/lit/ - Literature

>>19435579
Any cyberpunk essential novels, I should read?

>>19435582
Obviously start with William Gibson and Neuromancer. Maybe check out the Mirrorshades anthology to sample the early cyberpunk authors and see who you like.

>>19435582
Software Series is the only one I enjoyed, and I enjoyed them a lot.

They're kind of on the fringe of cyberpunk though

just saw this on /v/ suprised i never saw the original first

>>19435731
TSA got pretty dank memes for being so obscure.

>>19435579
>If the Allies Had Fallen: Sixty Alternate Scenarios of World War II
What the hell is this shit?

Is Bakker ok? He's disappeared for almost 2 years now.

>>19435857
i killed him

>>19435857
He'll come back... some day...

>>19436032
"You?”

The dark figure nods. Obscurity plumes and bloats about his edges. The Shroud-of-the-desperate has become his halo.

“My Author.”

“How?” he coughs. “What are … you doin—?”

“Shssh.... my Author... and my prophet...”

Fire leaps through the Canadian writer's wood-paneled home office. The figure hesitates, then raises a hand as great as his father’s, clamps it about Bakker’s mouth and nose.

“Ssssh …” he says with what seems an ancient melancholy. He has pondered this. He has resolved. Convulsions wrack bloated flesh.

“You have lingered overlong.”

His strength scarcely seems human.

“And I will not let the No-God draft go unreleased.”

The Autist-Author of Ontario suffocates. Light and image dissolve. His lungs cramp. A burning flashes from his bones. His flailing astonishes him, for he had counted his body dead.

But then the animal within never ceases battling, never quite abandons hope … Faith.

No soul is so fanatic as the darkness that comes before. This is the lesson we each take to our grave—

And to hell.

I came up with this science fiction book idea based on the punic wars. Its about humanity (Carthage) in the far future at war with another planet inhabited by Aliens (Romans). I thought the first punic war could be like a space ship battle, the secnd punic war a daring drop attack on the planet like crossing the alps/battle of Cannae, and the eventual destruction of the humans by the aliens (3rd punic war).

Any books like this? Probably Foundation.

Bakkerbros, which death/destiny in the Kellhusverse is the most tragic and why is it...

poor street urchin Hertata?


Legit ruined mah day

>>19436041
kek

>>19435800
Very specifically detailed and researched scenarios. You won't really se "what if I Hitler had dinosaurs to replace tanks?" kind of stuff and it does require some WW2 knowledge to fully appreciate. Less alternative history fiction and more comprehensive what-if scenario analysis. Good shit, but difficult to recommend.

King of /sffg/.

Simple as.

>>19436398
Once again, please post quotes validating all the praise he receives. His books seem fairly average

>>19436429

Fuck the fucking Fatman

Any fantasy books like pic related that are actually good?

Does there exist a fantasy books in which the prose is more beautiful than a cathedral? Is that even possible?

>>19436465
The Silmarillion is the only thing I can think of remotely like that

>>19436498
You heard of the rapper spottemgottem?

Instead of doing anything useful today I will be getting comfy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S89BHnaxULo&t=29s

Book of the New Sun really picka up in book 2

>>19436631
I found it boring until the Inire's mirrors and the botanical gardens in book 1. 2 is actually my least favorite book other than the manape scene.

>>19436631
About to start it today, fren. I really like book 1 but the way the story is told makes it feel like nothing really happened and that it's all just backstory. I like how the worldbuilding is complex but is unveiled naturally through the eyes of Severian. I can't really remember a single instance where it was just a black of text explaining something about Urth without it having any sort of connection to the plot or characters in that particular moment. Top shelf worldbuilding, honestly.

Also, to that one anon from the last thread who was asking about his eldritch horror book (idk how to quote from another thread) I just wanted to say that after your explanation it does sound pretty neat. So here's the thing. You basically mentioned 3 ideas. 1. Earf is magicless because this Htfs'Flghtha Crygh or whatever is in its gestation period. 2. This creature is also veiling earf from the rest of the universe, so humans don't know that ayy lmaos exist ontop of not being able to use magic. 3. Once it awakens, presumably they can now use magic in this new, restructured earf/"reality" AND are able to see other ayy lmao civilizations.
My point is that unless you're going to have ayy lmaos in the book, there's no reason to mention the whole idea of the planet being veiled from the rest of the universe. If the story is about earf before and after magic is "released" due to the birthing of this eldritch horror, then why mention the rest of the universe at all? It could just be that this being was using up all of the magic energy in order to gestate, so no one else had access to it. You can absolutely go ahead and go with your first instinct, but there better be some fuckin ayy's to justify them being locked away from them forever

>>19436772
you just reply to the post number what the fuck else would you do

>>19436921
Please don't yell at me

>>19436452
>>19436398
Based.
>>19436429
Cringe.

writer publishes first book in fantasy sci-fi series that was 50 years in the making

It's never too late. What an article.

this thread is unjustly mean. There's no reason for you people to behave like this.

>>19437417
Care to share?

>>19437430
Search engines are your friend.

>>19437428
Where do you think you are?

>>19436041
kek’d

>>19435579
Why isn't /sffg/ reading a real work of sci-fi like pic related?

>>19437602
chinkshit is cringe

>>19436429

>he doesn't know about the honey of unwashed anuses

Jesus Christ anon, what have you been reading all the time?

>>19436037
>>19435857
Some Redditor, who by the looks of it seems to be some sort of insider, posted this not so long ago.

Maybe the silence is a good thing. He might actually be writing. Doesn't even matter if it's not the Second Apocalypse. I just want something to read from him.

Tolkien could never write anything on par with Elden Ring.

imagine if your comfort genre was Xianxia

>>19437602
I'd rather read Cradle!

>>19428924
On a mildly relevant note, it seems he has left everything /sffg/ related. GR group, discord, this thread and whatever else.

>>19435579
I like all the modern references, even meta in there, I would replace btc with monero though

>>19438301

>>19435579
will future cities have purple neon lights everywhere and lots of niggers?

>>19438733
no to the first yes to the second

will future cities have purple neon lights everywhere and lots of niggers?

>>19437602
Because it's a modern work infested with unnecessary feminist-intersectional grievance and I just want to read about cool spaceships and shit.

>>19438961
>I just want to read about cool spaceships and shit.
Omg, stfu you chud bigot. You're lucky you didn't say this on social media, otherwise I'd make sure you'd lose your job ;)

any comfy Bogdanoffs sci-fi?

>>19435857
fuck man, I want the no-god series NOW.

>>19436041
Kino

>>19438301

>>19437417
>>19437430
>>19437554
What a fucking fag, just post the fucking article
https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-region/2021/11/20/waterloo-writer-publishes-first-book-in-fantasy-sci-fi-series-that-was-50-years-in-the-making.html#:~:text=holiday-,Waterloo%20writer%20publishes%20first%20book%20in%20fantasy%20sci%2Dfi%20series,50%20years%20in%20the%20making&text=WATERLOO%20%E2%80%94%20On%20their%20writing%20days,the%20epic%20of%20Planet%20Anu.

>>19435579
I read the Thrawn Trilogy and the first three Shadowrun books. All shit.

>>19438073
You're absolutely right, nothing a Tolkien ever produced could be as pretentious, insipid, and outright awful as anything produced by Gurm.

Also why did bakkerfag's pocket janny give me a 3-day vacation for posting an /sffg/ banner starring Tolkien and Wolfe?

>>19435579
>zombie plague
>space opera
>erotica
Does such a book exist?

>>19435579
All /sffg/fags must hang

>>19439040
The fact that bakker shills seem utterly incapable of producing memes around his books that don't involve wojaks seems a good enough reason to never read bakker.

>>19439266
Cope, seethe, and go back to reading very poorly written books my tranoid friend.

>>19439266
based

I love how scifi-general is the only thread left on /lit/ that aren't objective trash or /pol/ bait.

>>19436498
It depends on what you mean by "fantasy" but the prose English translation of the 9th century Saxon retelling of the Gospel narrative as a Germanic epic poem is definitely up there as far as beauty of language.

>>19439375
yeah we purged women and other incapables from here ages ago so now we can just bask in the glory of pure intellect.

>>19439384
this sounds kino

>>19439375
/sffg/ is objective trash lmao. If you ask a single question about actually developing the genre they seethe and tell you to go to a different thread. The reason all we do is circlejerk about writers we hate is because everyone here is imbittered by the fact that they, along with all sci fi and fantasy nerd faggots, will never and can never produce anything of value, and therefore must hate anyone who does, tries, or even wants to.

>>19439394
Imagine if Beowulf was about Jesus battling the devil, and the powers of death and fate and entropy itself, that's basically the Heliand.
It's written in the same alliterative verse style and language as Beowulf.
You can get the original text with a direct verse translation here http://www.hieronymus.us.com/latinweb/Mediaevum/Heliand.htm but the beauty of the language is lost in a direct translation rather than an idiomatic one. I recommend purchasing this copy https://www.amazon.com/Heliand-Gospel-G-Ronald-Murphy/dp/0195073762, though that particular publication is very expensive as it is technically a university textbook.

It's going to suck, isn't it?

I'm halfway thought this and it's been good.

>>19439452
of course

>>19439492
They're all good. Fun and easy to read

>>19439492
I restarted the trilogy recently and they're a nice nostalgic trip.
My only annoyance with the first book is how correct the main characters are. They keep making the correct decisions for the seldon crisis de jour, when others would have made the wrong choice. And then they just monologue the answer because it's obtuse to the reader what the actual correct answer is.
The mule stuff is kino though.

>can only create waifu characters
>need an antagonist
>the co-protagonist both have daddy issues
Please just kill me now, I am destined to suffer forever.

>>19440473
make a waifu antagonist who was the daughter of one of the women MC's dad NTRed

>>19436498
I'm reading Song of Albion by Stephen Lawhead and it leans pretty heavily into indulgent and extravagant prose without being overly saccharine. It appreciates the beauty of its words more than other, better, fantasy works I've read and it's not full of itself like the endless pretention and sanctimony of edgelord fantasy fiction.

I'm a successful ghostwriter and want to make my debut under my own name in the genre.

Is it even possible to sell pulp stories or Euro-centric adventures anymore or does everything have to be some kind of pseudoliterary diverse statement about the Trump administration?

>>19440627
You can do strong wamyn of color or you can make an anime.

>>19435857
Is Pat Rothfuss okay? He's approaching the ten year mark for writing a single book.

I'd meme about Jim Butcher too but he finally wrote a book.

>>19440627
Option A: Black trans womynx smashing the patriarchy
Option B: Isekai LitRPG
Option C: Degeneracy

>>19440666
It's sad but isekai litrpg actually appeals to me the most of all these. I bet I could do Will Wright better than Will Wright and just about everyone else in the 'progression fiction' space is writing hyper derivative garbage not even worth mentioning as anything other than disposable product.

>>19440644
fuck both of them right off into outer s[ace, yet when i compare their work to sanderino's...maybe nothing is better?

>>19440812
I think Pat Rothfuss deserves some special ire for his misleading nonsense about the whole trilogy already being written early on. And also for being extremely visible online and on the convention circuit and with his charity while the work that makes all those things possible for him remains seemingly neglected. At a certain point I wonder why guys like that don't just pay someone to write the work for them.

Sanderson is a whole other thing. Honestly, I feel like he becomes less interesting with each book, and his MG/YA offerings are all uniformly terrible.

>names
I need help naming my male human delivery ship captain. What would be some good names for him?

Bakker posting is ruining this general. Based on the way y'all post, I question whether or not you even read him.

>>19439367
>it's a Silk eats tomatoes chapter

>>19440921
Frank

>>19439492
Asimov is far from the best but he's so readable and the Mule is so great I can't help but love him.

>>19440921
This isn't a writing advice thread, but man, you need to give more details than that. What is his personality? What are his goals and desires? Does he have a real-world ethnicity or some made-up space one? Are you using real-world names or invented ones? Ideally, his name should in some way evoke the kind of character he is. When you say 'delivery ship,' I don't even know if this is for delivering mail or special cargo or consumer goods or what.

Does anyone have a list of Scifi that's been written in like the last five years? I was talking to some people and every thing that was brought up as good scifi was old as fuck and we started wondering what the new ideas behind modern scifi even are but I can't think of any scifi books that get talked about that aren't from 40 plus years ago

>>19441093
Iron Prince

>>19439397
>imbittered

>>19441093
Look at one of the various encyclopedia or database sites. There are a lot of other lists as well.

>>19441093
That's just the people you talk with and that you have too high of expectations on a yearly basis. It's called selection and survivor bias.

>>19440921
Chuck

>>19441093
I don't think you have any idea how many books that would be. You're eyes would glaze over just scrolling through a list of names.

>>19440943
His series is still the most distinctive fantasy. Honestly the fact he hasn't been toppled since is how far fantasy has fallen as genre literature.

>>19441270
My favorite part is when all the men are inseminated with black seed and become pregnant then give birth to Inchoroi.

>>19439031
Has Bakker ever indicated that he intends to write a No-God trilogy or is it all cope?

Anyone know of a sci-fi series that was written at least before 1990 and it starts with a guy getting onto a ship?

>>19441270
His series is a highly derivative work with basically no original ideas. What do you think is in it that can't be found either in myth, history, another series, or a basic philosophy class?

>>19441292
that's just Alien

>>19441317
Could something to do with last book ending on bullshit cliffhanger.

>"a song of ice and fire"
>it's a series of novels instead of a song
I don't understand, bros

Can't believe I never checked in on this thread when DUNC came out.
How was this thread towards the movie?

Do you guys agree there’s some art style that tries to replicate the very old long images, like the dance macabre, where the images form a greater whole but it just looks like random images put besides eachother with no real relationship ?

>>19441377
Casting a fucking wide net there anon. Any other details?

>>19441649
No
I just remember reading it and disliking it and the artwork was hand painted and it had a space ship on the front

>>19441317
>The series was originally planned as a trilogy with the first two books entitled The Prince of Nothing and The Aspect-Emperor. The third book has been referred to as The Book That Shall Not Be Named by Bakker, since the title of this book is considered to be a spoiler for the preceding volumes.

>>19441441
Thats broad enough to dismiss pretty much everything written though, especially in the last 20 or so years. The point is that, of recent and still living fantasy writers, Bakker is the best. Retards seething about this and going 'Dunsany was better' are missing the point; Bakker isn't so much amazing as everything else is shit or mediocre now, so The Second Apocalypse just being enjoyable and well done is what makes it stand out.

>Start Malazan which, I was told, is dark and gritty fantasy that takes itself seriously
>It has women serving in medieval troops together with men and it being treated as completely normal
Lmao wtf? I am not the type to be bothered by similar shit in fiction as long as it at least tries to stick to common sense, but this one was way beyond it, especially for the story that takes itself seriously.

>>19435857

Start with Prince of Nothing?

I'm allowed to wear headphones at work now so what are some audiobooks that have different readers for the male and female characters.

>>19441777
Malazan is literally an adaptation of a tabletop campaign, mixed with a bunch of boomercore "MUHREEN oo ah" shit. It's not dark and gritty, it's edgy and juvenile.

Totally because of the marketing around the show, I started reading Wheel of Time. Halfway through book 1 and quite enjoying the simple adventure story. Not read anything like this for a long time, but it's the sort of thing that got me started reading SF/F.

Just started getting hints that it's actually the far flung future, based on people describing metal towers, or what sounds like the Arecibo telescope. Pretty intriguing.

>>19442003
A lot of people completely fail to realize that, for some reason, but you're correct. It's heavily implied that the current age is that was before the age of legends, and that it ended in Nuclear holocaust between Moscow and America (Mosk and Merk).

>>19441777
women in the malazan world are stronger than women in the real world, simple as, especially when ascendency is taken into consideration

>>19442024
>>19441777
also most of the female soldiers aren't shown being stronger or more competent in combat than men, the only ones that are are mages or have some kind of special powers amping them

>>19442003
What are the hints?

>>19442024
It's not only about physical strength, if anything strength issue is nowhere as important as various psychological shit happening because of that.
>Male instinct to defend female interferes with discipline
>Sexual tension
>Whole amount of additional much more "fun" perspectives for female POWs
>Pregnancies
Etc etc etc. At least gotta address those, but this one seems to treat it as if they're just on some white collar office jobs and not in the military.

Anyone read this?

>>19442065
https://wot.fandom.com/wiki/The_Eye_of_the_World/Chapter_24

Hints at dinosaurs here? It also mentioned something like (paraphrasing) a mountain with a hollow carved out of it, and a tall spire sticking straight up from the middle, and anyone who came within a mile of it would die. I'm taking that to be some sort of scifi radio dish type deal.

>>19440686
Shill some of your books

>>19435579
how does a fanasty series filled with more bronze agelike cultures and only a few iron agelike cultures sound like to you guys? Each book taking part in one specific cultures struggle. Does it sound like it'd appeal to anyone aside from my autistic self?

>>19442563
Who cares about that stuff. on its own? Just make the story good.

>>19441518
There hasn't really been any discussion of it at any point.

>>19441510
It's the name of a song in the book.

>>19442144
https://wot.fandom.com/wiki/Real-world_references
Yes

>>19442898
I'd love to know how far into the future WoT takes place. Is it farther than Dune, which is 40,000+ years from now?

wen Bogdanoff Sci-fi?

>>19443050
wen stahp funposting in /sffg/?

>>19443136
bearish and meanpilled

are people afraid of the Bogdanoffs?

>>19443192
>bogdanoffs
Can I get a quick rundown?

>>19440860
Its because Sanderson's putting all his effort into the mainline Cosmere books while basically just phoning it in for his YA/non-Cosmere stuff.
Steelheart had a wonderful premise, but was super lame and anticlimactic for most of it except for Limelight's whole development.
Skyward started off good, but now it really feels like young adult fantasy in space.
Stormlight books are so far ahead that you can scarcely believe the same man wrote them (barring the shitter than is ROW).

>>19443273
They are crypto memes.

Anyone else read this? I think it's better than Virtual Light, although I'm probably just enjoying seeing all the characters from the last two books come back. It's more than a thriller, at least. Not as good as Idoru though, that's definitely the best of the trilogy. The whole lot are much better than The Difference Engine, but I think that goes without saying.
I think that Idoru was a peak and Difference Engine was a valley. Starting with Mona Lisa Overdrive Gibson definitely averaged out the quality of his work to a steady line. I think I will read Pattern Recognition.

Monsterfucker here, can I get some alien/creature and human romance recs that isn't just porn? Can even just be a subplot, even preferable if it is. As long as it isn't just blue spacebabes/elves/cat girls and it's not all just smut I'll take it.

>>19443401
Saya no Uta

>>19435582
schismatrix is often labelled as cyberpunk. Personally I don't really think it fits into the genre, but I enjoyed it quite a bit regardless of where it fits in

bakker can write a genuinely enchanting and horrible scene
kellhus strung to serwë and them just hanging there like a terrible flesh star as he meditates and whispers things to people through this giant ruined citadel
just one of the most convincingly chilling scenes I've come across anywhere

also serwë is a perfect narcissist woman-child, he really captured that dumb, animal innocence aspect of maternity in her

I'm working on the solar cycle, what other Gene Wolfe books are good /sffg/? I'm worried GW is spoiling me for other authors, he's so high caliber it might be hard getting into other works I have waiting in the wings

also lmao @ goodreads seething over Book of the New Sun

goodreads.com/review/show/171908501?book_show_action=true&from_review_page=1

>>19443691
next book i'm going to read is Soldier of the Mist, it was very well recommended here once when somebody asked something

>eshonai saw the world before dying
bros.......

>>19441772
Best in what respect? Plotting? Prose? Characterization? I would argue there are others who are better at each of these individually. Probably of these his prose is what is best but it's still outclassed by someone like Patricia McKillip (even if that's a much more feminine mode).

>>19443284
I overall agree with this analysis, but for some reason the most recent Stormlight bored me. I couldn't finish it. Maybe it's just the nature of it being a middle-of-series book after a very climactic end-of-act-1 book.

>>19440666
For option B you have to be Japanese, publish it online and hope some big publisher like Kadokawa notices you. Nobody reads western isekai LitRPG.

>>19443864
There is a huge scene for it on Amazon, believe it or not, people make enough money off that shit to make a living off it.

>>19443287

Fucking newfag.

>Rothschilds bow to the Bogdanoffs

>in contact with aliens

>rumored to possess psychic abilities

>control France with an iron fist

>own castles and banks all over the world

>direct descendants of the ancient royal blood line

>will bankroll the first cities on Mars (Bogdangrad will be be the first city)

>own basically every DNA editing research facility on Earth

>first designer babies will be Bogdanoff Babies

>both brothers said to have 200+ IQ

>ancient Indian scriptures tell of two angels who will descend upon the Earth and will bring an era of enlightenment and unprecedented technological progress with them

>They own Nanobot R&D labs around the world

>You likely have Bogdabots inside you right now

>The Bogdanoffs are in regular communication with the Archangels Michael and Gabriel, forwarding the word of God to the Orthodox Church

>They learned fluent French in under a week

>Nation states entrust their gold reserves with the twins. There's no gold in Ft. Knox, only Ft. Bogdanoff

>The twins are 67 years old, from the space-time reference point of the base human.

>In reality, they are timeless beings existing in all points of time and space from the Bog bang to the end of the universe

>The Bogdanoffs will guide humanity into a new age of wisdom, peace and love

>>19443991
You seem upset.

>try reading Beware of Chicken
>remember exactly why I hate western authors

>>19444173
Yet you post here, a place dedicated to western authors. How curious.

>>19444177
?
We read xianxia here I thought

To read xianxia is to betray the values that brought you on, stablished your nation. It is to surrender to a foreign communist propaganda machine.

>>19440627
this >>19440666
Usually B and C are the same book, but degeneracy always sell.

>>19444239
Buddy those values died in the two great wars and didn’t exist long before we were born

>>19443991

>>19435731

>Unholy Consult bows to the Inchoroi

>ARE aliens

>rumored to possess Gnostic abilities

>control Golgotterath with an iron fist

>own Sranc tribes all over the world

>direct descendants of the ancient rapist blood line

>will bankroll the first cities in Ruined North (Rapegrad will be be the first city)

>own basically every Tekne research facility on Earwa

>first no babies will be No-God's influence

>both brothers said to have 200+ IQ

>ancient Cunuroi scriptures tell of two angels who will descend upon the Earwa and will bring an era of salvation from gods and unprecedented rape with them

>They own black seed R&D labs around the world

>You likely have skin-spies inside your family right now

>The Inchoroi are in regular communication with the Mog-Pharau, forwarding the word of No-God to the Consult

>They learned fluent Sheyic in under a week

>Nonmen states entrust their gold reserves with the twins. There's no gold in Ft. Ishterebinth, only Ft. Golgotterath

>The twins are about 3000 years old, from the space-time reference point of the base human.

>In reality, they are timeless beings existing in all points of time and space from the Arkfall to the end of the universe

>The Inchoroi will guide humanity into a new age of salvation, love and rape

Like
No western author is capable of naming their black dog “da hei” without making a allusion to negroid phalluses

That’s why I will always read chi-com literature with a smattering of corean/jap

>>19440627
you can but it's an uphill battle. You'll probably need to self publish and you're not going to get any sort of recognition that's not overly negative and damaging(deplatforming, etc)

look at the state of modern awards. You can count the amount of normal whites that aren't dangerhairs or landwhales on one hand, and they're usually s o y guzzlers or goony beardmen. They usually award it to a negress, they especially love nk "half savage" jemisin it seems

>>19440666
I don't think I've seen anything written past the 2000s in the west that's interested me in the genre. I'm glad there's enough classic authors to read for a lifetime, new releases are pretty much all A with a sf/f veneer

>>19440627
>is it even possible to write insipid commercial trash that's been done over and over again for two-thirds of a century
"no"

Happen to be any John Crowley fans on board?

>>19444343
what's your beef with jemisin anon

>>19443852
The main die-hard plotline is goofy as fuck and a massive drop in quality. The other parts were still kino though, and there were enough big developments for it to not suffer too much from middle-book syndrome

>>19443691
Kek any book that triggers a femi-harpy that hard is a book I wanna read

"Wait until it's finished" kills careers. If you wait it may never finish ever due to lack of sales. If you care about something, support it.

>>19435579
How many years does it have to before you wonder whether the next book in a series will ever be released?

>>19445064
It depends on the author's cadence, I suppose

>>19442970
its hard to say. each age is never really specified to have a set amount of years but the age in which the main story takes place is at least a few after our own, to the point that the only information about our own is extremely limited and filtered through several civilization's legends and myths.

>>19442065
The biggest hints would be the stories Thom tells near the beginning. I forget the specifics but I'm pretty sure there was a mention of going to the moon among a reference to the cold war and mentioning mother Teresa.

>>19443691
Why do so many people get filtered by the play in book 2?

I read the first Bakker book. Are you supposed to root for the barbarian over kellhus? Because I really wanted for him to win but looks like the author is just cucking him.

>>19443836
Prose and plotting. Who alive and writing fantasy does both better? You’ve got Sanderson and Rothfuss, along with some w*man authors writing pussy shit. Bakker has the iron men of the tusk singing their hymns as the march into traceries of sorcerous destruction, foreboding and eerie worldbuilding of a millennia long war between creatures too inhuman to comprehend and men so far removed from the war started by their ancestors they don’t even remember or understand it anymore. A savour who leads them to salvation but is actual just as inhuman as the monsters they’re crusading against.

Sure it has edgelord philosophy (like a lot of ‘mature fantasy’; Malazan), but it’s well written and has a strong tone and aesthetic to it. Read, for example, the showdown at the Sareötic Library. Who the fuck else writes magic like that nowadays? Something with actual meat to it/weight behind it, something that doesn't just feel like a vibeo game ability or D&D spell. Bakker might not be one of the greats, but at least he tries and fails, which imo puts him above the schlock being squeezed out for zombified modern audiences.

>>19444185
>read xianxia
>thought
A contradiction.

>>19445567
me on the left

>>19445596
coom goblins

>>19445567
cringe incel shit

Is Foreigner by CJ Cherryh good? I want a good military sf/space navy series

>>19445664
Legend of The Galactic Heroes

>>19445688
I already saw the anime, any reason to read to books too?

>>19445567
Cool art, haven’t seen that one before.
Imagine slicing through benighted dozens, hundreds of seething sranc, their violet blood smoking in arcs flung askew by your Tydonni or Conriyan steel. Imagine the desperation, the danger, the bloodlust… the taste of hot, griddled Meat on your hungering lips…

>>19445700
Not particularly no, but it had been a long time since I watched the anime so I thought I may as well.

>>19445700
>>19445797
That is assuming you mean the original OVA series and its side stories and not the remake of recent years.

>>19445566
This was my problem with the series. Kellhus comes off to me as a monstrous asshole but I think we're supposed to root for him because he's the only fully self-actualized man in a world full of irrational meat-men or something, regardless of him lacking any humanizing qualities and ruthlessly using everyone he meets. I think if the author portrayed Kellhus as more of a dark messiah instead of an unambiguous superman I'd have liked the work more.

>>19445664
I find CJ Cherryh's works to generally be pretty good on the idea level, but sometimes a little boring/draggy scene-by-scene. If it clicks for you, there's a big ride waiting for you.

>>19445800
Ah yes, it was the OVA. I forgot they made a remake. It still kind of blows my mind that they made such a long series direct-to-video. Sales must have been huge in Japan
It's been a long time since I saw it too, probably wouldn't hurt to read the books now.
>>19445892
I'll give them a try, I admit the length was part of the initial attraction for me. I also have a Fire Upon the Deep sitting around here in my backlog

>>19445884
Never thought that when i was reading, if anything he is portrayed exactly like autistic psycho robot who is willing to throw everyone including his children under the bus as long as his goal (which might or might not be worse than what rape aliens trying to pull off) demands it. But positively portrayed characters generally get short end of the stick in TSA, until Mimara appears with her bullshit plot armor.

Sup bois. I'm looking for a specific fantasy book I came across in my travels but I lost it in an old hard drive and cannot find what it was for the life of me.

It begins with a young buck who seems a bit simple, in a castle, he also witnesses two princes having an argument. Fin. I know you wil come through for me.

>>19446295
rage of dragons

>>19446320
Nope, thank you for the rec though.

Why didn't Kellhus try to procure his proper son from Ishual? Would have been so much better ally than whatever insane mutts he managed to make. Was he too wary of possibility of Moenghus moment repeating itself and him finding knife in his ribs one day?

>>19446356
So, are you going to keep on repeating the same questions over and over again?

I'm finding it harder and harder to get through books recently. I feel like I'm getting burned out from SF, but Ive never really enjoyed other genres.

>>19446409
Read some non fiction

>>19446409
How much have you tried reading other genres?

>>19446409
Do something else then for a while that isn't reading.

Any Mad Max style adventure post-apocalypse and/or dystopia?

I really don't understand the people who say the Mercerism subplot and scene in the desert in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep are the weakest parts. Those are the only parts where you get full-throttle PKD insanity

Is it just that people expect it to be like the movies?

>>19443401

Philip Jose Farmer's The Lovers

>>19441983
Hyperion is the only one I know

Are there any mecha "real robot" books out of there or I am pretty much stuck with anime/manga?

For anyone who doesn't know what real robot is, it is a "genre features robots that do not have mythical superpowers, but rather use largely conventional, albeit futuristic weapons and power sources, and are often mass-produced on a large scale for use in wars.". Some examples include the UC Gundam timeline, Macross, Armored Trooper Votoms, Dougram, etc.

I feel like it should be a common theme, but I am struggling finding good books about this.

What good Sci-fi or fantasy books has a good romance subplot that basically starts off as a semi-kidnapping? It feels like something that should be everywhere, but I have not been able to find anything.

>>19444519
the same with every black author-you know what the theme of every fucking book of theirs is

I know this isn't for writers and you guys hate magic systems, so let's talk about mine and how shit it is (or am I unto something?)

>users can put spirits inside of them like it's Reverend Insanity and if their respective mana pools remain unused, they provide passive buffs to things such as strength and speed or shielding

>each spirit's mana dwindles, reducing the buffs, when you use an incantation for it to cast it's spell

>each spirit represents an intelligent entity with it's own unique language, but it's bestial brain is still somewhat separate, so it can learn new things an animal could and even reminisce on new experiences with it's higher mind, but it can't learn new languages or skills very easily. Every time it goes to sleep, any extra information you fed it is erased

>Each spirit has it's own language, some share a tongue and some share a 'similar' language like Norwegian through the norse world so you can kind of use a lot of spirits if you get creative. Some are vastly different, with an almost chinese or thai structure, so the type of magic you learn first will automatically predispose you into a 'class' unless you study many languages hard

>spell books and magic circles/runes are glorified instruction manuals teaching many common phrases for mages to use, with things like runic engravings being for your spirit to read since their programming resets daily so they might be able to keep remembering specific plans

>this means you have total control over how and where and when, say, a fire spirit's magic works for you. Maybe you'll tell it to erupt when things get close so it can be a shield or tell it to wait until an opponent shows a specific cue then fire, tl;dr if you know the language well enough you can tell it to do anything it's magic allows it to do provided mana is left

Idk, it seemed reasonably logical to me, and it's also probably pretty easy to hide as a soft system to keep Tolkenian wonder high while doing it too. Thoughts?

>>19446935
Jack Vance loves these kinds of relationships although they usually end poorly. Aillas and Tatzel in The Green Pearl is my favourite example

>>19447034
if your point of reference is Reverend Insanity, I will not give you any feedback

>>19437428
N

>>19447076
Hlmao a, fair enough. The characters aren't heartless if that's the issue though

>>19447034
There's a writing general, go there instead.
>>19438007

>>19447080
its shitty chink shit thats the reason, your taste in books is bad and you probably shouldnt write

>>19447083
no one in /wg/ actually writes (or reads), they watch anime and want to write shitty anime scripts

>>19447090
I like western classical fiction a lot and my reference point for the flavour of the world is something like the Nibelung

>>19447101
Fuck off to /wg/ already.

>>19447102
based

>>19447092
Kill yourself faggot
writing fantasy does not belong on /sffg/

>>19447034
>I know this isn't for writers
Delete your shit post then. Writefags are ruining this general

>>19447201
Before I do, let me just point out I was not defending the writer fag. I was just pointing out that /wg/ is a shithole of people who only pretend to be writing.

>>19447303
Ok? Don't talk about it here. Writefaggotry is a plague, and you're a nigger

>>19444272
>Nonmen states entrust their gold reserves with the twins. There's no gold in Ft. Ishterebinth, only Ft. Golgotterath

kino

>>19447328
What I enjoy both writing and reading?

>>19446909
battletech novels like warrior trilogy

>>19447034
>it's spell

>>19446909
You read anime/manga? Have you considered its not actually reading, rather can looking at cartoons? No wonder you enjoy some dumb robots when your brain is burned out and hardwired to enjoy televised excrement.

>>19446909
You're pretty shit out of luck, battletech/roboetch tie-in novels are probably the closest you're going to get. The only notable mech themed series to come out of western fiction recently is the Mecha Samurai Empire series, which did win a bunch of awards in Japan and even got praised by Kojima.

>>19441981
I did last month, I'm up to the White Luck Warrior now. They're actually great books if you like fantasy in the vein of Tolkien, Wolfe, Leiber and Glen Cook.

I've recently started reading the "stories" for Magic : The Gathering.

Some of them are pretty good, particularly the Innistrad ones.
The whole "Shadows Over Innistrad" and "Eldricht Moon" block was cool as fuck.

In comparison, the Midnight Hunt and Crimson Vow are very lacking in quality/fun, even though the whole concept behind Midnight Hunt/Harvesttide had a lot of potential. The side stories are ok though.

Anyone play Destiny?
I desperately need books similar to that games weird-ass violently-spacey lore

>>19447483
no

>>19447458
cringe

>>19436459
sauce on that excerpt?

Is Wheel of Time as bad as the show seemed? I seen the first 5 minutes and shut it off. I hate women.
I want a fantasy story to read preferably about a knight in a fantasy setting or if they go into DnD terms a paladin. I thought about reading Conan but the barbarian aspect is unattractive.

>>19447727
>"I hate women."
/sffg/ in a nutshell

>>19447727
I didn't like Wheel of Time, stopped reading at the 8th book and feel like I should have stopped before. It drags so much. The female characters are so poorly written, not sure if you'd hate it more or like it more. Like I remember at some point they catch the most powerful/evil female magic user (don't remember how they're called). That woman was like the right hand to the big, evil, super powerful guy, she must have killed thousands of people herself and tried to destroy the world a couple of times. Well they catch her, put some magic handcuffs/chains on her and she just keeps whining and crying all the goddamn time, she's that powerful and evil and they break her in like a day or something.

>>19443836
Plot is kinda shit, but captivating enough. Prose and characterization are messy, but they are really damn interesting.

That's the whole thing - it's not a masterpiece, but it hooks and entertains you well enough, quite better than almost anything in modern fantasy. The downside is that the series-specific trappings (rape-cuck-murder-genocide-blood-blood-rape-backstab-rape-BLACK SEED-rape-rape-cuck-rape) get really tiresome over time, to the point that they fail to elicit any emotional response. But the thing is still captivating enough for you to go
>"Ugh I'm tired of all the rape and hundred-thousands of people who die every other sentence, where's the next cool metaphysical reveal at?"
instead of just dropping it.

>>19445567
>Sure it has edgelord philosophy (like a lot of ‘mature fantasy’; Malazan), but it’s well written and has a strong tone and aesthetic to it.
>Bakker might not be one of the greats, but at least he tries and fails, which imo puts him above the schlock being squeezed out for zombified modern audiences.
This desu.

>>19445664
No.

>>19445892
Correct.

anyone read lindsay ellis' books axiom's end and truth of the divine? she has a great youtube channel with insightful video essays so I'm wondering if that analytical style translates well into scifi.

>>19447727
Conan stories are great.
It's not always super "barbarian".
Depending on the stories, Conan is sometimes a thief, a reaver, a pirate, a mercenary in armies, a king or just lost somewhere in some weird country. Some of them are kind of meh because the guy was writing them for pulp magazines as quick bucks but a lot of them are really fucking fun.

>>19447787
I will gift one internet to the person who will make a best selling sword and sorcery book in year 2022

>>19446935
"The Stars My Destination"

>>19447784
I stole Axiom's End about three months ago but still haven't read it.

>>19446676
Damnation Alley.

>>19446535
I barely read half hour to an hour a day now, and usually not even everyday and have a lot of other hobbies, so thats why Im thinking in a genre issue.
>>19446531
I used to read the odd historical/military non fiction book, philosophy, classics, but everything I have ever liked has been at least a little bit SF so I haven't strayed outside the genre for a few years now.

>>19447510
>Innistrad
>east european gothic setting
>cosmic horror
>otherwordly cthlhu creature turning the landscape to horror
>people going insane
>inquisitiors and bishops going insane
>angels going insane and purging people
>actual cool lycanthropy
>lycanthropes on boats
>big tittied goth vampire gfs
>weird "frankenstein" science
>zombies and ghouls
>ghosts
>a town literally fusing with its inhabitants and starts moving around
>eternal night
>pumpkins
do you not like fun or something?

>>19447727
>I hate women
It sounds like the best author for you is Chuck Tingle.

anyone else reading this tranny garbage?

>>19448104
what does this have to do with transsexuals

>>19448133
So many words now mean nothing other than to express displeasure.

>>19448133
brandon sanderson now adds transgender characters to his books and use gender neutral pronouns

>>19447803
>three months on the shelf
Is that about how long Lindsay's baby spent in her womb, before she stole it?

The starving camel is still bigger than the horse

>>19448176
You mean like magically genderswapped characters? That's based.

>>19448176
Please provide evidence. I sincerely want to see if that mormon sold his faith for money

>>19448620
its probably just some freaky friday bodyswap or dungeons and dragons girdle of femininity bullshit, the probability of a respectable fantasy writer, even a m*rmon, putting the modern day butchery called a "sex change" in a story is in the realm of slim to nil

>>19448504
no

>>19444984
Just write the fucking book, George

>>19447034
no

>>19447727
Look into the Wizard Knight by Gene Wolfe.

>>19448638
The series shown is YA SF, not fantasy.

>>19448752
He wont be able to read a real book

>>19448773
Gene Wolfe will turn him into a proper sff appreciator.

>>19448761
A distinction without a difference, science fiction is still just magic by another means. Sex changes in scifi are as easy, instantaneous, and biologically complete as they are with fantasy.
>>19448752
This book has women in it, I don't think he'll like it.

>>19448780
Do you consider contemporary technology to be magical as well?

>>19447727
Seems you need to be reading all the HomoFash you can find.

>>19448620
the "man" has breasts lmao

>>19448806
Contemporary technology is real and therefore by definition not fiction, let alone science fiction. Cloning may be a real technology but Michael Crichton cloning dinosaurs in Jurassic Park is magic. Spacecraft may be a real technology but Gene Roddenberry hauling the Enterprise around the galaxy is magic. Robotics may be a real technology, but James Cameron's nightmares about skeletal murder machines are magic.

>>19448826
>it's literally just a woman with a heightened sense of importance
if every egotistical female fits the newfag definition of a tranny, then there can't be more than a few dozen real women on earth

>>19448842
So by your definition crewed space ships were magic until April 12th 1961 when Vostok 1 carried the first human into space. Before that you could've said, yes crewed flights are a real technology but space flight is magic.

Give me more hacker stuff, can be accurate or not, it's more than often not. Stuff like the sprawn trilogy.

>>19448918
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1162700/Midnight_Protocol/

>>19448934
Well, that's good, thanks.

>>19448895
Space flight had already been achieved in 1957 by Sputnik, and they had stuck dogs and rats and chimps and soon-to-be-molten russians in them before Gagarin, so it'd hardly be magic by that point.
But certainly, crewed space flight must be considered magic before the 1950s when you recognize that the Nazis had plans for moon landings that were as utterly fantastical as their researches into the occult, and with equal results.

>>19448957
The definition that anything is magic until it's successfully demonstrated is rather limiting. That makes all speculation magical.

>>19448973
Yes.

>>19448826
That’s it?

>>19448973
You're talking to a giga autist who is also a massive hypocrite.

>>19441777
I swear I've read this exact post like 10 times before. The replies to it as well.

>>19447727
>I hate women.
Go hit up a gay bar then gay boy.

>>19449236
Don’t check the warosu….

>>19447858
Good shit, but too narrow to really expand on the topic. I wanted to find out more about Three Days, for example.

>Hell saves a woman after he torches her biker friends only to fuck her
Nice.

>>19447787
Like they say Conan was the original multi-classer.

>>19436037
Is the Aspect Emperor worth reading? Finishing up The Prince of Nothing now and love it. Reviews on the next set are really bad, and the books are more expensive than I like to put, so are they worth it?

>>19449236
Anon, there are a few anons here who do nothing but repeat the same questions over and over again and think other won’t notice.

>>19449189
you asked for a tranny and he literally added a tranny character to a book. what else do you want? the gender neutral language is in skyward. too lazy to find it right now though

>>19443401
The Barrow by Mark Smylie has normal sex and monster sex and it isn't an erotic novel/LITRPG or anything

>>19449627
its not a tranny though its just a woman

>>19449663
what? brandon sanderson uses "he/him" for the female character. google it yourself. im not going to hold your hand

>>19435582
Make sure to check out The Stars My Destination, it's the inspiration for a large chunk of the cyberpunk genre and it's very good.

>>19449680
yeah and thats not what a tranny is, any more than calling a fish an elephant makes it a tranny or calling muhammad a prophet makes him a tranny
stop letting shemales live in your head rent-free you porn-addicted freak

>>19449770
im using the word "tranny" to refer to a transgendered person and that's exactly what is in the book you schizo. the character that was female in the first two books is now a male in the third book. do you get it?

>>19449663
>>19449770
>>19449785
stfu faggots

so, how about the new joe abercrombie? he’s improoving as a writer, isn’t he?

>>19449785
>tranny-obsessed
>actually cares about transgender identity verbiage and pays attention to it as an excuse to complain about media he doesn't consume instead of dismissing it as the joke that it is
If I looked up the definition of "useful idiot" in the dictionary, there'd be a picture of you

>>19449591
They are the grand finale that delve into some deep shit. Definitely you should read them.

>>19449852
>he’s improoving as a writer, isn’t he?
He is.

>>19449918
I will then. Thanks.

Have you any suggestions on where to buy them cheap? Thriftbooks has the first couple at a good price, but the third is listed for $50.

Amazon also doesn't have much.

>>19449852
I know! Instead of grizzled veteran soldiers that have seen too much shit and dour magic badass women we have...

>>19447526
https://doms2cents.com/winds-of-winter-release-date-hinted-by-george-rr-martin/

>>19450015
>>19447526
Don't worry, though. He's opening up some autistic train thing.

>>19449958
I live in Europe and I believe I still got them quite cheaply ordered from Amazon. I bought mostly used books. I can only wish you luck. Maybe they have them in your libraries?

Are these any good?

>>19450067
Read them and form your own opinion.

>>19450062
I'm in a tiny town and the library's collection has very little fantasy. Loans from other libraries are possible but only for one week intervals.

Anyway, I'll quit bitching. Thanks!

>>19450067
Tad Williams is a great author.

look guys, I'm a basic bitch who's been going through some hard times, and I could use some mainstream comfort food for the brain

What's been coming out thats like, big and obvious ever since The Rythm of War?
I have already emotionally divorced from Scott Lynch and Rothfuss, but please dont get me to rehab right now

>>19450123
You really need to improve your bait.

>>19450123
Go to rehab

>>19449852
>new joe abercrombie
Some anons were praising his book, but also shitting on a character.

>>19450123
Wizard of the Earth Sea

>>19450151
Is Ursula K. Le Guin good? People shit on her for some reason.

>>19450157
Just /pol/tards

>>19450123
The dragonbone chair.

>>19450123
Hope everything is okay, friend.

new thread
>>19450180

>>19450067
I read them earlier this year and it was one of the biggest disappointments in my life. You're better off reading almost anything else.
I can go into greater depth if you really want me to explain my complaints, but if you do, please give me examples of the kinds of fantasy books you like/have in your library.

>>19443691
Why are people convinced Jolenta was raped?
She's a waitress (gee definitely a profession for a saint who doesn't put out easily) and she agreed to be bimbofied so she can become a traveling town bicycle. What's the big deal?

>>19450231
Lord of the Rings, ASOIaF, Night Angel Trilogy

Tried to get into Wheel of Time, didn't like it that much. Currently reading Plato's Protagoras and Tolstoy's The Gospel in Brief.

>>19450157
It was subversive for the time it was written because the good guy (Ged) resembles a gypsy while the Kergs (or Kargs or whatever) who are sea-raiders, robbers, barbarians, etc. etc. are the only white race in the books.
They're still fairly based though.
If you really wanna get into it read Tao Te Ching by Gia Fu Feng first, the Earthsea cycle messes around heavily with Daoist themes.

>>19450185
New thread already shit with the /pol/tard.

>>19450250
If you enjoy GRRM, you might enjoy Memory Sorrow and Thorn, because just like Game of Thrones it's unfinished (by design)

>>19450067
i liked them overall. they are somewhat long, and some parts the story takes its time to get going, and also some characters are meh. but on the other hand it has great worldbuilding overall, some of the character arcs are fantastic and some of the scenes are great too, there's a couple that really stuck with me and i want to read it again just because of them

>>19450178
it's broadly fine.
I've been working hard to finally line up with a therapist in the health service but they've finally come back to me with an opening and there's a whole year waiting time.

It was a big shock but getting in on escapist fantasy and sci fi helps me through it

>>19450239
because they're using the hyper sensitive autistic tier evaluation of the situation. Severian made it clear she acknowledged him and didn't seem to care when he initiated. They're the types who think someone regretting a drunken hookup is literal rape, and since severian didn't renew consent every 30 seconds he's a rapist and Gene Wolfe wrote him as a vehicle for his thoughts, actions and beliefs

what has academia done to retard thought to this extent?

Is dune audiobook okay or terrible?

What do you guys do after having read part of a book, become distracted and haven't picked it up for months. I read about a third of it. But I don't feel like I remember it well enough to pick back up where I stopped. But on the other hand it will be tedious and boring to start from the beginning. I do this far to often and I'm not sure how to remedy this issue when it inevitably arises due to my lack of discipline.