/sffg/ - Science Fiction and Fantasy General

>If I through in a few well foreshadowed plot twists maybe people will think my bland book is great

Every time I see some fantasy babe dressed like that I think about how fucking awful it would be to bushwhack through a forest or skulk around in some sewer/dungeon. At least she's wearing boots.

Anyone out there know of any character that compares to the humor that is Jack Vance's Cugel the Clever? Or is he really the funniest character in all of fiction?

I don't. Authors always feel the need to add comma with a heart of gold after such characters

Clark Ashton Smith doesn't have the great characters, but there is a wry and ironic streak running through his Hyperborean and Averoigne stories in particular. Arrogant thieves, hapless or venal priests, mischievous wizards. His gods and demons also tend to be more meddling and capricious than Lovecraft's. While he is more morbid than REH and Lovecraft, he is undoubtedly the most humorous.

>They were gay, these people of waning Earth

As she is a Trollop, it's perfectly in character. Though I can appreciate your sentiments, the alternative is not to be contemplated.

As he did with Barthes' Death of the Author.

Oh fuck we have two sffg's going right now >> 9988793

oops

Pierre Menard >>>>> Cervantes

Thanks, I will have a look.

>going

save it for later. we're here now.

Don't say that. I was just in another thread where an user was getting mad that people were equating religion with magic, and God with a wizard. Though I fail to see how the comparison is inaccurate...

>Next SFF Book you are planning to read?
Going to start Revelation Space... again. I just can't seem to stick with that thing, not sure why.

>Post lovely SFF cover paintings
I really should start saving more of these. Ugh, don't you hate it when the art is worse than what you imagined in your head? Still have to read Judas Solution. I love how Zahn doubled-down on the retro setting (they still use tapes!) despite writing the last book in 2006.

Why would they get mad? God is the greatest of wizards, for He is the Most Wise. Magic is real.

Is the Second Apocalypse worth reading? Does it have a satisfying conclusion?

Never heard of this before, decided to skim TV Tropes.
>Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: This series is unrelentingly dark and negative. Every character hates everybody else, they all live in a Crapsack World and there's no humor at all, not even of the gallows variety. After a while you wonder why you should care if any of these characters live or die.
As for a conclusion, it doesn't look like the series is even finished.

>you wonder why you should care if any of these characters live or die.

What a shitty reason to read a story.

>What a shitty reason to read a story.
Why?

>Never heard of this before, decided to skim TV Tropes.
Please tell me you don't do this before you actually start something. Even if you don't it's a good way to zap all the creativity in your mind to the point you think everything's a fucking trope.

Do wizards generally exist eternally, before and after all of reality, which they also create out of nothing?

I usually avoid reading the full entries if it's something I'm interested in. But when it's to get the gist of something I'll usually skim the page. Since I usually don't think about tropes as I'm in the middle of reading something, I think I'm OK.

Only the most powerful ones. But to put this another way
>Do wizards generally defy reality?
Only always.

Same. Skimming a tvtropes page gives me a much better idea of if its actually something I'm interested in than the equivalent wikipedia page, or even some goodreads pages.

I can't trust GoodReads. I never see anything there get less than 3.5 stars.

It's only a matter of time.

True, but the reviews can be illuminating. I remember there was a 1 star City of Stairs review that pushed me to grab a book.

Help me lads. I'm looking for stories in which a leader type transfers their memories to their successors, making a kind of immortal leader. So far I have BotNS, The 100 and Attack on Titan. Are there any other stories with this motif?

Maybe, but I've been on it for years and it hasn't happened yet. The closest thing that happened recently was thinking Seinfeld is Unfunny about a character that was an inch away from being the walking stereotype of an edgy character/Drizzt clone, but the book was written before that was popular, and before Drizzt was made.

I'm curious. What happened?

I think this happened in a 40K series. Path of the Eldar, I think, but I'm pretty sure it was just something at the end, not a huge theme. Uh... Sector General?

>What do you get when you cross Gene Wolfe's "Book of the Long Sun" with Beowulf, "Moby Dick", "The Wizard of Oz", "Crime and Punishment", and throw in some steampunk for good measure?
>You get this book, and it's an incoherent mess.

The review opened with this, and I thought, god damn I need to read this. I don't know where she got half of these comparisons, but I loved the book.

>she
There's your problem.

Pretty much an inevitability on goodreads. Aren't women like 60-80% of book buyers? So even for sff, there's gonna be tons of female reviewers. I don't much care though.

OK, I'll have to give it a shot then. But speaking of
>Book of the Long Sun
Is this any good? I read a summary and it sounds like a random collection of sidequests ripped from a video game.

Thanks. Doesn't have to be a major theme, this motif just really revs my neurons for some reason.

>Aren't women like 60-80% of book buyers?
Wouldn't surprise me. My mother reads more than anyone I've ever known, and she's gone through hundreds of books. Granted, most of them are cheap romance novels, but still.

If you want to have a laugh go on goodreads and look at some of the """"reviews"""" for A Throne of Bones.

This. That site is anti-human

It kind of appears late in the Star Force series, in a charming and unexpected way. Not so much a leader but a central character.

The first reviews made it sound like a literary masterpiece. Then I start scrolling down and it begins to sound like /x/ and /d/ co-wrote a book.

> This book's got everything. Ghouls, vampires, ghosts, witches, necrophilia, pedophilia, incest, cannibalism, rape... Man, I could go on listing stuff. But I won't, read it and find out for yourself.
She gave the book four stars. These are positive things in her eyes?

If you want an experience unlike most other sff books, then yes. But I won't guarantee if it will be good for you

Isn't Drizzt just Elric but far less interesting?

>GRI
Could VD be any more /ourguy/?

Dunno, never read Elric of Melinbone. I've been thinking of it, but I just get this bad feeling it's going to be slow and boring.

I mean, boring is a matter of perspective, but the first book is less than 200 pages. Just give it a shot.

I don't like this guy.

It's alright. Nothing to write home about either way.

Thanks buddy.

no and no-er. unless you have a thing for gay rapey aliens and gay rapey messiah characters swaddled in "philosophy", i'd recommend against them. it was sold to me as "a metaphysical whodunit" and i'm still struggling to see how the metaphysics are anything spectacular or unique as well as that the whodunit could possibly be.

seriously, bakker's explanation of his "philosophy" and how that's incorporated into the books is basically making up excuses to never clarify things and shout phrases like "crash space of meaning!" and "semantic apocalypse!" also, he has some of the thinnest skin for an author that i've ever seen.

so unless that sounds really interesting, save your time for something else/better

Almost finished with the first book and I pretty much agree. It's very pretentious. So much so it makes Erikson's philosophical meanderings in Malazan that annoyed the hell out of me seem charming by comparison. Which is a shame because I do like the setting, but all the characters are miserable balls of shit except for Kellhus who's just plain boring.

Give us the setting but spare us the story.

God damn it you spoiled attack on titan

Cugel is probably the all-time funniest character in fiction, or at least /sffg/ stuff, but there are other writers who can write stuff as entertaining as Vance. R.A. Lafferty's short-fiction is probably the most consistently funny and entertaining stuff I've ever read. There's a pretty big crossover in appeal between Vance/Lafferty/Wolfe.

>Book of the Long Sun
If you read Book of the New Sun before it and Book of the Short Sun afterwards it's a masterpiece. However as a standalone story it's also very strong. Using multiple POVs it tells an intricate story about humanity, society, faith and conflict all centered around the rise of a spiritual hero in a corrupt and unhappy city. Wolfe did so much more in 1400 pages than GRRM has managed in his 5000+ that it's embarrassing.

It might sound like a bunch of random bullshit and events all thrown together from a plot summary but it all feels very coherent if you understand Wolfe and why he writes. The entirety of the Solar Cycle is an endorsement of Catholic living but this is probably most obvious in Book of the Long Sun (however, several moments in Short Sun are equally Catholic if not more so). The purpose behind the wide subject matter is to look at several different world-views and approaches to government and explore and critique each one in turn. Long Sun looks at utopianism, democracy, monarchy, atheism, suicide, war, crime, it's really an incredibly broad story. It's very interesting to see Wolfe deal with so much, but at the same time it still feels like a personal story. Especially if you read Short Sun afterwards. Everyone with an interest in science-fiction or fantasy should read the entire Solar Cycle at some point.

Is Three Fingers an allegory on Disney's monopolizing of fairy tales? Why does the protagonist have the same initials as Mickey Mafia? Why does the woman allude to having drugged him in the past as they kill him?

Guys I'm about to read Heinlein's Tunnel in the Meme recommended by a shill. Is it safe to say that this is Lord of the Flies in space?

I laughed way too hard at this dumb picture

...

2AM doggoposting is best doggoposting

Isn't nicodemus a demon's name? One of the twelve who gave Judas his silver?

>Every time I see some fantasy babe dressed like that I think about how fucking awful it would be to bushwhack through a forest or skulk around in some sewer/dungeon

i don't get it

it's supposed to be one of those screencaps of a gril accidentally texting nudes to her dad

>accidentally

They're not done by accident, honey

you mean they're stage or girls intentionally send nudes to their dads?

Sand dan Glokta from Joe Abercrombie's First Law Trilogy.

Both

I think about how nice it would be to be pretty like her

same, no homo

Not an unqualified recommendation, but Ximen Del Azarchel in the Eschaton Sequence has some pretty good moments.

You couldn't possibly know what that refers to unless you were pretty much at the point it happens. It's a mid-story pre-twist at best.

Brandon Sanderson makes me so happy.

I'm happy that you're happy user.
(დ‿)ﾉ

Answer to this plz.

...

It doesn't take place in space?
Fun book though.

>it was sold to me as "a metaphysical whodunit" and i'm still struggling to see how the metaphysics are anything spectacular or unique as well as that the whodunit could possibly be.
I don't know if it's unique but the metaphysics might be the best part of it. The arbitrary Lovecraftian demon gods, alien fucbois trying to save themselves from damnation, neo materialist cult that subdues the latter, and not elves/dwarves gone insane because immortality is something to be suffered. I haven't really seen a universe with such cosmology, so even if it's not unique, it's definitely interesting as fuck. The whodunit maybe a question of who made the world in this state, which is why the dunselt/no good are trying to fix it by killing mostly everyone.

Does the person with the book in hand have a vagina...

Does my analogy stand? It's not earth and they travel through space to get there.

Is this the actual Baru Comorant cover or are you blueballing me with some godly /ic/?

What should I read, Way of Kings or Shadow of the Torturer?

This is /gwg/, what do you think?

Yep. And it cost around $10 in Russia.
fanzon-portal.ru/press-center/news/knigi/baru-kormoran-predatelnitsa-set-dikinson/?PAGEN_2=2/#comments-block

I've never read Lord of the Flies, but based on my limited knowledge I'd say they share some plot elements.

Russia and China have the best renderfag artists, goddamn.

They want it at arms-length but not as a reality. It's like saying that the enduring popularity of the dystopian novel means people want a dystopia

Nah. Baru have top notch cover.
Here is Bakker "The Darkness That Comes Before" and it is kinda shitty.