What are you reading in 2023?

[Clint_L]

I read them a long time ago, though the details escape me. It was similar to reading Snow Crash again, I totally remember reading it back then though huge chunks I had simply forgot. I kind of want to look for Diamond Age by Stephenson.

I don't think I've read a Stephenson book that I haven't enjoyed.

 

[Clint_L]

What I'm looking for is really good fantasy. I love playing fantasy games, but good fantasy fiction is hard to find.

 

[Mallus]

I’m finally finishing Butler’s Parable of the Talents, the second Earthseed novel. It’s doing nothing to improve my mood. That whole “Make America Great Again” thing was kinda prescient, eh?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

What I'm looking for is really good fantasy. I love playing fantasy games, but good fantasy fiction is hard to find.

Fantasy is a broad category. What kind are you looking for?

 

[HaroldTheHobbit]

If you have never read the "Lensmen" series by EE "Doc" Smith, then now might be a good time.

I have a very soft spot for old space opera with wavy-haired pipe smoking heroes looking like Gregory Peck, sassy damsels in distress, and thinly disguised commie tentacled aliens of pure evil. And the Lensman series is at the peak of that sub-genre. A must read for any sci-fi fan imho, even if just for a dive into genre history.

 

[dragoner]

I don't think I've read a Stephenson book that I haven't enjoyed.

I most recently read Seveneves, Cryptonomicon is his best work, however.

 

[Clint_L]

Fantasy is a broad category. What kind are you looking for?

I don't really care, as long as it's good. I find most fantasy to be basically YA fiction - it often relies on predictable tropes and thin characterization with little moral complexity. For example, I just tried to read Patrick Rothfuss's The Name of the Wind and couldn't make it past the first hundred pages.

I have enjoyed Tolkien because his world building and story scope are amazing, even if his prose is not. Some Terry Pratchett. George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire books are great. Ursula K. LeGuin.

 

[Mad_Jack]

Just picked up Steven Erikson's Willful Child, the first book in his really-not-a-Star-Trek-spoof series. Haven't read it yet, but can't wait to see how the author of The Malazan Books of the Fallen does parody space opera...

 

[Ryujin]

Just picked up Steven Erikson's Willful Child, the first book in his really-not-a-Star-Trek-spoof series. Haven't read it yet, but can't wait to see how the author of The Malazan Books of the Fallen does parody space opera...

If you like Trek parody, then you might also enjoy "The Fatal Frontier", by Matt Vancil. The "Federation" in it is a for-profit organization.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

While he’s nowhere near as bad as H. P. Lovecraft, he’s way worse than a lot of apologists claim. I’d read a little of his stuff when I was younger and comics based in his works, but it really took me aback when I dove into his stuff and saw the drum beat of racism and sexism in his fiction.

Same. It's quite shocking to me the stuff that I didn't clock back in the day. But hey, we grow as people as we get older, if we're lucky. The dialog back then over racism in fantasy was very different, too.

I’m finally finishing Butler’s Parable of the Talents, the second Earthseed novel. It’s doing nothing to improve my mood. That whole “Make America Great Again” thing was kinda prescient, eh?

The Earthseed novels feel like terrifying prophecy. They're amazing, but frightening.

I don't really care, as long as it's good. I find most fantasy to be basically YA fiction - it often relies on predictable tropes and thin characterization with little moral complexity. For example, I just tried to read Patrick Rothfuss's The Name of the Wind and couldn't make it past the first hundred pages.

I have enjoyed Tolkien because his world building and story scope are amazing, even if his prose is not. Some Terry Pratchett. George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire books are great. Ursula K. LeGuin.

Lord Dunsany's King of Elfland's Daughter springs to mind as a meeting ground between Tolkien and Pratchett, if the humor element was much, much drier. If you're looking for something like LeGuin, I'd suggest Patricia McKillip's The Forgotten Beasts of Eld.

As for stuff like A Song of Ice and Fire, how about Evan Winter's The Rage of Dragons. Also, Dune, which is very much science-fantasy.