The GMG SF/Fantasy/Horror Club

Started by Dr. Dread, August 04, 2009, 10:18:46 AM

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Saul

Quote from: DavidW on October 17, 2010, 06:34:18 AM
I've read similar complaints Saul about that series.  That the author has a poor grasp of character development and can't prioritize plot threads, and that it ends up being boring and disengaging.  That is one of the two reasons that I've avoided the series, the other being that it is not finished yet.

Its like reading something that has no begining or end.


DavidW

Quote from: Saul on October 17, 2010, 01:22:21 PM
Its like reading something that has no begining or end.

Alot of fantasy epics feel that way.  Are they paid by the word?  Could they possibly stop trying to write huge multi-volume thousand page 12 volume door stoppers and try writing a short, character driven story?  Would it kill them?

MN Dave

Quote from: DavidW on October 17, 2010, 02:12:16 PM
Alot of fantasy epics feel that way.  Are they paid by the word?  Could they possibly stop trying to write huge multi-volume thousand page 12 volume door stoppers and try writing a short, character driven story?  Would it kill them?

Tolkien started that shit.

Saul

Quote from: DavidW on October 17, 2010, 02:12:16 PM
Alot of fantasy epics feel that way.  Are they paid by the word?  Could they possibly stop trying to write huge multi-volume thousand page 12 volume door stoppers and try writing a short, character driven story?  Would it kill them?

Freaking reviews full of hype, they even made him better then Tolkien, just to make a sell.
This dude is galaxies far from Tolkien.

DavidW

Quote from: Saul on October 17, 2010, 02:14:14 PM
Freaking reviews full of hype, they even made him better then Tolkien, just to make a sell.
This dude is galaxies far from Tolkien.

I think that alot of people don't get what makes Tolkien so interesting.  I have to quote myself passionately defending LoTR on another site (this was due to the reviewer putting many series above LoTR):

QuoteTolkien thought through genealogies of all principle characters, and there is a story behind every song, every statue, every creature. When you read the Silmarillion and the Unfinished Tales you have a sense of a world unfolding and marvel at how Tolkien chronicled an entire history. You will not find that in Martin, Jordan, or Hobb.

It's not just that we have a great story reflecting mythologies from many cultures in Hobbit and Lord of the Rings but we have this fully formed universe with amazing back story in every way from languages to calendars to histories to family trees... and you really don't get that in the other epics. :)

bwv 1080

Quote from: DavidW on October 17, 2010, 06:34:18 AM
I've read similar complaints Saul about that series.  That the author has a poor grasp of character development and can't prioritize plot threads, and that it ends up being boring and disengaging.  That is one of the two reasons that I've avoided the series, the other being that it is not finished yet.

Don't let that stop you, I am a huge fan of the series.  The Malazan books are the only series other than LOTR that I have read more than once.  The character development is as good as Martin or Tolkien or anything else in the genre.  With 100s of characters, it is only a few and the development is not always in a positive direction.  I wonder if what is called "lack of character development" is that the typical genre cliches are avoided - there are no farm-boys with a great destiny or many of the other typical plot devices.

The prioritizing plot criticism is unwarranted.  The first 9 books (the final 10th is due early next year) are tied together in an almost uncanny way, with flashes in earlier books of events that are important in later ones.  The plot is is very complex and multi-faceted, which is its great strength  - it reads much more like real history where you have a bunch of competing tribes and empires with no grand narrative to tie them together (although Erikson is using a couple of very large events to tie his together which only begins to happen in the last couple of books). 

The greatest strength is the depth of the world and the backstory - no one comes close to Erikson here.  The different people groups seem to have evolved naturally from their environments rather than the contrived hybrids of historical stereotypes that populate most fantasy books.  The world functions very logically from the underlying premise that magic and gods exist and despite their existence, the books are brutally naturalistic with the complex outcomes one would expect from dozens of players each pursuing their own ends rather than a binary struggle against some sauron-clone.

also Saul hates it - what better endorsement could you have?

DavidW

That sounds very tempting, that's a good sale! :)  Perhaps when the final volume is out there, or at least there is a specific date in the near future and the author has no known medical conditions... I might start 'em.

Benji

Quote from: DavidW on October 16, 2010, 10:59:21 AM
Edit: hilarious "I've seen then all" and before the next line "haven't seen #5."  I think I just pulled a Paulb. ;D

Oh i'm all nostalgic. Memories, like the corners of my mind...  ;D

DavidW

Quote from: Benji on October 18, 2010, 04:14:07 PM
Oh i'm all nostalgic. Memories, like the corners of my mind...  ;D

Yeah I can't help but remember Paulb now that I'm into Pettersson! :D

Benji

Quote from: bwv 1080 on October 18, 2010, 01:27:16 PM
Don't let that stop you, I am a huge fan of the series.  The Malazan books are the only series other than LOTR that I have read more than once.  The character development is as good as Martin or Tolkien or anything else in the genre.  With 100s of characters, it is only a few and the development is not always in a positive direction.  I wonder if what is called "lack of character development" is that the typical genre cliches are avoided - there are no farm-boys with a great destiny or many of the other typical plot devices.

The prioritizing plot criticism is unwarranted.  The first 9 books (the final 10th is due early next year) are tied together in an almost uncanny way, with flashes in earlier books of events that are important in later ones.  The plot is is very complex and multi-faceted, which is its great strength  - it reads much more like real history where you have a bunch of competing tribes and empires with no grand narrative to tie them together (although Erikson is using a couple of very large events to tie his together which only begins to happen in the last couple of books). 

The greatest strength is the depth of the world and the backstory - no one comes close to Erikson here.  The different people groups seem to have evolved naturally from their environments rather than the contrived hybrids of historical stereotypes that populate most fantasy books.  The world functions very logically from the underlying premise that magic and gods exist and despite their existence, the books are brutally naturalistic with the complex outcomes one would expect from dozens of players each pursuing their own ends rather than a binary struggle against some sauron-clone.

also Saul hates it - what better endorsement could you have?

I read that Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea Quartet is the next best thing in fantasy writing to LOTR. Any thoughts on this? I'm ashamed to say I've not read it, even though I bought it for my best friend and told him exactly the above as fact  :o

I have; however, seen the Studio Ghibli animation Tales from Earthsea....so I know there's a magician called Sparrowhawk and that when I do read the book it will be Timothy Dalton's voice.  8)

Truth be told, I love the idea of reading fantasy, but it's never taken me like sci-fi has, the main reason being that fantasy lends itself to epic yarns and multiple book series (as can sci-fi I know) but my love is for sci-fi short stories. Recs for fantasy short stories would be gratefully received!

Benji

And this year i've branched out into horror short story - I received the Call of Cthulu as a gift so i'm working my way through that. So far I <3 Lovecraft! The writing is so chillingly descriptive it gives me goosebumps - Lovecraft is well-deserving of his name becoming an adjective. The first story, Dagon, still haunts me, especially this passage:

Plainly visible across the intervening water on account of their enormous size was an array of bas-reliefs whose subjects would have excited the envy of a Dore. I think that these things were supposed to depict men -- at least, a certain sort of men; though the creatures were shown disporting like fishes in the waters of some marine grotto, or paying homage at some monolithic shrine which appeared to be under the waves as well. Of their faces and forms I dare not speak in detail, for the mere remembrance makes me grow faint. Grotesque beyond the imagination of a Poe or a Bulwer, they were damnably human in general outline despite webbed hands and feet, shockingly wide and flabby lips, glassy, bulging eyes, and other features less pleasant to recall. Curiously enough, they seemed to have been chiselled badly out of proportion with their scenic background; for one of the creatures was shown in the act of killing a whale represented as but little larger than himself. I remarked, as I say, their grotesqueness and strange size; but in a moment decided that they were merely the imaginary gods of some primitive fishing or seafaring tribe; some tribe whose last descendant had perished eras before the first ancestor of the Piltdown or Neanderthal Man was born.

Awestruck at this unexpected glimpse into a past beyond the conception of the most daring anthropologist, I stood musing whilst the moon cast queer reflections on the silent channel before me. Then suddenly I saw it. With only a slight churning to mark its rise to the surface, the thing slid into view above the dark waters. Vast, Polyphemus-like, and loathsome, it darted like a stupendous monster of nightmares to the monolith, about which it flung its gigantic scaly arms, the while it bowed its hideous head and gave vent to certain measured sounds. I think I went mad then.

http://www.dagonbytes.com/thelibrary/lovecraft/dagon.htm

Full story here.

DavidW

Now you'll have to watch Dagon Ben! :)



This summer I read At the Mountain of Madness, always very interesting visualization of monsters in both more detail and strangeness than most stuff out there, but the whole cold, detailed narrative left me struggling to focus.  The short stories are easier on my ADD mind. ;D

Benji

Quote from: DavidW on October 18, 2010, 05:23:12 PM
Now you'll have to watch Dagon Ben! :)



This summer I read At the Mountain of Madness, always very interesting visualization of monsters in both more detail and strangeness than most stuff out there, but the whole cold, detailed narrative left me struggling to focus.  The short stories are easier on my ADD mind. ;D

I saw that pop up on IMDB in my Google results when I was looking for the text above. Dare I ask....is the film any good?

Is the Mountains of Madness a novel then? It is on my wishlist - I thought it was another short story collection.

DavidW

Quote from: Benji on October 18, 2010, 05:25:57 PM
I saw that pop up on IMDB in my Google results when I was looking for the text above. Dare I ask....is the film any good?

I liked it!  But my favorite Lovecraft movie is still The Dunwich Horror. :)

QuoteIs the Mountains of Madness a novel then? It is on my wishlist - I thought it was another short story collection.

Yup or novella.  It's about 100 pages long.  I never know when you stop saying novella or novellette and when you say novel.

MN Dave

Benji, try to find the oop anthologies DARK DESCENT and FOUNDATIONS OF FEAR ed. by Hartwell. Also, try to find a Thomas Ligotti collection.

Benji

Quote from: DavidW on October 18, 2010, 07:08:24 PM
I liked it!  But my favorite Lovecraft movie is still The Dunwich Horror. :)

Yup or novella.  It's about 100 pages long.  I never know when you stop saying novella or novellette and when you say novel.

When the story loses its novelty?......






Benji

Quote from: MN Dave on October 19, 2010, 05:02:59 AM
Benji, try to find the oop anthologies DARK DESCENT and FOUNDATIONS OF FEAR ed. by Hartwell. Also, try to find a Thomas Ligotti collection.

Cheers bud. Those are all quite cheap on Amazon UK so i'll treat myself next time I do a book order.

MN Dave


Benji

Quote from: MN Dave on October 19, 2010, 12:06:32 PM
And this comes out each year:

http://www.amazon.com/Mammoth-Book-Best-New-Horror/dp/0762439971/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1287518742&sr=1-1

Ahhhh. I have a load of those mammoth books on my wishlist (Apocalyptic Sci-fi, Mind-blowing Sci-fi - very excited to order those). And, I actually own this:



So far so good - I read a story last night after posting - it was quite entertaining. Something about a house buried in a crater full of snow, that happens to be on an infinitely deep lake of ice and two explorers get trapped as the house as it melts its way through the ice. Then it turns out one of the characters is the Devil...  extreme indeed.

What I don't own:



Who buys this? I don't know if I should be surprised that there are even enough special ops romance short stories to fill a mammoth book?  ???

MN Dave

Oooo! I might look for that Extreme Fantasy tome.