Ok so im making a list.

[Dawn]

Hey now, Lucas finger painted at day care today... He gets arts and crafts, I get my reality cooking show fix!

[Dawn]

Ala wrote: "you should be, my face hurts now.

(ಠ_ಠ) see?

swollen."

Awww, that makes it look even more pinchable!

*double pinches cheeks*

[Chris]

Dawn wrote: "Hey now, Lucas finger painted at day care today... He gets arts and crafts, I get my reality cooking show fix!"

Yeah? Maybe that's just down here in the South that they're killing it. They'll probably replace it with Facebook Networking or something.

[Becky]

Ala wrote: "you should be, my face hurts now.

(ಠ_ಠ) see?

swollen."

Oh my... You have sensitive skin. You know what's needed for sensitive skin right? Diaper rash cream... Dawn? Could you? We have an issue over here.

[Chris]

*Watches Laurel's giggle-fit while Ala gets gang-pinched by the girls*

[Dawn]

*hands over the butt paste*

[[deleted user]]

wait. just a minute now.


There's no need for that.






damnit, don't make me restart the argument.

[Becky]

Thanks, Dawn. Come here, Ala. This will help the swelling. You'll see. :D

[[deleted user]]

*flee*

[Becky]

Wait!! You're still all swooooolllleeeeeennnnnn!!!

*sigh*

[mark]

many good points grant! things for me to consider.

re. Kitchen Nightmares...i dunno, is that one where a blonde english douche is running around yelling at people? i don't like those shows. but i do love Top Chef because it supplies a reason for perfect Padma Lakshmi to look good, walk into rooms, look judgmental, etc. gosh i love her. sigh.

[carol. , Senor Crabbypants]

Dawn wrote: "I was reading Dragons.. Then Hells Kitchen came on.. Then the baby was all "Waaah! Waah! I want to go to bed!" Then it was a commercial.. And voila, here I am."

Waaah, waaah, I want to go to bed! ;)

Ala's right, no one can derail a thread like him.

*throws old gummy bears*

[Dawn]

*catches in mouth*

Nom nom nom :)

[Elizabeth]

Wow. I came here just to add to the list - but whew did it get heated in here. I'm new to Goodreads and the group so I think I'll just move on as I'm a bit afraid now.

[Elien]

Don't worry, Elizabeth, you'll get used to it in no time, that's a promise. :p

[James]

I loved read The Golden Compass. If the sequel is not that good I might not read the third book in the series.

[Jason]

Don't be frightened off, Elizabeth. :)

See? This is another reason why I tried to cool things down yesterday. We're scaring off new members! lol

[[deleted user]]

Lol...you guys have a funny definition of heated :) You'd freaking hate to see me pissed off apparently ;) Still, I've no desire to scare off any of the noobs and I've no doubt the others involved in the discussion feel the same way.

[Jason]

Ah, I was just joking around. Elizabeth was, too, I think.

I have seen you angry, Grant.

Never. Again. LOL

[seak]

Wow, there's a lot going on in this thread. I really liked the Pullman debate and I learned lots of good things, thanks Dread Pirate Grant especially. I didn't realize he had that much of a mission.

Have nothing else to add on that one though. :)

To the OP, great list. :)

[Scott]

On the other hand, if you want a more balanced view of the author, you should visit his own website. Or even his Wikipedia page.

[seak]

Oh, I'm good with biased. :D

I also get all my political views fed to me from Rush Limbaugh.

[mark]

i get mine from jon stewart!

[Dawn]

I get mine from my cats O_o

[mark]

LOL! my cat is also very opinionated, but only on the topics of trying to get out of the house and on feed-me-now. otherwise, she is strictly apolitical.

[Jason]

My cat is opinionated, too. Especially when it comes to her food and her back scratches. LOL

[Valerie]

Dawn wrote: "I get mine from my cats O_o"

This is the best option.

[Dawn]

Meow.

[Scott]

*gets popcorn*

[Jason]

*Crunch crunch*

Thanks for the popcorn, Scott!

[Scott]

Um...I didn't pop it yet.

[Jason]

That's why it hurt chewing it! LOL

[[deleted user]]

Lol...I'd totally forgotten about that, Jason! Lol...yeah I do tend to hulk out when angry.

Ahhh Jon Stewart. Darn his charm and stylish hair

[seak]

I really liked Craig Killborn though.

[James]

Stephen Colbert gets my vote.

[Philip]

I'll try to drag the discussion back to the original question and recommend some epic fantasy I used to work on at Wizards of the Coast--an no, you do not have to be a gamer to read, understand, and enjoy these great books:

Though it's really more "high fantasy" than "epic fantasy," you can't miss R.A. Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt.

Epic fantasy of the first order: The Dragonlance Chronicles by Weis & Hickman.

And do yourselves a favor and read all of the Erevis Cale novels by Paul S. Kemp, The Last Mythal trilogy by Richard Baker, and The Year of Rogue Dragons trilogy by Richard Lee Byers.

And see, I didn't even pimp any of my own books!

[[deleted user]]

Ah Dragonlance and Forgotten realms books. Young Adult before Young Adult was cool :)

[Scott]

Yeah, I enjoyed Dragonlance when I was in junior high/high school. The first two trilogies, anyway. Should have ended after that.

[Kevin]

Scott wrote: "Yeah, I enjoyed Dragonlance when I was in junior high/high school. The first two trilogies, anyway. Should have ended after that."

I agree with you, even though I have only read the first trilogy.

[[deleted user]]

I read all the available titles and found that there were some random books I enjoyed. The Legend of Huma was enjoyable and there was some trilogy that followed a thief that rose through the ranks of the Knights of Solamnia. Can't recall the series but I enjoyed it as well. Overall Chronicles and Legends were a cut above the rest tho

[Kevin]

Philip wrote: "I'll try to drag the discussion back to the original question and recommend some epic fantasy I used to work on at Wizards of the Coast--an no, you do not have to be a gamer to read, understand, an..."

Just wondering why do not work for Wizard of the Coast anymore? If you don't work there anymore, then who is Salvatore's editor now?

[Gabriel]

Got a lot of books on my list now, thanks.

[Traci]

@ Grant I've been wanting to ask but haven't, why do you consider Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms books young adult? Yes they can be considered lower fantasy than the likes of ASoIaF, the Malazan series, and The Name of the Wind. But I really don't see them as young adult. Role Playing Fantasy maybe? I guess I consider young adult books to be those that feature teenage characters, but I've just argued myself into a corner because the Wheel of Time series is definately not young adult but it has teenage characters. Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms reminds me more of the sword and sorcery genre. Like Robert E. Howard or Fritz Leiber.

[[deleted user]]

Hmm...let me start off by saying that I love the Dragonlance novels. I read them when I was 10 or 11 and while I was already deep into fantasy, Dragonlance cemented my love. The books seemed written for a younger audience. They're easy to digest with fairly clear themes (in early books at least) and simple, clean language that young adults can understand. I don't consider myself an expert in any way when it comes to YA but in my mind, I consider a novel young adult if it seems as though it's written to pander to a younger audience. It never occured to me that a book would have to have young characters in order to be considered young adult. I wouldn't argue against your Sword & Sorcery idea though. I don't think the genres need be mutually exclusive :)

[Traci]

I guess when I hear young adult I picture young girls and vampires. Which is completely unfair because what are little boys supposed to read? :) I read them too when I was in that age group. So can't exactly argue. I think the s&s books used to be called juvenile. Which is even more insulting if you think about it.

[Chris]

I agree with Grant here too.

(Biting has no bearing on this one)

[colleen the convivial curmudgeon]

It's sort of funny that you would consider Dragonlance YA because they've been released as YA novels... after being edited...

[Chris]

They've been edited? That seems strange. There shouldn't have been anything in there that needed it to make it fit YA.

I think what Grant is getting at is more the target audience than some arbitrary label. They used to not label stuff as "YA". That's a recent thing. But I think that the D&D roleplaying novels were based on their target audience of gamers, that usually fit the teen to early twenties age-range.

[colleen the convivial curmudgeon]

I think they were edited more for length than content. Each book was also broken into two.


As to what reading level the books were aimed at:

When Margaret and I were first writing 'Dragons of Autumn Twilight', TSR management came to us and asked if we could 'dumb down' the books a little -- not make the text so adult -- so that the 'young D&D readers' could read it.

Our response was that the D&D readers were intelligent and knew how to use a dictionary. Both Margaret and I had read challenging books when we were young and from that challenge grew our love of reading. We refused to 'dumb down' the reading level.

Over time, that decision has proven to be right. Time and again, we've had adults come up to us to tell us that before they picked up the Dragonlance books, they didn't read. But they were determined to read THIS book -- and from it learned to read and love reading.

So, reading level is something of a question mark in my mind. Does one get people to read by giving them a book that is easy for them to read or is it better to give them a hard book whose subject they really are motivated to experience?

My experience is the latter.

Tracy Hickman


Also, I'm not sure I get the young adult as target audience versus arbitrary label thing since the label given today is because the target audience is the age range deemed as young adult.

[Chris]

That's an interesting letter. Thanks for sharing that.

I'll stick by my opinion on it though. Sure, they weren't written for 8-year olds. But I still think of late teen to twenties as "young". Maybe because I'm working on getting "old".

To be honest, I think that the YA label is often used as a marketing ploy to sell a book as the next Harry Potter or Twilight. There are also different levels of "young" that's it is stuck to. Anything from 6 years on up to 25. That's where I get "arbitrary".

To me if everything is YA, it loses its meaning.