The Fantasy/Sci-Fi Books Thread Book • Page 85

I'm on "Toll the Hounds" on my Malazan read. Once I finish this, I'm hopping over to The Sunlit Man, though.

 

I started The Hexologists and I love it so far even though I'm only like 40 pages in. Some fantastic characterization going on, and very funny and whimsical thus far with a strong style. It's also 'British, very British'. I know he sold the rights with it immediately, and it was a huge deal with Orbit, and I could totally see BBC wanting to do a series on it if it ever gets traction to justify it. It has all the hallmarks of other classic urban fantasies, but doesn't feel like a copy (yet).

No comments on the plot really as it's so early, but as with Senlin's tale, I am in love with the prose. It is a very different book - it's faster paced, it seems to have a deeper world, and there's more political intrigue. Also the main characters, Liz and Warren are nothing like Senlin, so very different perspectives and archetypes.

I won't spam here with thoughts every 40 pages, so full review when done. But not all disappointed with what I'm getting vs what I wanted from another Josiah Bancroft book.

 

Just finished up Pet Sematary for the first time. Excellent book and that ending was great. Plan on reading Revival for another spooky month King read. I've not read much King so slowly making my way through.

Started Black River Orchard from Chuck Wendig and so far the mystery is really good but man, I have to admit, authors inserting zoomer slang and current events can take me out of something if done poorly. It's mostly with a certain POV so hoping it's not consistent, and could be a product of the narrator (they have a different narrator for each POV).

 

I finished the book a couple of days ago and enjoyed it. I do like the prose but I sometimes I find this style of writing gets a bit wordy and I’m like “what did I just read”.

There’s some fun twists and turns in the story so I’ll be interested to hear what you think once you’ve finished.

I’m working my way through Dragonfired, Goodreads, at the moment and after that I’m not sure where I’ll go next I’m leaning towards something sci-fi or something more traditional fantasy since the last few books of read have leaned towards the humours side of things.

 

Currently reading Sword Catcher by Cassandra Clare. Never read anything by them, I think they did Mortal Instruments, but it's started off strong. The cover is really cool too.

 

Pet Sematary is so well done. I remember that around the halfway point or so I started feeling this absolute sense of dread about the plot—I knew what was going to happen, knew it was inevitable, knew how it would turn out, and couldn't do anything about it...it almost nauseated me in a way. Such an incredible book.

 

Thanks for these! Yeah, I'm not sure if I'll go with Rage right away—I specifically want to read Stephen King for Halloween season, but I'm also trying to read them chronologically, which is why Rage would be next. I might forego that in favor of something like Revival, as you mentioned, and then return to the chronology.

The Fisherman is one of my absolute favorite novels. Truly incredible. I'm probably due for a reread, actually.

House of Leaves has been on my to-read list for a long time—maybe I should do it this year!

Haven't read Night of the Ghoul, but I'm a big fan of Scott Snyder for his work with Batman and The Wake, so that sounds perfect.

 

Have you checked out Adam Nevill yet? Because that should be step one. His best is Last Days. Ritual also perfect and has a great movie to go along with it. No One Gets Out Alive another masterpiece, with a movie that's a fine horror movie, but awful adaptation.

Clive Barker's Books of Blood is still the ultimate short story collection, so many original ideas in there it will make your head hurt.

I just read a book by Alma Katsu called The Fervor, and although it's not exactly "Halloween scary," it focuses on America's Japanese internment camps, but it's really excellent and I feel I should mention it, and it's horror comes from Japanese folklore.

As for comics, did you read Infidel? I rec that a lot so we might have already talked about it. Also, if you liked Gideon Falls, which of course you did, it's incredible, I have amazing news for you (if you didn't already know), Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino decided that they were going to create a whole shared universe together of horror stories similar to Gideon Falls and so far it fucking rules. Called the Bone Orchard Mythos. I don't know if Ten Thousand Black Feathers is collected yet, but you can get The Passageway now since that was an ogn.

I'm sure I'll think of more, but that's what immediately came to mind.

EDIT: Oh and def take that advice about getting the Bachman Books in one collection. It's pretty much the only way to get Rage unless you want to do some searching. Plus you get Long Walk and Running Man. And Roadwork, which is like bottom 3 King novels for me, but I still liked it, and also I read it as a kid and I'm guessing it would probably hit harder for me now.

Although damn, it looks like those went up in price like crazy. I've definitely bought it twice in the past for under 10 dollars damn.

One more random rec I just thought of, I read this trilogy years ago, probably longer than a decade, it was one of the first things I read when I was spreading my wings after finishing King's biblio. Jonathan Maberry's Pine Deep Trilogy, starting with Ghost Road Blues. It's perfect Spooky season material.

 

Speaking of horror, The Ice is giving me major horror vibes which I am all here for.

 

The MOST dense/philosophical of the main ten. Erikson wrote it just after his dad died iirc

 

Picked up my second Riftwar book and my first Guy Gavriel Kay book. Tryna build up the bookshelf again

 

Oh wow that makes sense. Yeah that was where his writing reached a whole new level for me and I just adored every single sentence.

He leans into that in Kharkanas unabashedly. Maybe why it didn't appeal to a huge audience. But still I feel like it should have appealed to his audience.

 

It’s interesting you say this because I feel like it’s the least dense of them all. But I’m very much just letting it all wash over me at this point.

 

It really is quite creepy, especially in it's descriptions. This is arguably my favourite of the novellas.

 

Yeah it was excellent. Definitely my favorite. These novellas are such great, one or two sitting reads, I love it.

 

cover reveal of book four, Of Empires and Dust, just happened!

 

Excellent, excellent suggestions. Knew I could count on you!

I've added everything to a queue and I'll start requesting stuff from the library etc.

I haven't read Infidel, and most importantly, I hadn't heard about the Bone Orchard Mythos, which blows my mind and I'm so excited about. Best news ever.

I haven't read any Maberry but my sister really likes his stuff, so I'll be checking him out too.

Thanks dude!

 

There's a Bone Orchard Mythos prelude that you'll want to read first, it's very short, I don't even think it's single issue length. It was a free comic for Free Comic Day, I'm not sure about how it's collected but I'm sure you can find it online, I would guess through completely legal means, but if not, like I said it was always a free comic so, you know, if you have to get little creative I'd say you're morally in the clear lol.

I keep meaning to pick up the Passageway, I've been such an issue by issue reader that I've literally just forgotten about graphic novels. Ten Thousand Black Feathers was really good, it leans heavy into fantasy, like its centered around a fantasy world that one of the characters created, so it's awesome seeing Andrea's beautiful drawings in a more fantasy style.

I'm currently reading the newest issue of Tenement (and by currently, I mean I just put it down on page two to make this post lol) which was originally going to be a graphic novel but it became a series. It's really fucking good.

EDIT: Here's a PDF of the Prelude Lemire and Sorrentino posted on their substack (NSFW warning)https://email.mg1.substack.com/c/eJ...MUC1TvWRUSdXrnr_ZNAL9QI0UlJMWHda2le0fg1-K2JX8

 

I've been picking up the first book in a bunch of different series for eventual starting points someday. Already had the first Feist book

 

Excellent haul. Dragon Wing and the rest of that series are criminally overlooked

 

Also got the first Chronicles of Thomas Covenant book. I got 7 books on this trip lol

 

Oh fuck. I am so curious to hear other people's thoughts on that. It's tough. The main character is a hard person to like, in fact you will hate him in book one for something in particular that is really hard to come to terms with your "hero" doing. I know you love the philosophical shit, so I do think you will love that aspect of it. I'll also add that every book gets better and the final series is just mindblowing.

And just to add, saying he's hard to like implies that you will at some point like him, but that's not really the point of the series, and your opinion of him by the end will be a lot grayer than like or dislike.

 

Donaldson is very good at these types of characters. I read Gap Cycle last year and there are some characters in there that… woof. That being said books 3-5 were some top tier space opera.

 

!! I feel the exact same way! I adored The Gap Cycle but you are absolutely right, it's a very tough one to recommend. And I completely agree with you about books 3-5, those are like my favorite sci fi books next to Three Body trilogy. They definitely have the best book titles ever.

 

Is there a series out there you haven't read and don't plan on it? Don't think I'll ever read Sword of Truth because I've heard some terrible things about the content in some of the books and that the MC is very unlikable