban fantasy and a cozy mystery. It also fills the Features an Animal Bingo slot, and that completes my Bingo for this year. Half way through the year, I would have bet that I wasn't going to make it this year, but I'm done with about 6 weeks to go.

Robert wrote: "Tony wrote: "I was a huge fan of Elfquest, and Wendy Pini's work in general, in the late 80s."

Interesting, any other titles she worked on you would recommend?"

She did do occasional stories for both Marvel and DC, but I think her best known work other than Elfquest, is her graphic novel adaptation of the Poe short story Masque of the Red Death. She has also done a couple of graphic novels based on the Beauty and the Beast TV series, although I haven't read them.

I have started reading At the Earth's Core

Robert wrote: "I just finished the fourth and final volume of the magisterial ElfQuest series after years and years of dipping in and out of the impressive tomes. Anyone else here go on the full Q..."

I was a huge fan of Elfquest, and Wendy Pini's work in general, in the late 80s.

I have started reading Summon the Keeper. This book will complete my Bingo card for this year.

Complete Stories of Oz fills the 1000+ pages Bingo slot and also completes row 1 and column G. One book to go and that will complete the last row (5) and last column (B).

I have finished Complete Stories of Oz which, at 1487 pages, easily fills the 1000+ pages Bingo slot. There's no doubt that Baum was an inventive fantasist, but it was pretty clear that he would have preferred to write other stories after the first 6 Oz books.