Science Fiction

Author
Discussion

JonChalk

6,469 posts

109 months

Monday 11th November 2019
quotequote all
jet_noise said:
RizzoTheRat said:
JonChalk said:
Clockwork Cupcake said:
I'm re-reading Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky at the moment.

I really enjoyed this book the first time I read it, and am enjoying it equally the second time.
Good call.

For absolutely no reason at all, I just remembered C Robert Cargill's Sea of Rust - have you read that?
I'm reading Dogs of War at the moment and enjoying it. I thought Children of Time was a bit let down by it's ending though so I'm hoping this has a more satisfying end.

I'll second the recommendation for Sea of Rust.

irocfan said:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07VNYQMWQ/ref...

aaaaaand Skippy the asshole is back thumbup
I still need to get the one they only did as audiobook before I read the one that came after that but I started reading without realising about the audiobook so seems have missed a load of stuff that happened in the meantime. I don't really do audiobooks so finding it's lack of availability to read to be rather annoying.


Edited by RizzoTheRat on Monday 11th November 09:20
Another thumbup for Dogs of War.
I just want someone to say "good dog".
Damn you all!

Had just bought James Holland's Battle of Britain in paperback as a break from SciFi.

(If you don't know Holland, he does a lot of WW2 on Nat Geo channel, does live shows and podcasts with Al Murray on history and has the coolest USN1 deck jacket (I know, man-crush!)........anyway.....)




It's 800 pages! (Plus a 100 pages of source notes, footnotes and general background);



Been looking forward to it for weeks.





Now, I just want to read Dogs of War and Sea of Rust again.


Damn you all!

jet_noise

5,630 posts

181 months

Monday 11th November 2019
quotequote all
JonChalk said:
Damn you all!

Had just bought James Holland's Battle of Britain in paperback as a break from SciFi.

(If you don't know Holland, he does a lot of WW2 on Nat Geo channel, does live shows and podcasts with Al Murray on history and has the coolest USN1 deck jacket (I know, man-crush!)........anyway.....)




It's 800 pages! (Plus a 100 pages of source notes, footnotes and general background);



Been looking forward to it for weeks.





Now, I just want to read Dogs of War and Sea of Rust again.


Damn you all!
Swerving to WW2 & aviation history have you sampled Jeffrey Quill: A Test Pilot's Story, Alex Henshaw: Sigh for a Merlin or if you're (only a bit) more techie then Stanley Hooker: Not Much of an Engineer?

LordGrover

33,531 posts

211 months

Wednesday 13th November 2019
quotequote all
irocfan said:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07VNYQMWQ/ref...

aaaaaand Skippy the asshole is back thumbup
Hmmm.
I read the first one, Columbus Day, but wasn't impressed. Is the series worth persevering with?

RizzoTheRat

25,085 posts

191 months

Wednesday 13th November 2019
quotequote all
LordGrover said:
irocfan said:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07VNYQMWQ/ref...

aaaaaand Skippy the asshole is back thumbup
Hmmm.
I read the first one, Columbus Day, but wasn't impressed. Is the series worth persevering with?
Probably not if you didn't enjoy the first. The story builds a lot but if you didn't like the writing style or characters I wouldn't bother.

irocfan

40,153 posts

189 months

Wednesday 13th November 2019
quotequote all
RizzoTheRat said:
LordGrover said:
irocfan said:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07VNYQMWQ/ref...

aaaaaand Skippy the asshole is back thumbup
Hmmm.
I read the first one, Columbus Day, but wasn't impressed. Is the series worth persevering with?
Probably not if you didn't enjoy the first. The story builds a lot but if you didn't like the writing style or characters I wouldn't bother.
very much what RtR said. It is, at heart, a light hearted scifi romp/adventure

grumbledoak

31,499 posts

232 months

Wednesday 13th November 2019
quotequote all
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. Something blows the moon to smithereens, and what happens afterwards.

It's very well imagined, very thorough and logical and all fairly plausible. Clearly the author is quite the geek. But all this explanation comes at cost to the characters, and the story is not help by starting a chapter two thirds of the way through with the sentence "Five thousand years later." I will probably grind on to the end but in truth I'm getting a bit bored.

Clockwork Cupcake

74,402 posts

271 months

Wednesday 13th November 2019
quotequote all
grumbledoak said:
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. Something blows the moon to smithereens, and what happens afterwards.

It's very well imagined, very thorough and logical and all fairly plausible. Clearly the author is quite the geek. But all this explanation comes at cost to the characters, and the story is not help by starting a chapter two thirds of the way through with the sentence "Five thousand years later." I will probably grind on to the end but in truth I'm getting a bit bored.
Reviewed at length by me earlier in the thread.

It is indeed a slog. Far too much detail where not needed, far too much hand wavey "never mind that" where more detail *is* needed, far too much "show don't tell" too. It is definitely not one of his better books.

Edit: For example, at one point in the book you're told that a snippet of information came from a guy adrift in his spacesuit, unable to get back, slowly drifting away still in radio contact but with dwindling battery. It could have been all related to you over a few pages, giving character and depth, and tense story telling. Instead, it is mentioned in passing in a sort of "so anyway..." fashion so that the author can get on with boring us with painfully detailed descriptions of Orbital Mechanics that add nothing to the story.



Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Wednesday 13th November 18:39

glazbagun

14,259 posts

196 months

Monday 25th November 2019
quotequote all
Clockwork Cupcake said:
grumbledoak said:
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. Something blows the moon to smithereens, and what happens afterwards.

It's very well imagined, very thorough and logical and all fairly plausible. Clearly the author is quite the geek. But all this explanation comes at cost to the characters, and the story is not help by starting a chapter two thirds of the way through with the sentence "Five thousand years later." I will probably grind on to the end but in truth I'm getting a bit bored.
Reviewed at length by me earlier in the thread.

It is indeed a slog. Far too much detail where not needed, far too much hand wavey "never mind that" where more detail *is* needed, far too much "show don't tell" too. It is definitely not one of his better books.

Edit: For example, at one point in the book you're told that a snippet of information came from a guy adrift in his spacesuit, unable to get back, slowly drifting away still in radio contact but with dwindling battery. It could have been all related to you over a few pages, giving character and depth, and tense story telling. Instead, it is mentioned in passing in a sort of "so anyway..." fashion so that the author can get on with boring us with painfully detailed descriptions of Orbital Mechanics that add nothing to the story.



Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Wednesday 13th November 18:39
I haven't read this, but the description reminds me of Alastair Reynolds first book (Revelation Space?) - great ideas and TBH great characters, but storytelling is clearly a skill which takes much repitition to master and it really suffers compared to his later work.

JonChalk

6,469 posts

109 months

Thursday 28th November 2019
quotequote all
glazbagun said:
I haven't read this, but the description reminds me of Alastair Reynolds first book (Revelation Space?) - great ideas and TBH great characters, but storytelling is clearly a skill which takes much repitition to master and it really suffers compared to his later work.
Respectfully disagree, whilst acknowledging your right to maintain your opinion.

AR's worst long-winded stuff, knocks Seveneves into a cocked hat. I never get truly bored, or struggle, reading AR.

I speed-read huge chunks of Seveneves, waiting for an interesting idea, turn of phrase or new viewpoint. It is high concept (a good one) executed poorly.

Returning to Sea of Rust / Dogs of War - I have now re-read both (& not yet started James Holland).

From first reads, I always thought Dogs of War edged it, but having re-read them, I now think Sea of Rust is a "better" book - Dogs of War starts really well, but some of the later story resolution is a bit weak & it ends less well than I remembered.

Also, got distracted by the 6th episode of Lindsay Buroker's Star Kingdom series - if anything is the complete opposite of Seveneves, this is it - lightweight, low-tech scifi, comedy, romance (all of which sounds bad, but it isnt!) but very funny in places, with lots of really sharp one liners.

If you've got Kindle Unlimited, and want something for light relief, give this a go.

Clockwork Cupcake

74,402 posts

271 months

Thursday 28th November 2019
quotequote all
I think the biggest criticism of Seveneves is that it tells you about stuff rather than telling you stuff.

I've already mentioned one example, but another is that he tells you that many of the habitation pods were tethered as co-orbiting binaries in order to create artificial gravity, and describes how this works in great detail. And then casually mentions that there were various dramas, like how one pair had drifted too far away and had to be separated to slingshot one pod back towards the rest (and the other away) and that it wasn't a unanimous decision, and that there was armed resistance. And he doesn't go into a huge amount more detail than I have - it's literally half a page, 1 page at most. In other words, he pretty much says "some interesting stuff happened, but I can't be arsed to write it".

There are so many times where he has the opportunity to write some proper story, some proper drama, and simply doesn't bother. Maybe he finds it easier and more interesting to simply describe stuff.

It would be like writing The Great Escape concentrating most of the effort on describing the tunnel digging, load calculations of the tunnel props, how the lighting was devised, construction of the digging implements, and then having half a page of dialogue where one guard mentions to another in passing that there was a breakout but that many prisoners have been recaptured or shot, and a chap on a motorbike had a pretty cool chase but was ultimately caught. And then a German Structural Engineer arrives and the next few chapters describe his admiration of the tunnel.








Edited by Clockwork Cupcake on Thursday 28th November 21:03

DibblyDobbler

11,257 posts

196 months

Thursday 28th November 2019
quotequote all
Just finished my second lap of Asher's 'Agent Cormac' series:

Gridlinked
The Line of Polity
Brass Man
Polity Agent
Line War

The series takes a book or two to really hit its stride but wow what a romp by the end - highly recommended smile

RobDickinson

31,343 posts

253 months

Thursday 28th November 2019
quotequote all
JonChalk said:
glazbagun said:
I haven't read this, but the description reminds me of Alastair Reynolds first book (Revelation Space?) - great ideas and TBH great characters, but storytelling is clearly a skill which takes much repitition to master and it really suffers compared to his later work.
Respectfully disagree, whilst acknowledging your right to maintain your opinion.
Revelation Space isnt an easy read. Often good scifi isnt, drops you into a whole universe of different and you work it out. Better on subsequent reads tho. I do get confused over which book when etc with AR.

DibblyDobbler said:
Just finished my second lap of Asher's 'Agent Cormac' series:

Gridlinked
The Line of Polity
Brass Man
Polity Agent
Line War

The series takes a book or two to really hit its stride but wow what a romp by the end - highly recommended smile
Agree, read them several times, the whole series and attache stuff is great, very rich universe.

JonChalk

6,469 posts

109 months

Friday 29th November 2019
quotequote all
Clockwork Cupcake said:
It would be like writing The Great Escape concentrating most of the effort on describing the tunnel digging, load calculations of the tunnel props, how the lighting was devised, construction of the digging implements, and then having half a page of dialogue where one guard mentions to another in passing that there was a breakout but that many prisoners have been recaptured or shot, and a chap on a motorbike had a pretty cool chase but was ultimately caught. And then a German Structural Engineer arrives and the next few chapters describe his admiration of the tunnel.
Nice analogy.

br d

8,388 posts

225 months

Friday 29th November 2019
quotequote all
DibblyDobbler said:
Just finished my second lap of Asher's 'Agent Cormac' series:

Gridlinked
The Line of Polity
Brass Man
Polity Agent
Line War

The series takes a book or two to really hit its stride but wow what a romp by the end - highly recommended smile
I enjoyed them but I thought Brass Man really dragged, which was a shame as it held the most promise for me, I thought it would be much more centered on Mr Crane.

BugLebowski

1,033 posts

115 months

Tuesday 10th December 2019
quotequote all
Thanks to whoever mentioned Sea of Rust up the thread; a really enjoyable read with some interesting new ideas. Although I thought it was a bit on the short side.

I'm just about to start 'Revenger' by Alastair Reynolds. I've long put off this series as it has the unfortunate YA fiction tag but I thought I'd give it a go as I've enjoyed everything else he has written and 'House of Suns' is probably my favourite SF book of all time.

JonChalk

6,469 posts

109 months

Tuesday 10th December 2019
quotequote all
BugLebowski said:
.....it has the unfortunate YA fiction tag but......
Has it really? Who gave it that? Didn't see that before I bought them & never occurred to me reading them. Yes, not his usual style, but many might consider that a good thing.

BugLebowski

1,033 posts

115 months

Wednesday 11th December 2019
quotequote all
JonChalk said:
Has it really? Who gave it that? Didn't see that before I bought them & never occurred to me reading them. Yes, not his usual style, but many might consider that a good thing.
It was mentioned in a few reviews I've read but I think Reynolds himself clarified that it was not (although I suspect he would say that regardless.) Anyway, the setting would seem to be a bit YA fiction (sisters running away to be space pirates!) but I'm enjoying it so far.

captain_cynic

11,874 posts

94 months

Friday 20th December 2019
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For Skippy fans, Expedition Force Book 9, Valkyrie was released earlier this month.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Valkyrie-Expeditionary-Fo...

390 odd pages, they're getting longer.

DibblyDobbler said:
Just finished my second lap of Asher's 'Agent Cormac' series:

Gridlinked
The Line of Polity
Brass Man
Polity Agent
Line War

The series takes a book or two to really hit its stride but wow what a romp by the end - highly recommended smile
Agent Cormac was the first of Asher's Polity series, they only get better from there and I'm not saying that any of the Agent Cormac books were bad in the slightest. If you liked the Agent Cormac series, start on the Spatterjay series (The Skinner -> Voyage of the Sable Keech -> Orbus).

Zirconia

36,010 posts

283 months

Friday 20th December 2019
quotequote all
Few books behind the curve with Skippy. Need to catch up.

Started to read Mortal Engines series after seeing the film. Not bad for a light SF. Two and a half books in at the mo.

Joel Shepard, Spiral Wars on hold waiting for the next book. Another not bad.

RizzoTheRat

25,085 posts

191 months

Saturday 21st December 2019
quotequote all
Zirconia said:
Few books behind the curve with Skippy. Need to catch up.
There's an audiobooks only one that comes between a couple of the later books, I need to listen to that before continuing with the books.