re: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Recommendation & Discussion Thread

I almost bought the Foundation for an upcoming trip looking to scratch the Expanse itch until Book 9. But I ended up going with Revelation Earth and then downloaded the Three Body Problem because it was $3 on Amazon. Anyone read the latter 2? Or have anything else along the same path that the Expanse has?

I just finiahed lord of light, i was confused as hell with the timing. Very interesting story, it almost feels like getting dropped into the crippled god without much explanation.

Definitely going to reread it at some point. The writing was tough to grasp - you dont really get much character but the scope and events were very interesting.

ETA: fun fact is that the fake movie that was cover for the cia rescue in argo was the failed attempt to make Lord of Light a movie

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just finiahed lord of light, i was confused as hell with the timing.

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Yeah, given how you didn't like the time switches in one of the Lawrence jorg books, I was wondering how you'd like the dual timelines of Lord of light. If you read it again sometime I'd imagine it would flow easier once you know what is going on. And yeah, it's more cool setting and plot than character development, but I think Sam himself has a decent arc.

And I could see that with the Crippled God comparison, Lord of light is even more in media res than Erikson.

Just bought the first foundation book, guess I'll grab the first three body problem too since it's on sale for 3 bucks.

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Those aspects of malazan and the lord of light i love - people who ascended to godhood.

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Yeah, the technology creating religion aspect I think is one of the most interesting facets of the book. Most sci fi has the religions fighting technology, not embracing it. Dune and one of the short stories in George rr Martin's tuf voyaging book are the only other books I've read I can think of offhand that play with that dynamic.

I had the same issue as you my first read-through. I knew something was off when I got to the time shift, but I didn't figure out it was dual timelines until about halfway through the book myself. There are a bunch of subtle clues here and there that are obvious once you know, but tough to see until then.

Ya I need to finish the last book in that one at some point.

Also trying to get into Butcher and Sullivan soon. Still need to read Pratchett / Disc World and the Farseer stuff. Plus I just bought the gap cycle and have it on my desk.

So many books so little time

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So many books so little time

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On the bright side you have a continuous source of entertainment for a while.

Just reading the third book of the Paternus trilogy by Dyrk Ashton, it's quite good and reminds me of Lord of Light in a lot of ways, with two groups of gods fighting each other, gods mixed in with humans, and a ton of mythology thrown in for good measure. Maybe American Gods meets Lord of Light would be a good comparison.

With butcher the storyline keeps building on previous books, particularly as you go along. Each book typically has a case/problem that is individual to that book, but stuff happens that builds on the overall storyline.

Storm front is one where you could probably skip it as long as you read a good synopsis of the plot, as nothing happens that directly impacts the overall plot, it just gives a bit of background to Dresden and introduces a couple side characters briefly. You could possibly skip the second one if you read a synopsis as well, as it doesn't impact the overall arching plot but it does give a bunch of character development between Dresden and a series long antagonist/sometime ally and two other side/main characters.
Butcher is also fairly good at giving background info/history inside the stories so I think you could follow along either way.

You'd definitely need to read all the books from grave peril (3rd book) on in order, as stuff happens in book 3 that has major effects on the entire storyline. The third book is where I personally found the books to get much better, with 4 and particularly 5 where it really starts to take off.

So if you want to get a feel for what the quality of the series will be like from the beginning you could start with book 3.

Double Post


But I decided to jump into Riyaria next as opposed to Butcher - seems like an easier jumping off point for me to just get the opening trilogy in Revelations (signed copies available on his website for the $40 set).

I'll probably go ahead and buy books 2 and 3 of Butcher to read while I'm reading other stuff. Decided to do a big Malazan re-read, so having Butchers stuff in there to help me break up the intensity and information overload of Malazan seems like a good plan.

Thanks! I read Old Man’s War and that one was great. Haven’t felt the desire to read Ghost Brigades though. I’ll have to check your other suggestion!