What are you reading at the moment?

I write alternate-history as well. Two books set in a World War 1 that lasts until 1922, with the allies losing. Book three is in the wings as well, but put it to one side so that I could come at it fresh

 

And? Do you like it? Do you prefer it to The Dresden Files?

 

Yeah, I'm liking it. I think it's a shame that it's so god-oriented, but I suppose that's its USP compared to books such as Dresden and my upcoming novel. I prefer less-uber characters, which is probably why I write about normal infantry so much, and why I didn't go with uber-MCs for my LitRPG series. I also don't like Space Marines that much, even though they sell.

 

The Uber MC or as I like to call them, deus ex machinegunners, annoy the hell out of me too, for the most part. I mean sure, sometimes it's good to read a lighthearted romp through an author's personal power fantasy, but they're all ultimately forgettable, which is probably the worst thing I can say about a book.

Even if a book is terrible and I only finish it out of a sense of obligation or best-begun, at least I remember it. It moved me in some way, although it wasn't the way the author intended. In terms of excellent books, though - THOSE, I remember fondly and even reread, on occasion. Those are the authors that I'll read everything they write even if it's out of genre for me.

Glynn Stewart is one of them. He writes space opera (Duchess of Terra), science fantasy (Starship's Mage), science fiction (Castle Federation), and has a couple of standalone fantasy novels too. But those are all genres that I really enjoy reading. Less so, modern paranormal fantasy - but I'd wholeheartedly recommend his ONSET novels to fans and detractors of the genre alike.

But I digress. On to what I'm currently reading.

I can't get enough of the Alexis Carew novels. They've officially dethroned David Weber's Honor Harrington novels as my absolute favorite military sci-fi series. And keep in mind that I'm a member of a fan organization called the Royal Manticore Navy and we even organize a yearly convention here called MantiCON ( http://www.trmn.org for those interested. It's a helluva group, and bloody well run/organized).

Even if you don't care for military themes, sailboats IN SPACE, fiction as thinly veiled historical parallels, hard sci-fi, or hell - even if you don't care for science fiction at all and prefer to stay in another genre, you should read these books. They're *that* good. There's a good bit of humor, a lot of dramatic tension building, and amazing characters from the beginning to end of each book. The only criticism I can think of is that the first bit of book one is dedicated almost entirely to world building and establishing the rules of the universe. There's a good bit of it dedicated solely to things that I already knew (sailing terms, boat parts, etc), but I can tell you that it's all accurate to tallships. I even suggest sticking around and not skipping the author's note at the end of the books, as it explains what historical parallel he's written about and puts everything in context.

This series is not a forgettable one, and Alexis Carew is going down as one of my favorite protagonists ever, and she might be my favorite protag of all time, overtaking Honor Harrington, Vanyel (of the Last Herald-Mage trilogy by Mercedes Lackey), Bruenor Battlehammer, Thibbledorf Pwent, and others.

I'm not only reading these on KU, but I'm also buying a copy of my own to keep, and I'm seriously debating whether or not to order them in hardcopy, despite the current price for each of them being $12.99 on Amazon.

 

lololol

 

I just finished "His Majesty's Dragon", and I found it to be somewhat less than I expected. It's supposed to be an alt-history with a dragon-based air force, but the existence of dragons of equal intelligence to humans doesn't seem to affected society in any other way (maybe this is different later in the series, but for right now in France, England and China everything seems much the same). Just being able to keep animals big enough to swallow an elephant should have some impact on the world. The other main gripe I have with it is how the dragons are so extremely subserviant to the humans. It's the polar opposite of Robin Hobbs "Rain Wilds" books, where the dragons are such obnoxious assholes it's painful to read about them, I'd much prefer more of a balance.

Otherwise I found the writing fairly bland in style, and nothing too extraordinary about the plot. When we find out the rarest and most powerful type of dragon is a Celestial, it's no surprise at all when the main character's mystery dragon not only turns out to be one, but has a deux ex machina superpower he manifests just in time to win the big battle at the end.

 

probably the best military fantasy that dosent wind up being YA is the kingfountan series i think that counts as he quickly becomes a commander in the kings military and its a large part of the book

 

Finished The Crimson Queen (Hutson) and Dawn of Wonder (Renshaw). Good enough fantasies to keep me entertained. I've read better, but I've also read worse. I'd say maybe 3.5 stars out of 5 each (on Goodreads I gave them 4 because I was feeling nice and I think both authors have potential).

Now busy with Warship, the first book of the Black Fleet series. So far it looks like it's going to be a good one. Sci-fi based on the navy command and maneuvering system. Kinda like Star Trek, but with tugboats to get the big Destroyer class ships out of a docking station.

 

I keep forgetting to post here when I finish a decent series.

Finished the Family Law sci-fi series. It barely involves lawyers at all, surprisingly. The blurb is TERRIBLE too, insofar as it has nothing to do with the first book in the series. Amazon, however, was insistent on me liking it so I gave it a shot.

I was pleasantly surprised. It's not a very action packed story, and the science is mostly hand wavey "it just works now shut up and read dammit!" but for some reason I couldn't put it down.

It's space opera in the vein of Star Trek with a mix of dystopian future sci-fi. Youd think that being richer than most first world countries would remove the drive to adventure from the MC, but you'd be wrong. Shortly in the first book, that's exactly what happens - the main character becomes richer than most nations; the interest is in what she does with the money and the consequences of her actions. The whole series is good, but I have a problem wrapping my head around the idea of a teenager who's just that bloody competent and level-headed.

Still, it turned me on to another 9 book (!!) series by the same author. I'm currently reading that one now and will probably be stuck in that for at least a few days more before I wrap on it. Shoulda read the April series first since it does come chronologically much earlier and I've had quite a bit of it spoiled already.

 

I loved William Wight's Cradle series so much I wrote a review for it on Goodreads. Great fantasy books with action and humour.

"I cannot recommend this series enough. The Cradle books are like Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn and Anime's Hunter X Hunter had a baby and with every book it's leveling up, getting stronger and gaining new powers. Cool characters, sly humour and holy s... action sequences all combine to make this one of the most fun and entertaining fantasy series it has been my pleasure to read in years.

The first book takes a few chapters to get going, but Will Wight has a reason for doing that: The same reason a roller coaster doesn't just take off at maximum speed. And then, just as you get settled in and start thinking, "Well, this isn't so bad," it accelerates. That's when all the screaming starts..."

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2105612787

 

Cradle is to Drizzt Do'Urden as Exalted is to Forgotten Realms.

I think that's what you were looking for. The entire trilogy (and there's a fourth book coming!) is basically a campaign from the tabletop Exalted RPG. Sadly, Exalted is nowhere near as popular as Vampire: the Masquerade, or the rest of the White Wolf "holy trinity" (Vampire: the Masquerade, Mage: the Awakening, and Werewolf: the Apocalypse). Exalted is on the second or third tier along with Changeling, Mummy, and Demon. Which is a shame, since it's the most fun game they've put out in terms of player interactions.

 

Just finished Robert Sheckley's "Dimension of Miracles" - it's similar to Hitchhiker's Guide but predates it by about a decade. The MC, a regular guy from Earth, wins a Galactic lottery he didn't even know existed and is transported to a distant planet to claim his Prize ( a sentient, shapeshifting gadget). Unfortunately for him, the aliens didn't realize us primitive Earth humans don't have a universe-spanning homing instinct like any self-respecting intelligent life form, and the poor hapless schmuck is stranded. He ends up meeting a bunch of different creatures as he tries to muddle his way through time and space back to his home, including a rather neurotic and very bored god, a creatures whose company builds planets for gods (complete with worshippers), a clingy and passive-aggressive automated city, a civilization of intelligent Tyrannosaurs, and so on. There isn't a whole lot of action or plot, as the novel is mainly a vehicle for satirical social commentary, much like Gulliver's Travels. Personally I enjoy this sort of tour through weird worlds and dry humor quite a bit, so that didn't bother me.

 

I started reading Shattered Lands by Darren Pillsbury last night and like it so far - just a generic LitRPG story, but well-written at least.

 

Hmm, for a fun sci fi space opera read I recommend the Silver Ship series. Available on KU.

 

Yeah, I really like the Shattered lands books. It's not so much about the world, which is about as big standard as you can get for a litRPG, so much as it is about the tale of two friends and how power corrupts. Also, examining just how real is real when it comes to AI and NPCs.

 

Yeah, those are really good. It gets kinda out there and the MC is a bit of a Marty Stu, along with a tendency to overuse the failing forward trope, but they're solid bits of space opera fluff nonetheless.

So I just finished catching up to Mackey Chandler's entire body of work. I've gotta say, the books are weirdly engaging. There's a ton of pacing issues and very little happens, plus the dude doesn't just have a chip on his shoulder, he's got an entire soapbox there. I don't know WHY I like the books, but I do.

There are a few issues I'd list out like so:
- way, WAY too many abrupt POV switches. There were quite a few times I had to back up a few pages because I didn't realize for a bit that I was reading about an entirely different character.

- grammar check: quotation mark abuse. They're either missing or oddly placed quite frequently. It's not as bad as some books I've read with serious editing misses, but it's noticeable until your brain finally decides to filter it out and pretend it's normal.

- Chandler seems to have a real love for adult MCs in young preteen/teenage bodies who end up fabulously wealthy because they're smarter and more experienced at 13-14 years old than every adult ever. I blame JK Rowling for this trend and hope she rots in hell.

- the antagonists are all about as effective as circa 1980s Saturday morning cartoon villain sidekicks, and about as obnoxious and caricaturized as well. Their sheer incompetence is absolutely mind bogglingly staggering.

- I get it, I get it. April and Lee (the protags of each series) are young. Book 1 is plenty to bring that up and really drive it home. By book 8-9 though, I'm getting tired of the repetition.

- you'd think that having teenagers in control of an undisclosed number of 350+ megaton fusion nukes in low earth orbit along with thousands of kinetic penetrators and an also unknown number of 10-ish kiloton nukes would be an effective deterrent and earth governments would stop antagonizing the teens. You would be wrong to think that, but still. You'd think it.

- seriously. Aaron Sorkin sized soapbox. The whole catalogue reads like a libertarian manifesto.

All of that said, I still thoroughly enjoyed the books.

 

About to finish the Black Fleet trilogy by Joshua Dalzelle. Pretty good if you like space opera.

Might try the Faithful and the Fallen series by John Gwynne next. Getting pretty good reviews on Goodreads.

 

Just finished Virtues of the Vicious. It's a pretty forgettable read: adequate in every way with nothing going either for or against it. Not recommended, unless you want to turn your brain off and read a bog standard space opera about a "war" with AI in which only one AI ever dies.

It's not a series although the author does revisit the universe in other books. Which is nice, I guess, because I won't be visiting it again and I don't want it to be lonely.

 

Currently re-reading The Hunt for Red October. An old Tom Clancy book. While the movie they made, starring Sean Connery, is good, the book is better.

 

Tribal leadership. Interesting but not litrpg related at all