OCCULT EDITION
>Post books that deal with the mystical arts
>What are you currently reading?
Monthly Reading for July: The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins
Monthly Reading books: drive.google.com
Fantasy:
imgoat.com
imgoat.com
Flowchart:
imgoat.com
Science Fiction:
imgoat.com
imgoat.com
General:
imgoat.com
imgoat.com
NPR's Top 100 Science Fiction & Fantasy Books:
imgoat.com
SF&F author listing with ratings and summaries:
greatsfandf.com
Previously:
First for sanderson is a waifu, lady a shit, and israel did 9/11
Abercrombie is pretty good.
Thank you.
I want to read about women who are essentially female Conan, especially with Howard style prose and storytelling.
Where should I start?
Can anyone explain what's going on in the end of Tlön, Uqbar. Orbis Tertius? Like, I get that the world is turning out more and more like Tlön and that this disturbs Borges, but he acts as if it's a big reveletation that Tlön was made up, but he already knew that Tlön was made up! That was the premise of the story. The revelation should have been that Uqbar didn't exist, but Uqbar was never important in the story other than as the place that had made up Tlön.
I dont agree. I liked the first law first book (mainly because of good character development in the barbarian arc) but second disapointed and the third I didnt finish and returned to the library.
Yeah thats right abercrombie, you hack, I paid nothing for your work and I didnt even Finish your SHITTY prose.
Im at least 3 times as good as Abercrombie
Starting pic related today.
Looks gay desu
He’s alright, his works feel like they were made for a modern day tv show than a classic work of literature
Fun read nonetheless
Should sci-fi that takes in a year that has already come and gone IRL be re-classified as fantasy or alternate history?
How can I put my dick in the thing in the OP pic?
LSD + $20 hooker in a $15 dress from Walmart.
You fags could have told me that the curse of chalion degenerates into a perfect princess self insert when I asked if that was going to happen.
A noose
>LSD
Acid doesn't make you see cool shit like that. It makes you obsess over angles, shapes and colors that are already there. If you want to see weird shit then you should go for something like shrooms or DMT.
Anyone ever read this? I just started today and the 3 legged alien is cute. Is it worth anything though?
I'm writing massive space opera and I'm just consuming everything that's must-read, in order to build my repertoire.
> Anyone ever read this?
You mean one of the most famous sci-fi books of all time? Nah, no one has ever read it.
Some good ideas but sub-par writing and very dated.
>He haven't done a large dose
I have actually. Large doses of acid makes it difficult for you to focus and you get lost in your own thoughts but you don't really see things that aren't there. Acid enhances your perception so that the world appears more vibrant than when sober but it won't make you see things that don't exist.
>nice picture
>shit hands
nnnnnnnooooooo
>womeme author
Don’t act like you didn’t know what you were getting.
It seems like monthly user has run away for good...
Recommend me a fantasy short-story collection. But not magical realism, actual fantasy.
Based, I loved that book.
cute
Any books released this year worth reading?
>>womeme author
LMB is a great writer, hang yourself incel trash.
yes
If she's so great why does she feel the need to self insert as a 16 year old flawless princess?
CNo
No idea why you're getting so hung up on a side character, the book isn't even really about her. I'd get it if you complained about the writer using a damsel in distress as a plot crutch but the princess doesn't even have enough of a role to say she's a self insert. It's pretty much all about Cazaril from the beginning until the end so I don't understand what's triggering you so much.
Maybe
They're all sequels, but in my experience:
The Hod King - Bancroft
Moon Rising - McDonald
Shadow Captain - Reynolds
why is this book so fucking overwritten? did i just get memed?
also recc me some actually creepy horror senpaitachi
Are we ever going to get the Atheist, Muslim, or Jewish equivalent of Book of the New Sun? What would that even be like.
>No idea why you're getting so hung up on a side character, the book isn't even really about her. I'd get it if you complained about the writer using a damsel in distress as a plot crutch but the princess doesn't even have enough of a role to say she's a self insert
When was the last time you read it?
It would be Prince of Nothing which is just nihilism and pretentiousness.
Lads I need some more weird/occult horror along the lines of Laird Barron
I've also been listening to the Magnus Archives and I'm on a kick of "unknowable horrors from beyond space", rituals, cults, etc
>still in the mood to read some bad bitches S&S after finishing Warrior Witch of Hel
>decide to check out the Red Sonja 6 book series written in the 80s
>the entire series is online, but only in German
>can only find books 1 and 5 in English
What madness is this?
Not that user but I read it last month. If you seriously think the princess is a perfect self-insert, you need to get your head checked and then re-read the book. A female side character being competent and useful is not the same thing as a perfect self-insert. Go read some YA trash if you want to see a real self-insert perfect female character.
Everything is triggering him. Quite literally, everything.
Jewish BotNS is Evangelion
Muslim BotNS is Dune, mang.
>A female side character being competent
She doesn't put a single foot wrong in the entire fucking book you spacker. That's more than just being competent.
>Go read some YA trash if you want to see a real self-insert perfect female character.
Why when I could just re-read Curse of Chalion.
Stop giving him the attention he desperately wants.
> The Library at Mount Char
That book was terrible. Tried too hard.
Yeah, I just figured out he was a troll, since the princess in question makes a mistake in like the second or third chapter of the book that she keeps in mind down the line. He would have known this if he'd actually read the book.
Holy shit, this was a fucking trip.
>What's the sci-fi equivalent of sword and sorcery?
Planetary Romance or Sword And Planet it's closest to S&S.
My waifu Jirel of Joiry
>investigate starship
>there are living quarters for women on this space ship
>clearly the men needed some entertainment
I miss 70s fiction
>Even now, it is sickeningly easy for beings to get lost in false grand narratives,
living out completely driven lives in pursuit of non-existent codes, ideals, climaxes and
golden ages. In blindly thinking that their stories serve absolute ends, such creatures
almost always end up harming themselves, if not those around them.
>To those like the misguided; look at the story of Man, and come to your senses! It
is not the destination, but the trip that matters. What you do today influences tomorrow,
not the other way around. Love Today, and seize All Tomorrows!
Do you think Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong fugged while Michael Collins was leering in the corner of the module?
Bloodsong
Red Sonja
You might not like it, but this is what the peak of the human form looks like.
What do you mean "overwritten"? I thought the author overexposed the bad guys/things, is that what you're talking about?
I am planning to read the Lyonesse Trilogy. Is it really that good, /sffg/ bros?
Takes a lot longer than a week to sort what one wants to read. I know.
Time really adds up quickly when going through so much.
Dying inside is indeed absolutely amazing. I didn't mention it because I saw it in the OP.
Collection or anthology? Collection tends to by one author, anthology tends to be by several.
What is "actual fantasy" to you?
I have a problem where a lot of short story writers that I like haven't written any novels that I've liked. I know they are entirely different, but it still baffles me how there's such a disconnect.
I don't have any much problem with novelists that I really like and their short stories, if any.
If they were 2 years going to mars, probably
I really like the Witcher World, but Ciri is an annoying cunt and the story is shit.
What do you recommend?
Unironically my diary desu
>since the princess in question makes a mistake in like the second or third chapter
>you din't know whether or not he was guilty!!1
>I mean he was, but that's not the point
So even when she fucks up she's in the right. Good job proving me wrong faggot.
What does sffg think of NK Jemisin? I know she's sjw trash, but are her books any good?
witcher main stories are shit. the shorts are where its at. also the games because they arent written by the book author.
Forgot to post pic
No. But you can look forward to her raping lovecraft’s mythos in the next year or two.
A collection.
In the actual fantasy there is always swords and shit.
>but are her books any good?
No.
That's hot.
Remember when Africans were an enlightened peaceful network of countries? No, me neither. Because no one was until Europe made that shit work after we nearly blew ourselves up.
>tfw too smart to be constrained by planetary gravity
yikes, not a good look user
If you're still looking for some check these
Demon in the Mirror by Andrew Offut
Silverglass by J.F Rivkin
Frost by Robin Bailey
Swordmistress of Chaos by Richard Kirk (aka Robert Holdstock the guy who wrote Mythago Wood)
yeah
>Swordmistress of Chaos by Richard Kirk (aka Robert Holdstock the guy who wrote Mythago Wood)
I got this guy's viking S&S trilogy in my queue. Probably gonna start in on it after I read this Red Sonja novel.
Well come on then, post it.
>Here's a story full of white people. they're all fucked up. they're screwing each other,they're cannibals,there's incest everywhere.
Why does she say this as this was strange in scifi? she basically described every Heinlein novel
But I doubt Heinlein was writing that stuff because he's a cunt who hates white people.
Are litrpgs still popular? I feel like they've been dying out, or at the very least moved out of the spotlight.
I know, right? And it's totally white societies that have always been big into cannibalism and incest. Those heat maps that show those things belonging exclusively to non-whites and rare among east Asians are just pol propaganda. We wuz spiritually enlightened feminists n shiet
She's a massive cunt who has a following because she openly hates white people which is apparently trendy these days. She does nothing but cry about how "da white man be putting me down" while simultaneously being propped up by the "industry" simply because she's a black woman. Also her books are utter garbage.
whiteoid seething that whites aren't the main characters in her (very good) books
Sharp Ends, Abercrombie. Lesbo take on Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser
>Abercrombie
He's a literal meme author.
bait
Which one is good, and why?
>
shadows of carcosa should be just what you're looking for
>Abercrombie
lol no thank you.
>Muh meme author
Riddle me this, Grimderppler: did Abercrombie, or did he not, produce a book that provides bad bitches doing S&S shit? Right.
>bad bitches doing S&S shit
Typical brainlet Abercrombie fans. He has no place in the S&S genre. If you like his garbage then that's fine, but don't trick other people into consuming his shit.
Did not enjoy it, but then I never read it until maybe a year ago, in my mid 30s. Too goofy and self referential and juvenile imo.
You ever see the little banner from ?
Go ask how to summen a sucubis
>Swordmistress of Chaos by Richard Kirk (aka Robert Holdstock the guy who wrote Mythago Wood)
Was not aware of this, I enjoyed the mythago wood books though, gonna check it out.
The Complete Chronicles of Conan the Barbarian
>Talks shit on a book
>Hasn't read the book
>Constant samefaggery
>Accuse others of deception
I can't imagine the level of loneliness that drives you to be this emotionally invested, grimanon. Maybe get out and make some friends in the real world. It's not hard as long as you don't sperg out
You guys are talking about fantasy AGAIN.
based dubs trips and hot
Would you rather berry your face in those cheeks or a good book?
>not having a huge ass row of women with the book written on their asses so you can enjoy asses and read the book you want
So I am reading through Snowcrash and the author makes repetitive remarks about how stinky and obnoxious old spice is. The fuck? Was it the axe of the 80s or is my deodorant that fucking bad?
Old Spice had kind of a reputation as an unfashionable brand until that ad campaign in the mid-2000s turned their image around.
Gentleman (and the one woman looking at this) I am happy to say I'm taking a break from sci-fi and reading a little woo-woo now: Prometheus Rising by Robert Anton Wilson. Something something about Tim Leary's 8 circuit model of consciousness. It's got some good humor in it, but I haven't found a quarter on the floor yet by "willing" it. I like it, and yes I get it - question everything. I'm learning to take myself less seriously, and that has helped the most.
How is The Illuminatus! Trilogy? Is it even /sffg/?
Old Spice is strong and recognizable, also Stephenson is a shit author. Snow Crash is a fucking cringe fest of garbage writing and edgy faggotry.
Damn I wish I could experience a lightning tribulation irl
Yikes.
Can anyone rec some /sffg/ audiobooks? I have a long as fuck commute every day and I like to listen to something while driving.
So far I've finished The New Sun, The Wheel of Time, and The Black Company series. I'd like to find some more long book series that will last me a while, but shorter ones are fine too.
The Culture series, my friend. Listen/read in publication order. (You may skip Consider Phlebas if you like)
I wrote a short story about a Conan-Clone that goes around fighting pirates, killing savages, and sleeping with exotic women. I'm currently in the process of writing a final draft of it. After I'm done with it, what do I do with it?
I've never written anything before, and I'm nervous about how people will respond, if at all. I'm not wanting to make a career out of writing, I just want to write stories about big burly barbarians and curvy clothless courtesans.
>How people will respond
You gotta make people read your work and then care enough to review it and then said review reach you. Just do it man. Worst come to worst its a cool hobby and some people might call you an idiot and others call it meh, at the very best you get rich and famous or shit, or in this case since you dont want a career, some community and people to chill with.
Make a royalroad account, post it and share the link here
I'm tired of all the deconstructions, recommend me some degenerate shit /sffg/
Strange Relations by Philip Jose Farmer
Haven't read a fantasy book in a couple years, went searching for one and realize every book is written by a woman or about a girl
What do you mean by degenerate
Sounds neat. Downloading it now. Is the first book unrelated to the others or what?
The books in the series all take place in the same universe, just many many years apart and with different characters. Also some folks are torn about the first book, but I enjoyed it.
>but I haven't found a quarter on the floor yet by "willing" it
Reading Prometheus Rise and Quantum Psychology in 2019 as opposed to 1999 can be a wild trip. Travel back in time to the date of publishing and imagine how things were then.
>How is The Illuminatus! Trilogy?
The audio book can be a fun listen.
Post it here. I'm down for some s&s kino
>I just want to write stories about big burly barbarians and curvy clothless courtesans.
Understandable, but I hope you at least TRY to make your Clonan somewhat his own character.
"went searching" where? most authors I see on the shelf are still men
My plan is to flesh him out more in other stories, but for now he's pretty rough around the edges, as far as personality goes. I'd say he's more lecherous and foolhardy than Conan, and more calculating. There are a several other major differences, like background and beliefs that set him apart.
Basically the only thing that makes him similar to Conan is that he's a Big unstoppable murderfucker whose rolling across Sword & Sorcery-land with a hunger for gold, gore, and girls.
Is the Horseclans series any good? Because the covers are pretty great and they're making me want to check it out.
>Cazaril doesn't even die in the end
This book really shit itself
Looks cool desu
>start writing story filled with dumb anime tropes for fun, like mecha, space politics, and scheming edgelord characters
>ripped off a ton of stuff like Gundam, LoGH, Eva, and other sci-fi anime
>always thought it was unpublishable so I started putting it up online on various sites
Should I try sending it to a publisher anyways? I'm almost done with the fourth ~24k word volume. Are there publishers who put stuff like this on the market?
It's ridiculous how far the quality for cover art has dropped for fantasy and sci-fi over the years. I'm assuming Horseclans was a middling seller (if even that) yet the cover art for these books stomps a fucking mudhole in pretty much all covert art for modern bestsellers.
Give him a sidekick of some sort. S&S needs more bros being bros protags.
Yes,good entertainment with no deep meaning just a bunch of bros fighting evil nerds.
Have you read all of them? Is there a stopping point where the series becomes shit?
Bad covers should be punished.
Either art colleges dont teach skills anymore or the publishers are saving money on the artists
The worst that happens is that it gets rejected. Then you can just self publish. If you can market yourself right, maybe as a slick new progressive writer breaking boundaries and sticking it to The Man, then you have a chance at making money.
Why the hell don't people talk about Mary Gentle? Rats & Gargoyles didb't really work out, but this Orthe shit is incredible.
Any other recs for sf in this vein (anthropologist making early first contact with intelligent species on his/her own). The first Orthe book is at least as good as Left Hand, and def better than A Woman of the Iron People
I've got a lot of ideas regarding sidekicks and bros that he'll meet up with in future adventures. In this first tale he saves a mischievous young lady from the clutches of some pirates, and she plays tagalong for the course of their adventure. Which leads to some interesting and hilarious stuff happening.
I read up until book 12.
You can stop with the first book or the 3,but every book tries to be stand-alone,like those conan comics from marvel,book 11 is pretty much the end,all the books after that are mostly prequels/midquels and or so i've been told,but even before that the series had some prequels,book 7 is set 30 before the events of book 1 for example so the series always liked to jump on the timeline.
And all the books you read were decent?
I cringe slightly at your post but also slightly intrigued. Post some of your stiff here sweety
Just over halfway finished with this and I'm surprised at how good it's been so far. Nothing really original or that would ever win any awards, but some very solid S&S that I would recommend to even those virgin geeks who don't read S&S. Also I think modern media has poisoned me so badly that when I read these older novels with female protags I expect them to have some degree of man-hating feminist bullshit despite the writers being men and they just aren't. I'm sure the Red Sonja film being made will be nothing but man-hate, but there's none of that crap here (so far anyways).
almost all of Asimov's works are available as audio books on youtube and the like.
>big burly barbarians and curvy clothless courtesans
truly, it is the golden age of alliteration
>Jewish equivalent of Book of the New Sun
The golem and the meme
>the guy who wrote Mythago Wood
So it's probably shit like mythago wood
You mean you couldn't find the sparknotes.
Swing shift is out on audio yesterday.
Why does audible release books on Tuesday?
No
Western chinkshit is the new litrpg.
Also original chinkshit is enjoyed by brainlets because they where bullied in school, and they can self insert as the protagonist who is all powerful.
It's why they say western chinkshit is trash. The protag doesn't start as a killing fucking machine they can self insert as.
>i find you freaky and like you a lot
Take your 3dpd ninja used up pussy elsewhere.
>flatlet brainlets consider those flat asses fat
No wonder America is into pedophilia when you are attracted to asses that 11 years old boys have.
Fuck off these covers are shit. All they needed to do is remove the helmet and give the guys long hair, and it would be the shit romance books I used to see my mom read decades ago.
>getting this triggered over masculine looking men
lol Jesus Christ, zoomer. Society has really done a number on you hasn't it?
>implying I'm a zoomer
Fuck off. Every thread you shit on "modern covers", and this is what you place up there as the pinnacle?
At least you didn't deny the portrayal of masculine men triggers you, ZOOMER. Now go question that sexuality somewhere else.
Show a good cover then?
The horseclan covers the (arguably based) user posted awakened multiple warrior genes in me.
>Show a good cover then?
I hope he posts a cover from an artist that has been working for decades and claims it's a modern cover kek
It looks like a cheap frazetta imitation
Cheap Frazetta imitation > modern covers.
Now post a modern cover, BY A MODERN ARTIST, you think is better, faggot.
No
That's what I thought, bitch.
i'm not the other user. i'm not going to get in a shitfight about what is "modern", what is "good", etc. Probably less than 5 percent of what i read is "modern", and since none of those books are picked out from a bookshelf the covers mean nothing to me. I can just recognize a trite, insipid cover when I see one
That's what I thought, BEEYATCH.
Apologize and rip out your own tongue, and I will spare your clan
>gurps
>shits on Malazan
>reading this roleplay shit
I just realised that Guy from naruto was a cultivator.
You are extremely retarded if you don't know the difference between an RPG based on a book series and a book series based on an RPG. Now go be a faggot somewhere else.
There we go with the fantasy AGAIN.
>The protag doesn't start as a killing fucking machine they can self insert as
They tend to early fucking on though.
>regularly killing other people with no issues in their early teens, if not tweens
Forgot my image :-)
Is Dragon Ball xianxia?
These bugmen books make me so mad how you have to kowtow to powerful people. Or how they pick on you and try to rape your girl and you release your seals and they bow and beg forgiveness. They were going to kill you and rape your girl, and because they saw they bit off more than they could chew they beg to spare their lives. Shit gets me mad.
The chink on the right is ugly and the one on the left looks like a fake whore. Just use their vag then discard them.
No. Have sex fa/tg/uy.
I like how (because he is Chinese) he doesn't have the chad giant dick bulge.
Techncally, no. There is no cultivation or any Daoist elements. Even though immortality is a prevalent theme in the series it is not the goal of the MC, which it needs to be for it to qualify as xianxia.
gib robots goy
Do you like your magic systems to be extra hard?
youtube.com
Any of you guys like Red Rising? Just finished book two and nearly shat myself over the ending.
I LOVE MAGIC SYSTEMS!!!!
Yes.
Nice thighs.
But Malazan's magic system is pretty soft?
How would you define "litrpg"? Like, basically animu in novel form? I can't stand Burando Sandaasu
I finished the Eisenhorn trilogy and really enjoyed it. I've seen people say it was one of best 40k books with most others being trash. If there are no other good ones it got me in the mood for some similar books. Any recs for sci-fi mystery/adventure/action?
I'm interested in reading BotNS, but I'm a booklet and something took me off guard
I understand that it's comprised of four volumes, but the total page count for Book of the New Sun itself is 950 pages, whereas the page count for all four volumes combined is 1225 pages
what's the deal with that?
I'm conflicted, guys. I want to write a story I genuinely enjoy. I think I can bust onto the fantasy writing scene with a big blockbuster book, but the time it would take makes me want to try a smaller, simpler project.
How do one-off fantasy novels fare in the market? I want to test the waters and my writing skills before going for something overly grand.
The first was some Hunger Games ya bullshit and the writers prose is trash but it was decent after that.
Ravenor by Dan Abnett
>How do one-off fantasy novels fare in the market?
They don't, especially not ones from new writers. To have any kind of success in the standalone fantasy market as a new author, you need to touch upon the realm of "magical realism" which is essentially fantasy lite that appeals to mainstream audience, so basically you need to shove some sjw ideologies into it and set it in Africa or some other shithole.
Or you can try being a woman writer, even better if you're a black woman writer
Which one is next /sffg/?
Dune, by Frank Herbert
Don't listen to this guy, user
Non-series do perfectly fine, he's just a retard.
and that's why it's based
I meant to say which one of these should I read first.
Then read The Island of Doctor Moreau
As much as I like Abnett's comics, I never liked his books. As the previous user already stated, I guess you'd do well with Ravenor though.
Those the ones you finished or the ones on your list? if on your list the The Stars My Destination
I finished Going Postal today, fantastic, but I always find Discworld stories overstay their welcome just a tiny bit.
Is Guard Guards worth reading?
Supposedly it's the best one, but I prefer the Death Stories. Try your luck, Discworld novels are, after all, always good for a chuckle at least.
Well I thought Guard Guards was the best fwiw. It felt like a proper novel that just happened to have a Discworld setting.
Yes.
I'm about to read it so I'll post a review for you in a week.
>Cute 3 legged alien
>Not Clark Ashton Smith
I'm honestly surprised. Have some big latina tiddies
someone pls post the litRPG charts
Omg who is she, source? Pls look at those tits man, just look at them.
>doesn't know how to use reverse image search that is right in front of him.
why are you this stupid?
anyone capable of helping a tard like myself out?
I'd go with The Island of Doctor Moreau, it's a great read and its fairly short.
Wrote a scene where the protagonist accidentally fucks his mom. Where do I go from here?
You win a Hugo
Publish
Make the next time not an accident.
You are seeking death!
different font sizes maybe?
Like the other user said don't make it an accident next time and just go all out. Don't worry about incest being divisive, as long as both parties are attractive enough then you're fine even if they're mother son.
IDK, I saved it a while back. Image search says Martina Finnochio, so I guess she's actually Italian
Post it faghot
Calm down incel
have there been any good recent tranhsumanism/posthumanism science fiction books? The last thing in that vein I read is the bobiverse trilogy and reynolds elyisum fire and shadow captain + peter Watts Freeze Frame Revolution
I already read everything Revelation Space, Peter Watts and most of Greg Egan's stuff as well as the Quantum thief books. I like grand scifi with very high tech, don't like old scifi much that was written before the internet was a thing
The most recent major transhumanist work of any note are the Count to a Trillion books. But they're subtly about how transhumanism is kind of a spook. Wright's earlier Golden Age books are probably closer to what you're looking for.
Yeah I actually already downloaded all the count to trillion books, its what i plan on reading next. Already read and liked the Golden Age books.
Anything new cyberpunk/nanopunk would be cool too
found void star and thin air by morgan, i'll add those
So you read accelerando?
Yeah
For the past 4 years I have been devouring anything remotely cyberpunk/postcyberpunk
It's only kind of fiction that gives me the same feeling I had when I was a kid reading fantasy
The singularity won't happen but it's nice to dream about, it's my blue pill ersatz for nihilism
>NorthWALKER
>NorthSTRIDER
Hmm
In the original Chinese it’s totes different
Are there any books that are set in a flat world?
Basically all xianxia
Bullshit. Some of the xianxia I've read are more sci-fi than real sci-fi with trillions of planets and interstellar travel. Not once have I encountered a flat world in any chinkshit that I've read.
Tales from the Flat Earth by Tanith Lee. Warning though: Lee is a chick, BUT she's one of the few chick writers worth reading.
Not that I know of, but seeing how cyberpunk is going to be the new meme genre for the next few years I don't think you'll have to wait long
Not that guy, but I read Two Lions, a Witch, and a War-Robe in an anthology a while back and was impressed. Been considering reading something of hers. Anything I should start with?
Tales from the Flat Earth, Birthgrave, and Wars of Vis seem to be her most popular stuff so start with any of those I guess.
Name of artist?
I rewatched Ghibli's Tales from Earthsea and got reminded how underrated and great it is, think of finally picking up the books.
Any opinions on them? How are Le Guin's other fantasy works, anything worth reading or is it all SJW shit?
Red Sonja ran, striking down anything in her path. A bloody, blinded trooper staggered before her; Sonja killed him with a single stroke—but assassination was a kindness compared to what gnawing rats had done to the soldier’s face. Sonja stumbled and almost fell across a still living young man whose grotesquely swollen body was being endlessly penetrated by countless hornets—to him, too, Sonja dispatched a fast and blessed end.
BRUTAL.
If you like postmodernist crap like modern art and modern architecture then by all means check out Le Guin since she's the literary equivalent of pic related.
>you will never be gangraped by hornets
>He was great of stature, both tall and broad. Barrel-chested and gigantic, but not in the malformed manner of an ogre. His skin rippled with the muscles of a veteran warrior, and that skin had a reddish tan. Upon it were painted long flowing serpentine patterns in bright red, especially around his sword-arm. His armor, chiefly a breastplate, greaves, and helm, was a gold-bronze which shined like the sun. On that armor were carved fine and intricate patterns, with similar motifs to the long flowing warpaint on his skin. Attached to the breastplate at the back was a flowing cape of fine fabric, coloured red with nearly dazzlingly bright yellow-gold knotwork patterns. All about the man was the energy of the Solar, bright and shining and red and almost impossible to look upon and take in all at once.
is this any good for a beginner
Kinda bad.
You tried. Too much trying to wax poetic about a character's clothing or appearance is cancer.
discworld, literally in the name
Finally a discussion about something other than fantasy.
>cyberpunk is going to be the new meme genre for the next few years
>new genre
Do you even read? Unless you consider litrpg cyberpunk.
You know what's bizarre? Random cussing in a story that doesn't fit at all. This Red Sonja novel I just finished had 3 instances of cussing ("shit," "assholes," and "get fucked") and they were all random and felt wildly out of place; especially the "assholes" and "get fucked" lines which happened back to back near the end of the book whereas "shit" popped up around the middle. Actually dragged the story down for me a bit because of how ridiculous it came across. I've never read any book with this kinda random cussing and only 3 instances of it. It was like whoever edited this book stuck them in there for a laugh.
Someone nominated this one for monthly reading and it had me thinking about how lame it was. The monster on the cover doesn't appear in the story. It's mentioned somewhere in the middle of the book but then the writer just forgets about it and it's never mentioned again. Makes you wonder how much an author who could do such a thing respects his readers or his craft. The story is a lazy promotion for the author's wicca beliefs anyway, and it's hard to take a person who believes in such things seriously.
She has Lovecraft's racism without any of his new ideas. I like some of the concepts she presents in Fifth Season, but it all reads like a mixture of the smut your mom waxes off to while your dad's at work and a sincere hatred and disgust of people that are different from her.
Riders of the Purple Wage. That shit's all about incest, fucking, and degeneracy into political action cafes.
Technically, you can count Silmarillion until the end of the story of Númenor, since the world was flat until Eru made it round.
Thinking of including a rape scene for every named female character in my story. Some of them could be grouped together so it wouldn't be more than 5 or 6 scenes. Is this a bad idea?
It's your story. Do whatever the fuck you like. Since you only seem to care about the rape I wouldn't worry about quality.
>tfw Suzie references Earthsea and I remember I've been meaning to buy the full series
>went on Amazon and ended up picking up another book entirely
Fuck.
>It's your story ;) but I'm going to make a passive-aggressive comment about how your writing is bad because rape offends me.
Aww. Did your Christian feelings get hurt? Sodomy must make you livid.
It doesn't offend me, it's simply boring.
I don't believe you. If you just thought it was boring there would be no need to make a comment like you did.
Nice try, bugman.
Flatland (d'oh). Flattest of them all.
I vaguely remember reading something years back--I even want to say it may have been a Sanderson interview or some sort of interview--but there was a mention or suggestion that authors in (IIRC, both) fantasy and sci-fi don't have control over their cover art unless they're hugely popular.
However, it is a vague memory and I could be completely wrong but I think of it every time you faggots bitch about covers (which is every fucking thread). I'll try to research the topic when I have a bit more time.
Please lurk for at least two years until you learn how to properly greentext.
whats /sffg/'s consensus on neil gaiman? considering ordering some of his books but id like some opinions first so i know what im getting myself into.
He's a bitch ass limey faggot.
I know that Lois McMaster Bujold sincerely hates her covers because they're Baen covers, but the one time she overruled marketing the book sold poorly so she never made a fuss of it again
Reading Desolate Era makes me wish Yerin was the MC instead
He peaked with Sandman (which would have been mediocre as prose instead of a comic) and has been coasting on it ever since.
If you try to "get into" Gaiman you'll be disappointed.
based take.
She was shilled hard even when she was writing garbage. I thought the Fifth Season showed a noticeable improvement in her writing style, but the sequels demonstrated that she has about zero self-awareness and, like you said, just hates everybody who isn't like her.
This is unironically good insight into the Chinese mindset.
Different print runs -- font, spacing. I wouldn't worry about it.
Someone bluepill me on Andre Norton. Currently reading The Toads of Grimmerdale because it was suggested as a good horror/fantasy story. Is the rest of her Witch World stuff worth checking out?
>Sanderson writing advice
If your book doesn't have a lot of women heroines it's bad! Go to a publisher even if they don't actually help you with anything nowadays that self-publishing doesn't already do! Aged women and homos should gatekeep all fantasy literature it's their prerogative shitlord!
And this guy pretends to be a mormon.
Ubik is pretty cool and mindfucky without being too late PKD to be good. One of his best works really.
Alfred Bester is just great and The Stars My Destination is one of his better ones though I prefer The Demolished Man I think.
Barely remember Ringworld beyond the psycho cowardice of the puppeteers.
Did... did he actually say all that?
>Go to a publisher even if they don't actually help you with anything nowadays that self-publishing doesn't already do!
You should refrain from making statements about the publishing industry, you don't know what you're talking about. Just in case you seem to think this is some form of Sanderson defense, it isn't, he's a hack but you are also a moron.
Traditional publishing is dying and good riddance.
Maybe it's dying or maybe it's just in a state of transition, who knows, it's a complex issue. In either case if you think a NYT best selling author is better off self publishing in the current industry, you're an idiot.
The worst of all possible takes on Le Guin. What is remotely "postmodernist" about her work?
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
Pure postmodern garbage. Even won a fucking Hugo for that shit.
Please explain what postmodernism is to you and what is postmodern about that story.
Oh god
>Please explain what postmodernism is to you
Garbage.
>and what is postmodern about that story.
It's garbage.
>postmodernism
Hello Dr Peterson, care to explain what that term means?
It's too much; blurs the image in the mind before you even finish describing it. Just say three things, stop, and let the rest trickle in later.
Postmodernism, also spelled post-modernism, in Western philosophy, a late 20th-century movement characterized by broad skepticism, subjectivism, or relativism; a general suspicion of reason; and an acute sensitivity to the role of ideology in asserting and maintaining political and economic power.
Very nice, you can copy/paste a definition
Care to explain what that means in the terms of literature? How is the book postmodern?
en.wikipedia.org
>It has been at times analyzed as a postmodernist work.[10]
So Wikipedia, citing literally who, informs your dislike of her whole oeuvre based on one short story?
Unironically, yikes.
>Hates whitey
>Hurr muh stronk xerples of colour
>Not postmodern
What did xir mean by this?
Why was it so predictable you would be /pol/?
Oh look, nothing but buzzwords
I'm not the guy you were taking to, user. And I'm not from pol, I'm formerly chuck
And yet, you can't refute them. Imagine that
I decided to look what female authors I've liked, though that's complicated by pen names.
F&SF = The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
non-novels:
Still Tomorrow's Going to Be Another Working Day Amy Griswold F&SF 733 September/October 2017
By the Light of the Electronic Moon Angelica Godorischer F&SF 707 May/June 2013
Savant Songs Brenda Cooper Year's Best SF 10
The North Revena Ladies Literary Society Catherine H. Shaffer Year's Best SF 18
The Trader and the Slave Cinda Williams Chima The Way of the Wizard
Stable Strategies for Middle Management Eileen Gunn Best of the Best: 20 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction
Kormak The Lucky Elenaor Arnason F&SF 708 July/August 2013
MetaPhysics Elizabeth M. Glover Sympathy for the Devil
Collector's Item Evelyn E. Smith The Golden Age of Science Fiction 10
What Do You Do? Gillian Flynn Rogues
Last One Out K.B. Rylander F&SF 726 July/August 2016
Wilder Still, The Stars Kathleen Ann Goonan Reach for Infinity
A Love Supreme Kathleen Ann Goonan Year's Best SF 18
Freezing Rain, a Chance of Falling L.X. Beckett F&SF 738 July/August 2018
Cupid's Compass Leah Cypess F&SF 727 September/October 2016
Attitude Linda Nagata Reach for Infinity
Nahiku West Linda Nagata Year's Best SF 18
Anything For You Lisa Mason F&SF 727 September/October 2016
An Unearned Death Marissa Lingen F&SF 732 July/August 2017
The Egg Man Mary Rosenblum The Year's Best Science Fiction 26
Alexandria Monica Byrne F&SF 729 January/February 2017
Act One Nancy Kress The Mammoth Book of Best New Science Fiction 23
Exegesis Nancy Kress Year's Best SF 15
Liberty's Daughter Naomi Kritzer F&SF 701 May/June 2012
High Stakes Naomi Kritzer F&SF 704 November/December 2012
Solidarity Naomi Kritzer F&SF 706 March/April 2013
Containment Zone: A Seastead Story Naomi Kritzer F&SF 713 May/June 2014
Jubilee: A Seastead Story Naomi Kritzer F&SF 717 January/February 2015
The Silicon Curtain: A Seastead Story Naomi Kritzer F&SF 720 July/August 2015
Evil Opposite Naomi Kritzer F&SF 733 September/October 2017
Liberty's Daughter Naomi Kritzer Year's Best SF 18
Rings Nina Kirki Hoffman F&SF 731 May/June 2017
The Properties of Shadow Nina Kirki Hoffman F&SF 737 May/June 2018
Speech Sounds Octavia E. Butler Wastelands
The Desert of Vanished Dreams Phyllis Eisenstein F&SF 726 July/August 2016
My English Name R.S. Benedict F&SF 731 May/June 2017
Morbier R.S. Benedict F&SF 738 July/August 2018
The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath The Queen's Window Rachel Swirsky The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 2011
The Day of the Nuptial Flight Sarina Dorie F&SF 714 July/August 2014
A Mother's Arms Sarina Dorie F&SF 724 March/April 2016
Suicide Watch Susan Emshwiller F&SF 739 September/October 2018
Hhasalin Susan Palwick F&SF 709 September/October 2013
The Deepwater Bride Tamsyn Muir F&SF 720 July/August 2015
Widdam Vandana Singh F&SF 735 January/February 2018
pottery
>female authors
The Word for World Is Forest by Ursula Le Guin is good.
I decided to look what female authors I've liked, though that's complicated by pen names.
non-novels:
Nice incel joke!
Do you have a resource to get the newer F&SF mags? Been looking and I can't find them online
Yikes
>NorthSTOMPER
I've been subscribed since 2012 for the Kindle.
Grandfathered in special price of $0.99 per month, so $2/issue.
I've exported to them to Calibre and can read them on the PC if I want, lose access to them after a year, and I'd rather not, but I haven't bothered to remove the DRM to share them. Currently requires my Kindle serial number to access.
Based user who actually post stuff about books
Now you guys are talking about postmodernist garbage.
Damn that's a good price. I'll keep looking, I'm sure they're out there somewhere
Maybe. The circulation for all mags is rather low.
The abyss strikes again
I found a torrent a while back but I only downloaded a couple issues. Big mistake. Clarkesworld, Asimovs, and Analog are all pretty easy to find but not F&SF for whatever reason.
I liked Hitchhiker so I read Douglas Adams's Dirk Gently books and what the fuck I don't understand the ending in either book. I don't understand how the "solution" in the first book resolves anything and in the second book it's like it just builds up to a climax and then skips the scene where Dirk presumably defeats the villains and then we see the villains get defeated and the happy ending.
Oh yeah and what's with the title of the second book? I get that it's vaguely funny but what does it have to do with the plot? Actually, it's kind of the same situation with the Hitchhiker sequels, each book is just a phrase taken from the first book.
The books are written to be fairly convoluted, the first more so than the second, so it's understandable that you wouldn't get the full extent on a first read; I don't think most casual readers would without a corkboard and red string. It might have been just because I first read them when I was fourteen but there was a lot of stuff I didn't get until my second read.
The ending of the first book doesn't "resolve" anything in the sense that the alien ghost is still around and now has a time travel clone, but they do manage to stop it from undoing its mistake and prevent it from trying again via indirect means. That's pretty much the best they can do since the established rules of the plot state a ghost can't actually go away until it feels it's finished its unfinished business. Also you're right that the end of the second book feels really abrupt, that's why I feel like it's the weaker of the two.
The title is a callback to the bit in Life, the Universe, and Everything about Wowbagger going insane with boredom due to his immortality, and how what really gets him is teatimes on Sundays. The same more or less applies to the Norse gods in the book, who are well past their prime and are just trying to fritter away eternity.
About the first book: really? But how does changing the plot of the poem Rime of the Ancient Mariner actually affect the events that take place in the book? How does it prevent them from taking the ghost back to the distant past?
According to the book, Coleridge wrote Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan under the influence of the ghost, which couldn't keep a hold on him because he lost his buzz. Kubla Khan is about the paradise the aliens were going to build on Earth, and Rime is about the ghost's torment of accidentally dooming the ship. The important thing is that the second half of Kubla Khan, which doesn't exist in real life, describes in detail the process by which somebody might undo the ghost's mistake in the past, create the paradise, and subsequently prevent all of Earth's history from happening. Wenton-Weakes becomes vulnerable to the ghost's influence, in part, because he reads Coleridge when the ghost attempts to grab a hold on him, and he knows what to do because of Kubla Khan. By causing the second half of Kubla Khan to be lost, they lessen the influence the ghost has on any minds in the future, and prevent any explicit instructions from surviving. An established detail is that a spirit's power waxes and wanes irregularly, so the ghost can't just keep trying to possess people at full strength.
Litrpg is honestly pretty awful and cringe
Sandman is pretty great. Stardust is standard fantasy but fun and very tightly written. Neverwhere may also be alright if you want Fallen London isekai. Everything else is pretty boring.
Why can’t anyone write some good settlement building litrpg without stupid gimmicks
>good
>litrpg
There's your problem.
Daniel Black. But sadly he has the harem gimmick.
Release that Witch if you dont mind chink shit. Its not a litrpg and it has some gimmicks though
>settlement building litrpg without stupid gimmicks
the ten realms.
Discussing Litrpgs is punishable with death by virginity.
Maybe out there somewhere there's a light novel that does this to your satisfaction.
More or less but less directly honest of course. It's from his writing class on youtube.
He defends publishers and their agents who gatekeep books without "strong heroines" because "lol those books aren't any good anyway" and tries to deflect from publisher agents being of a single type of people after a single type of book (read: old women and homosexuals).
Yeah nah, he even admits they barely can help you out anymore beyond getting paid upfront or setting up book signings and that's only really if they're part of the Big Five.
He still shills them anyway despite not coming up with m(any) positives.