What book did you just buy?

[Kez]

Originally Posted by Celebrindal

I was reading the star wars mmo thread and it struck me to buy a few novels, as I haven't read any SW books for atleast 12 years. And those were the teen books.

I picked up I, jedi and heir to the empire, based on a google search for the better books in the genre.

Question. I was reading the thread and someone pointed out the books shatterpoint, traitor and Luke skywalker and the shadows of mindor as great books, but they appear to be from a long series of stories. Should I read the 13 prior books before trying those or is it possible those books stand on their own?

The only one of those three that was part of a series is Traitor. You would be fine reading that as a standalone book as well though I think.

[Celebrindal]

Heir to the Empire is a really good read, about halfway through and I already went out and bought the other 2 of the Thrawn trilogy.
Just for direction, what should I get after finishing this trilogy? I will do I, jedi after this and I was thinking about the hand of thrawn books.

[Nebuchadnezzar]

You shouldn't read "I, Jedi" first if you plan on ever reading the X-Wing Rogue Squadron novels by Stackpole btw, it pretty much tells you everything that happened in them.

And I was the one that mentioned Stover, Shatterpoint is about Mace Windu, its standalone, so is Luke Skywalker and tSoM, as far as Traitor, don't both with the rest of the series first unless you REALLY get into Star Wars Books. Shatterpoint is a good starting point for Stover.

[Arbuste]

I bought "The Darkness that Comes Before", by R. Scott Baker. Just finished it. It was pretty good. Very similar to George Martin's ASoIaF in scope and tones. Bonus points for having written a trilogy instead of projecting an infinite amount of books (fuck you, Erikson and co.)
Baker is apprently a philosophy teacher too, and it shows in his book. There are many interesting (and basic) philosophy snippets and pastiches.
Very good characters. Even a few original ones, which is seldom seen in fantasy anymore.
9/10. Buy it if you haven't yet.

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Originally Posted by Arbuste

Bonus points for having written a trilogy instead of projecting an infinite amount of books (fuck you, Erikson and co.)

It's not really a completed trilogy. It would be like if Martin had said his first three novels was a trilogy and yes they would tell a specific part of the story, but not all of the story.

[DoctorSpooge]

Originally Posted by Nebuchadnezzar

It's not really a completed trilogy. It would be like if Martin had said his first three novels was a trilogy and yes they would tell a specific part of the story, but not all of the story.

Bakker's trilogy is a little more self-contained than AGoT-ASoS. Feast is a direct continuation of the preceding events (with a few questionable narrators thrown in.) Bakker's prince of nothing is more like an Iain M. Banks Culture novel. It's a large, completed slice of a greater event. The Thousandfold Thought, whether you cared for it or not, did end the arc he started in the first book. A lot of people took issue with the way the trilogy ended, but I thought it was a rather appropriate, especially since Bakker has clearly opted to fill in the details by writing a new trilogy.

Anyway, just thought I'd throw in a minor nitpick. It is a completed trilogy, but it's not a completed story. It provided enough closure for me to pause and read other things. I read PoN probably two years ago and have yet to read the new book.

Edit: back on topic. I just bought The Corrections (Jonathan Franzen) and Kafka on the Shore (Murakami,) but my backlog of unread material has ballooned into a 40+ book monstrosity and I don't know when I'll get into them. At the moment, reading Vandermeer's City of Saints and Madmen.

[Tarrant220]

Well after making a post asking people to recommend me some books to read, I took a few of the recommendations and picked up Steven Erikson's "Gardens of the Moon" Hopefully it's as good as I've been told.

[Tortfeasor]

Originally Posted by Tarrant220

Well after making a post asking people to recommend me some books to read, I took a few of the recommendations and picked up Steven Erikson's "Gardens of the Moon" Hopefully it's as good as I've been told.

Just to be sure you understand:The series is incredibly good. Gardens of the Moon is pretty good but easily the worst book in the series.


I just got done with Anathem by Neal Stephenson. I am pretty impressed with the amount of research he does for his books and I love his style. However, Anathem doesn't really have the humor that his other books have but its still very clever and well researched. My favorite of his is still Cryptonomicon.

[Tarrant220]

Originally Posted by Tortfeasor

Just to be sure you understand:The series is incredibly good. Gardens of the Moon is pretty good but easily the worst book in the series.

Well now I'm just staring at the book thinking "well fuck...." It's the worst in the series but it's still good enough for me to be like "well that was pretty damn good time to go get book 2?"

*Edit* Yay 1,000th post

[chaos]

I just bought All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy. I really liked No Country for Old Men, The Road, and Blood Meridian so I'm going to start on the border trilogy now.

My wife bought this book written by Lauren hamilton, some weird ass vampire sex book, it's pretty much porn and that makes it awesome. And I bought my daughter a book on animals that has different textures. Like, it shows a picture of a bunny and has real fur that she can touch. It's also awesome.

[Ilex]

Originally Posted by chaos

I just bought All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy. I really liked No Country for Old Men, The Road, and Blood Meridian so I'm going to start on the border trilogy now.

Be ready to be sad... a lot. The books are excellent but McCarthy is pretty grim in his outlook and there's not a lot of hope in any of those books.

That said, I just read The Strain and thought is was a pretty entertaining book. I think it would probably work better as a movie though (and it seems to be written for that express purpose).

Just started reading Altered Carbon and holy shit is it awesome.

[chaos]

You know, that seems to be McCarthy's theme. It's as if he is trying to be as realistic as possible, and reality to him means no hope, not ever, everything always turns out shit.

[Tortfeasor]

Originally Posted by Tarrant220

Well now I'm just staring at the book thinking "well fuck...." It's the worst in the series but it's still good enough for me to be like "well that was pretty damn good time to go get book 2?"

*Edit* Yay 1,000th post

Yes it's good enough on its own to want to read book two. It's just that after reading the rest of the series the first books seems underwhelming.

[Adam Jones]

Originally Posted by chaos

I just bought All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy. I really liked No Country for Old Men, The Road, and Blood Meridian so I'm going to start on the border trilogy now.

My wife bought this book written by Lauren hamilton, some weird ass vampire sex book, it's pretty much porn and that makes it awesome. And I bought my daughter a book on animals that has different textures. Like, it shows a picture of a bunny and has real fur that she can touch. It's also awesome.

Great choice. Believe it or not, I read those books in the exact same order about 6 months back. I think you're going to love the Border Trilogy; it easily topped his other works in my opinion, and has found a place in my top 3 books (taking the trilogy as one piece).

Now, having taken a break, I'm ready to finish reading the rest of his stuff.

[Auren]

Chaos I think you were referring to Laurell K. Hamilton and her Anita Blake series of books. I got into them at first cause I was looking for some decent vampire fiction and they stood out every time I went to the bookstore. There first few books don't have much sex and there was plenty of vampire/wereanimal/necromancy action to keep me entertained and they are all easy reads. As the series goes on there is more and more sex. I like most of the characters and Hamilton can write some good action and metaphysical stuff but I wish she'd obsess less about the damn sex. I'm actually going to say it gets old after a while. I'd recommend the series to anyone interested in vampire type stuff if not for that but I have still enjoyed all of the books so they might be up your alley if you are either looking for that kind of stuff or are willing to tolerate it for the other cool stuff in the books.