/lit/ - Literature

Sex Books

I.
SMELL.

>>18422778
uooohhh sketchy digital background and anime girl so sai fai so kawaiii

>>18422778
I'm halfway through The Ship of Magic and it's already better than the entire Farseer trilogy.
Truly pirates improve anything.

Just finished chapter 7 of book of the new sun. This is pretty rad so far. I don’t like that the first chapter was so different and confusing compared to the rest of what was going on. That’s what stopped me from reading it 2 years ago. I finished the first chapter and was all “well, that was rough and confusing and expected way too much out of me” and I dropped it, not even considering that chapter 2 was going to be easier and smoother and more focused.

Thanks to the anon a few threads ago that told me to stick with it this time.

>>18422890
>pick up Shadow of the Torturer
>read it
>this sucks!
>two years later reread it
>read Claw of the Conciliator too because I'm really feeling
>not feeling it anymore
>two years later read through Shadow, Claw, Sword, Citadel and Urth all back to back
It wasn't an easy road but in the end it was worth it

>>18422921
Hey, at this point anything is easier than how long and how many attempts it took me to finish infinite jest.

>>18422778
Discord: https://discord.com/invite/KWPCM7m
Book Club Read: Chasm City by Alastair Reynolds, ongoing
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/89185.Chasm_City

> The once-utopian Chasm City -a doomed human settlement on an otherwise inhospitable planet- has been overrun by a virus known as the Melding Plague, capable of infecting any body, organic or computerized. Now, with the entire city corrupted -from the people to the very buildings they inhabit- only the most wretched sort of existence remains. For security operative Tanner Mirabel, it is the landscape of nightmares through which he searches for a low-life postmortal killer. But the stakes are raised when his search brings him face to face with a centuries-old atrocity that history would rather forget

Been picking up a ton of cheap and absolute trash scifi paper backs from mid century on. It's terrible but comfy and very quickly turning into a rotting tooth... currently consooming zach hughes 'for texas and zed'

is current ya fantasy basically the romance novel/dime paper back trash of the modern day?

>>18422976
Give up. You've been doing this for over a year and no one has cared during that entire time.

>>18423025
there are over 300 people in the discord, anon

>>18423009

Japanese light novels are the closest thing today to the pulps, John Carter is remarkably similar to a generic isekai story

>>18423174
And none of them came from shilling here. Fuck off retard.

>>18422890
I absolutely love Book of the New Sun; I've read it twice and listened to the audiobooks. I noticed a lot of things I missed on the second read. I had no problem at all finishing the books, but I bought a copy of Shadow of the Torturer for my friend a couple of years ago and he's still not read more than a third of it.
>>18422882
Good, is it? It sounds pretty interesting from the synopsis.

>>18423417
>Good, is it?
There's the usual Robin Hobb frustrations from people behaving in completely unreasonable ways, but the place where these people live is so much more interesting than the Six Duchies and I enjoy reading about these people much, much more than I did reading about Fitz angsting over Molly.
Liveships and sea serpents are neat. I look forward to learning more about the Rain Wilds and Others.

>>18422882
I remember the dragons, cool stuff.

>>18422778
>hello, go to my website and read these 32 pages of diagrams and equations to understand my book

wtf is Greg Egan's problem?
is this the "autism superpower" I hear so much about?

>>18423555
>"and this is why in this universe the plants glow light instead of absorb it"
fucking really?

>>18423442
(not the guy you replied to) Would Liveship traders be ok to read as a standalone trilogy? I read farseer a few years back but i dont really remember anything about it.

>>18423592
Absolutely.

>>18422766
What is it about now?

>>18422778
Just started The Tower of The Elephant, a Conan the Barbarian short story, and so far its pretty classic low fantasy. Can any anons recommend me some more Conan stories, or collections of stories in one book?

>>18423658
Why not just read all of it? Anyway
>The Phoenix on the Sword
>Queen of the Black Coast
>A Witch Shall be Born
>Hour of the Dragon

>>18423685
Any particular order these need to be read in? From what I've heard Tower takes place early in Conan's life.

>>18423642
Trying to cure goblin slayer’s autistic genocidal hatred of goblins.

>>18423700
If you want chronological order, then it would be
>Queen of the Black Coast
>A Witch Shall be Born
>The Phoenix on the Sword
>The Hour of the Dragon

>>18423709
Alright, thanks anon. Cheers.

>>18423701
Sounds like the Jews got to the author.

>>18423701
They made the goblins good then?

>>18423759
Oh no. They actually want Goblin Slayer to have a life instead of enacting the final solution to the goblin question.

Though there is a Goblin Paladin in the story.

>>18423809
I thought they had given more nuance to them and made him rethink his methods, like they were dealing with the feral goblins until now and then found there was some decent goblin civilization somewhere.

>>18423701
Are the goblins supposed to represent black people?

>>18423866
if you want them to, they represent the chinese for me

>>18424167
That does make more sense considering that it's a Japanese story.

did they?

>>18422882
i preferred liveships too, although that may be my preference for a large 3rd person POV cast as compared to a fix 1st person one

>>18423417
>he's still not read more than a third of it.
The book is not for everyone.

>>18424870
That's exactly what I said to him. He finished Ready Player One just fine though.

>>18423417
The way I’ve seen book of the new sun talked about and praised I better orgasm during reading it, I’m incredibly excited but my expectations are high

>>18423417
>he's still not read more than a third of
Not surprised, it's boring as fuck. A lot of the hype comes Dr Who redditors who think they're uncovering some profound mystery and "catholic" twitter zoomzooms who get excited over Wolfe's beliefs.

>>18423297
All but a few came from here. You're the retard it looks like.

>>18425017
Tell the animefags to fuck off for me.

>>18423555
>>18423566
Fag's failed miserably if he needs the reader to seek external sources to understand core concepts of a fucking SF novel.

>>18425017
>300-person discord
>Majority come from a thread with ~50 posters max
Very believable, my socially stunted friend.

>>18425074
>He doesn't know what lurkers are
new much?

>>18425098
>Lurk on 4chan
>Several times those numbers are willing to join a discord
lmao

>>18424907
I only managed to read a third of that.

>>18424907
>>18425147
The duality of man.

>>18425147
I picked it up in the library on a whim when it had just come out and I'm ashamed to admit I did enjoy it at the time, so I bought a copy for my friend as it was his birthday coming up, and he loved it — he really enjoyed the movie too, but I won't watch it. I understand better now exactly why it is cringe material.

Will you watch it?
https://deadline.com/2021/06/the-broken-earth-nk-jemisin-sony-tristar-7-figure-deal-author-adapts-1234769656/

>Logan still in the cuck hole

>>18425267
>niggers

NO MORE FUCKING KEKOLDRY
FUCK YOUUUUUU

Writing idea for annoying a reader the most
Have a male main character get married in the book with no signs of unfaithfulness from his wife and on the last chapter of the book have his wife turn him into a cuckold then have the man that cuckolded him rape him.

>>18425349
That's far from original.

>>18425405
Name 3000 books published in 1987 which have that

>>18425349
>annoying a reader the most
Write a great book with an excellent sequel, then spend decades posting about how well the third and final book is coming along.

>>18425349
that's what we call a Bakkerism in literary circles

>>18425349
Read the octopus interactions in Children of Ruin to find out how to annoy the reader beyond belief.

>>18425446
I thought this was about Patrick Rothfuss, but no, he never wrote anything good in the first place.

>>18425690
And look how well it worked even without that.

>>18425841
Also the third book isn't the final one anymore but it's coming along even better, ahaha

Fuck E William Brown
Fuck Delays
Fuck Pay Walls
Fuck Pay Pigs
Fuck not keeping your promise to your readers
Fuck you

>>18425108
The key here is that most Discord users lurk too. It's standard practice for people to join 90-some servers they never even look at (with a cap of 100 servers being joinable by a single user I believe). The difference here is that 4chan lurkers are invisible, while discord lurkers accumulate in the user list. Obviously a discord server all but exclusively posted in /sffg/ and titled "the /sffg/ server" will have users largely from /sffg/.
The harsh reality is that while some 4channers cling to elitism and desperately pray for 4chan users to be spiritually "better" than those from other sites ("plebbitors", "discordtrannies", etc), at the end of the day we're all just people, and the overlap between 4chan and other communities is fairly large. Such that, indeed, hundreds of 4channers will join a discord server for a general thread despite the whining of a few about discordtrannies and muh anonymous pride. At the end of the day, not every 4channer is an autistic elitist.

>>18426312
Not getting in the honey pot, simple as.

>>18426312
why would a lurker go out of his way to make an account on some fucking site

Are the chronicles of amber worth reading?

javascript:quote('18421941');
anyone read the first two of LeGuin's Hainish books, Rocannon's World and Planet of Exile? Doesn't seem like they're discussed as much

>>18426679
lol still don't know how to reply to posts from other threads

>>18426530
If you want just another medieval sword and sorcery, not sure. But if you want an actual take on interdimensional cosmology, kingdoms of Order and Chaos, and complex royal intrigues, yes.

>>18426716
nice, thanks for the info, sounds interesting

are there any good fantasy short stories? I hate reading book series and novels in general.

>>18426930
just go on literotica

>>18426312
Discord is shit, same as anywhere where you need to have a username. It's literally impossible to join a new community like that, because people read your name, don't recognise it, and ignore you.
4chan is a million times better.

>>18422836
What is this image supposed to be?

>>18426701
It's the same as replying to any post in general. Just use >> and the post number, or copypaste the post url. It's basically the same for referring to posts on other boards as well.

>>18427063
>4chan is a million times better.
Most people ignore most posts in general, so what difference is there?

>>18427505
The name attached to my post when it gets ignored is Anonymous, so it's less embarrassing.

currently on book six of the wheel of time. it's getting slow. is it worth continuing?

>>18427595
dont know

>>18427595
People who say it rebounded admit that didn't happen until Sanderson took over. Others say it never did. I quit before he died and haven't been able to make myself go back. I mean, you were warned.

>>18427638
>sanderson
definitely not continuing then

>Reading a fantasy novel
>"It was week SPLOOSH of the year 1777A on day FLEMBY of the fifth SPLURGE cycle"

Holy fuck just use the normal calendar system. We can still understand that it's a different planet than Earth. C'mon now.

>>18427694
Better question: Is it really necessary to the story to inform the reader of the exact day of the year.

>>18427694
Depends on the story. If you're telling one focused around an imperial court full of bureaucracy, it's part of setting the scene. If you're telling some story about some farmboy whose days are largely the same aside from a few exceptions, there's probably no need to be more specific than what season it is.

>>18427063
>have boring and shallow takes
>i-it's not m-my fault! people are just bullies!

>>18427063
>It's literally impossible to join a new community like that, because people read your name, don't recognise it, and ignore you
Once I stop laughing, I'm gonna feel sorry for you.
It may take a while though.

>>18422976
Discord is for trannies. Anyway, first for The March North. Very abstract and kinda good in an asberger kinda way

>>18425281
Lmao. Enjoyed those books though. Tfw no Doll Girl to guilt you from a life of amoral nihilism

>>18426333
Checked; discord trannies btfo

>>18426312
>Obviously a discord server all but exclusively posted in /sffg/ and titled "the /sffg/ server" will have users largely from /sffg/.
No, it's mostly full of tourists and newfags. The kind of people who'd rather lurk a discord channel than post on 4chan don't belong here.

>>18427595
That's up to you. It's going to keep being slow for the next few books.

>>18425690
>>18425993
Wise Man's Fear came out in 2011. Children born after that book was published are in elementary school. How much you want to bet they'll reach adulthood before we ever see book 3? An entire generation of kids will grow up in the gap between his books, never knowing anything about how hyped he was in the 00s. This is how you make yourself irrelevant. At least GRRM actually does stuff whenever he's not writing (which is all the time).

>>18428618
>At least GRRM actually does stuff whenever he's not writing (which is all the time).
He will never finish that series.

>>18428588
>the kind of people who lurk 4chan don't belong on 4chan

>>18428747
do people here still care? its been so long and personally i lost interest after a feast for crows

>>18422976
Hey anon, I totally believe you, but I'm afraid of opening any link without knowing what is it.
Do a livestream of your discord channel on youtube to prove that it's really filled with /sffg/ anons and I'll happily join :)

welp, after reading Seveneves Ina whim and then spending the last year reading almost every word Neal Stephenson has ever written, I'm at a loss what to read next. Does anything else in Cyberpunk capture the light-hearted tone of Diamond Age and Snow Crash?

>>18425446
>>18425690
Name of the Wind is solid. Wise Man's fear is good, then starts to fall apart about 2/3rd's of the way through. Fucking Adem. Dumbest shit ever.
Rothfuss is a douche, but I'll still read Doors of Stone if/when it releases.

>>18429166
Headcrash by Bethke

>>18427595
start skipping sections. or even books.

>>18426930
Zelazny was great at short stories

>>18426530
Yes. The second series is very less good tho

>>18429282
I don't even remember Adem because of Felurian. It literally looked like a horny tenaager's fanfiction.

I really like John C. Wright's books

>>18423709
What's the best order for a beginner?

>>18428870
here is a screenshot of /lit/ sensation f gardner expressing his beliefs

>>18429415
While you're correct, the Fae-Realm sequence does have its merits- the initial other-ness of Felurian, the description of traveling through the land to create the shaed, and most of all the Cthaeh, which is awesome (could have used a better mechanism for encountering it, rather than just "I wandered off until I saw a neat-looking tree, lol"). Still, up until the Cthaeh, I was getting annoyed and peeked ahead to see just how much more of it I'd have to put up with.

With the Adem, there is nothing redeeming.

>>18429532
Based.

>>18429282
No, it wasn't solid, and no it wasn't good. I will never understand what people saw in him.

>Think /sffg/ is just memeing about Bakker and cuckoldry
>100 pages into first apocalypse book
>the love of one of pov character is literally selling her body while he watched her do so. she's standing on her balcony welcoming him back home, as she's fresh from the downdicking
>their big love story is actually pov character going after (but never finding) a sex customer that hurt the girl

>>18429901
Akka did nothing wrong. Well, besides playing at love with a whore.

>>18429901
>>18430125
>He had loved a whore and had reaped the wages accordingly.

thinking of a scifi scenario where the earth becomes an arcology as soon as possible. starts with 80s neoliberalism run loose, artificial wombs etc. companies and governments start breeding ppl and it becomes an arms race. within 5 decades there are a trillion people on earth, and billions on mars and the moon. and by 2080 all 3 are arcologies. need to calculate the upper limits but they're actually more limited by with how to deal with waste heat than anything else

the point of the framing is to get a kind of trantor like imperial centre for a galactic empire asap so their technology and culture are much more closer to ours than in something that takes place in 3000 or 10000

suggestions?

>>18422778
turns out I never actually read anything from ursula le guin. how is she? which books would you recommend?

>>18430468
I think starting a project on a scale this big can lead to a failure as big. How about you tell me the story of a single character from this world? And I don't mean just how angry he is at the world as social commentary.

>>18430566
>How about you tell me the story of a single character from this world?
you don't really need that to be compelling

>>18430566
i'm more interested in just worldbuilding for now. tho maybe that makes it not strictly lit anymore. any kind of stories would take place in the periphery like how it's usually done in these settings

>>18430619
It just seems that you are writing an extended universe before writing the work that can lead to it.

>>18429591
Your pic gave me a craving for Fae stuff, any halfway decent book about fairies and the feywild?
Preferably slightly grim fantasy a la Osten Ard, but I take anything really.

>>18423838
SJW detected

>>18429516
Just read whatever to see if you even like Conan

>>18424599
i'm actually serious
we know ungoliant had a bunch of kids, including shelob
who else could be the father?

>>18430766
Maybe it was parthenogenesis, eldritch abominations should be able to do that.

>>18429335
You can safely get by books 7-10 by skipping all sections that are not Rand, Mat, Perrin and your flavour of Forsaken.

Are there any other books like this that feature voodoo magic? I find it really appealing. I wish more contemporary screenwriters/game designers would make use of magic/voodoo zombies instead of using the massively played out zombie virus trope every single time.
I actually suggested this to somebody once when they were interested in writing a zombie novel; since the idea of a virus that turns people into living dead is so implausible it would actually make more sense for them to be magic. Their reply was, "It's just zombies, they're supposed to make sense."

>>18429532
That's a great compilation of true facts that he posted.

>>18423555
>>18423566
>>18425036
the link with the physics:
http://gregegan.net/ORTHOGONAL/ORTHOGONAL.html#CC

and the video tutorials
http://gregegan.net/ORTHOGONAL/Videos/Videos.html#Tutorials

>>18428849
I'd read a new asoiaf book if it dropped, absolutely. No idea why losers like you need to be so emotionally invested in simple consumerist media, all butthurt about not getting one product out of literal millions of others you could just as easily by enjoying in the mean time. If it comes, great. If not, whatever, plenty of other stuff out there.

>>18431211
I don't think I've ever seen such concentrated autism in my life.

Beautiful

>>18431211
>>18431250
creating a coherent alternative model of physics for a book is quite an impressive achievement

>>18422921
“What struck me on the beach–and it struck me indeed, so that I staggered as at a blow–was that if the Eternal Principle had rested in that curved thorn I had carried about my neck across so many leagues, and if it now rested in the new thorn (perhaps the same thorn) I had only now put there, then it might rest in everything, in every thorn in every bush, in every drop of water in the sea. The thorn was a sacred Claw because all thorns were sacred Claws; the sand in my boots was sacred sand because it came from a beach of sacred sand. The cenobites treasured up the relics of the sannyasins because the sannyasins had approached the Pancreator. But everything had approached and even touched the Pancreator, because everything had dropped from his hand. Everything was a relic. All the world was a relic. I drew off my boots, that had traveled with me so far, and threw them into the waves that I might not walk shod on holy ground.”

The Forever War was way better than I expected. The Earth segment was the best part. No wonder women and fags seethe so much about this book on gayreads.

>>18424909
You won’t orgasm until your first reread.

>>18423555
> GregEgan.gif
doesn't he work in some hobby store in australis or something? some /lit/erati should go and snap a pic of him

Man, Firefall is boring so far. Could have removed like 50% of the first hundred pages and nothing would be lost. It's just Watt jacking himself off spending paragraphs describing a spaceship in a language that a layman could never understand.

>>18431420
Tell me more.

>>18431702
Vietnam in space but with /pol/'s worst nightmares becoming reality, but in a way that makes SJWs seethe.

>>18432025
Not the person you replied to, but you're selling it to me, I'll add it to my reading list.

>>18422778
Can I use this thread to ask a question? I'm working on a open-world fantasy game and would like to hire a fantasy writer to help create the lore and write in-game books (these are short stories and histories, much in the style of Elder Scrolls games).
Hiring writers online everywhere seems based around novels or articles. Where can I find fantasy writers and lore creators? What platforms do you fantasy writers use? How can I find you?

>>18432200
Checked. But shan't be answering your question about faggy video games. Talk about books, you cunt.

>>18432200
unironically, reddit

>>18432200
Maybe try Fiverr, see if there's someone offering the kind of service you're looking for. I used that site to hire someone to make a cover for my book and I had a good experience with it.

>>18432216
In the video game an actual book opens on the screen with the text of the work which the player can read through. How is that not about books?

fuck cuckoldry

>>18432291
It's the intellectuals' fetish, goy.

What's sffg's thoughts on k j parker? I find his stand alones and short stories very entertaining

>Reading a fantasy novel
>Get too anxious about the possibility of cuckoldry occurring
>Have to look up the character online to see if it happens
>It doesn't but I end up spoiling the entire series
Why does this happen

>>18432530
>out of a fear of cuckoldry you cuck yourself out of enjoying a book

Like pottery

>>18432564
If I sit in a corner and watch you read the Prince of Nothing books, who's the cuck?

>>18432567
Still Kvothe

>>18432564
If authors didn't include cucking then it wouldn't be a problem. That being said, if it's going to happen I'd rather know in advance so I can decrease my emotional investment.

Hey does anybody know of any good books to have come out these past 10 years?

>>18432655
sure

>>18432200
I will give you a real answer. You need to look for award winners. Not the biggest awards, but research some lesser-known ones, read their winners, see which you like from among them. The kinds of authors who win the majority of those mid-size rewards are lower middle class people - school teachers, librarians, etc. They're good enough at writing to beat the competition, but they aren't making six figures from their books, so they're as generally open to side hustles as the majority of people are these days. Reach out to them with an offer of contract work doing whatever you need done for a few months. Most authors will be happy to have an escape from the godawful quest to get manuscripts published for a while.

Anyone read book two yet?
Do you think the Golem will get raped again?

Do you look up words you don't know /sffg/?

>>18432995
imagine getting upset at a book for expanding your vocabulary and exposing you to new words lmao

>>18432995
That author's done a number on him. Certainly if I'm reading on my Kindle, I only need to click on the word.

>>18432995
I use an ereader so I can just tap the word and get the definition. No reason not to look it up.

>>18433060
>>18433097
bugmen need to LEAVE
>>>/r/eddit

>>18432820
Thank you, much appreciated

>>18432995
That commenter is a pseud. however, to be fair, I can't imagine needing to use the words cladistic or phenomenological.

>>18433126
seethe

>>18425281
Speaking of cucks, there's a part in the later books where Kyler accidentally puts a ring on one of the characters that literally causes her pain when he cheats and he has sex with the childhood friend while she just sits in the other room in agony.

>>18430699
Deathless reads like a legit old school fairy tale if that's up your ally, though more Russian folklore than British fae stuff.

>>18422778
In your guys opinion is the sanderson cosmere stuff worth it?

>>18433579
no

>>18432995
If I legit can't figure out the word and it seems to be important sure, but usually I can figure out what the word means from context easy enough.

>>18433601
Any particular reason? I had a friend recommend it but it seems all over the place.

200 pages in and this is the most cliche poorly written Tolkien knock-off. Is this really that highly regarded? when does this get good? Most people say the first book is one of the best but it just seems so trite.

>>18433689
You have to get past the first book for it to start feeling original

>>18432567
>>18432586
top kek!

>>18433560
They weren’t in a relationship. She is just stuck feeling him have sex with his girlfriend

Any books with this kind of feel?

>>18422778
>>18422778
Just marathoned Shadow of the Torturer, Starship Troopers, and Neuromancer
I did not like Shadow, felt like there was too many plots and setup and overall nothing really interesting happened after Severian got kicked out. I started Claw of the conciliator because they came in one book and I just don’t like it. The cast from the first book gets separated from him in a single paragraph that I thought was a dream, and then this Jonas guy is introduced out of nowhere. I feel like I’m too stupid to understand this book because I often have no idea what’s happening. And there’s a point where Jonas points out that Severian has like a dozen goals and laughs about it, yet here I am one book down and like sixty percent of it was a complex plot to try and steal his sword. I have been filtered. I kneel.
Loved Starship troopers, definitely a 10/10 for me. Kept me captivated and I felt like I learned a lot from it.
Neuromancer was great too, however I think Hyperion/Endymion Cantos did AI better
Molly is cute

>>18433624
It lacks cuckoldry and homosexual rape, which are staples of every good epic fantasies.

>>18433624
I've read Way of Kings and DNF'd Words of Radiance, so that's my experience. I've heard the same thing from others as well, so I believe it's not gonna change for any of his other books-

Extremely basic prose (By design, but still a negative in my mind)
Characters are little more than a checklist of personality traits, because of that, they felt extremely flat
Slow in the first 2/3 of the books, everything happens in the latter third
PG-13 content; This isn't just "No sex and swearing", it felt Marvel movie level clean (Sando is a mormon)
Some people like his hard magic systems, I do not.

Most of all, I finished Way of Kings and didn't feel anything. Sure, it had a big battle at the end. Sure, it had cool magic. But by the end, the only characters that didn't feel like props were the main 3 POV characters

You can find pretty much all of these criticisms elsewhere online, along with the enormous fanbase for the books. I'm probably slightly biased, because anything that I'm not of a huge fan of, but is incredibly popular, I dislike even more. I see his fanbase as the kinds of people who have never really read outside of YA and fantasy.

I'm not opposed to trying Mistborn or Stormlight again at one point, but there are so many other books I'd rather read before that happens.

These two recent posts also put it better than I probably could.
https://old.reddit.com/r/books/comments/nvw6wk/i_got_around_to_reading_brandon_sanderson_and_i/
https://old.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/nvsbkp/brandon_sanderson_a_competent_man/

>Most modern fantasy reads like straight up YA-tier power fantasies but they threw in the word "fuck" a few times to make it """mature"""
How did it get so bad?

>>18433838
Books no longer need plot nor prose. Now you just need to check off dots on the diversity sheet and you get a movie deal

>>18433858
>Books no longer need plot nor prose
this is the main reason, especially prose. It feels like all modern fantasy writers are trying to write the next Guardians of the Galaxy or Star Wars

>>18433858
I think morals and prose is what is lacking the most desu

How do you all feel about straight infodumps? Like if occasionally in a book, maybe every 100 pages or so, there were a short interlude that just exposited contextually relevant information about the setting? I know it's not "proper" storytelling, but it's something I've seen done in other mediums and appreciated.

>Sméagol had Dissociative Identity Disorder and his alter was an evil entity, probably created during his torture or before that when he blamed himself for killing his hobbit friend over the ring.

>>18433838
false

>>18433838
Sanderson has had an extremely negative influence on the market. He set the bar so low for success by pandering to videogamer types with difficulties focusing on anything but the most barebone plots, where important details are repeated dozens of time, loads of shitty writers felt empowered. Even worse, it showed publishers that people will just gobble up low quality trash so long as it checks a few easy nerdy boxes like worldbuilding, magic system or cool badass with "tragic flaw", i.e. reads like dime a dozen shounen action manga from like over a decade ago, so now they actively seek out and cultivate this type of writing. Long gone are the days where theming, characterization or even quality of prose matter.

>>18433838
Most fantasy used to be pulp, and there was a reason it was called that.

>>18433970
Not really a fan. A good writer can set up a lot of explanations via contextual clues and indirect dialogue, allowing actually attentive readers to piece things together without explicit explaining, but that requires actual skill. It's the method I prefer.

Sometimes a writer can get away with info dumps the more engaging the story itself is, I suppose. If it's actually interesting, people will want to learn more about things within the story. I find instances of this to be extremely rare, though, and only acceptable if the exposition is relatively short, like a couple of sentences at most, preferably something that naturally occurs within dialogue as well. The only other exceptions I can think of is having something like a small quote from some book within the story or news source at the start of a chapter. Those can kind of help set the tone and add a little more flavor and sense of size to the setting of the book.

>>18433970
Hammer's Slammers does this between stories, like explaining how the hovertanks and laserguns work. I thought it was fine, but skippable.

>>18434267
>Not really a fan. A good writer can set up a lot of explanations via contextual clues and indirect dialogue, allowing actually attentive readers to piece things together without explicit explaining, but that requires actual skill.
I think that's the normal way to look at it, and I don't disagree about the issue of skill. It's something I'm thinking about doing for stylistic reasons, though. There's a certain thing I want to emulate, but I do doubt it would carry over well in a novel.
>The only other exceptions I can think of is having something like a small quote from some book within the story or news source at the start of a chapter. Those can kind of help set the tone and add a little more flavor and sense of size to the setting of the book.
I considered that as well. I think there's an expectation in a novel that everything be confined to the presentation of the narrative, so even if you wanted to infodump a little, you'd still have to create the pretense that it's from an in-world source. That's something I kind of want to break.

>>18433826
>You can find pretty much all of these criticisms elsewhere online
Yeah but I came here first so thank you for the insight.

>>18433689
>Most people say the first book is one of the best
No one says this. Some of the books during teh slog are worse though.

I will write my fantasy series in first-person present tense and there's nothing anyone can do to stop me.

>>18425036
Don't feel bad. It filtered me too

>>18434375
*character is stabbed and no one can ask who did it*

>>18433334
It depends on the topic. I regularly come across "phenomenological" and I've seen "cladistic " often enough to know what it means. In any case seraphim is a very common term that everyone should know. Not understanding the most basic biological, philosophical, or cultural terms, but feeling the need to point out they are "a well educated individual with a science background" does paint quite the picture of the reviewers personality though.

>>18433791

>>18433862
>It was a place where subtlety had become a disease and where luxury had washed away the bourne between what was womanish and what was manly.

>“Thou art overthrown, sorcerer. Thy tribe hath perished, dashed like a potter’s vessel by our fury. The earth is sown with thy nation’s blood, and soon thine enemies will compass thee with bent bow and whetted bronze. Wilt thou not repent thy folly? Wilt thou not abase thyself before our Lord?”

>>18434498
>the cuckoldry is so deep...

>>18434145
Smeagol was trans. Both the mental issues and appearance give that away.

>>18433689
It's been said before that WoT was essentially released in the right time and at the right place for a mediocre work to reach such acclaim.

>>18431241
clearly you seem to much more emotionally invested in it than me

finally getting back to writing my book

wish me luck

>>18434153
We accept your defeat.

>>18434366
>"The Slog of Slogs," she says lamely, not knowing where to begin with a madman. "Eh, Anon?"

what's the coolest way for a character to die

>>18434765
Nice. I've been sitting on an unexited draft for a few months, need to go finish editing it.

>>18433970
Alfred Besser starts his books off with a section that basically goes "right here's how all the magic science fiction stuff works" and it's absolutely fine as a method of getting the info to the reader.

The intro to Stars My Destination is actually a great bit of writing despite being a literal infodump

>>18434885
>>18433970
Also I should add that my actual preference is absolutely no info provided, you only learn from observing stuff happen and you don't have a child/amnesiac/newcomber protagonist to explain everything to you but it's incredibly rare to have this done well

>>18434355
Not them, but there used to be heated, like borderline thread eating fights over how bad Sanderson is.

I'm in the boat of Snadseron is actually delusional. Pic related.

>NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! SANDARO IS LITERATURE!!! YOU CAN'T SAY HE'S BAD!!!!!

What are we expecting?

>>18434196
Sanderson is an incredible business man. He created his own fucking franchise. Shit writer though.

>>18434196
Sanderson's bad but everything else you wrote is bullshit, he's still a much much better writer than most of the shit that was bestselling in the 90's.
He didn't "show" publishers anything.

>>18435061
>he's still a much much better writer than most of the shit that was bestselling in the 90's.

>>18435330
This is still miles above Goodkind lol

>>18435337
Literal who?

Sanderson being better than whoever you mentioned only means that they're both shit. It's futile to make comparisons between turds.

>>18434993
>>18435330
It's shit like this that makes me seriously doubt there's any editor working for the fat mormon.

>>18429166
>Diamond Age
amazing fucking book

>>18435350
If you're this genre illiterate why are you trying to make sweeping statements about publishing trends and quality

>>18435330
Not a single line about cuckold gay rape, abysmal.

>>18435393
Literally rent free.

>>18435393
You need to be 18 to post here.

>>18435384
I only read literature.

>>18435047
>>18435330
The fucking marvel cinematic universe of books

Should I start this? I'm a little antsy because I keep hearing it's bad, and while I really enjoyed the Neuromancer trilogy, The Difference Engine was shit.

>>18424599
At some point, yeah. In earlier scripts the Valar had children.
One of them was Gothmog, son of Morgoth and Ungoliant.

Fëanor Did Nothing Wrong.
https://voca.ro/16qPZsDtcrmR

Did Jack Vance write any fantasy besides Dying Earth and Lyonesse? I want to read more of him but SF isn’t my thing

>>18435554
Just read Demon Princes, sure there's a space ship and planet hopping but it's still the same adventuring on weird worlds vibe as dying earth

Worm is dogshit. Convince me that everyone who reads this crap isn't in the midst of transitioning/has already transitioned.

Cordeliah Logsdon – Gondor in Transition: A Brief Introduction to Transgender Realities in The Lord of the Rings
Clare Moore – The Problem of Pain: Portraying Physical Disability in the Fantasy of J. R. R. Tolkien
V. Elizabeth King – “The Burnt Hand Teaches Most About Fire”: Applying Traumatic Stress and Ecological Frameworks to Narratives of Displacement and Resettlement Across Cultures in Tolkien’s Middle-earth
Christopher Vaccaro – Pardoning Saruman?: The Queer in Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings
Sultana Raza – Projecting Indian Myths, Culture and History onto Tolkien’s Worlds
Nicholas Birns – The Lossoth: Indigeneity, Identity, and Antiracism
Kristine Larsen – The Problematic Perimeters of Elrond Half-elven and Ronald English-Catholic
Cami Agan – Hearkening to the Other: Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth
Sara Brown – The Invisible Other: Tolkien’s Dwarf-Women and the ‘Feminine Lack’
Sonali Chunodkar – Desire of the Ring: An Indian Academic’s Adventures in her Quest for the Perilous Realm
Robin Reid – Queer Atheists, Agnostics, and Animists, Oh, My!
Joel Merriner – Hidden Visions: Iconographies of Alterity in Soviet Bloc Illustrations for The Lord of the Rings
Eric Reinders – Questions of Caste in The Lord of the Rings and its Multiple Chinese Translations
Dawn Walls-Thumma – Stars Less Strange: An Analysis of Fanfiction and Representation within the Tolkien Fan Community
Danna Petersen-Deeprose – “Something Mighty Queer”: Destabilizing Cishetero Amatonormativity in the Works of Tolkien
Martha Celis-Mendoza – Translation as a means of representation and diversity in Tolkien’s scholarship and fandom

>>18435981
the fuck is this word salad

>>18436023
https://www.tolkiensociety.org/2021/06/seminar-speakers-announced-tolkien-and-diversity/

>>18435981
Behold: the intersection of academia and fanfiction.

>>18435330
Can you actually tell me what's wrong with this scene?

>>18435981
Anything flooded with women and men who behave like women will soon crumble.

As these people age and get more and more bitter, they will produce the backlash that reasserts proper order in the long run.

>>18436144
no

>>18435981
>A Brief Introduction to Transgender Realities in The Lord of the Rings
Wat, is there actually any trans in lotr

>>18436045
who is even going to watch this shit

>>18434885
>>18433970
A solid bit of evocative prose can be a good way of shoring up a straight infodump. One of my favorite bits of A Canticle for Leibowitz is the short history of the Simplification, just because of how it captures the blunt misdirected anger of the people involved in a way that makes the information fit the story. It evokes emotion and builds up the themes of the story in addition to just telling you how things work in the world.

The plain truth of the matter is that good writing is good writing. A good writer can make an infodump good, a bad writer can make more subtle techniques bad.

>>18436187
Mischlings

>>18433573
Tell me about Deathless.

>>18430699
I had a similar craving, but couldn't find anything proper. I did just read City of Brass, which is about Djinn (basically Arab fae), and while the book is solid, it's not as... wild/otherworldly as I'd have liked.

>>18435981
Academia is such a fucking joke

>>18433689
Book 2 is where it comes into its own, book 1 is seriously devoid of anything.

>>18434386
Haven't read it. It just seems to me that if you need to educate the reader using external sources, then you've failed as a writer.

>>18436424
It's honestly a really neat book, the whole thing is written in a real old school kind of prose and way of story telling, but the setting is primarily in communist Russia around WW2, so it ends up being this weird kind of mix of a modern and old school story.
Read the summery, if it sounds neat to you than I'd recommend picking it up cause it's legitimately a great book.

What are some good forums or places to discuss fantasy lit? R/fantasy is too pozed for my liking

>>18436424
>>18437138
Also, since I know where a lot of /lit/'s fears lies, don't worry, the book isn't a political check list, the setting doesn't glorify communism as being a great system (it's just kind of the backdrop) and there's no modern poc/lgbtbbq/whatever non-sense, just pure storytelling.

>>18437143
The only non-pozzed forums are places like this, you know?

>>18436134
Humour is forbidden

>>18436897
He's just writing for a different sort of reader. Not everything has to be for everyone.

>>18437375
What are similar places like this?

>>18438212
other chans with different language

>>18437143
Game of Thrones threads on /tv/ used to be a pretty good place to talk about other fantasy stories, since most people there had read the books they'd naturally read other fantasy too. That's where I first got recommended Book of the New Sun, in fact.
Those were fun threads, shit but good.

>>18436134
ngmi

Bit of a dumb question but does Lem's Solaris count as a first contact novel?

>>18438279
>Game of Thrones threads on /tv/ used to be a pretty good place to talk about other fantasy stories
No they didn't.

"Glow gave me a sweet, innocent smile as she watched my masculinity wither and die."

>>18429166
Accelerando by Charles Stross.
Also maybe try Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge.

>>18435364
Rally? That good?

>>18429166
Neuromancer

Started Malazan, with Gardens of the Moon. About a quarter in and the book is pretty confusing, lots of jumps in time, lots of things that arent explained how they work or anything (book mentions they have undead fighting for them casually, never explains what the Warrens are, etc.)
Does it get less confusing or better? Kinda weirded out

>>18438959
GotM is notoriously a difficult read and then people get backhanded when they realize the second book changes 3/4 of the cast. It's a problem because the book is setting up a lot of things.

>>18435981

>>18438959
It stays exactly the same the entire series through. Exacerbated by the fact that every book completely ditches the entire main cast of the previous book and all its unresolved plots and starts over with a completely new cast of characters, peaking in the fifth book where it cuts to a completely new civilization that is completely disconnected to anything that's happened previously, and none of the characters are even aware of the rest of the plot that happened in the first 4 books.
If you hate how every fantasy book has multiple PoV characters nowadays like I do, you'll find it infuriationg.

>>18425240
How can anyone take you seriously after you say you are the kind of person who enjoys ready player one, a book written in the style of a child for subnormal manchildren? How can you take yourself seriously?

>>18435981
Everyone says this is bad, but no one explains why.
It's cause they can't.

>>18427072
Personified smell.

>>18433970
Infodump is as good as always inelegant. An author of calibre will let you discover the exposition as much as possible by yourself. Hacks cannot think of elegant ways to do this and have to resort to "it was the year 27864,my name is kloshnael and this is how the society I live in works"

>>18439077
I honestly didn't know any better. I smoked the herbal Jew back then, I still thought the Earth was round.

>>18434837
Either with a lot of meaning or totally devoid of meaning.

The alien chapter in The Gods Themselves is garbage. All the momentum from the first chapter is just sucked right out.

>>18435454
It's a bit dated with things like car mounted fax machines, but all in all its an entertaining trilogy. Idoru is the best of the three, and don't expect it to be on the level of neuromancer. Still good stuff in it tho, with Idoru again being the most prophetic.

>>18435454
Difference engine was written together with Bruce sterling, so of course its shit. The man is an idiot.

>>18438434
I'd say so

>>18439148

Wasn't sure if 100% or not first contact but thanks for clearing.

>>18435836
Worm is unfortunately unique. I feel like it could have been done much better by someone else, but it hasn't been attempted. If you want what it offers, you have to skim through many chapters of complete bullshit because there is nowhere else to get it. It helps if you just start skimming any time you see the word "headspace."

>Tolkien, Lewis, and others were active members of a fantasy writing group called The Inklings that was active for nearly two decades between the early 1930s and late 1940s
>CA Smith, RE Howard, and HP Lovecraft all corresponded with one another and were known as the "the big three of Weird Tales"
anybody want to start a writing group

>>18439227
Not with yanks

>>18439245
Based

>>18439251
Based on what?

>>18439173
What's so unique about it? I found its first half to be quite similar to Dresden books - fun action that doesn't pretend to be something it's not. Didn't read past chapter 17 or so because it got too repetitive.

>>18439282
Very good.

>>18439111
I'm talking about just having a straight history lesson in the middle of the book that doesn't make any attempt to pretend to be anything else.

>>18439366
If you're going to do that then I'd say do it like LOTR or Dune does and put all of it and the end of the book in Appendices

>>18439392
I want it to be necessary reading in order for the setting to make sense. I need to deliberately break this writing convention.

>>18438888
>Neuromancer
>lighthearted
no

Any books like this?

>>18439141
I often see posters defending Bakker, Sanderson, even Rothfuss. I have never seen a positive post about Bruce Sterling.

>>18439628
I gotta admit I was mistaking Neil Stevenson for him, who I also hate. But good to know about sterling. There's so little quality in scifi : /

>>18439407
If you have to do it you have to do it, but the way you describe it makes it sound like it wouldn't be that good. In the end ompossible to say without reading it though.

>>18439628
Sanderson is a good and fun writer, he's just a problematic personality is all. He rubs /lit/ the wrong way cause he shows you can write good books while not being a miserable piece of shit.

>>18439681
Worst case, he writes something that suits his personal tastes rather than what the market wants and it doesn't get picked up by a literary agent. I've been there. Just going to write whatever the fuck I want from now on since hardly anyone's going to read it anyway.

>>18439690
No, actually its the opposite: his books are formulaic bland drivel meant to appeal to the Star-Wars and Marvel crowd, this is why he rubs /lit/ the wrong way; in reality he seems like a nice (if slightly dorky) person

>>18439706
Please cite an example or something. Everyone says this but none prove it true.
Also
>Star Wars
>Bad
Maybe the newer stuff.

>>18439690
>Sanderson is a good and fun writer
No, he isn't. He's a terrible writer who recycles four incredibly generic character archetypes constantly. His plots are 1980's comics tier, and by that I mean he constantly crosses over with all his other series because he's under the impression that this will sell more copies, and he is one of the select few who seem to get worse with practice rather than better.
He constantly falls back on terrible quips like a superhero movie, and he pads the absolute SHIT out of his books for zero reason while delivering zero value with the padding. You could literally cut the page count of Stormlight Archive by nearly half and lose absolutely nothing of value (granted this is a given because you could really just the page count by 100% and lose nothing of value.)
His books are the equivalent of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Incredibly dull, incredibly boring, mass produced garbage for sub-normal masses who wouldn't know good if it slapped them.

And this is before you even go into his obnoxious SJW leanings which he constantly forces into the books, muh mental healf a-bloo-bloo. Fuck off.

>>18439705
I'd be happy if a couple of people read it and appreciated it. I don't have any delusions about being a full-time writer or something.

>>18439721
Go for it, if it doesn't work you'll find out soon enough. No benefit in not trying.

>>18439721
Then write what makes you happy. It's never been easier to publish shit yourself. I went by the more difficult route of setting up my own publishing company and publishing my book that way, since I didn't want to settle for it just being an ebook and neither did I want to pay some vanity publisher. Setting up the company wasn't as bad as trying to shut the fucking thing down.

>>18439717
now say that without buzzwords

>>18439757
Comparing what Brandon Sanderson writes to children's stories is insulting to children's stories because children's stories are brief, have an actual point, and have far better characterization. Plus, children's stories are occasionally witty, in contrast to Sanderson.

>>18425439
There's probably at least one old hentai.

>getting filtered by branderson

>>18439136
>dude rock masturbation is amazing also let's bang for 100 pages

Please recommend me a book to get started on reading Star Wars stuff. I think the original movies are just okay but I really liked KOTOR. In terms of other books in the genre, I love BOTNS and Hyperion; hate Dune.

>>18439813
I recommend you read something else.

>>18439817
I've read enough "genre classics" for now. Dune completely jaded me. Now I just want dumb schlock where characters have classes, but I still want it to be written decently. Good writers only produce that content when they're paid to, so I'm looking at what the Star Wars money behemoth has commissioned.

>>18439847
>Now I just want dumb schlock where characters have classes, but I still want it to be written decently.
I think that SW doesn't have that.
Maybe M.Y.T.H Inc as a fun adventure with mages, demons, warriors and all that?

>>18439529
Seconding this request.

Is there any literary cyberpunk?

I am looking for near future, cyberspace, hiteklowlife, body modification etc, not action adventure for kids but with a bit more depth to it, like new rose hotel, or at least atmospherically along the lines of the first two ghost in the shell movies? I tried to get into stuff like altered carbon but the pew pew action shit and surface level characterizations are lame to me.

Does anything like that exist?

>>18440019
Oh and recent, not the classic 80s stuff

>>18440019
read blindsight

NEW THREAD
>>18440126

>>18440129
>No anime in the OP
Already shit.

>>18440079
Thanks!

>>18439711
See >>18433826

>>18422778
>https://mega.nz/folder/kj5hWI6J#0cyw0-ZdvZKOJW3fPI6RfQ

>3books
>Roman Republic

it's a picture for ants, please, fix that

>>18435981
>Destabilizing Cishetero Amatonormativity

Any recs for inspiration on writing a character driven novel? Mainly focused on personal relations, human bonds, love, and that gay shit