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I loved The Heroes by Abercrombie. His many dark heros and badass northmen are some of my favorite book characters.
With that said, First Law started promising and then went down at the end. Other than Glokta, which is a great character imo, the rest is forgettable. Not a book I'd recommend to classic/high fantasy fans that's for sure.
For me its a page turner/light read, you can't go into it expecting a masterwork or you will be felt down.
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England2657 Posts
On March 11 2017 02:04 Redox wrote: I liked the First Law trilogy. I guess I prefer most that there is no classic good vs bad situation and the generally mature approach. And I much prefer when magic is not so omnipresent. Although the build-up is indeed slow. It is a trilogy though, without the 3rd book evaluating the overall arch does not really work. Also I dont agree at all on "no character development". E.g. the development of self-centered golden boy Jezal is one of the main story lines. Logen also has development even though his path kinda takes him full circle and he ends up where he started. Never had any trouble remembering characters. They are indeed often cliche-ed but all super different from each other.
I'd say that the story is still pretty black and white compared to other books. Also, development of Jezal? You mean + Show Spoiler +he's a cliché, then he gets hit with a mace and gets nicer? Such a sudden change of tone is not good development, in my opinion. .
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England2657 Posts
I've started working my way through reading recommendations including the /lit/ top 100 list that was making the rounds a year ago. I finished Ubik by Phillip K. Dick a few days ago and enjoyed it mostly. There are some weird spelling errors and that in there and in some ways, the book feels rushed. I wonder what the book could've done with an extra 100 pages to really flesh out characters and the situation. A lot of it is kind of glazed over. Anyway, the premise is interesting and really made me stop and think about what was happening and how, which is a great thing for a book. I think it kind of has a fun unreliable narrative too. A lot of the time you just can't believe the explanations given.
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Ubik is one of PKD's best, and many feel he could have done a lot more with it.
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Ubik is awesome. The scene in the beginning with the girl switching up realities during the conversation is amazing. Talking about science-fiction, this arrived in the mail today
![[image loading]](https://images-eu.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51-EAB0ZTgL.jpg)
Aurora was really good and the mars trilogy is still one of my favourite series, so I am excited
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The Catcher in the Rye Novel by J. D. Salinger xD
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England2657 Posts
How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid. Was recommended the book from a blog I like. It was alright and somewhat compelling reading, but it kind of just tapers off and not a lot really happens in it. It kind of summarises someone's life without ever really explaining the whys.
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Just finished
![[image loading]](http://images.gr-assets.com/books/1480096580l/34897.jpg)
the 3rd book of Wheel of Time out of 14 lol
oh man totally got what i expected from the series
+ Show Spoiler [I waited 3 books for this to happen] +He raised Callandor above his head. Silver lightning crackled from the blade, jagged streaks arching toward the great dome above. “Stop!” he shouted. The fighting ceased; men stared at him in wonder, over black veils, from beneath the rims of round helmets. “I am Rand al’Thor!” he called, so his voice rang through the chamber. “I am the Dragon Reborn!” Callandor shone in his grasp. He was so damn naive. Now finally
this series is so fun
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On March 15 2017 05:11 {CC}StealthBlue wrote: ![[image loading]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51am8V2N91L._SX330_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg) ![[image loading]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51j0AyyRqgL._SX327_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg)
Ironically enough I've been reading the same bio of Oppenheimer lately. Have a professor currently who co-authored it.
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ironically enough to what? seems not very ironic. coincidental maybe ...
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Alanis Morissette ironic
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like raaaaaaiiiiiiiinnnnn on your wedding day? the double irony: wherein the symbolic wedding day is radiantly sunny but dreariness interrupts this fantasy; wherein rain is dreary but symbolizes radiant fertility?
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I started but stopped fairly quickly. I think you need to know the lore pretty well to appreciate it.
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I actually started reading Warhammer 40k a few weeks ago. Since I had no idea where to start, I searched online and found these recommendations. I simply started with the first book recommended which is ![[image loading]](http://b-i.forbesimg.com/jenniferbosier/files/2013/04/eisenhorn-eisenhorn-omnibus-14738197.jpeg) For the background, I spent some hours in this wiki which I found very helpful.
As far as I see the books in the bundle are the Horus Heresy series. After everything I have read, this seems to be more for people who already have lots of W40k background, so probably it is not the starting point you are looking for.
Some comments on the Eisenhorn books I am reading: Generally an OK book. This is obviously supposed to appeal more to young (as in highschool) american males. I am only the latter, so some of the book is quite cheesy to me. For example, the main character is supposed to be the stoic, cool type that I guess appeals to younger guys. To reinforce this, in one encounter his facial nerves are hurt which results in him being unable to show any facial expressions (no, I am not kidding!). Most of the characters are pretty one-dimensional; everything is pretty simple good versus evil. Many of the things the characters do are neither well motivated nor intelligent (like attacking a cult nest containing an unknown number of heretics with unknown special powers with just a team of a handful people despite many more being available).
That being said, on a mechanical level it is rather well designed. I imagine that this is the kind of book you learn to write if you pay attention in writing courses. There is nothing wrong with this, easy to read, it's just very formulaic.
Overall, this is more of a guilty pleasure for me. I imagine that reading, say, 40 shades of grey or watching telenovelas must be similar for some people. I mostly started this because I wanted to see what the universe is like (kind of as expected, large but not very deep) and I needed something easy to read for a long train trip. And for this purpose these books are fine. So while I am not going crazy about this book or the world, I could see myself reading more W40k books in the future (I have more train trips coming up).
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On March 30 2017 20:53 123Gurke wrote: Overall, this is more of a guilty pleasure for me. I imagine that reading, say, 40 shades of grey or watching telenovelas must be similar for some people. I mostly started this because I wanted to see what the universe is like (kind of as expected, large but not very deep) and I needed something easy to read for a long train trip. And for this purpose these books are fine. So while I am not going crazy about this book or the world, I could see myself reading more W40k books in the future (I have more train trips coming up).
Thank you for the information. Based on your post I am skipping that bundle. I still have a 50 book backlog (due to starting to read web novels) so no rush finding more. It seems I am a huge fan of LitRPG, didn't really know that until recently when the genre started expanding and the selection increased. These are books where you can talk about guilty pleasure, I can imagine most other stuff people talk about in that style actually being less of it.
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England2657 Posts
The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks - Was entertaining enough. Didn't hit me much beyond that.
A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell - Don't think I have much to say about this beyond the standard response. Super interesting in some places but a little all over. Lists the history nicely and expands on the philosophy of certain points too. My issue is that certain people that Russell doesn't like or agree with get lampooned pretty heavily which leads to entire chapters being pretty weak.
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On March 06 2017 23:23 Manit0u wrote:Show nested quote +On February 14 2017 12:06 SCC-Faust wrote:On February 07 2017 17:49 Manit0u wrote: The Sandman: Overture by Neil Gaiman I know it's not technically a book, but it's amazing enough to include here. It's a must buy for everyone in my opinion. Sandman has changed the comic book world 20 years ago, and now, with this prequel Gaiman and J. H. Williams III have pretty much redefined what makes a good comic. The visuals in this one are astounding and it's pointless to get it in digital format since some of the tricks used in it (no spoilers here) require the physical printing. It is bloody amazing. After reading that I don't think I'll ever be happy with any other comic book now that I know what you can do with it. Frames and fonts being intrinsic parts of images, pages that you read around (it's really engaging to read about the character being caught in a swirl when you have to turn the book around), images seamlessly floating from one cadre to another... It's a wonder to behold. And the story is really good too, a kaleidoscope of seemingly unrelated events that take part in different times and places (like, all around the universe and beyond) that come together perfectly as the story nears its end. 11/10 I've been looking into getting this, but I've never read any previous Sandman installments. Will I be completely lost reading this? No. It's a prequel to the others. The entire idea behind is that both people new to the Sandman and those who read all the other parts will enjoy it. There's plenty of references to the other stories that shed new light on them so the proper reading order is actually this, then all the others, then this again (and again and again, you can read it in circles). My bookstore finally had it, so I picked it up. First impressions are that the artwork is absolutely gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful just to look at.
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