re: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Recommendation & Discussion Thread

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The Gap Cycle by Stephen R. Donaldson has been very intriguing through two books. The story is really fricked up, if 

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I was looking up the ratings for the series the other day on Goodreads just because I was curious how people thought of it these days, and one of the first reviews for the first book was basically like "congrats, you've finished Rape:the novel, now you get to read one of the best sci fi series of all time".

And I'd agree, the first book and a good portion of the second are some of the most fricked up stuff I've read (along with the hobbling portions of Dust of Dreams in Malazan). The series has a really good payoff from it though in the last three books, and I think it has some intriguing things to say about how mental abuse and control can be just as bad as physical.

The last three books are where the action takes off though, and the abuse type fricked up stuff mostly goes away in those three books, though it still a very dark and gritty series all the way through.

If I were to rate the books in that series I'd probably put the first as a 6.5/10, second as a 7.5 or 8/10, and the last three are all 9/10s or better for me. The first one is a fast read and isn't really what I would call a good book, simply because it is so uncomfortable.

And yeah, most of the characters aren't very nice people. The two I really like are Warden Dios and Min Donner, though I don't know how much you've seen of them by the end of book 2, it's been a long time since I read the series,and never reread the first.