/lit/ - Literature

go to amazon and buy someone's self-published book

Pendragon, all ten books. Pure enjoyable dumb literature with a great scifi/fantasy feel.

Do you want "pleb" books or "bad" books? Not all "pleb" books are terrible, but all "bad" books are "pleb" books, usually.
A "pleb" fantasy series would I guess be that one Brent Weeks trilogy. Something about the NIght.
A "bad" fantasy series is Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series or Legend of the Seeker or whatever the series is called.

>>2958806
For bad sci-fi, try the Honor Harrington series. The guy's just an awful, awful writer for everything except lavish descriptions of a million nuclear space missiles detonating at once, which are admittedly awesome to read. Problem is, he writes characters the same way.

>>2958806
I remember the brief Huge Orson Welles meme.

>>2958826
Have you ever considered writing pithy reviews for newspapers? Because you should, and I'm being completely sincere here.

>go to the sci-fi/fantasy section of a bookstore
>pick a random book
>congratulations, you've acquired "low class" and "no merit" literature

Its pretty pleb but I don't considered it bad, in fact I really enjoyed The Wheel of Time.

WoT though, either you love it or you hate it. No middle ground.

Why in the world do you want to read something 'low class' and with 'no merit'?

If you want to read some scifi or fantasy you can read quality examples of both genres (inb4 all fantasy and sci fi are pleb). You can find more bad literature outside these two styles.

>>2958849
>congratulations, you're an ignorant, elitist fag

>>2958857
In order for his statement to be false at least 50% or more of random sci-fi and fantasy books should be middle to upper class. Is that what you are stating?

>>2958818
I understand the difference, I'm looking for "pleb"

>>2958856
Expand my horizonts

>>2958863
Not really. Every genre consists of a minority of gems in a sea of poo. This applies to non-genre literature too. The chances of randomly picking out a sub par example in the sci fi or fantasy section is pretty great, but the same is true for any style of writing or genre. If he was to pick a great work of scifi or fantasy what then?

>>2958849 iks just talking shit.

Try the Kingkiller Chronicles. It's not bad at all, actually, and very accessible (for literature).

What a shitty thread so far.

OP, I'm gonna pull two titles out of the air for you.

Sci Fi:
>Downward to the Earth by Robert Silverberg.

My favorite sci fi novel, it even got a nice write up at B&N today. http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/Explorations-The-BN-SciFi-and/Robert-Silverberg-s-Transcenden
tal-Classic-Still-Mind-Blowing/ba-p/1381212

Fantasy:
>The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfus.

I read this a couple books ago and liked it a lot. It's a plebey fantasy coming-of-ager, but it had a certain magic that kept the pages turning. This one is also a relatively new book, so you can really make people mad by saying you liked it.

.

just read ASOIAF. it's trashy as all hell but impossible to put down. if that doesn't strike your fancy, you could always sample the King of the plebs - pic related. I'd suggest the Stand or the Long Walk.

>>2958896
silverberg fuck yeah. pretty sure this is what op wants. this was probably written in a week and it's plenty entertaining, but it's also not brainmeltingly dumb.

>>2958943
King and ASOIAF are like the kind of stuff I'm looking for but all of those books are pretty long and this is not a project I wish to dedicate too much time

>>2958943
Christ, The Stand had a horrible ending.
Yet somehow I don't regret reading it... CONFOUND YOU, KING, CONFOUND YOU!

>>2958975
King has written a lot of short stories and short novels. Pick up one of his collections of short fiction. They're generally better than his long form novels anyway.

>>2959136
>Longer and suckier
>Shorter and better
Uff can't decide

The Founding sounds like exactly what you're looking for. Dan Abnett is pretty great at writing battle scenes.

You may also consider Eisenhorn, which has better characters than the Gaunt's Ghosts series (though not as much action).

Most perturbatory.

>>2958806
Atlas Shrugged. Can't get worse than that, OP.

Relevant to my interests, I've been wanting to read some simple fiction, nothing too high-brow, just a fun page turner that isn't too dumb/childish, ie Percy Jackson

>>2959395
>>2959405
Do I need any WH knowlage before picking it up?

The Eye of Argon

You sure you can handle this?

>>2959493
Already readed it, I even make an audiobook

>>2959514
Looks heterosexual

>>2959521
I can show you the door...

>>2959521
...but you're the one who must walk through it.

>>2958943
What do people mean when they describe Asoiaf as 'trashy'? This word is always thrown around the instance these books are brought up on /lit/. I have no idea if it's supposed to mean anything significant. The books have some very well-realized themes and ideas, it's just that they're written in simple language.

>>2959528
>>2959533

>>2959551
> The books have some very well-realized themes and ideas

No, they don't. They're shitty soap opera with ridiculous Renfayre constumes.

>>2959656
good post imo

Bumping

>>2960593
>>2960593

>>2958880
>Expand my horizonts
Some fantasy:
Lord Dunsany
Clark Ashton Smith
George MacDonald
Fritz Leiber
Robert E. Howard
Jack Vance
Leigh Brackett
Poul Anderson
Gene Wolfe
Guy Gavriel Kay
Hope Mirlees
Patrick Rothfuss
Roger Zelazny

Ringworld series and Protector, by Larry Niven.

You really can't pull anything from it but SF wankery and bad dialogue.

Also I really like the Protectors' behavior and how they run on resolve.

>>2958880
>Expand my horizonts
Some fantasy:
Lord Dunsany
Clark Ashton Smith
George MacDonald
Fritz Leiber
Robert E. Howard
Jack Vance
Leigh Brackett
Poul Anderson
Gene Wolfe
Guy Gavriel Kay
Hope Mirlees
Patrick Rothfuss
Roger Zelazny
Terry Pratchett
Edgar Rice Burroughs

Some SF:
Alfred Bester
Frank Herbert
Robert A. Heinlein
Arthur C. Clarke
Philip K. Dick
Jack Vance
Theodore Sturgeon
Frederik Pohl
Cordwainer Smith
Ursula LeGuin
Spider Robinson

>>2961114
b-b-but a lot of these have literary merit.

>>2961124
Maybe, I just didn't feel right in parading out Black Library or RGP tie-in horrors when he was asking for his "horizons to be expanded".

Last bump.

This question still stands >>2959464