/sffg/ - Science Fiction and Fantasy General

>all these sad elitist trying to fit in and failing big time
Just an hero desu

Just read Wolfe, kiddo

Forgot to link previous thread...
PREVIOUS Have a corny cover as recompense.

Kek. Look at the pic.
In the window that says "bring your own little girl protagonist". At the bottom.

Have you read Game of Rat and Dragon, crazy catperson?

HAHAHA
!!!

I have not. Should I be?

Damn right you should! It's just a short story, so not a big time sink. Available on Gutenberg.

Oh right, Cordwainer has come up as relevant to my interests here before. I know I've got a few of his, but I don't remember which ones.

NESFA Press did a golden job collecting all the Rediscovery of Mankind stories in one volume. I think all other collections (even the ones named similarly) collect only part of them.

I think I have this one, hmmmm. It's in a taped up box right now. I need to finish my library :(

Thanks for the tips, sorry I haven't followed up yet.

The people who whinge about Gene Wolfe's popularity in these parts will only make people curious, and read him. In the same way, I will inevitably cave in and read Brandon Sanderson before long.

As for SF book covers, the more lurid and garish the better. The old PKD editions are a good example. Cheesecake art is more questionable.

Following the last thread I will be reading I, Robot this weekend.

I'm reading Moore's memebook, nothing traditionally sff atm tho

forgot pic

Hey man, no need for that! I have a couple of hundred unread books on my shelves, so I sympathize. At your leisure.

How's the book so far OP? Any gri yet?

Want to know if I should add this catgod to house of blades as to read.

Could you please give me a hint as to the name of one of those six books?

For research purposes of course.

Is this /sffg/ approved?

Young Adult trash.

Only been able to read a little during lunch break. There've been some near misses for feline on feline, but not G or I. I think something might happen, maybe even in the R department. I probably won't be able to get back to it for another couple of hours.

recommend me some dark comedy,Veeky Forums.

Gene Wolfe

Gulag Archipelago by Alexander Solzhenitsyn is really funny. Of course it isn't science fiction or fantasy.
Kafka is also entertaining.
Gene Wolfe isn't particularly funny tho.

"Eyes of the Overworld" and "Cugel's Saga" by Jack Vance, in the fantasy genre.

Douglas Adams isn't dark so I'm drawing a blank in the scifi genre.

Thanks!
I'll check them all out.

First for Bakker! The fan favorite of old Veeky Forums before the you guys ruined this place...

Fuck off to reddit.

>tfw finished Towers Of Midnight and now beginning A Memory Of Light

Finally it's nearly over. It got extremely bad in the middle books but as much as he gets shit on here, Sanderson was the best thing to ever happen to this series. Reading The Gathering Storm was like breathing fresh air after being drowned with hot sand for six months.

Just keep in mind that Gulag Archipelago is funny because it's absurd, real and Solzhenitsyn has perfect banter comments.

Finished up the new Shadow Campaigns book last week. Started the Lazarus War series but the second book has two holds on it at the library. Dropped Off Armageddon Reef for the third time, I think I'm done with giving Weber a second chance.

Currently reading Mechanical Failure by Joe Zieja, which is a fairly funny scifi/comedy that really reminds me of Keith Laumer and Harry Harrison's comedic stuff, with a bit of Spaceballs and Terry Pratchett mixed in. I'm about halfway through and I think I'd recommend it.

New(ish) books on my to-read list:
Exordium of Tears (first book was great, bunch of human soldiers from various time periods get abducted by aliens to fight demons)
The Fifth Season
Ninefox Gambit
Necrotech (waiting for epubs to show up)
Outriders by Jay Posey
Revenger (anybody read this yet? never read anything by Reynolds but the plot description sounds cool)
Behind the Throne by K.B. Wagers
Breath of Earth by Beth Cato

>replying to b8

So there's a new Reynolds book coming out tomorrow.

Reviews on amazon seem good.

The galaxy has seen great empires rise and fall. Planets have shattered and been remade. Amongst the ruins of alien civilisations, building our own from the rubble, humanity still thrives.

And there are vast fortunes to be made, if you know where to find them . . .

Captain Rackamore and his crew do. It's their business to find the tiny, enigmatic worlds which have been hidden away, booby-trapped, surrounded with layers of protection - and to crack them open for the ancient relics and barely-remembered technologies inside. But while they ply their risky trade with integrity, not everyone is so scrupulous.

Adrana and Fura Ness are the newest members of Rackamore's crew, signed on to save their family from bankruptcy. Only Rackamore has enemies, and there might be more waiting for them in space than adventure and fortune: the fabled and feared Bosa Sennen in particular.

Revenger is a science fiction adventure story set in the rubble of our solar system in the dark, distant future - a tale of space pirates, buried treasure and phantom weapons, of unspeakable hazards and single-minded heroism . . . and of vengeance . . .

Are we back to 1950s scifi now?

I pray

>I will inevitably cave in and read Brandon Sanderson before long.

And then you will have a reason to warn against reading him.

sounds like quite a tale of revengeance

>Now I understand why the Hugo Award trophies look like dildos.

>600 pages into Way of Kings
>Still waiting for the plot to start

Do I get one of these chrome dildos too if I write a book about a transgender magic girl with only one leg and one eye?

>ugly nerds, beardos, and hambeasts.

For sure, what a horror show.

>only 600 pages to start the plot

Sanderson is like a little baby.

It's incredible one can say so little in so many words.

>that sure is a interesting scifi series you have there
>it would be a shame if someone were to... add 200 pages of technical descriptions to it

Just skip the flashbacks, they don't matter for the plot at all in the first book.

>skipping anything ever

All these flashbacks and interludes feel like padding honestly

Obelisk Gate was tight. 30% Dilbert in a geode, 30% loredumps with a cannibalized petrified fag, 30% Loli SoL, 10% magic.

Pretty pumped for The Unholy Consult.

It's all but confirmed that everyone and everything is going to die horrifically, and no one is going to have a happy ending.

Can't say as I recall any. Wouldn't you rather have a feral waifu?

>Start reading first book of the Mistborn Trilogy
>Sanderson calls a door a 'portal'
>Stop reading

His prose is so cringey. It's like he just used the synonym option on Microsoft Word to make himself sound more fancy. I fucking hate it.

Some occasional tasty panther lady PoV here.

>portal
>noun
>1. a door, gate, or entrance, especially one of imposing appearance, as to a palace.
>2. an iron or steel bent for bracing a framed structure, having curved braces between the vertical members and a horizontal member at the top.
>3. an entrance to a tunnel or mine.
>4. Computers. a website that functions as an entry point to the Internet, as by providing useful content and linking to various sites and features on the World Wide Web.

Any books featuring a brown witch as an antagonist?

The Wheel of Time

Yes it makes sense from a technical standpoint, but it sounds ridiculous. Nobody says 'I walked through the portal' when referring to doors because they'd sound like a jackass. I got the same feeling with the rest of his prose: he's trying to sound smart by using 'smart' words, and as a result his writing comes off as stiff and awkward. Like I said, it reads like something the author went through on Word, swapping out words with the synonym option in an attempt to make himself sound more intelligent. It simply didn't fit.

It's like saying "gather around the light source" instead of "gather around the fire". Only a cunt would use the former.

Is there an author who shoves in more palindromes than Sanderson?

perec

I just finished it

Prologue had me expecting 1007 pages of
>*unsheathes shardblade*
>*windruns behind you*
>Heh, tell me how's the weather when you meet the stormfather, kid

one can never truly finish Dhalgren

No the usage of portal implies something more like a big, arched door made from dark wood secured with heavy iron bands, instead of a regular door.

Review for us? Was it good?

Reposting since it got some positive feedback last thread.

I hadn't heard of this. Is it post-Galactic North?

Better than the other chartanon's.

I will dub you G (Good) chart user. And the other, B Chartanon, for bad.

Can you do one for fantasy, G chart user?

I bought the Jim Butcher book because there is an airship on the cover. It was ok. Interested in seeing where he goes with it.

It's not set in the Revelation Space universe (unfortunately).

Oxford agrees with this user.

>A doorway, gate, or other entrance, especially a large and elaborate one.

>An Internet site providing access or links to other sites.

A door doesn't seem strictly necessary although the root Latin word "porta" does mean door so I would probably restrict my usage to an opening with a door.

I don't know if it was good, but I really liked it. Sometimes it was repulsive, sometimes bland, sometimes piercing.

It has nothing to do with Stranger in a Strange Land, Dune, the end of time or really science fiction, even. It's a portrait of the artist as a young man, when that man is Sam Delany in the early 1970s. As he surrenders his identity to find his voice, struggles to observe faithfully and to communicate his observations truthfully, balls boys, girls and men, and is reconstructed by all according to their needs.

Sorry if that sounds elliptical. No one can be told what Dhalgren is.

which is completely stupid and shallow. how many people find delany interesting? fucking nobody except trans and queers, because thats all he writes about.

THE THING ITSELF
ADAM ROBERTS

WAS IT GOOD?

>and fascinating characters
lol, I bet

>What SFF book cover elements are automatic purchases for you?
Well fucking Boris Vallejo for one

I might when I have time, but I haven't read as much fantasy as SF so the chart will likely be a lot smaller if I do.

>unlikely things to read in a science fiction book

healthy three dimensional human relationships

Subtle or original themes

>What SFF book cover elements are automatic purchases for you?
It is, of course, the felines. Even if they look like strung out milfs. I only shop the super-cheap used, so the impulse buy feels ohsogood.

>Boris Vallejo for one
Definitely love these

good prose

Fantasy is less productive to be honest, smaller would make more sense.

Thanks in advance.

Very good.
It's incredibly strange though. It swaps between this multi-century collection of historical short stories and this modern action packed philosophical narrative.

I tried to recommend it to someone before here and failed dreadfully. All I can say is read the first and/or second chapters then go from there. It stipulates ones of the finest novel hard science principles I've heard in a while, and does it well.

Also my god it never shuts up about Emanuel Kant.

10/10 it's my 3rd fav book ever

An excellent metaphor for trannies.

Ran across this last night, I'm tempted to read it.

>Your favorite SFF felines?
These gals are certainly up there. Hilfy is pretty swingin :3

>Ran across this last night, I'm tempted to read it.
Looks fun to me.

>shoots lazers out of fingers
bet the ladies love him

Science fiction depresses me

It just reminds me how fucking insignificant we all are

...

To clarify, what does the "likelihood of satisfaction" scale mean? That the books at the higher end are better, or more what someone interested in that subgenre is typically looking for, or something else?

Not him but

When I finally read Dune after countless people telling me too, I did not feel satisfied.

I was glad I read it. I felt slightly accomplished and relieved. I wasn't satisfied.

Satisfaction is my book is when you, personally, are glad you've read something. I dunno though.