/lit/ - Literature

Solarpunk

TWI 8.56
great chapter, the entire backstory/logic to the scroll and rhisveri was fascinating.
and fuck, another devilish cliffhanger.

Bakkerpunk, the real rebels and anti society, bakkerchads are the real punk, sandersois are the real fascists

Glen Cook honestly shits on all the other authors posted here, between The Black Company, The Dread Empire and Garret P.I hes got everything fantasy covered.

>>20986709
Been a while since I've read it but I recall that the middle books were garbagé.

Finished this. Onto the part everyone says is interminably boring.
Reading the glossary of names gives a few hints at what's to come. How much of the Valfather's castle will we see? How much of King Arnthor's court? (Rhetorical questions.) If half the book is basically nothing, and then it rushes through all these things in the last third, I can imagine it will be very disappointing, but I have my doubts about that.
Mostly I'm looking forward to the giant on human slave rape.

What the hell happened last thread? Go back and scroll through the last 100 posts. Most of the posts are literally 1 sentence. Or even just 1 word.

Was someone spamming?

>>20986835
I want Uri and Baki to masturbate me.

>>20986391
Whenever book discussion occurs about something not popular nor widely read, it is more than often ignored. It is all so tiresome.
>>20986840
Yes. It is not the first occurrence.

posting idea here because the writing general is schizoshit

>HAW(Human Assault Weapon)-000, prototype bioweapon with unbelievable regenerative abilities, resistant to low-caliber rounds, and beyond peak human strength with the ability to lift things several times his weight
>Product of Prometheus Pharmaceuticals
>Goes rogue very first test mission to dismantle the company as to hide his existence from the world
>Destroys other, more refined experiments than him from subsidiaries
>Ending is him meeting the CEO: a former mercenary turned investor who striked it big when traditional money went under in favor of crypto
>is actually HAW-000's human genetic baseline, making him for all intents and purposes his father, which is why people think he looks vaguely familiar
>have a civil chat about the nature of humanity, existence, and instincts before mr. prototype kills him
i really liked the thing-thing games

>>20986391
Bakker is King. The sooner you accept this, the better for you.

>>20986840
>someone
something

>>20986567
>TWI 8.56
One of the few chapters in Ailendamus that I liked. Ryoka got incredibly flanderized in that arc, almost insufferably so, which made me hate her. I liked older Ryoka more.

>>20982523
TWI up to 6.62ish
I am sure you are going to love or have already read and loved Volume 6's finale. It's amazing.

>>20987656
>>20982523
And yeah, I didn't like Tiqr arc either. It was really boring to me, just 'why would I read about this? Give me the usual TWI stuff.'
Peril Chandler remains TWI's most interesting character, alongside Teriarch.

Is Unsouled YA or just simple?

>>20987689
I'd argue it's YA. Doesn't really deal with any really mature themes, has pretty straightforward, simple characters, etc. It's not bad, but it probably fits as YA in terms of reading level, if not target audience.

Could someone find https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?1425506 and upload this collection?
>not on libgen or zlib
>not on #bookz

>>20987689
It's above all else just bad. Cradle books only get readable starting from book 2, then it gets good. Unsoulsed is almost trash.

>>20987689
Totally YA. You'll see from the very beginning, as the hero of the story goes through a sorting ritual to decide his place in society. But aside from some minor YA cliches, it manages to avoid most of the cringier cliches. So it's a fun light read.

>>20986550
where is that pic from?

Just finished Morning Sun. Was pretty upset we didn't get to see more trauma or consequences related to Darrow's time in the box. Overall this series has so many cliches and shit characters mixed with descriptions that I like and a world that is a yellow light in terms of interesting. Sevro's the only cool guy. For those who have read the other books in the series, are they worth it? I liked how Morning Star tied up.
Also on that note, any books to recc that have actual proper torture segments where the character has a real recovery arc? This one was flimsy and left me wanting to see someone get absolutely beat low.

>>20987709
Early Cradle has a bit of an unfortunate issue of books feeling like they're half a book. Unsouled and Soulsmith really should just be one book, for example, it just feels awkward otherwise.

>>20987748
Half the opinions I hear say that the Red Rising series is fucking great and the other half say it's trash. What's the real story?

>>20987900
I'm divided on this. It has red light, yellow light and green light elements almost entirely even throughout.
Green being
>occasionally good environmental and emotional descriptions, usually surrounding anger and wrath or power.
>narrative choosing for the audience view. You don't know everything and without thinking about what might happen ahead, you'll be suprised by a few plot twists. Darrow will hide shit from you.
>literally Pax's family and Sevro's family are the only based characters in my opinion. Also the based outer rim families that say fuck you to Octavia. Everyone else can rot.
Yellow being
>characters are bland. Not to the point of no return for many. This includes imo Mustang, Victra, Rouque, Cassius. I wish these people made more sense in their decisons.

Red light being:
>some characters are BAD. All the howlers are shit, most senior members of high color character class are just as forgettable.
>terrible lines come into this book like potholes on a highway. You find some of them on page one. Darrow not crying at age six when his dad died. Edgy motherfucker. Darrow also has presumptions too haughty which could be percieved as a character flaw but I attribute it more to a narrative choice that I find annoying, considering that it makes up a good 40% of the damn book
>typical YA plot twists that you can see coming do happen
>the author avoids many opportunities for character growth. Darrow was tortured for an entire year yet we see no evidence of any mental turmoil aside from one panic attack and a year of working out.

A mixed bag. Unless someone tells me something's especially good about Iron Gold and Dark Age I won't be reading them.

Can anyone recommend me the best Elric release in english? Possibly some huge collection in one volume.
I've already read most of the stories.

>>20986709
Cook just has an extremely divisive writing style. Turns out most people actually want purple prose to a degree.

>>20987947
Thanks anon. It sounds like I shouldn't rush out to read them.

>>20986709
he has one model for anti-hero characters. They all "giggle"

>>20987703
You should be using using #ebooks on irchighway instead. I see it there.

read cradle

Just something I thought I might share in relation to cyberpunk and Blade Runner.

I have not read Philip K Dick's original novel, which I know differs significantly from the film screenplay.

But I have been reading Shakespeare Richard III, and came across this passage. I wonder if it inspired the screenwriters and also the imagery used in the films, iconic aesthetics that came to define the genre that followed. If you examine the names of some of the other characters of the film, you can see they are taken from literature (eg Salome). Here Tyrrell / Tyrell is the murderer of the Princes in the tower.

KING RICHARD
Know’st thou not any whom corrupting gold
Will tempt unto a close exploit of death?

PAGE
I know a discontented gentleman
Whose humble means match not his haughty spirit.
Gold were as good as twenty orators,
And will no doubt tempt him to anything.

KING RICHARD
What is his name?

PAGE
His name, my lord, is Tyrrell.

(...)

KING RICHARD
(...)
Uncertain way of gain, but I am in
So far in blood that sin will pluck on sin.
Tear-falling pity dwells not in this eye.—

Is thy name Tyrrell?
(...) Dar’st thou resolve to kill a friend of mine?

>>20988047
Trying to join irchighway fails. I don't have much of an idea of what I'm doing with IRC. I've never had an issue connecting to #bookz through undernet.

>>20987965
Saga Press is putting out new compendiums of Elric books. They are pretty nice, I have the first one in hardcover.

>>20988509
In order to connect to our network, use the following address in your client: irc.irchighway.net
It will automatically redirect you to a server close to your location. The ports we support are 6660 to 6669 and 7000. For connections through SSL use port 6697 or 9999.
https://irchighway.net/

Well, if you can't get it, I'll upload it sometime later. I'm the same anon who suggested using ISFDB, etc.

>>20988538
I'd like to see what you upload since I got it working and there is definitely no "Eater-of-bone" by Reed at all whatsoever when I ctrl+f his own search and searching "Eater-of-bone" returns 6 unrelated results. About the same results as #bookz gave me.

>>20986840
Tranny jannie bans any post more substantial than "I like book" or "read book".

>>20988401
They changed it to Tyrel in the movie because in the book it was (((Rosen))).

>>20988569
I was doing an offline search at the time, so the server may not be there right now. It says dragnbreaker had it. The search term I used was eater reed I believe.

>>20988659
books similar to this?

>>20988659
>>20988674
idk why I replied to you there I just meant to post that question to the thread

>>20988659
I'm certain you're just fucking with me at this point. Not sure why but this general does attract all sorts of character.

>>20988715
I'm not at home right now, but when I am I'll explain to you what you did wrong and upload it. I just checked using the webclient and it should still be there, the server is anyway. I'm not going to respond further.

Someone here recently inquired about recommendations for recent Sword and Sorcery both the The Turquoise Serpent and Frolic on the Amaranthyn are both great.

>>20987748
Pierce gets better
Dark Age is Kino

>>20989140
How's Iron Gold? And more importantly, do I get any box related trauma scenes? Damn Morning Sun reawakened my need to see characters suffer. Drop reccs if you're able, anyone.

>>20988390
Why? So far this shit is information overload.

Can someone explain the appeal of Sanderson to me? I think he's a great teacher (from his lectures) but he's a pretty horrible writer. His positives are that every story is understandable, characters are unoffensive and likeable, each novel has a "cool factor", but everything is done at a well-refined high school level.

>>20989392
>everything is done at a well-refined high school level.
...more than half of Americans between the ages of 16 and 74 (54%) read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level according to the Department of Education (2022)

>>20989413
doesn’t matter. no one is trying to sell a book to 200 million american adults. they’re just trying to sell a couple hundred thousand to the small niche audience who read fantasy fiction.

>>20989392
He's a competent writer who has a decent output and his novels generally lack notable errors. Basically, he doesn't do anything 'wrong' as such, even if he doesn't do a lot that's great.

>>20989427
The appeal is that high school level is just right for most of those as well. That's the appeal.

>>20989457
What a terrible world we live in.

>>20989472
Way of Kings is the most read book by /sffg/ and arguably the best rated.

>>20989379
Iron Gold is serviceable, it mainly just sets the stage for what the setting looks like after the 10 year time skip and sets up the events that happen in Dark Age. Tons of misery and suffering in that one.

>Hear good things about Bakker
>Start reading Prince of Nothing book one
>Main character belongs to a special bloodline and has a special unpronuncable title, exactly like Dune
>Main character is so smart and strong can mind control first normal person he comes across and can slay multiple enemy warriors with ease
>Beast man race of faceless mooks
>Literally has an epic wizard battle with a generic "dark rider" in the Prologue
>This is the "peak" of genre fantasy according to /sffg/

>>20989613
>Something remarkable... has begun - Steven Erikson

>>20989613
>trying to judge the series after finishing the prologue
Lmao still filtered pleb.

>>20989613
>epic wizard battle
>runs away scared shitless as soon as the magic starts flying

Finished pic related last night. I liked it.

>>20989768
neat

>>20989770
Thank you.

>>20989675
A prologue, a map, or a division into "parts" is a sign in the first few pages to let you know you're reading trash.

>>20988031
Varthlokker never giggles, except when his babies born and he writes "IT'S A GIRL" in the sky

>>20989917
I have read good books with garbage maps
And vise versa

>>20989917
>t. litrpg fag

>>20989613
>i read the first 80 pages of this book
>now here's my review
Do BotNS next.

>>20989589
radical. I will now read this book.

Does Cradle have suffering in it

>>20990602
only if you're Jai Long

>no fourth book expanding on the neana or the god at the end of time
Sad!

>>20986835
Did you enjoy the book? I was looking for something new and thought about getting this

>>20990602
In general? It's... Present, but not really a major thing. It's more struggle than suffering, if anything.

>>20990688
Figured. I was half dicking around asking that, but it is a big series. Knowing as much as I can before listening to it would help.

>>20988715
>>20988845
Well, this is unfortunate. As I said I was doing an offline search at the time. The list was from 2020. Apparently since then the server removed everything from Robert Reed and various other authors. He seemed to be the only one that had it. The commands were

!dragnbreaker Reed,
Robert - Greatship 02.8 - Eater-of-Bone.rtf ::INFO:: 357.9KB
!dragnbreaker Reed, Robert - SSC 03 - Eater-of-Bone and Other Novellas.rtf ::INFO:: 1.4MB

But they won't work now. I'll see what I can do when able. May still be in some fan made collection or elsewhere. I didn't expect so much to be removed. That's life though. I can provid the 2020 list, but it doesn't really matter.

>>20990733
After a couple minutes of searching, here's the titular story anyway.

https://escapepod.org/2014/04/05/ep442a-eater-bone/

I don't understand the ending to Lud-in-the-Mist

>>20989613
I have a feeling you read Bakker with no knowledge whatsoever of the Epic Of Gilgamesh.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_Gilgamesh
It is not subtle, there is a city in his novel called "Nilnamesh" lol. The opening narrative corresponds closely to the ancient Sumerian tale. A major character, Achamian, is named Akka, which is reminiscent of Akkadian, a language alongside Sumerian and Babylonian cuneiform in which Gilgamesh was retold and transcribed for a thousand years.

If you persevered you would see the parallels between the 4100 year old tale of hierodulic ziggurat prostitutes, a barbarian wild man, Iraqi outer space Noah Utnapishtim and various characters like Cnaiur, Esmenet, the nonmen underground cities. If you know the story of the Flood, of Joseph dreams of 7 lean years of famine, of Nebuchadnezzer eating grass, or of Orpheus descent into the Underworld, you alresdy know of Gilgamesh and his cosmic tale.

(NK Sandars 1960 prose translation. The Andrew George 1999 version is arguably better though)
***
Enkidu ate grass in the hills with the gazelle and lurked with wild beasts at the water-holes; he had joy of the water with the herds of wild game. But there was a trapper who met him one day face to face at the drinking-hole, for the wild game had entered his territory. On three days he met him face to face, and the trapper was frozen with fear.

***
The trapper’s sled dogs yelped and nosed through the snow. He pulled them away and fastened their harness to the base of a stunted pine. Astonished, he brushed the snow away from the limbs curling beneath. His first thought was to feed the dead man to his dogs. The wolves would have him otherwise, and meat was scarce in the abandoned north

>>20990839
Particularly, I didn't get who Duke Aubrey is supposed to be and why he couldn't go to Dorimare or why in the very last chapter Ambrose wanted Fairy Fruit to be sold and eaten regularly when Fairy Fruit is supposed to be a metaphor for drugs.

>>20990886
A modern story is not automatically good just because it shares parallels with an ancient one.

Did the bard just straight up raped the young boy? I don't have problems with things like that happening, but writing this in such not-direct way is annoying, and I'm unsure if that's just edgy or merely supposed to set the proper tone for the rest of the book. Anyway, is there a guide of how to read those weird letter? I'm not even English native, but still unsure how to read words like 'Eleneöt' or 'Kûniüri' in my mind.

Did the bard just straight up raped the young boy? I don't have problems with things like that happening, but writing this in such not-direct way is annoying, and I'm unsure if that's just edgy or merely supposed to set the proper tone for the rest of the book. Anyway, is there a guide of how to read those weird letter? I'm not even English native, but still unsure how to read words like 'Eleneöt' or 'Kûniüri' in my mind.

[Posting a second time because I forgot the right image]

>>20990651
I did, it's great but are you familiar with Wolfe? I would try to read a couple of full chapters for free somehow before spending your money, because he writes different than pretty much anyone and you might not like it. Some people don't.

>>20991158
Yes it's total foreshadowing
kellus ancestor is raised on rape by a stronger charismatic stranger, so kellus rapes all his close male followers

>>20991226
I hate it when that happens

>>20990733
>>20990746
Neener neener, told you so, baka!! I have the 'Eater-of-bone' story alone that I found through an anthology but I could never find that specific collection. Thanks for trying.
Maybe somebody with a bibliotik account could check?

>>20991247
Fang Yuan did nothing wrong

>>20991903
supreme move from a sublime mind operating an exquisite body

I remember vaguely people here discussing a couple of assassin characters I think it may have been Fitz and or Dancer and comparing them, in their ability or confidence. I think someone asked about characters that were already pretty based from the beginning. Is there an archive of those posts or does anyone remember what was exactly discussed and which books. I remember wanting to follow up on it, but live got in the way.

Best lovecraftian/hypnagogic books?

>>20991158
Are you a child? Is this your first time reading dark fantasy? I bet you haven't even read Berserk.

>>20991158
Ellen-eot and Koon-e-ore-e. You're welcome.

>>20992089
For Lovecraftian fiction it's hard to beat Lovecraft.

>>20991158
Some people interpret this passage as the bard having raped Kellhus, but I've always maintained there's no basis for that reading.

>>20992357
This isn't Kellhus.

>>20987748
just finished it myself

almost tossed the kindle when Goblin "died". legitimately didn't see the revive tranq/Cassius help thing coming

>>20992357
>Some people interpret this passage as the bard having raped Kellhus, but I've always maintained there's no basis for that reading.
So what other interpretation there is? That he just molested him? To me this is the clearest :
1. The boy was hiding because he knew the bard would do something bad to him
2. After catching the boy, the bard started touching him in a way that can be almost certainly read as sexual/intimate
3. The bard himself knew what he did was a crime and cried, implying that he did something that he considered to be deeply wrong
4. Using 'afterward' clearly tells us that something had happened
5. The boy murdered the bard for what he had done to him

And guys, don't spoil me, at the moment I'm at the moment where Kellhus is doing a psycho talk with the guy that found him in the snow. And when I saw the line about the guy needing to find someone new to love, basing on the previous event I thought Kellhus would stick it up the guy's ass here and there. I'm actually unsure whether it had happened, because the text was a bit ambiguous again.

>>20992373
that's literally the boy's name

>>20992608
As I recall the beginning of the Prologue is set during the first apocalypse, which makes it a few thousand years before Kelhus.

>>20992126
You joking? Comparing this to shit like beserk?

>>20990886
Wow, copying shit but changing the letters is HECKING based! Now talk about the honey of unwashed man anus please

>>20986550
omfg I hate it.

>>20992608
The prologue is just showing how a prince ended up with the dunyain a thousand years ago

>>20992646
forgot pic. this I hate

>>20992402
Same. I saw it coming when Darrow was being read his shit because it was the only way out and I remembered that Cassius had been given a holocube. Plus it had bothered me that he named the substsnce Snakebite only to not use it again. If you name it, it must have significance. Antonia's death made me hard.

>>20992637
Berserk has much worse content right at its start. If you haven't even read Berserk then you're basically a retarded child in my eyes.

>>20992608
>I thought Kellhus would stick it up the guy's ass here and there
wtf. Why would you think this?

>>20992687
>reading a story that will never be finished by its original author
Hard pass.

>>20992703
So second apocalypse?

>>20991903
Kek

>>20992667
Aja was a big girl

>>20992635
It is set during the first apocalypse. And? It's not what we are posting about. Every person with three working brain cells understands we were talking about the boy, not Kellhus. The anon was just mistaken.

>>20992657
What does it have to do with the question whether the boy was raped or not?

>>20992699
Are you retarded? I explained why I thought that in the very same sentence:
>basing on the previous event I thought Kellhus would stick it up the guy's ass here and there


Are Bakkerfags mentally deficient or am I being trolled? Can someone call for the Bakker Spamer? At least he knows what the story is about.

>>20992816
A hint of a rape scene set 2000 years before made you think Kellhus was randomly going to rape a man? Are you retarded?

read paranoid mage.
Its ok, backstory and character development are extremely thin. Already in book 1 mc who practised magic for few months starts dealing with archmages, dragons, fairy kings etc, all those magical beings who are hundreds of years old are just dull and uninteresting, they are literally random person on a street tier, the character dialogue and interactions are low energy an just too simple, mc himself is sort of low energy, the only good parts is when mc is alone and is planning to or executing some plan or something, writing is really good, magic too simple and when mc starts interacting and talking with other characters it becomes shit again. I finished what is available on rr, in book three I had to skip most of it because of that retard woman Lucy and nonsensical dialogue, if the author does not remove her from mc storyline asap then it will ruin the story completely.

>>20992130
Bro, what? Hell no. Kuniuri is "coon-e-YUR-i" with e-YUR as a compound vowel. Cmon now.

AFTERWORD
>And what happens next?
>I have predictions. As the author and as someone deeply invested in this saga, I have quite a collection of imagery still to be used, and plot points and plot twists that startle me, and basic questions that need to be answered, and maybe I already know those answers. Or maybe, getting into the hard work of many pages and added details, I’ll think of something else entirely. Something better, I can hope. We can hope.
>This is an elaborate undertaking. In some ways, the Greatship is guaranteed to be the impossible undertaking. Billions of years laced within the infinite multiverse, coupled with a hyperabundance of characters and species and shifting ideas … well, I won’t pretend that I can make a dent in the full story. Just the biography of a single dragon would be a ridiculous goal. A madman’s dream. What I think I can achieve is a dramatic resolution that satisfies me as well as a healthy portion of my readers. That endpoint has already been written. Inside my skull only, but still, it is my goal. Everything else that I write has to serve that seminal moment.
>Three novels are in the works. The first follows up on events in THE DRAGONS OF MARROW. Which stands to reason. I have this delicate balance of dragons and children, and there is a mysterious hole that needs to be investigated, and something waits to be discovered. Something unexpected, yet in the same breath, entirely reasonable.
>DRAGONS is around 80,000 words. Its sequel might come in half again larger, or bigger. It depends on how I cobble together what has to happen -- elegance playing with my patience and endurance.

>>20992869
Paranoid Mage is the story that Blackpilled me on readers. Like, I know webnovels by and large aren't amazing, but the stories that get popular most of the time has at least few elements going for them.

But Paranoid Mage? It's popular only because it's a cheap power fantasy of a guy almost effortlessly dunking on an 'authority' while at the same by practicing on his own in the middle of nowhere becoming better at magic than literal centuries old Archmages. But we have OP protagonist who fights the power, so of course it is popular.

The same with He Who Fights With Monsters. The protagonist is an edgy Mary Sue and basically every person that reads webnovels or just litrpg/progression-fantasy genres is to some degree critical of it, yet the series is #1 selling at Amazon. Because people love reading an edgy OP protagonists, even if it's dumb.

HWFWM is webnovel Stormlight Archive, some good writing but overall a bad story, yet it's extremely popular despite people shiting on it everywhere.

God, this is so fucking stupid. No wonder so many writers just grift and write cheap trashy litrpg stories, that's what people want, they will even call you a master writer for it.

>>20992976
>The next novel takes place on the Greatship proper, and at this point, I’m planning that almost every event happens inside the same modest room. Which sounds rather limited, doesn’t it? Not at all. I picked the best room for this sort of fun. And it will probably be the longest and most complicated of these coming novels.
>The last book is the gorgeous fierce relentless and traumatic capstone. About its details, I know nothing. Nearly. But that’s why it will be fun to write.
>My best guess is that I will publish books every 3 years. Or maybe in less time. But hopefully no slower than that.
>I’m not a dragon, that I know of. And I’ll be 62 in a few months.
>The clock is humming away.

I wish more authors would be so harmoniously transparent.

>>20992608
>So what other interpretation there is?
None. I was goofing around.

нeпpямoй

>>20992979
You're so bitter about people reading things you don't like. Failed novelist?

>>20993158
>You're so bitter about people reading things you don't like. Failed novelist?
Nah, just bitching about average reader who would rather read trash than anything that at least aspires to have literary value. Trashy webnovels or books with op edgy protagonists are the literary equivalent of Marvel movies, so it aggravates me to no end.

>>20989491
lol how far up your ass did you need to reach to pull that one out?

>>20993165
>aspires to have literary value
Such as?
>Trashy webnovels or books with op edgy protagonists are the literary equivalent of Marvel movies
Not even close. However flawed, there is a person making it.

>>20989491
Never heard of it.

>>20993180
>Such as?
Worth the Candle, Dungeon Crawler Carl, The Wandering Inn, probably some others could be found, but these three off the top of my head are stories that at the very least attempt to do more than just entertainment.

>>20993179
Sure, you can argue the Goodreads grouo isn't representative enough for your preferences, but according to the aggregate of the several 100s of profiles, that's just how it is. Maybe most just left off various books. I don't know. if you value your personal feelings over everything else, then that's fine as well.

>>20993261
But all of those are more popular than paranoid mage.

>>20993261
Isnt wandering inn a womans fantasy? I guess women will rate it high but I sure as hell not going to read something like that.

>>20986550
One of you niggers recommended the red knight in a previous thread, so ill complain here.
Dont get me wrong, it is good. Its a good setting, a fine story and I like the main character. Having finished the first and started with the second book, I am getting annoyed with one thing. The women. They are all far too competent and liberated. I cant think of any female character in the first book that shows even slight weakness, aside from the young farmer girl who fucks the squire, she was the on believable female character. Oh an I guess the female soldier has a chip on her shoulder (ill get to her in a minute). Every other one is extremely confident, brave, moral, competent and constantly sasses the men. Its not even that they are all full on mary sues, each of them would be fine on their own, but together, combined with the conspicuous lack of any weak females, its getting on my nerves.
Now, for the female soldier. Female soldiers (in a high magic equivalent of the europen 16th century with christianity and all) are bullshit. The author doesnt justify it at all beyond one character going "thats weird" and another "actually its pretty common in *foregin country*". How the fuck does she pull her own weight in combat? ffs, she was a literal whore before joining this wild merc band full of rapists. And even if we granted that she is an exceptional woman (and osmehow still attractive), the bigger problem is HOW DOES SHE NOT GET PREGNANT? How the fuck does this bitch stay child free while staying for months on end with these high test, murderous, borderline criminal and many explicitly rapist men? Does she just not fuck them? How does she get them to play along? God, I mean dudes like that historically fuck each other if they get horny enough. Is there birth control? It would make sense, with how sexually liberated every woman seems to be, taking lovers and all that shit. With the queen and the ladies of the court openly talking about fucking the knights and all that. But for one, Id expect a mention or an explanation of that and two, I think that would alter the society pretty radically, considering IT IS A CHRISTIAN, MEDIEVAL SOCIETY. Does the author think the church would be fine with liberated women and reliable birth control? Fuck no, those bitches would get burned.
tl:dr, the story is good, but the author has mother issues and a femdom fetish, probably.

>>20993338
I can suspend my disbelief for anything and everything.....except for WOMEN!

>>20991960
I think that was me in response to someone asking about assassin characters, I don't remember the post exactly though.

>>20993338
You can’t get published in 2022 unless you write women like this. Also including but not limited to making them in your face man hating dykes.

>>20992979
I've delved decently into a bunch of LitRPG/Progression Fantasy stuff and yeah, HWFWM is... Fine at best. The peak of LitRPG seems to still just be Dungeon Crawler Carl, sadly.

>>20993362
Absolutely. A god shooting fireballs at a dragon is less jarring than a normal woman being a competent mercenary warrior. Not unless she was being protected by one of the leaders there, and took part in battles as an archer - for example.

>>20993338
More of her backstory comes out later, I agree there's not a lot of 'weak' women main characters. There are a few that show up later. Regarding sauce though, I think it's confirmed that she can't get pregnant and also she's not that attractive. As to why she's not getting raped though, I think it has to do with women being less uncommon in armies on the continent and that's where their company was formed. She's not the only woman in the company and they already have literal whores as camp followers.

The history of the captain and the few who started with him is drip fed over the next few books, sauce was one of them.

>>20993338
I don't remember birth control being mentioned but in his other book series which is set late medieval age, magic is widespread in households due to these crystals and emperor some time last developed a use for which essentially diverts the magic of the world into these crystals instead of people, leading to less powerful wizards but more general use for the public. Anyway in the main city in this series everyone's become a degenerate since these crystals can basically stop disease and pregnancy.

How do you feel about the Hyborian Age as a setting? We only got so much detail about it before Howard died, but I think it's incredibly underrated. The lore being founded on a combination of human evolutionary concepts and fringe theories about Atlantis and pre history makes for something that I feel is pretty unique in fantasy

>>20989392
>great teacher (from his lectures)
Have you actually ever listened to ANY other lectures on writing? Like someone who isn't a mormon who is only teaching because it's a mormon school?

>>20993397
What if I want to write a shy submissive woman?

>>20993594
Sure, you can do that, as long as she's in a lesbian relationship.

Tolkien's favorite language was Welsh. Here's a Welsh lullaby.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBl7ZFI-QP8

>>20993298
lol

>>20993288
>But all of those are more popular than paranoid mage.
Are they? DCC is moderately successful and even stopped being published outside of patreon, but it had to work for this position until it has achieved respect even outside of Litrpg circles. It's the closest to the typical good book you will find in the bookstore, both entertaining and exploring difficult problems.

The Wandering Inn is famous, but in webnovel circles. The volumes are being cut into books, but the author releases them at the same time as audiobooks. And there are only three audiobooks per year, while the book chart has already nearly 30 books. It will take 10 years for the narrator to arrive at the current events of the story, and the story will be probably at Volume 20 by that time (picrel the chart). The author has terrible bussiness sense and is unlikely to gain more popularity aside of slowly raising mainstream appeal for Litrpgs. I'm sure if it was properly edited and advertised it would easily slip into top charts, but what publisher would want to advertise a story 10 milion words long, even if it's one of the most known ones?

Worth the Candle is the most serious Litrpg you will find, with the author dealing with his own trauma and issues through the story, exploring current rational and philosophical ideas more than any other fiction book I've seen. And while the author has some degree of renown among other authors, the story itself has little mass appeal because the book is a deconstruction of a typical Litrpg power fantasy.

>>20993288
Forgot to summarize:

The difference between those 'popular' stories is that Paranoid Mage gained popularity instantly, and with great force. People are talking about it everywhere and lauding if like the second coming of christ, even if it's quite simply poor in idea, execution and writing quality. It's not bad, but it can hardly be called more than decent. Soon you will see more stories like that landing on top of Amazon book lists. I wonder if the market will share the fate of Video Games, with people prefering to read on kindle and similar rather than buying paper books.

>>20993830
>People are talking about it everywhere and lauding if like the second coming of christ,
Where, exactly.

>>20993766
>>20993830
Good lord, all of this just to say you're a bitter autist who can't stand that people read things you don't like.

>>20993844
GOTTEM 2011+ newfag

>>20993844
But I like Paranoid Mage, even despite its flaws. I'm merely annoyed at the success of stories like that when compared to others. As I said, I can watch Marvel cape-shit and enjoy it, but when it's all major cinema stuff then it gets fucking annoying.

which of the discworld books is the most kino? i picked one up at the library and I really enjoyed it!

>>20993844
Yeah, I don’t know why he went on a rant. If he doesn’t like it, just drop it. Being angry and bitter that other people like it seems pretty and pathetic since it doesn’t affect him whatsoever. But it is what it is.

>>20993861
I'm personally a big fan of Reaper Man.

>>20992787
Still amazed she killed Ragnar holy shit

TWI 8.61, 62 K
>multiple K chapters
nooooooo-
also my gut reaction is i really don't like this iron man shit. but i'll wait to see how it plays out.

TWI 8.61, 62 K
>multiple K chapters
nooooooo-
also my gut reaction is i really don't like this iron man shit. but i'll wait to see how it plays out.

Bill Door: lánaosta

Everybody else: 大嗮

I did not like War of the Worlds, it didn't hook me at all

>>20993861
Thud! and Men At Arms are both pretty great.

>>20993527
it's good but people need to stop portraying it as a bronze age setting when its anything but that

>>20993962
What? The Wistram three chapter arc is one of the better parts of Volume 8. As for Iron Man stuff, unsure what you're talking about. You mean the magical armors project started by Blackmage? It was cringe when he was doing it, but you know who took over the project later. Wait, the stuff was explained in 8.61, so you know how it was used.

>>20993976
Try picrel.

>>20993966
Why would Bill write about borrowing cheese?

" An anti-meme is an idea with self-censoring properties; an idea which, by its intrinsic nature, discourages or prevents people from spreading it.”


This a very clever and strong premise, but not one that is easy to execute. In fact it just begs for paradoxes and potholes. And I am sure the cleverer people here (bakkerchads & Pringle worshippers) will have plenty to complain about. I however don’t, far from it. I was always pleasantly surprised at the direction the stories went. The second half of the book where stories focus on one big threat are not as fantastic as the beginning, but still very good. Overall it is a short book and it doesn’t focus on developing the characters. In fact, they are as barebones as you can get. Which is not bad, this kind of approach sacrifices potentials highs for pace and focus on the premise. This book is to literature what “The Outer Wilds” was to video games. Something that comes along and is so good that it makes me smile when thinking that after work I get to read/play some more. And just like that game it certainly is not for everyone, and I understand that. It doesn’t scratch a lot of itches. Luckily due to it being a collection of short stories available online for free it is incredibly easy to ascertain if you will like it. That is why I haven’t wasted time in describing the plot.

It’s these kinds of books that showcase the biggest advantage the written word has over all other media. The relative low cost and time investment of writing, allows the exploration of all kinds of weird and original ideas that would otherwise be hard to sell if millions were at stake. It’s why book have made almost all other media dull. Though ironically I think this could be easily made in to a television show.

In any case people that are interested can read the short stories here:
https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/antimemetics-division-hub

You can also buy this and his other books here https://qntm.gumroad.com/
Anyway this discovery let me to discover exurb1a I am going to read one of his books next

>>20994038
can't i'm half way through some fuckin' non-fiction shit. I just wanna read about fun fantasy stories jesus fuck

>>20993976
Its almost as if Wells was a mediocre writer, making the books he wrote grueling to read.
The closest I have read of him that is readable is Island of Doctor Moreau, where the prose is slightly better.

>>20994063
why is he so verenated then? (is that spelt right?)
is it his ideas more then his prose?

Just finished the first book of DCC. The humor in this is really trash.

Just purchased pic related. I hope it's based.

I'm looking for the title of some series I used to read.
Story was about some dude who used to be a semi synth soldier trying to take care of his kids, both were full synth or something.
World was set in some dystopian completely fucked post-war apocalyptica world/universe where in the very recent history a whole bunch of factions and races had fought each other to a complete loss on all sides.
One of the factions was a religious cult that was based around VR.

Complete roller coaster of a story. Last I recall the writer stopped posting and I didn't bookmark the thing. It was posted to reddit I'm fairly sure, might've been the HFY sub.
Anyone know what I'm talking about? Would love to see if there's been updates cuz it was a blast.

>>20987900
Red Rising is Hunger Games YA trash. Golden Sun tosses the YA formula out the window and is a kino Space Opera. Morning Star was alright, but not as good as Golden Sun. Sequel series is pretty good, it's darker and grittier than the original series though it also introduces some shit that was never even hinted at in the original series that I still have mixed feeling about.

>forward says "perjorative terms of an extremely offensive nature partially obscured" instead of "pages and pages of retarded Lancashire dialect turned into real words"
I HATE THE BRITISH LIBRARY I HATE THE BRITISH LIBRARY I HATE THE BRITISH LIBRARY

>>20993876
I think he's that twifag who just can't stand that every post isn't about twi

>>20993835
Still waiting.

>>20993430
I tried reading several $1 books on amazon about magical academy, they weren't exactly urban fantasy but the level of effort spent writing them seemed similar to paranoid mage(at least at first). I understand now why paranoid mage is so highly regarded even being mediocre with a ton of flaws compared to traditional literature (which itself is shit these days). All this cheap kindle unlimited garbage is anime/harem/game story rip offs with stereothypical mc surrounded by a group of "girls" (who may be teenage students or mature women in their 30s but are still referred to as girls by the author). Paranoid mage not having teenage mc and "girls" and the useless drama that comes with it makes such a huge difference (even then it has some unnecessary drama).
Another thing is barely 200 pages now constitute a book on amazon? wtf?

>>20994436
>Paranoid mage not having teenage mc and "girls" and the useless drama that comes with it makes such a huge difference
Paranoid Mage's previous work, Blue Core, was literally a harem Litrpg. And it was actually a better story than Paranoid Mage, so that's that, I guess.

>>20994450
Yeah thats garbage, clearly the author abandoned that nonsense and got on the right track with paranoid mage, hopefully his next series will be actually good

anyone here read bingus quest? I'm not sure if I want to read another one so similar to Big Floppa's Adventures

>>20991960
What did you want to speak on regarding them?

About to read pic related, what can I expect?

>>20994851
menstrual cramps, judging by the cover

>>20987900
The beginning of book one is insanely edgy and reeks of 'take me seriously' and like the other anon said Darrow is edge personified. He gets better pretty quickly but none of the other Gold characters that make up the cast are particularly interesting even the love interest is the personification of genericness (somehow despite living in a world of 8 ft tall megalomaniac narcissist Darrow hooks up with the only petite pretty 'don't need no man' archetype). Golden Sun is way better and three is a decent wrap-up. My min issues is that aside from Darrow, Sevro and his dad, Ragnar and maybe Victra is didn't give a shit about the rest of the cast.

>>20994851
incest and sex through rice paper walls

>>20994851
Hipster Japanese crap.

>>20994851
Read it in Japanese, and don't read it at all.

Anybody read any long Xianxia recently?

>>20993766
>Worth the Candle is the
worst novel ever written by man, mostly because the author is an enormous piece of shit 10x worse than yudowsky with an ego twice the size, and the entire story is about him. Literally him, not even a fictional character he's supposed to self insert into!

>>20995159
Wait, do these video game books have something to do with Eliezer Yudkowsky?
And don't get all mad at me again, I'm genuinely just trying to learn now. I understand that Xianxia is an ancient, noble genre and all that.

>>20995127
>>20994899
Kasuo Ichiguro isn't even Japanese you dumbfucks.

>>20995200
The lesswrong jew? No. They pretty much sprang up around the site royalroad, I'm sure they were around before that but not in a crystallized form except for maybe a few authors webpages.
Xianxia and LitRPG are seperate genres, and people of only now started fusing genres after they both exploded in popularity in the west.
Modern Xianxia and LitRPG before their fusion are similar as they are both popular in web novel format, with usually some weekly chapter release schedule.
Xianxia are usually epic stories or an entire series following a single protagonist on his/her quest for immortality.
LitRPGs are usually some basement NEETs self insert fantasy.

>>20995200
"Rational" fiction all stems from Yud and his clique, and their number obsession naturally leads them into litrpg. You may know them as the guys who all worship and fear a hypothetical future Ai that will send their digital souls to hell for not advancing the singularity. They're probably connected to the longtermists too. Basically, they're midwit utilitarians who think they can "mathematically solve emotions" through multiplication of arbitrary mad up probabilities(I feel like there's a 99% chance superman will come kill me if I don't spin around in a circle three times so I should therefore immediately do it). In other words, they're nutbags, and also assholes who view themselves as "the superior future leaders of humanity".

If you want a great story to read, I highly recommend the readthrough and critique of "the elements of rationality" AKA the yud harry potter fanfic, written by an actual physicist who tears him a new asshole for basically making up all the "scientific facts" he's constantly talking about off the top of his head.

I'm not mad at you, I just can't stand those fucking "rationalfic" guys.

>>20995237
I could see some LitRPG novels being rational fiction, but I doubt this would ever be close to a majority. And Xianxia is so far away from rational fiction it's funny, the only thing that comes close is clearly defined power levels. Pretty much everything else is complete nonsense, as Chinese authors and readers don't give a fuck about realism or even creating a semi-cohesive world.

>>20995257
Here's an example from an early chapter of Er Gen's first completed novel.
But now, he was 100% sure that that person was Wang Lin. This confirmation had no logical reason. It was purely based on his intuition.

>“This Wang Lin has already reached such a high cultivation level! Good thing I didn’t do anything to him back then. Alas, the secret of the spirit water must be buried in my heart. It doesn’t matter if Wang Lin is really that person or not, because the cultivation world is too cruel. Not to mention fellows from the same sect, even brothers would kill each other. With Wang Lin’s cultivation, I won’t be able to fight back
at all!” Zhang Kuang decided to never mess with Wang Lin.

>>20995257
It's just an infestation, they're in literally everything, I mean remember the fucking harry potter fanfiction, there's nothing they won't get involved in.

>>20995283
The third line is part of the quote

>>20994893
>but none of the other Gold characters that make up the cast are particularly interesting
I like Cassius and he only gets better in the sequel series and Tactus was pretty cool as well and had potential for some interesting character development. Also, Mustang never came off as a 'don't need no man" character hell, she spends the first two books pining after Darrow.

What is the complete end-point of technological and scientific advancement for a civilization in sci-fi?

>>20995282
I mean, theoretically it should be possible given the criteria listed on goodreads. But in Xianxia there is the concept of face, which usually seems irrational to the western reader.
For example, some arrogant young master may try to kill the protagonist for some petty reason, the protagonist will fight back, and the young master will be offended that he fought back and escalate the conflict. So if the villains "beliefs and values" are even slightly non-western people start to get confused, you could easily take this to hilarious extremes and create the silliest Rational Fiction novel.
For examples, just look at continental philosophy

>>20994851
Nobel Prize winning author writing Cyberpunk yuri about a girl and her robot, that's the best way to describe it.

>>20995329
That's just bad writing, face is perfectly logical, rational even. Arrogant young masters are arrogant because they're powerful, and they HAVE TO show off and pick fights to prove their strength. It's like gang warfare, if you're viewed as soft people come after you. So the best way to keep yourself safe is to find some guy you're sure you can take, then publically have him "insult" you and "retaliate" extremely harshly as a warning to others.
Consider that the situation always ends in the young master's loss ONLY because the MC is some ridiculously overpowered self insert. Rationally, he'd at best manage to go up a few steps in the chain and then would either be forced to make a deal with the higher ups or get killed.
Reputation is VITALLY IMPORTANT in a world where anyone could kill you at any time for no reason. It's based in the roots of wuxia, where reputation is literally all you had between a carefree life and being hunted down and killed in your sleep by 10 guys.

>>20995326
Waifu robots with artificial wombs.

>>20994141
I"ve heard very good things and it's on my backlog.

>>20995237
You don't even know, I've actually met some of those guys (such as "Roko" of the AI basilisk you described) and even been in the same room as EY once. Like any cult leader, you couldn't talk approach or talk to him unless you were performatively drinking the kool-aid. Based on my description of them as a cult I think you know how I feel, but even then I wouldn't have guessed they'd be drawn to "litRPG" stuff.

>just finished Solaris
Damn bros, that was good. Now I have the misfortune of trying to pick what next to read.

>>20995356
Except it's not logical in universe as these young master are head disciples of sects with literal gods protecting them, even the "young masters" are thousands of year olds, and they don't sleep. Just because there is the meta explanation of wuxia->xianxia doesn't mean it makes sense, which is why it's not rational literature. Also, Xianxia MCs aren't usually self-insert, they seem to win all the time because usually they are fighting "villains of the week".
Face is nothing like gang reputation, that's laughable.

Why did she decide to punch me straight on the nose with this one?

>>20995882
I always come close to reading le guin and then don't.

Maybe not quite the right thread, but I like sci-fi and fantasy and I have to say that the Sharpe series/Last Kingdom by Bernard Cornwell may lack all the gay shit you fags like but they are better series than half the ones i've read here. Steven Ericsons malazan series is pretty good but has female warriors which I can't take seriously

>>20995904
The first three was alright. Big decline in the fourth book, sadly the characters suffers from the story being second to her feminists points in Tehanu. It should not have to be like that.

>>20995909
I read Warlord Chronicles but he has too much of a hateon for Christianity. I also read the first Sharpe book but got tired of him being a simp.

>>20995909
I just don't get how people are against women combatants in worlds full of magic
Empress laseen the only 'small' woman in Malazan that is seen as an accomplished fighter that has no magic, the explanation there is that she trained since she was a child by palace assassin and such since she was a princess. Also napans are 'built different'
All the women in the Marines are built like trucks, even tavore is a tactician and never described as some god with a sword. Although she was trained by people who cotillion trained.

>>20995949
Because I can believe in magic, but not strong women. I've trained a lot of England women rugby players playing for a top university side here in the UK, and even though i'm not the biggest bloke around I know full well I could cut my dick off and play in the England team, and these girls were "built like trucks" they still lack functional strength. it's just silly.
based malazan knowledge though
>>20995923
I can't forgive him for writing the warlord chronicles, Arthur was invented by normans to divide the conquered saxons & britons. shouldn't get any attention.

>>20995949
Don't forget Tattersail is straight up described as THICK.

>>20995949
>I just don't get how people are against women combatants in worlds full of magic
For starters, women need to birth the next generation, if they spend all their time training for a task that isn't motherhood they will probably never have kids and if they do only a few and very late in life.
Imagine a reality where women go to university and work just like men, it would likely mean the collapse of civilization is neigh, that would make a good setting for an apocalyptic novel, but not even most fiction.

>>20993861
I enjoyed all of them desu but the first one (The Colour of Magic) was probably my favourite;
perhaps just for introducing them to me.
The only one of the main series I thought a bit silly was Pyramids.
And the Tiffany Aching/Wee free men semi-spinoff was a bit too YA (intentionally) for me.

>>20996018

>>20996018
Tattersail is a mage only

>>20994003
it's again because of flos.
yes, he's charred and bedridden, but even now he STILL manages to fuck up my enjoyment of the story. it sucks because i'm not very invested in what seems to be the main goal in this arc: freeing amerys. quite the opposite, since freeing her would just lead to flos gaining more power and his dumb wars gaining more screentime. i wish trey would split from flos already, but actelios will probably keep him with flos.

>iron man
it was revealed in 8.61 but i haven't seen much in terms of detail. unless this is all there is too it and they're really making everything else obsolete. but this is exactly the idea i don't like. i don't like superhero shit in general. the idea is just not very appealing to me at all.

>>20995977
>based malazan knowledge though
Ty
This is actually touched on even more directly in the recent Erikson Malazan book that takes places like a decade after the crippled god
The new emperor has pushed for almost every person with even a little magical talent into the marines. There's one woman 'heavy' but the rest of the woman in there are a mixed into units to cover the different warrens and the new warrens that developed since the crippled god which has resulted in way more people having talent, some to absurdly strong levels of power

His bed was barren there black phantoms
of desire unsated and savage fury
in his brain had brooded till bleak morning

What's that book about a giant spaceship that travels for thousands of years and the humans inside develop rival civilization? I'm sure I saw it on here

>>20993861
All the city guard ones

>>20996171
Renegade Immortal by Er Gen

>>20986550
I have recently caught up to a webnovel called 'There is Something Wrong with This Game" which is a vrmmorpg starring a misanthropic loli protagonist called Yasaki Ruri who goes by Hecatate in-game. I think this novel does well in connecting both the real-world and game-world that so many novels fail on by introducing the mc's reality-defying ability to transport in-game items to the real-world. Which is why she looks like a loli at 18 since she used a potion to cure her cancer from four years ago and to others (specifically her parents) should not live past 20. This does not mean that her life has been solved as the cancer showed her parent's lack of affection, due to them being a political marriage, and now she lives alone in their house without any connection to her parents since they don't want to waste time pretending affection to someone who won't be able to inherit the company because of death. Her life-views may have been affected by this as she now spends her days betraying guilds from the inside using her cute appearance to get past suspicion, like stealing bosses from plans she told guildmembers to follow. Also, she sells furniture she makes inside the game online to net her some pocket money. Her main conflict now is betraying her guild (preferably multiple times without getting caught) and leaving her parents' crib before they realize she's cured.

I would give this compared to other litrpg novels a 9/10.

BTW the "Ultimate Colossal Calibre Science Fiction and Fantasy Torrent" is up and running again over on /t/, it would ne nice of the creator of the next /sffg/ thread included a link again.

>>20987900
People get put off by the first book and don't realize it gets better every book as the writer improves. By book 5 you have a kino space opera where the major factions battle for the soul and future of hummanity among the stars

>>20989392
women, children, autists

>>20987900
As someone who's reading through them now (on the third), I can say it definitely does get better but the first book is a huge filter because it is absolute garbage

>>20989392
That's how he can put books out so fast.

>>20989392
Is there truly a problem with this? Does everything you read need to be so high brow? His books are entertaining. Like capeshit. It's not the best shit but it's still a good experience.

>Honor is dead. But I'll see what I can do
Unironically the most hyped I have ever been reading a book.
How do you even top this? I heard that Stormlight 3-4 are not good so I guess Brando couldn't top it.

>>20996226
Sounds like alot of other novels, weed (moonlight sculpture) and a few others, but they escape me now. Which is a shame as it sounds very close.

>>20996082
I don't recall much of Flos content in that three-parter, but that's possibly because my mind erased those memories. Reading about Trey is much more interesting.
I admit I'm not a fan of Flos, but then I'm also not a fan of Baleros either. I'd rather read mainly about Izril, but oh well.
Btw, Iron Man project wasn't revealed in 8.61, it was a thing way, waaaaay earlier, possibly as far as Voulme 4 or 5. It's only in V8 that it actually become something concrete.

Honestly, I'd love if Pirate had the balls to kill Flos off, that would make both for a good story and make it easier for everyone who's readin the story. But he appears to not only have a long-term story, but there's also the case of Pirateaba's obsession with not killing off characters. just imagine what kind of shake would that be. Maybe there's a chance for that once Flos finally conquers Chandrar again, in Volume 11 or 12. But very slim. Pirateaba is hellbent on torturing us with him, even though it's the most hated character in the story. I can only imagine ever increasing backlash once Flos starts conquering lands beyond Chandrar as he is bound to eventually, fanbase will go rabid.

Thoughts on the Broken Empire trilogy? (No spoilers please)

Seems interesting and apparently the protagonist is as anti hero as they come

>>20996704
Consider browsing the 4chan.org/lit archives.

>>20996693
I remember it was Overgeared

>>20989392
Is he a great teacher? I've listened to some of his lectures, in full, but a lot fo what he's talking about is very structural and mechanistic. He's the equivalent of a corporation that looks at what's popular and churns out a deisgned product to an intended consumer group. There is little art or literary value in what he creates. If you want to write for a living without doing anything with meaning, then yeah, lear this sort of 'craftmanship' from him. If you want something of value, run the other way as fast as you can.

>>20995237
Link this critique of harry potter fanfic

>>20996607
The costant woe is me I'm so mentally deranged thing gets REALLY old after a while

>>20996820
https://danluu.com/su3su2u1/hpmor/
At least I think that's it, the content seems to match but I remember the site looking different, maybe I read it on the original blog. There may be another one, but it's the only thing in my history.
Sort of related, I also enjoyed another review by some other guy of the actual books themselves, where he got so fed up with the story that by book six he rewrote the entire ending with Snape replaced by an angry gorilla that kills and eats all the other characters.

>>20996862
Levitation could easily be any number of things (also) why (does this ) faggot (write (like (he is coding (in )(lisp))))

>>20996862
Wow, really seems like he enjoyed it. I would be trilled if I could spend more than 1 minute thinking about a novel after having read it.

>>20996704
I might have liked it if I was 13. There's an /ss/ scene, but it's with a mid hooker instead of a hot mommy so that didn't save it either.

>>20996704
I found it pretty meh. It's like First Law but without the humor and even edgier (not in a good way)

has anyone written or tried to write their own fantasy ssf book?

Any published books (nonweeb) with loli?

Do you take women's reviews on novels seriously?
>Second, the tournament arcs. It's not the tournament that I don't like, but the many racist remarks and excessive nationalism which makes this novel hard to read. Even MC is not free from stereotyping other nation:

>>20997241
>Second, the tournament arcs. It's not the tournament that I don't like, but the many racist remarks and excessive nationalism which makes this novel hard to read. Even MC is not free from stereotyping other nation:
Was this an american woman reviwing an european book? Sounds like it.

>>20997261
American reviewing Korean

>>20997286
A different woman.
>If you hate strong, independent, world-shatteringly beautiful women abandoning their ability to think or act rationally simply because they've had brief contact with the MC, then you'll also hate this series.

Bakkersoys MUST prove that Bakker is both BASED and REDPILLED before I consider reading him. What's his deal with conciousness?

>>20996862
thank you for linkin it

>>20997362
Just read Xianxia, they literally cultivate for millions of years. And of course they are racist too.

>>20996701
>>20996082

I agree with killing Flos off, but there has to be a satisfactory build-up. I don't want to see him go before he fights the factions we know from Izril or see him try to invade Baleros again. I don't care how he dies. He can die to trey, to the might of the world proving too much for him or anything else, but he still has a lot left to do.

Flos is unique. Every time something important happens I can be assured that he has a new perspective to view things from. I don't want to lose that. Not without him unifying chandrar again at the very least.

Pirate doesn't need balls to kill him but to keep him alive. Also, he is not the most hated character in the story, that would be Yazdil or the Blighted King

>>20986550
Uhh kinda offtopic. But does anyone have that titanic ice(((berg))) brain expand meme

>>20997483
It might be somewhere in the OP mega, but you could also search the archives.

>>20997476
>Pirate doesn't need balls to kill him but to keep him alive. Also, he is not the most hated character in the story, that would be Yazdil or the Blighted King
There's a difference between hating a character and hating reading a character. Yazidil's scenes are consistently sinister and unnerving due to him being the most powerful slaver in the world, with terrifying methods of compelling loyalty, not to mention his designs on the world. Blighted King is similarly a self-righteous totalitarian dictator and zealot who will do everything to satisfy his obssesion of destroying Demons.

Both of Yazidil and Othius are compelling, interesting characters that people are interested in reading about. Flos on the other hand is simply annoying people. His goal is ambigious 'rule the world,' but without any real substance because Pirateaba refuses to explore his motivations - there are no real motivations present, just a goal of world domination. He's not presented in a compelling way, only other people around him are.

He's not a good person so people don't find him relatable, no one cheers for him. He's not a good villain and not even presented as such, so you cannot be interested in his 'villianery'. Nothing about him is compelling, people are actively wondering whether his 'charisma' is just the right Skills that makes people follow him, because why would people otherwise follow this lunatic? The past of his conquest is also barely explored, which is baffling.

K plotline took FOUR fucking volumes before there was something interesting, and that's only because the focus shifted to Trey and Gazi, then other Flos's Seven. Flos is the least interesting person in his storyline, in the earlier volumes at least he had some interesting opinions ('Hitler was a great man'), now he's just a 'good' guy that wants to conquer the world and somehow the events serendipitously benefit him, even though he should have failed instantly due to his negligence.

Is summary, only a small % of readers like to read about Flos, people vocally hate him and his chapters. Even course correcting by the author barely helps. So yes, killing him off would be for the best.

>>20997630
>Author literally kill characters because they are unpopular
Way to ruin your shitty novel by being a spineless hack.

>>20996607
It's moreso that he just keeps repeating the same character arc with Kaladin after that. He keeps getting depressed and then goes "fuck it I'll do the right thing anyway" and does a cool thing but is still depressed.

>>20997476
>>20996701
the difference is the yazdil and the blighted king are good villains. flos on the other hand SHOULD be a villain, but is instead treated like a hero. this is only roughly speaking of course.
the fact that he does horrible things but still is portrayed as righteous is what makes him such a shitty character. he also WANTS to to be righteous despite being a aggressive conqueror. i'm pretty sure there was one point where he said, and i'm paraphrasing: "we don't have a reason to invade them yet, but we'll find a reason eventually" about one of the kingdoms, i think it was medain or jecrass.
he wants to have his cake and eat it too. that's the problem. or rather, the problem is that the story can't seem to decide whether he is a villain or not, even though, at least in my opinion, his actions disqualify him from being a "morally grey" type character. he is a villain and the story should treat him as such.

case in point, volume 8. trey is working to free amerys. now from my perspective, this is flos, i.e. one of the VILLAINS objectives, why the fuck would i want him to achieve his objectives? so now i find myself actively rooting against what trey is trying to accomplish, and that sucks. good thing the chapters have other things going for them, otherwise it'd be torture.

>>20996704
I tried reading it as a teenager and couldn't get through the first book.
The MC is a cringey, whiny little brat, who constantly goes on about how dark and le sad he is; using this to justify being a vile subhuman.
It feels a bit like what a socially isolated 13 year old boy thinks is a cool character with a dark past.
It's essentially generic YA fantasy with guyliner and fake .

>>20997803
>>20997700
>>20997476
Allow me to rant a bit more, because lately I've been reading on stable governments, how turbulent transitions of power can be, etc. And looking at Flos from that perspective makes one contemplate suicide:

1. Flos doesn't intend to leave anything after his death. He has no successor to his kingdom and isn't interested in anything that happens after his death, all that matters is his goal of conquering the world and ruling it for the rest of his mortal livespan. He knows his kingdom will go down in flames the moment he dies and he DOESN'T CARE, he literally rejoices in that fact by quoting 'Ozymandias' poem.

2. The entire government of Reim is just Flos as an absolute monarch and Orthenon, his steward. Or so it appears at least, because I don't think we've seen a single advisor, clerk or official during 8 volumes of the story. It's just Flos and his Seven, at most. Reim resembles more a start-up company rather than a kingdom.

3. Flos keeps making allies with people and offering them lands, which barely belongs to him as he just conquered it. And then those allies, like Gnolls for instance, are supposed to live in the given lands. Which means bringing an outside political entities entities to the region which doesn't want them and would consider their lands to be stolen. And after Flos dies there is no one to guard the legitimacy of their ownership. Great idea, surely there won't be a literal genocide of this outside element very soon!

4. Flos embodies everything wrong with monarchic system of governship. When he got depressed he had simply decided to stop doing anything FOR ALMOST 20 YEARS. He threw his entire conquered continent into a massive political turmoil that makes people hate him to this day. He literally abandoned everyone as he had a big sad becuase his wife died :(

5. His entire conquest and following errosion of the kingdom due to his 'slumber' resulted in milions people dead, extreme political instability that people like Queen Yisame still have PTSD from, entire continent was thrown upside down with entire nations vanishing and new rising up in unstable, bloody times. The entire continent of Chandrar has turned into burning garbage. All that for a selfish desire of a man with ambition to rule everything.


And we are supposed to believe anyone but closest friends and madmen would follow this man? That any sane person without a death wish would support him? Fight in unending wars and for what, for Flos to become the King of the entire world, then see it all crumble down? This is insane. The entire character and the storyline is batshit crazy. No one in their right mind should ally with Flos for anything than short-term goals or in dire need.

This is guy is actually worse than Hitler, because he his actions has already resulted in death of milions, any many more will follow if he doesn't change his mind. He's a man-child, focused on his childish ambition, leaving ash in his wake.

>>20997803
Oh, concerning your misgivings for Trey's actions, I assume you haven't finished this arc yet, right? You will soon realize why Trey is doing this for Flos. There is a colossal difference between Trey and Flos in characterization, because Trey's goals and motivations make sense both for him and for a reader, a text-book proper character, the literal opposite of Flos.

I never ceased to be amazed by how so many can bloviate at length about nonsense regarding the most shallow works. The lack of self-awareness is absurd. So much meaning is fabricated from nothing without realizing.

>WoT: The Gathering Storm
This book was pure kino and it reads fast as Path of Daggers. Egwene's POV after she got caught was great so fuck haters.

>>20998028
>The lack of self-awareness is absurd
Ahem.

>>20998028
>I never ceased to be amazed by how so many can bloviate at length about nonsense regarding the most shallow works. The lack of self-awareness is absurd. So much meaning is fabricated from nothing without realizing.
TWI has a lot of good qualities, it's just that it also has a lot of plotlines and this one in particular is driving people insane. That's why I postulate that the author should kill the character off so that we can rather read about other, more interesting characters.

>>20998058
Just because you greentext doesn't make it applicable in reverse. I was fully aware someone would reply with that. If I didn't want someone to, I wouldn't have included it. Let's assume you're aware of all of this as well. That means we're just playing a game where we know everything that will happen from beginning to end. There's a certain sense of comfort in that, wouldn't you say?

>>20998028
>being this insecure

>>20998000
>And we are supposed to believe anyone but closest friends and madmen would follow this man?
that's the main problem to be honest. he could be a insane retard and it wouldn't be an issue, if it weren't for all the people looking up to him for some godforsaken reason. i feel like there is a disconnect between how pirate sees this character and how he actually comes across to the reader. he is a giant stain on the story imo.

>>20998020
i'm still in the third chapter so yeah. again i do think trey is fine as a character. and he's obviously conflicted about flos. but the impression i got was that for better or worse, he will stick with flos because of his revenge on actelios. but maybe it will play out differently, that would be for the best. i'll see how it goes.

>>20998093
holy cringe

This whole “discussion” is so fake and artificial, holy shit, how do you fag keep it up. Fucking hell, I thought the schizo from yesterday was just bullshitting, but fuck.

>>20998102
Please do comment after you finish the arc, I'm interested in your reaction.

>>20998111
Careful, anon. the two TWIfags are going to spam 1 sentence if you call them out.

>>20997803
It was more like "I know peace is not an option because they will eventually want war with me" more than "I have to find a reason for war with them, now".

Flos is not a righteous ruler, he is not a good guy but he is not a villain either. Chandrar was prosperous when he was ruling it. His initial conquest started as defense against Helios and was fueled by going from one righteous cause to another. And the second time around, you have to remember that the only time he declared war without someone else doing it first to him was in Belchan. And even that time it was in response to Belchan slaughtering those gnolls.

The problem with Flos was that at first you were supposed to see him as how the world sees him. A ruthless conqueror. And that impression stuck. He enjoys war because that's what he is good which gives the wrong impression that he goes looking for it. it's always been a result of his own reputation.

>>20997630
You talk like you are speaking for everyone who
reads TWI. The sporadic Flos chapters in the first few volumes weren't the best, but a lot of it was setting up the character. Showing us what he means to the world, there might have been better ways to do it but once the ball got rolling it has been consistently entertaining.

Flos is never depicted as the 'Good Guy'. He is to his subjects because as it was discussed in vol 4 rulers in innworld are substitutes for Gods. They are the highest authority people in that world can believe in. It's the blind devotion people have for religion transferred to him. He is the higher purpose. To die for him is to have lived well.

Also, he is one of the few rulers in Chandrar that gives halt a shit about his subjects. The only one better than him is Fetohep, who at the time of introduction was just an arrogant undead that rules an isolationist utopia uninterested in everyone not within his borders, thus a literal non-entity in the continent's landscape.

It never ceases to amaze me as to how so many 'people' can gripe and comment and complain yet never actively promote discussion, nor themselves read anything beyond the same 15 titles.

>>20998083
Yes, chapter by chapter polls resulting in writing to reader specifications work so well. They work even better if the poll is behind a paywall. The writer is a mere servant of the reader whom ought dictate what happens. The writer is merely there to carry out the reader's commands.

>>20998000
>mortal livespan
Literally mostly irrelevant to Xianxia chads, they are all immortal and shit on mortals whenever they get the chance. Though mortal/immortal isn't a perfect translation, my personal thoughts, outside of obliteration, if an immortal dies it's because they reached the end of their stages lifespan and can no longer prevent their qi from returning to the heavens and earth, so they slowly wither til they are mortal and die because they are a million-year mortal.

>>20998126
It's like they want to be replaced by gpt-4

>>20998111
>This whole “discussion” is so fake and artificial
Thread was going slow as fuck, really tells you that these zoomers just want this thread on page 1 for some god damn reason/.

Speaking of xianxia timetables
>end of Dragons of Marrow (hard sci-fi)
>big reveal is that the time since the dragons self-exiled themselves to Marrow from the Great Ship has been around 5 billion years
>this is already after the first two novels which comprise around 50k years into a 500000 year circumnavigation around the galaxy
Granted, humans are functionally immortal as they have bioceramic brains and can have bodies regrown. Nothing short of a black hole or plasma through the head would permanently kill them.

>>20998140
It'd be less work for them and possibly the same amount of money if they can keep the audience.

>>20998155
There are probably already poll driven web novels using of the gpt3 based text generators, and a lot of generation and a some rewriting.

>>20998000
You know is a great leader according to all of the points he listed? Magnolia. She cares about administration, the impact she would leave on the world, and bringing world peace all without having a single point of failure. Why should Flos be Magnolia 2.0?

>>20998189
Thread was about to hit page 2 couldn’t let that happen, could you?

>>20998195
Why would any sane person care about which page /sffg/ is on?

>>20998204
He's mocking the zoomer because he keeps trying to force the discussion going instead of letting it die naturally.

>>20998151
You should read to the end of desolate era if you think (supermassive) black holes are worth a shit.

>>20998195
page count schizo in the year of our lord 2012+10. Get deleted chud

>>20989379
>How's Iron Gold?
For Red Rising I would rate the books
Red Rising 7/10
Golden Son 9.5/10
Morning Star 8.5/10
Iron Gold 8-8.5/10
Dark Age 10/10

>>20998259
so -0.5 /10 or 7.15?

>>20998222
I have and I believe you misconstrued the context of my post.
It did get silly at the end (and felt rushed, of all times to do so). Ji Ning could have kept ascending but he had enough.

>>20998277
No, he literally reached the zenith. Though it is I eat tomatos, so he could have popped into the realm from the end of coiling dragon[/code], but I think that's only for Xuanhuan protagonists; and could be millions of times weaker for all I know.

>make a modest living writing erotica
>realize most of the people who read my stuff are otherwise illiterate retards with the vocabulary of middle schoolers
>feel my true passion for fantasy is unattainable from a financial standpoint because the average readerbase simply does not want to read
Is there a way to counteract this blackpill bros? Is fantasy that isn't Young Adult shit still a viable publishing path? I can't write gay porn for the rest of my life.

What about becoming an NPC, and using your knowledge of the game you find yourself in, to pull of the most insane power growth in the history of the galaxy? Even better, how about going from a surface dwelling setting to a chessboard rivalling the greatest of space opera?

>>20998342
Have you tried not being a faggot?

>>20998348
>What about becoming an NPC
But I already read webnovels and Xianxia, anon.

>>20998342
You write erotica for literal middle schoolers, the quicker you understand that, the quicker you realize what you must do.

>>20998342
You may have to accept your limitations as a writer and do something else.

>>20998342
Sounds like cool story for (You)s. Especially when eroge genre exist and not all nukige are rated same despite having sex scenes with good art

>>20998384
What's a good place to find good eroge?

>>20998342
Most artists I know do art as a side thing since it doesn't pay the bills. You can still write books and do what you love while not having it as your job.

>>20986550
She killed millions...

>>20994045
i readthat recently coincidentally and i like the idea, i had seen similar things in scps before, but i dont think that article did it very well. its a problem that i think lots of scp articles have, cool concepts but execution bad

>>20994054
i only was talkng about this one, dont know right now if i read others https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/we-need-to-talk-about-fifty-five

Really liked the bear and the nightingale, really hope Arden's working on another adult novel behind the scenes because it's a gigantic shame that she's followed up B+N with a YA series.
I guess that's just what you have to do these days if you actually need your writing to generate an income.

>>20994356
This is fun to read, it's like reading Chaucer in middle english

>>20998521
WHO

One thing that bothers me a lot about the red rising series is how many of the main characters are from Darrow's class
Like there tens of thousands of gold's and the institute runs every year right?
Why don't we hear from the guy who came first the year before, or the year before that, or the year after?
It makes world (universe) feel so small when you end up with all of Darrow's classmates being captains of either side by the third book

Also don't spoil me I haven't finished the third book I'm like 80% though but it's just really annoyed me

What are the best Fantasy books?

I liked Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire, but I disliked The Wheel of Time and The Name of the Wind. I feel like I've already read the peak of this genre and it's all downhill from there.

>>20999337
There's a very simple explanation. You expect too much from what you're reading considering what it is.

>>20999382
Maybe you have for you personally, or not, and your feelings are delusional regardless.

>>20999337
it's based around mars and they are all from the most powerful families.
but yeah, it's just story convenience that they are all the same age

>>20986835
>If half the book is basically nothing, and then it rushes through all these things in the last third, I can imagine it will be very disappointing, but I have my doubts about that.
this is exactly what happens except instead of a half being nothing and a third being rushed through its more like 90% being nothing and a tenth having all the plot in it
its still better than 90% of the authors retarded faggots like to shill in these threads

>>20999382
Take this milquepost to /r/fantasy or elsewhere. You'll get more updoots.

>>20999392
>>20999430
What the fuck? I just wanted recommendations, you fucking assholes.

>>20999438
Fuck off you attention-seeking whore. Do something better with your life.

>>20999438
NTA but your request is banal and inane, if you want useful recommendations for a field as vast as fantasy, you need to better elucidate your desires and preferences

>>20999453
Are you blind? I literally wrote:
>I liked Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire

>>20999457
Stop being such a fucking retard, either check the archives or the mega folder on the Op. nobody’s going to pander to you, fucking retard.

>>20999464
>Just read a chart
Useless thread.

>>20999457
>I like the two biggest names in fantasy fiction, despite them being the complete opposite of each other
That tells us absolutely nothing. You may as well have said "I like Star Wars and the expanse, recommend me some scifi", either give meaningful details and criteria or fuck off.

>>20999337
Fitcher being a Proctor probably saw that that year's Institute was stacked with heirs of prominent Mars families and then decided to insert Red infiltrators as a result. Why have your spy rub shoulders with a bunch of literally whos when they could be making connections with Bellonas, Augustans, and Julii

Filthy elf fucker.
Filthy dog fucker.
Filthy cat ear'd fucker.

>>20999584
Ok, I like romance and world building.

Incredibly bored of the lotr is the peak of the genre posts lads
Even though I vehemently disagree it's just not an interesting argument to have.

>>20999632
Read the Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb, considered to be one of the best fantasy in the last decades.

>>20999632
chalion

>>20999637
It is though?

>>20999632
Penric and Desdemona by Lois McMaster Bujold (she has lots of works focused on worldbuilding and romance)
David Eddings' works like Belgariad and Sparhawk series are full of the same
I read Fionavar Tapestry recently and romantic subplots are almost THE plot

>>20999846
>belgariad
Don't read the fucking belgariad, shit sucks.

>>20999846
>Boregariad
No.

>>20999893
>>20999898
sovlless posters

>>20999912
The Belgariad is the most soulless fantasy story I have ever read. The second book is a beat for beat repeat of the first, and absolutely nothing of value happens in the third until the final 30 pages. How anyone decided Eddings was better than the tides of Tolkien clones of his era I will never know.

>>20999627
I love Baron Slade.

Weird request but do you know of anything published in fantasy that focuses on administration or what the Web novel writers call town building?
I liked release that witch for this but ultimately the Web novel format just drags on and on so I'm wondering if anyone has done it as a traditional book.

>>20996018
I respect Erickson because he is a follower of the architect just like me.

>>20999968
The closest that may come to the that of an established novels would be fictional novels, or nonfiction, about people going to live out on the frontier, especially in the US, that establish frontier towns. Aside from that, I think you're going to be hard-pressed to find it outside of web novels and self-published stuff that's probably more concerned with sex and harems.

>>20999968
1632 is all that comes to mind sadly

>>20999968
Plenty of books like this, look in the litrpg sections.
It might also be under 4X books.

>>20997212
no

oh my gosh i feel so bad, how embarrassing

>>20995332
More like a friendship between girl and her robot-maid-sister than yuri, but then again I don't read enough yuri to know...
Also very nice cover art here

New thread
>>21000871