Book Review

[BrokenQuill92]

Book recommendation! Let's get started!

[Chad32]

I'd be happy to talk about the Animorphs series.

Steve Shives likes to review christian books on Youtube.

[Bad Wolf]

Game of thrones! Get on my level you filthy casuals who only watch the tv series!

[thesummerqueen]

I'm reading The Black Count.

Alexandre Dumas is famous for writing The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers. What lots of people don't know is that his father, Alex Dumas, was a major figure through the French Revolution and Napoleon's reign...and was half-black. The book is a really interesting glimpse into the strange race relations that went on in the French-held portions of the Caribbean and in France itself. In America we learn all about the way the United States handled slavery and the resulting racism, but France had its own very quixotic relationship with the slave trade and racism. On top of it, Alex Dumas cuts a very romantic figure and his experiences clearly influence many of the scenes we see in Alexandre's novels later in life. I really recommend it for getting to see a portion of history from a different perspective, and because it's always cool to read about the people who inspire our favorite literary characters.

I also read Cooked - Michael Pollan is awesome as long as he's not on an anti-GMO or pro-organics kick.

And I'm also working my way through Paradise Lost. Epic poetry is epic.

[Chad32]

Game of thrones! Get on my level you filthy casuals who only watch the tv series!

I read Ice and Fire, until the five year gap. After that I just lost interest. One year between books is bad enough. Five years, and I start to wonder if it's still worth it.

the sad thing is one of my online friends still loves the series, and I know he'd like to talk about it with me because he mentions it sometimes.

[Tea Earl Grey Hot]

I'm reading "Belief's Own Ethics" by Jonathan E Adler. Awesome book that makes a strong case for the epistemology of evidentialism.

[Ravenshire]

I read Ice and Fire, until the five year gap. After that I just lost interest. One year between books is bad enough. Five years, and I start to wonder if it's still worth it.

the sad thing is one of my online friends still loves the series, and I know he'd like to talk about it with me because he mentions it sometimes.

The five year break wasn't enough to kill my interest, but the fifth book was. The story has spun out of Martin's control.

To the OP:
I can recommend a ton:
Brandon Mull: "Fablehaven" (YA fantasy series).

Brandon Sanderson: Most anything he's ever written, but especially "Elantris" (stand-alone fantasy), The "Mistborn" Trilogy (fantasy) and the "Reckoners" series (super-hero, sorta, books with the second due out this fall).

Brenna Yavanoff: "The Replacement" (modern day fairy tale)

C.J. Cherryh: Anything she's written but especially the "Foreigner" series (really good alien culture sci-fi) and the "Tristan" series (sword and sorcerer fantasy).

Carrie Vaughn (local Boulder author, yay): "Discord's Apple" (modern day greek pantheon fantasy) and her "Kitty" series (urban fantasy with a werewolf name Kitty )

Conor Kostick: The "Avatar Chronicles" (fantasy inside a sci-fi tale).

Dan Wells: The "Partials" series (dystopian future, YA)

Daniel H. Wilson: "Amped" (near future sc-fi) and Robopocalypse (near future sci-fi).

Eoin Colfer: EVERYTHING!!!!!!! "The Supernaturalist" (near future YA sci-fi) was amazing. His "Artemis Fowl" (12-year old criminal mastermind with fairies) series is insanely good though I heard a nasty rumor that the latest and last is the last because Disney bought his publishing house. If true, kudos to him for wanting nothing to do with Disney and a hearty "FUCK YOU!" to Disney.

Ernest Cline: "Ready Player One" (near future sci-fi). Future world where most typical human interaction takes place in VR, on-line. TONS of '80s references but a damned good read.

Isobelle Carmody: The "Obernewtyn Chronicles" (very, very good dystopian future with a bit of fantasy in the mix).

James Alan Gardner: The "League of Peoples" series (sci-fi). How do you not like a series about red-shirts?!?

James Dashner: The "Maze Runner" series. (dystopian future).

Jim Butcher: "The Dresden Files" series (urban fantasy). Wizard at large with a spirit guide named Bob, who lives in a skull and has a libido roughly the size of Alaska. Hugely entertaining.

Kage Baker (RIP Kage!): "The Company" series. (time travel sc-fi with cyborgs).

Kim Harrison: "The Hollows" series (urban fantasy)

Mark Walden: The "H.I.V.E" higher institute for villainous education series (YA action/adventure).

Max Brooks: "World War Z" (historical documentary of the zombie apocalypse). Awesome book. Hollywood bought the rights just to get the title and ignored the content.

Michael J. Fox: "Luck Man" (non-fiction). Michael J. Fox's autobiographical story of dealing with Lou Gherig's disease. Touching and funny.

Neil Gaiman: EVERYTHING!!!!! But, especially "American Gods" (modern mythos fiction), "Stardust" (fantasy in the early mold of the genre) and "Neverwhere" (modern day fantasy).

Nick Sagan (yes, Carl's kid): The "Idlewild" series. (near future dystopia).

Pete Hamill: "Forever." This one's hard to calssify because it has elements of many genres, but a superb read!

Philip Pullman: "His Dark Materials" (fantasy series).

Richard Adams: "Watership Down" (contemporary fiction).

Richard K. Morgan: "Thirteen" and the "Takeshi Kovacs" series (sci-fi/dystopian future).

Robert Asprin: The "Myth" and "Myth Adventures" series' (comedic fantasy).

Robert Rankin: The "Toy Town" duology (comedic fairy tales). I've never laughed so hard at the written word as I did while reading "The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse!"

Sophie Littlefield: The "Aftertime" series. Zombie stories on Harlequin imprint? Really? Yes, really, and they're not romances.

Steven Gould: The "Jumper" series. (sci-fi). The first is the book that the really bad Hayden Christensen film is (very, very loosely) based on but don't hold that against it. It's a really good coming of age story.

Ted Kosmatka: "The Games" (near future sci-fi). Genetic manipulation gone wrong. Sure, it's done to death but this one's pretty good.

Vince Flynn (died at 47, victim of cancer, RIP Vince!!!): The "Mitch Rapp" series (political thrillers). Mitch Rapp is a CIA agent with some very typical Republican beliefs but these are very good "spy story" books.

If you want/need any more recommendations, let me know. This is really just scraping the surface. I read prodigiously. Sci-fi and fantasy are my go-tos, but I'll read damn near anything, unless it's really bad. Life's too short for bad fiction.

[Esquilax]

Jim Butcher: "The Dresden Files" series (urban fantasy). Wizard at large with a spirit guide named Bob, who lives in a skull and has a libido roughly the size of Alaska. Hugely entertaining.

Tell me this: does the simplistic, exposition heavy narration style ever clear up? I recently cracked open the first one and I'm aware it's a long series, but jeez is that narration ever hard for me to swallow. The ideas look cool, but I dunno if I can wade through so many paragraphs of being told things rather than shown them.

[Ravenshire]

Jim Butcher is a bit ( ) heavy handed, true. It does get better. Go away, not so sure, but it does get better. I'm a little more tolerant of it seeing as I've read everything Stephen King (the master of purple prose) has written.

[Esquilax]

Jim Butcher is a bit ( ) heavy handed, true. It does get better. Go away, not so sure, but it does get better. I'm a little more tolerant of it seeing as I've read everything Stephen King (the master of purple prose) has written.

I'll give it a book or two, see where it goes.

It does have one thing going for it, which is that I feel much better about the flow of my own writing, especially when I remind myself that it's a very long running, successful series.