re: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Recommendation & Discussion Thread

I haven’t read through this whole thread and seen it mentioned elsewhere, but I recently finished The End of Eternity which I found excellent, especially for its time. My first foray into Asimov so I’ll definitely be returning to some of his other works later.

Currently cruising through the Dune series, Frank Hebert’s novels at least. Messiah was a bit of a let down but Children pulled me right back in.

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Have any of y’all read Battle Mage by Peter A. Flannery?

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It's a great book, was always kinda sad that he never wrote any other fantasy.

I know you've read a bunch of fantasy, so trying to think of something somewhat close that's under the radar.

Miles Cameron's Traitor Son series has a somewhat similar feel.

Phil Tucker's Black Gate series and Faith and the Fallen series by John Gwynne maybe.

David Wells sovereign of the seven isles series maybe.

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while it was predictable and cliche as all hell it was a shite ton of fun.

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My feelings about it exactly.

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Finished the Demon Cycle series by Peter Brett. Pretty enjoyable, though... I've realized that binging big series like this might not be the best option for me. There's a push/pull between immersion and fatigue. On one hand, I love to just live in that world for a prolonged period. On the other, I feel like I might become a little number to the world and am just sprinting through the books to finish them and reach the conclusion at a certain point.

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I got burned out on them. I made it to the 3rd book and couldn’t do it anymore. I need to pick it back up

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You’ve nailed it. I haven’t read any of these so I’ll look into 

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Definitely check out John Gwynne then, that and Cameron's Traitor Son series would be the two closest I think.

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I've realized that binging big series like this might not be the best option for me. There's a push/pull between immersion and fatigue. 

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I think that's more due to the last three books of the demon cycle series not being nearly as good as the first couple. It becomes a slog at a certain point. The Middle Eastern style main character whose name I can't remember just isn't nearly as interesting as Arlen either, which hurts the series IMO.

I think it finished reasonably well with the last book, but I had to power through to finish myself.

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Plus the solo books are amazing.

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I think I might have actually enjoyed the solo books more than the first law series. And I really loved First Law.

I don’t know if they were actually better or if I was just dying to re-enter that world and check up on those characters but those solo books were great.

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Red country is my favorite book by him period.

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I agree.

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I still need to read the last two books of the last trilogy though.

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I haven’t started the second series yet. I either read or listened to the entire first law series and the 3 solo books in like a year and a half a couple of years ago. I needed some time away to read some other stuff on the list.

To my disappointment, I gave up on the Wheel of Time series. I'll get downvotes but I just wasn't a fan. Like, at all. I finished the 2nd book, and according to some of yall, it is one of the better of the series. I figured if it was a pain to get through that one and basically became a sleeping pill for me at night, I wouldn't be able to finish the series.

I just dont like his writing style and I really just didnt grow to really like any of the characters. I mean some of them were ok, but none of them made me really care about what happened to them. Rand could have gotten his chopped off at the end of book two and I wouldnt have cared.

Plus, I am a dialog fan. There just wasnt enough dialof for me. Way too much writing on useless stuff. Someone would walk in a room and he'd spend a whole page describing the room that they were in for 5 minutes that played absolutely no role in the story. Or the endless amount of mind wondering/thoughts of certain characters. I mean that stuff adds up to pages upon pages of absolutely useless material that adds absolutely nothing at all to the story.

End of rant. Just wanted to say why I didnt like it

Halfway through the 1st book of the Gentleman Bastard series. Really liking it so far.

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Book 2 less so and book 3 ends with a big cliff hanger of sorts. Which is frustrating knowing that GRRM will probably finish ASOIAF before Lynch gets the next Gentleman Bastard book done.

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Dangit I thought it was just a trilogy. That is extremely disappointing to hear.