Books

[Frank Delicious]

And if anyone recommends A Song of Fire and Ice that person should instantly be ignored because they clearly have no taste in books.

[uNicedmeMan]

I didn't get to read any of those books in college (stupid business degree).

Stranger in a Strange Land was badass and is in my top 5.

I just threw down Slaughter House Five because of how much fun that book is to read. I love recommending it to folks.

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Oh hey, I know you're a DFW fan. Just finished A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, it's a good time, highly recommend. What a virtuoso bad-ass he was.

I'll check that out. I'm still working on Infinite Jest (moving and other things have cut into my reading) but I'll check it out after. His non-fiction is pretty good too, check out Consider the Lobster (been pretty busy so I'll read alot then let it sit for a week or two.

[chiggins]

check out Consider the Lobster

Loved that one too. ASFTINDA is all reporting and essays too, but same kinda thing. Every paragraph's a pleasure to read and the insights are potent and hilarious.

[Timko]

I'm reading Against The Day by Thomas Pynchon.

If you REALLY want a challenge, pick up Gravity's Rainbow.

[some call me...tim?]

And if anyone recommends A Song of Fire and Ice that person should instantly be ignored because they clearly have no taste in books.

????

I guess I don't have taste in books, because I thoroughly enjoyed those (though, the fourth book was the weakest, I thought). Why the hate for GRRM?

[Frank Delicious]

And if anyone recommends A Song of Fire and Ice that person should instantly be ignored because they clearly have no taste in books.

????

I guess I don't have taste in books, because I thoroughly enjoyed those (though, the fourth book was the weakest, I thought). Why the hate for GRRM?

Don't listen to any book this man recommends.

[Frank Delicious]

And if anyone recommends A Song of Fire and Ice that person should instantly be ignored because they clearly have no taste in books.

????

I guess I don't have taste in books, because I thoroughly enjoyed those (though, the fourth book was the weakest, I thought). Why the hate for GRRM?

I read the first one and part of the second one and I couldn't decide what was worst, the prose or the frequency of rape scenes.

[some call me...tim?]

hehe, I would have recommended Stranger in a Strange Land too.

I didn't think the prose was bad at all, though I wouldn't mark that as the strength of the books. And yeah, there's lots of scandalous behavior throughout the books, but it's all very believable. It's fantasy sure, but that rape, murder, torture, etc. is all stuff that really went on in medieval times. It's a lot more convincing than say, Tolkien's world, where the most you see of carnal desire is Sam's infatuation with Rosie, or Eowyn's crush on Aragorn. (I still dig on LOTR too, btw). GRRM's world isn't a pretty one, but neither is reality.

What I liked most about the books was the shades of gray...there were only a couple characters you could legitimately put into a corner of "good" or "evil". At some points, you loathe a character, only to end up rooting for them later. I also found his pacing and tension to be extremely well done, even though the books were huge, I never got bored with them (except #4 dragged a bit).

[Frank Delicious]

While I agree that many fantasy novels idealize Medieval times, ASOFAI really went above and beyond on the rape scenes and moved into rape fetish territory too many times for me.

For me there are way better trash fantasy novels that aren't a thousand pages long, have an ending, and don't contain multiple references to a woman's virginity being taken forcible. I could go the rest of my life without reading in detail about blood dripping out of "places" in the ways GRRM describes them.

I have actually been really into space opera trash lately and have read a ton of Alastair Reyonds stuff lately and it has been all good.

[disc junkie]

My favorite series of all time has to be the

Sword of Truth Series by Terry Goodkind

The first three of the series being my favorite.

Goodkind's novels include the following:

Wizard's First Rule (1994)
Stone of Tears (1995)
Blood of the Fold (1996)
Temple of the Winds (1997)
Soul of the Fire (1999)
Faith of the Fallen (2000)
The Pillars of Creation (2002)
Naked Empire (2003)
Chainfire (2005)
Phantom (2006)
Confessor (2007)

[Timko]

If you're into the fantasy genre, I read the 1st 6 books of the Wheel of Time series, and thought they were really good.

[Frank Delicious]

Why does everyone here love reading series that don't end?

[disc junkie]

Why does everyone here love reading series that don't end?

Im scared of the end

[chiggins]

Its rained all week and its suppose to rain the rest of the week where I live. Anybody know of any new good books to read?

So back to the OP: whatcha in the mood for? Action? Crime drama? Mystery? Fantasy? SciFi? Bodice Ripper? Fine Litchrutcha?

[some call me...tim?]

While I agree that many fantasy novels idealize Medieval times, ASOFAI really went above and beyond on the rape scenes and moved into rape fetish territory too many times for me.

For me there are way better trash fantasy novels that aren't a thousand pages long, have an ending, and don't contain multiple references to a woman's virginity being taken forcible. I could go the rest of my life without reading in detail about blood dripping out of "places" in the ways GRRM describes them.

I have actually been really into space opera trash lately and have read a ton of Alastair Reyonds stuff lately and it has been all good.

I honestly don't remember too many rape scenes in the stories. There's lots of violence and brutality, sure, but most of the sexual stuff I remember had to do with prostitutes and such. There was the part about marriage of Daenerys to her husband, who was basically a fantasy version of Genghis Khan, and that was pretty brutal from what I recall. That's all over relatively quickly in the scope of the novels though. And to be fair, most of the people committing atrocities in the books, end up getting their just desserts in the end.

I got into the Sword of Truth and Wheel of Time series a bit, got through the first 4 or so books in each one, but they kind of got stale on me. I may give them another go at some point though.

Frank, what fantasy novels would recommend? I'm always on the lookout for more stuff. And just because something isn't highbrow literature, I wouldn't call it "trash"...formulaic plots and cookie cutter characters, I would call trash--like the equivalent of sitcom TV. Trash to me is just there to pass time and fill a void, if a story leaves you thinking afterward, and has characters you remember years later, it ain't trash. BTW, ASOFAI is SUPPOSED to end (I think), if GRRM would get his ass in gear and get the book(s) finished.

I just got done with Book III of Stephen King's "The Dark Tower" saga. I'm not usually a big King fan, but this is better than I would have expected. Weird and trippy, but pretty cool. It makes me want to play Fallout 3.