Mark Jordan
Blue Belt
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The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon and just started reading yesterday Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen
What fiction book are you currently reading?
- Thread starter arnisador
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Omar B
Senior Master
F-ing amazing book! You'll love it on a regular storytelling level, but if you know the history of comics well it toys around with he different eras and occurrences throughout the comic world for quite a few decades. Reading it was like reading another version of the Lee and Kirby or the Kane and Finger or some other famous comic creating duo.
Indagator
Blue Belt
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Technically non-fiction masquerading as fiction (little bit of kyojutsu tenkan ho going on there lol) but I'm about to begin The Windswept House by Fr Malachi Martin.
Think the last fiction book I read would have been either A Scanner Darkly by Phillip K Dick, or one of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. Don't quite remember as I've been reading a lot of non-fiction books lately.
PAX
Think the last fiction book I read would have been either A Scanner Darkly by Phillip K Dick, or one of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels. Don't quite remember as I've been reading a lot of non-fiction books lately.
PAX
You really should pick this up, it is his best work IMO
Brandon Sanderson - "The Way of Kings" currently & am waiting for the Robert Jordan via Brandon Sanderson "Towers of Midnight" next month.
dancingalone
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I'm now reading Lady of the Forest by Jennifer Roberson. It's essentially another retelling of the Robin Hood story from the viewpoint of Lady Marian.
For another excellent retelling of the Robin Hood tale try "Sherwood" by Parke Godwin.
girlbug2
Master of Arts
Now on "The Bad Mother's Handbook". Taught me everything I know 
.
But really it is a good read from the POVs of 3 generations in one family. Mainly a comedy, but also insightful at times. Good characterizations of how different people think and what drives them. I will be ordering more from this author.
Oh, and it's British! Double bonus!
.But really it is a good read from the POVs of 3 generations in one family. Mainly a comedy, but also insightful at times. Good characterizations of how different people think and what drives them. I will be ordering more from this author.
Oh, and it's British! Double bonus!
:lol: I know oh-so-well how that feels, Don . I'm re-reading all the Honor Harrington series yet again!
. I'm re-reading all the Honor Harrington series yet again!Yeah, Griffin sucks me in pretty fast. Fiest, I can read one alone, but, he sucks me in a lot of times too.:lol: I know oh-so-well how that feels, Don
" A legend in time" by Jonathan Westbrook. I swam competitively with this guy long ago and it's very cool that he is now an author!
The Honor books are essentially a space opera Horatio Hornblower, with the early setting being direct parallels to the Napoleonic wars. The Miles Vorkosigan books exist in a similar space opera universe, but the world (or universe) creation is different as it seems to be more individual systems plotted against each other rather than well developed federations/kingdoms/whatever. Protagonist wise, Honor is a paragon, eventually growing into the uber martial artist/gunslinger/tactician/strategist/ridiculously wealthy/lord/ultra-dutiful sailor/heroic icon for Manticore and Grayson, Miles is "just" damn smart, devious, and heroic.
I like both, but Miles was never built up to the point that he has to be retired, Honor does, she is simply too good at everything at this point, and too important to be haring off on the wild adventures that we want to read about.
That's a fair point about how the Harrington series has to end, Blind. After book 10 the feeling of it being a touch 'far fetched' grows to the point of affecting the enjoyment of the reader.
I can suspend disbelief with the best of them if the story warrants it, mind you, and if the hero is my kind of guy (or lass in Honors case). Why Honor appeals to me so much is that there are elements of how I'd like me to be in her character (or so I delude myself) and I like my heroes to be heroic.
In general terms, I've had my fill of this 'Shades-of-Grey' crap that we've been getting in Sci-Fi recently. I get enough of that in the real world. Give me heroes I can admire and villains I can despise, not good bad-guys and bad good-guys :lol:.
... psst ... Battlestar Galactica remake and Stargate Universe I am pointing at YOU (way to go wrecking my favourite sci-fi series of all time in the latter case).
I can suspend disbelief with the best of them if the story warrants it, mind you, and if the hero is my kind of guy (or lass in Honors case
). Why Honor appeals to me so much is that there are elements of how I'd like me to be in her character (or so I delude myself) and I like my heroes to be heroic.In general terms, I've had my fill of this 'Shades-of-Grey' crap that we've been getting in Sci-Fi recently. I get enough of that in the real world. Give me heroes I can admire and villains I can despise, not good bad-guys and bad good-guys :lol:.
... psst ... Battlestar Galactica remake and Stargate Universe I am pointing at YOU
(way to go wrecking my favourite sci-fi series of all time in the latter case).Amen brother, that show is pissing me off.Stargate Universe I am pointing at YOU
Omar B
Senior Master
That's a fair point about how the Harrington series has to end, Blind. After book 10 the feeling of it being a touch 'far fetched' grows to the point of affecting the enjoyment of the reader.
I can suspend disbelief with the best of them if the story warrants it, mind you, and if the hero is my kind of guy (or lass in Honors case
In general terms, I've had my fill of this 'Shades-of-Grey' crap that we've been getting in Sci-Fi recently. I get enough of that in the real world. Give me heroes I can admire and villains I can despise, not good bad-guys and bad good-guys :lol:.
... psst ... Battlestar Galactica remake and Stargate Universe I am pointing at YOU
I am so with you on that man. Sci-Fi literature is (the way I see it) an extension of romanticism. The characters should not be gray, they should be technicolor. Good guys should be paragons of heroism and virtue and villains should be broken, corrupt souls. Stargate was great till they went in the shades of gray direction with SGU, now if I miss an episode I really don't care one way or another.
Have you read W.E.B. Griffin at all? Because all his heroes are a little morally jacked at times. Yes, way off topic, but, Suke started it
Omar B
Senior Master
I've got a WEB Griffin book sitting on the pile waiting to be read. It's 7th in the order right now.
I have no problem with naturalism in literature, but it is it's own thing. If I wanted to read about people who are just like regular people, who have problems with their ethics, who do good but could have easily have done wrong then I would buy those books. But I grew up on Superheros and sci-fi novels. Heroes present the Greek Ideal, perfect in mind and body. Even Ian Fleming (my favorite) made a point of giving many of his villains ugly, twisted, as if their evil was made manifest upon their person.
I have no problem with naturalism in literature, but it is it's own thing. If I wanted to read about people who are just like regular people, who have problems with their ethics, who do good but could have easily have done wrong then I would buy those books. But I grew up on Superheros and sci-fi novels. Heroes present the Greek Ideal, perfect in mind and body. Even Ian Fleming (my favorite) made a point of giving many of his villains ugly, twisted, as if their evil was made manifest upon their person.
