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A Song of Ice and Fire / Other Topics / Recommended Reading VII

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Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 13th 4:33 PM
There, that should be right. ;)

Thorfinn posted:

Just wanted to keep this up. I like reading what others recomend.

Hey, there is a website for Jakl of Nar.
www.tyrantsandkings.com

its pretty cool but, no meesage board. I've already sent him an e-mail saying how much I liked his book and he replied the next day! Check it out.

I'm going to buy Grand Design today (I have a 2 week business trip and that will keep me busy at night).

Tom R.
User ID: 3647314 Apr 13th 6:28 PM
Greyjoy, as I mentioned at the end of the VI thread, I also have a lot of questions I'd like to discuss someday concerning "Jackal of Nar," but I suspect some of them may be answered in "The Grand Design," which I'll be starting soon.

The whole incident with Biagio about midway through Jackal took me quite by surprise. I didn't see that one coming, I must say, and Jojustin proved a surprise, as well. One of the things that Marco does is make you think he is "building up" a character for some purpose and then, the next thing you know, that character is TOAST. It really keeps you, as the reader, on your toes. Marco is kind of like Martin in that regard.

What I'd most like to know right now is where, exactly, Marco and this storyline are going with regard to "magic" ... especially in view of the rather surprising ending of the first book. But, then again, as I said, I don't want to give anything away by actually discussing what happened.

Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 13th 7:01 PM
BTW, I'm considering what to do about spoilerish discussion of various books in general. I think the best option right now is probably to have a thread for Marco, and in the future push it together with other similar threads in some useable fashion.

Greyjoy
User ID: 0860834 Apr 13th 7:37 PM
Hey Tom,
I was at Marco's homepage and it said something about a fourth book as well. Do you know anything about this?
I also know what you mean about the building up of certain characters.
I'm telling you right now, the mark of a great author is whether he can write a thoroughly convincing evil/bad guy. Not many authors can create such characters, more often than not they come off as comical. However, Marco is doing one hell of a job with Biagio. I love that guy. A great bad guy is always wonderful.
I'm also wondering where he's gonna go with the magic. Right now I'm on page 500 and I should be done by Saturday. I'm just motoring along.
I'll tell you what is annoying though. I live up in Nova Scotia Canada and we still don't have the Grand Design here yet. I work in a bookstore and am checking everyday but it is still not here.
Oh, and another thing Tom or Ran, isn't it funny as hell when Liss comes up in the book and there ability to hold off the empire? I always get a kick out of that. As Richius says, "God bless those hearty bastards."

Greyjoy
User ID: 0860834 Apr 13th 7:39 PM
One more thing,
Tom or Ran, you should check out Marco's website that is listed above. It's pretty cool.

Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 13th 7:53 PM
Not read the books, myself, though I might soon. Just doing the moderator thing. :)

Tom R.
User ID: 3647314 Apr 13th 8:03 PM
Yeah, I've been to Marco's site. He seems very accessible, doesn't he?

That "fourth volume" you're referring to, Greyjoy, is actually just part 2 of "The Grand Design." Evidently, the German edition(s) of these books are each being printed in two volumes or something like that, thus making the latter half of the Grand Design "volume 4" in the German language version. I think that's what Marco was referring to, anyway.

As for getting a copy of Grand Design in Nova Scotia, maybe you could order the book from Amazon.com? That's how I got mine.

And thanks, Ran. You do that "moderator thing" quite well.

labor
User ID: 8722703 Apr 14th 3:58 AM
I am game to discuss "Jackal of Nar" and am not afraid of spoilers for the further books. Though, I�ll have to warn you that I am going to disrupt your shining harmony... For instance, while I agree that Biaggio has some promise, he and the other villains seemed incredibly ham-handed and not very bright to me... As to Richius, I don�t think that his silliness detracts from his character, in fact I rather liked him. But then, I like Sansa, too.

Let�s start a "Jackal" thread,so that we can stop tiptoing around and really discuss it!

Throfinn
User ID: 9906923 Apr 14th 9:50 AM
Sorry Ran. I screwed up again. #@it happens.

Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 14th 9:56 AM
No problem, Thorfinn. :)

Shagga
User ID: 9022063 Apr 14th 11:56 PM
Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment

Great Literary peice of art

Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 19th 4:06 PM
Finished _The Brotherhood of the Wolf_ by David Farland, the second book of his Runelords series.

All considered, it's a bit above average -- superior to someone like Eddings, in my mind, and I've found it rather more interesting (or perhaps less annoying -- bloody Scottish dwarves...) than Feist.

The real draw, I suppose, is the magic system -- a way of using "forcibles" made of a rare metal to pass endowments of brawn, wit, metabolism, stamina, etc. from one person to another. I'm not a person particularly impressed by magic systems, though, but still, this one's a good try.

There's some holes in the system -- oversights from the author than anything. But Farland also isn't particularly good at logistics or even military matters, I'm afraid. He's got hundreds of thousands of people from all around the continent, coming to one spot which was recently stripped bare by warfare, and not a single mention of people starving.

Big story, as well, of course -- though he seems intent to make the series (planned as 5 books) cover a very short time. Perhaps as little as a couple of months, I suppose. It's a big land, but travel isn't much of an issue when "force" horses, endowed with metabolism and stamina, can race hundreds of miles in a day.

Characters and dialogue ... hrm. The characters are often rather generic, though not unlikeable, and their travails and dialogue are rather bland and often kind of sloppy (redundancies and the like.) The only moderately interesting character is the deluded, power-mad "villain" (I put it in quotes because, though he really is a bad guy, he's not the most dangerous of the enemies to mankind), Raj Ahten. But we've seen these type of characters before, so it's nothing new.

Plot complexity is last I suppose, and it rather pales against GRRM or Jordan and so on. Oh, Farland shows there's some interesting turns coming, but political power plays are kept simple and rather direct, with only one promising any level of mystery or complexity.

If I had to grade the first two books on a scale, I'd call it about a 5.5 of 10 -- worth reading if nothing better is at hand, good and honest fantasy literature that follows a clean, simple line, not particularly demanding. _The Brotherhood of the Wolf_ itself is very slow to start, and really doesn't pick up until the last couple hundred pages.

Ran
User ID: 0867924 Apr 20th 6:34 AM
I thought we had already gone over, folks, that "borrowing" someone else's name to make stupid posts is _not_ amusing. I've deleted one such, I'm almost certain. If I'm wrong, I'll just say I'm shocked, and will hash it out by e-mail with whoever; not naming names).

I hope not to see any resurgence in that rather annoying prank, and also hope that folks will try to keep their posts constructive in this sort of topic.

Ser Gary
User ID: 1502094 Apr 22nd 8:20 AM
"Borrowing" anyone's name for ANY reason is at the very least unethical.

Back to books, though :) I just completed Lonesome Dove, which I'd been wanting to read for several months. I was amazed at how closely the mini-series followed the novel. Along those lines, there were few surprises for me. However, I have come to realize that the book is almost always better than the movie - and that was certainly the case here. There was much more detail offered, especially in terms of the characters' backgrounds. That was particularly true of Clara. And Augustus McRae is undoubtedly one of the greatest literary characters ever created. I won't go on and on about the book, but it is definitely worth anyone's while to pick it up while we're all sitting around waiting for ASOS to come out. I'm planning to read Lonesome Dove's sequel in the near future.

Dirjj
User ID: 0094674 Apr 23rd 11:57 PM
I just finished the Hel's Crucible Duology by Dennis McKieren. I don't know if I thought it was dumb for the sake of it, or because the author was bashed by others on this site. It's true, it's true, it was a lame story. Well, actually the story itself wasn't lame, but damn me if the author didn't create the lamest protagonists. Here's some stupid points:

*************spoilers*******************

1). The entire point of the first book was for the two warrows (read that, Hobbits the ballz the size of grapefruits) to deliver a token to a King Agron in Aven about a 1000 leagues away. All the token was, was just a summons by the High King for Agron to muster his forces to join the High King. I'll leave some stuff out, but basically, Agron mustered an army of 30K, and instead of sending them to aid the King, he tries to attack the enemies land of Gron (read that Morder). Well, two chapters later, his entire army is swallowed up by an Avalanche. Dumb!!

2) The High King finally arrives with all the forces of the free folk from over 12 nations, and read this, he barely has 40K men. He is later reinforced by another army that shows up late that had 30K from Jord. Aven and Jord are way out in BFE (bumfukegypt) and they muster 60K, while the High King and such who live in more prosperous land only muster 40K. Hmm. Stupid.

3) Then, ala Tolkien, the bad guys still outnumber the good guys 3 to 1, but get wiped out in one fell swoop by a flood. Oh boy!

*******************end of spoiler****************

Well, that's it for what it's worth.

ab

Kristin
User ID: 0192094 Apr 24th 0:05 AM
Well, I just started Jackal of Nar. I like it so far, although Richius has an amusing last name--Vantran is the name of a transportation service for the handicapped in the town where I live. Every time his name shows up, I get very incongrous mental images of white vans with red trim on the battlefields.

Relic
User ID: 9308123 Apr 24th 0:35 AM
I read this awhile back in high school but did anyone here read the Death Gate Cycle by Weiss and Hickman? At the time i read it I thought it to be an amazing work of fantasy/sci-fi.

WeissVan
User ID: 5483603 Apr 24th 1:37 AM
Ser Gary, I definitely encourage you to read "Streets of Laredo", the next one in the series and is set 20 (!) years after "Lonesome Dove". The prequels "Dead Man's Walk" and "Comanche Moon" are not as good (feels like McMurtry is getting the most mileage he can out of Gus & Call).

But "Lonesome Dove" and "Streets of Laredo" together make an awesome two-part epic. All I can say about "Streets of Laredo" -- poetic justice. And the mini-series was not bad, either.

The rest of you may be saying, "Why are you discussing WESTERNS?" I must respond that "Lonesome Dove" transcends the genre, and I heartily encourage Martin fans who enjoy an epic with unforgettable characters to pick up "Lonesome Dove".

Tom R.
User ID: 3647314 Apr 24th 4:53 AM
Let us know what you think of Jackal, Kristin. I liked it pretty well, and now I'm about 100 pages into the sequel, The Grand Design. It's a pretty intriguing story, I think.

Relic: I read the death gate cycle because I had so much enjoyed the Dragonlance novels by Hickman and Weis. While I thought the basic premise of the Deathgate books was pretty clever, I found the characterizations to be pretty weak. The primary character, Haplo, had virtually no personality at all, and I also felt the books had a disjointed, hurriedly-written feel to them. The best of the lot, IMHO, was Fire Sea. Now that these authors have returned to Dragonlance and Krynn, it'll be interesting to see what they can come up with.

Ser Gary
User ID: 1502094 Apr 24th 8:37 AM
WeissVan, thanks so much for your comments concerning the Lonesome Dove saga. I just started Streets of Laredo. I do want to mention one thing to those of you have read it, though:

** SPOILERS **

Having read Lonesome Dove and familiarized myself with many of the characters, I find the marriage between Lorena and Pea Eye totally implausible. He had zero social skills, and despite her questionable background she was beautiful and had recently become educated. I've had a difficult time getting used to that union. Anyone else?

Next 20 Messages Newest Messages

Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 13th 4:33 PM There, that should be right. ;) Thorfinn posted: Just wanted to keep this up. I like reading what others recomend. Hey, there is a website for Jakl of Nar. www.tyrantsandkings.com its pretty cool but, no meesage board. I've already sent him an e-mail saying how much I liked his book and he replied the next day! Check it out. I'm going to buy Grand Design today (I have a 2 week business trip and that will keep me busy at night).
Tom R. User ID: 3647314	Apr 13th 6:28 PM Greyjoy, as I mentioned at the end of the VI thread, I also have a lot of questions I'd like to discuss someday concerning "Jackal of Nar," but I suspect some of them may be answered in "The Grand Design," which I'll be starting soon. The whole incident with Biagio about midway through Jackal took me quite by surprise. I didn't see that one coming, I must say, and Jojustin proved a surprise, as well. One of the things that Marco does is make you think he is "building up" a character for some purpose and then, the next thing you know, that character is TOAST. It really keeps you, as the reader, on your toes. Marco is kind of like Martin in that regard. What I'd most like to know right now is where, exactly, Marco and this storyline are going with regard to "magic" ... especially in view of the rather surprising ending of the first book. But, then again, as I said, I don't want to give anything away by actually discussing what happened.
Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 13th 7:01 PM BTW, I'm considering what to do about spoilerish discussion of various books in general. I think the best option right now is probably to have a thread for Marco, and in the future push it together with other similar threads in some useable fashion.
Greyjoy User ID: 0860834	Apr 13th 7:37 PM Hey Tom, I was at Marco's homepage and it said something about a fourth book as well. Do you know anything about this? I also know what you mean about the building up of certain characters. I'm telling you right now, the mark of a great author is whether he can write a thoroughly convincing evil/bad guy. Not many authors can create such characters, more often than not they come off as comical. However, Marco is doing one hell of a job with Biagio. I love that guy. A great bad guy is always wonderful. I'm also wondering where he's gonna go with the magic. Right now I'm on page 500 and I should be done by Saturday. I'm just motoring along. I'll tell you what is annoying though. I live up in Nova Scotia Canada and we still don't have the Grand Design here yet. I work in a bookstore and am checking everyday but it is still not here. Oh, and another thing Tom or Ran, isn't it funny as hell when Liss comes up in the book and there ability to hold off the empire? I always get a kick out of that. As Richius says, "God bless those hearty bastards."
Greyjoy User ID: 0860834	Apr 13th 7:39 PM One more thing, Tom or Ran, you should check out Marco's website that is listed above. It's pretty cool.
Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 13th 7:53 PM Not read the books, myself, though I might soon. Just doing the moderator thing. :)
Tom R. User ID: 3647314	Apr 13th 8:03 PM Yeah, I've been to Marco's site. He seems very accessible, doesn't he? That "fourth volume" you're referring to, Greyjoy, is actually just part 2 of "The Grand Design." Evidently, the German edition(s) of these books are each being printed in two volumes or something like that, thus making the latter half of the Grand Design "volume 4" in the German language version. I think that's what Marco was referring to, anyway. As for getting a copy of Grand Design in Nova Scotia, maybe you could order the book from Amazon.com? That's how I got mine. And thanks, Ran. You do that "moderator thing" quite well.
labor User ID: 8722703	Apr 14th 3:58 AM I am game to discuss "Jackal of Nar" and am not afraid of spoilers for the further books. Though, I�ll have to warn you that I am going to disrupt your shining harmony... For instance, while I agree that Biaggio has some promise, he and the other villains seemed incredibly ham-handed and not very bright to me... As to Richius, I don�t think that his silliness detracts from his character, in fact I rather liked him. But then, I like Sansa, too. Let�s start a "Jackal" thread,so that we can stop tiptoing around and really discuss it!
Throfinn User ID: 9906923	Apr 14th 9:50 AM Sorry Ran. I screwed up again. #@it happens.
Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 14th 9:56 AM No problem, Thorfinn. :)
Shagga User ID: 9022063	Apr 14th 11:56 PM Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment Great Literary peice of art
Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 19th 4:06 PM Finished _The Brotherhood of the Wolf_ by David Farland, the second book of his Runelords series. All considered, it's a bit above average -- superior to someone like Eddings, in my mind, and I've found it rather more interesting (or perhaps less annoying -- bloody Scottish dwarves...) than Feist. The real draw, I suppose, is the magic system -- a way of using "forcibles" made of a rare metal to pass endowments of brawn, wit, metabolism, stamina, etc. from one person to another. I'm not a person particularly impressed by magic systems, though, but still, this one's a good try. There's some holes in the system -- oversights from the author than anything. But Farland also isn't particularly good at logistics or even military matters, I'm afraid. He's got hundreds of thousands of people from all around the continent, coming to one spot which was recently stripped bare by warfare, and not a single mention of people starving. Big story, as well, of course -- though he seems intent to make the series (planned as 5 books) cover a very short time. Perhaps as little as a couple of months, I suppose. It's a big land, but travel isn't much of an issue when "force" horses, endowed with metabolism and stamina, can race hundreds of miles in a day. Characters and dialogue ... hrm. The characters are often rather generic, though not unlikeable, and their travails and dialogue are rather bland and often kind of sloppy (redundancies and the like.) The only moderately interesting character is the deluded, power-mad "villain" (I put it in quotes because, though he really is a bad guy, he's not the most dangerous of the enemies to mankind), Raj Ahten. But we've seen these type of characters before, so it's nothing new. Plot complexity is last I suppose, and it rather pales against GRRM or Jordan and so on. Oh, Farland shows there's some interesting turns coming, but political power plays are kept simple and rather direct, with only one promising any level of mystery or complexity. If I had to grade the first two books on a scale, I'd call it about a 5.5 of 10 -- worth reading if nothing better is at hand, good and honest fantasy literature that follows a clean, simple line, not particularly demanding. _The Brotherhood of the Wolf_ itself is very slow to start, and really doesn't pick up until the last couple hundred pages.
Ran User ID: 0867924	Apr 20th 6:34 AM I thought we had already gone over, folks, that "borrowing" someone else's name to make stupid posts is _not_ amusing. I've deleted one such, I'm almost certain. If I'm wrong, I'll just say I'm shocked, and will hash it out by e-mail with whoever; not naming names). I hope not to see any resurgence in that rather annoying prank, and also hope that folks will try to keep their posts constructive in this sort of topic.
Ser Gary User ID: 1502094	Apr 22nd 8:20 AM "Borrowing" anyone's name for ANY reason is at the very least unethical. Back to books, though :) I just completed Lonesome Dove, which I'd been wanting to read for several months. I was amazed at how closely the mini-series followed the novel. Along those lines, there were few surprises for me. However, I have come to realize that the book is almost always better than the movie - and that was certainly the case here. There was much more detail offered, especially in terms of the characters' backgrounds. That was particularly true of Clara. And Augustus McRae is undoubtedly one of the greatest literary characters ever created. I won't go on and on about the book, but it is definitely worth anyone's while to pick it up while we're all sitting around waiting for ASOS to come out. I'm planning to read Lonesome Dove's sequel in the near future.
Dirjj User ID: 0094674	Apr 23rd 11:57 PM I just finished the Hel's Crucible Duology by Dennis McKieren. I don't know if I thought it was dumb for the sake of it, or because the author was bashed by others on this site. It's true, it's true, it was a lame story. Well, actually the story itself wasn't lame, but damn me if the author didn't create the lamest protagonists. Here's some stupid points: ***********spoilers*************** 1). The entire point of the first book was for the two warrows (read that, Hobbits the ballz the size of grapefruits) to deliver a token to a King Agron in Aven about a 1000 leagues away. All the token was, was just a summons by the High King for Agron to muster his forces to join the High King. I'll leave some stuff out, but basically, Agron mustered an army of 30K, and instead of sending them to aid the King, he tries to attack the enemies land of Gron (read that Morder). Well, two chapters later, his entire army is swallowed up by an Avalanche. Dumb!! 2) The High King finally arrives with all the forces of the free folk from over 12 nations, and read this, he barely has 40K men. He is later reinforced by another army that shows up late that had 30K from Jord. Aven and Jord are way out in BFE (bumfukegypt) and they muster 60K, while the High King and such who live in more prosperous land only muster 40K. Hmm. Stupid. 3) Then, ala Tolkien, the bad guys still outnumber the good guys 3 to 1, but get wiped out in one fell swoop by a flood. Oh boy! ***************end of spoiler************** Well, that's it for what it's worth. ab
Kristin User ID: 0192094	Apr 24th 0:05 AM Well, I just started Jackal of Nar. I like it so far, although Richius has an amusing last name--Vantran is the name of a transportation service for the handicapped in the town where I live. Every time his name shows up, I get very incongrous mental images of white vans with red trim on the battlefields.
Relic User ID: 9308123	Apr 24th 0:35 AM I read this awhile back in high school but did anyone here read the Death Gate Cycle by Weiss and Hickman? At the time i read it I thought it to be an amazing work of fantasy/sci-fi.
WeissVan User ID: 5483603	Apr 24th 1:37 AM Ser Gary, I definitely encourage you to read "Streets of Laredo", the next one in the series and is set 20 (!) years after "Lonesome Dove". The prequels "Dead Man's Walk" and "Comanche Moon" are not as good (feels like McMurtry is getting the most mileage he can out of Gus & Call). But "Lonesome Dove" and "Streets of Laredo" together make an awesome two-part epic. All I can say about "Streets of Laredo" -- poetic justice. And the mini-series was not bad, either. The rest of you may be saying, "Why are you discussing WESTERNS?" I must respond that "Lonesome Dove" transcends the genre, and I heartily encourage Martin fans who enjoy an epic with unforgettable characters to pick up "Lonesome Dove".
Tom R. User ID: 3647314	Apr 24th 4:53 AM Let us know what you think of Jackal, Kristin. I liked it pretty well, and now I'm about 100 pages into the sequel, The Grand Design. It's a pretty intriguing story, I think. Relic: I read the death gate cycle because I had so much enjoyed the Dragonlance novels by Hickman and Weis. While I thought the basic premise of the Deathgate books was pretty clever, I found the characterizations to be pretty weak. The primary character, Haplo, had virtually no personality at all, and I also felt the books had a disjointed, hurriedly-written feel to them. The best of the lot, IMHO, was Fire Sea. Now that these authors have returned to Dragonlance and Krynn, it'll be interesting to see what they can come up with.
Ser Gary User ID: 1502094	Apr 24th 8:37 AM WeissVan, thanks so much for your comments concerning the Lonesome Dove saga. I just started Streets of Laredo. I do want to mention one thing to those of you have read it, though: SPOILERS Having read Lonesome Dove and familiarized myself with many of the characters, I find the marriage between Lorena and Pea Eye totally implausible. He had zero social skills, and despite her questionable background she was beautiful and had recently become educated. I've had a difficult time getting used to that union. Anyone else?