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 Mr Morden wrote:
Just finished the 4th Josh Reynolds detective novel set in Legend of the Five Rings - A most enjoyable character based novel which explores the world but avoids the obvious Clan stereotypes quite often

4th? I thought that there were just 2 so far. I need to get other 2 as soon as possible.

 Shadow Walker wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:
Just finished the 4th Josh Reynolds detective novel set in Legend of the Five Rings - A most enjoyable character based novel which explores the world but avoids the obvious Clan stereotypes quite often

4th? I thought that there were just 2 so far. I need to get other 2 as soon as possible.

5th one coming out soon

https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/A-Bitter-Taste/Josh-Reynolds/Legend-of-the-Five-Rings/9781839083013

Just started re reading Gaunt's Ghosts series. I know Abnett isn't for everyone but I'm really enjoying them.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Shadow Walker wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:
Just finished the 4th Josh Reynolds detective novel set in Legend of the Five Rings - A most enjoyable character based novel which explores the world but avoids the obvious Clan stereotypes quite often

4th? I thought that there were just 2 so far. I need to get other 2 as soon as possible.

5th one coming out soon

https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/A-Bitter-Taste/Josh-Reynolds/Legend-of-the-Five-Rings/9781839083013

Wow, such a backlog I have! Now imagine George R. R. Martin writing so fast.

The AoS book section of Black Library is still slow due to losing Josh! He's a writing machine and seemed to really like working in that setting and writing stuff that wasn't just "ties into latest release of whatever major thing is new hotness"

 Overread wrote:
The AoS book section of Black Library is still slow due to losing Josh! He's a writing machine and seemed to really like working in that setting and writing stuff that wasn't just "ties into latest release of whatever major thing is new hotness"

Whole BL is poorer because of him leaving it. His Fabius novels were one of the best 40k ones.

So I am reading Iron Gold and I really do not understand the authors characterisation of Mustang

In book 2 there’s a very significant scene between her and Darrow where she’s very clear that she will not stand for the massacres and atrocities being committed. Okay, that shows Mustang is a principled character who will object to if Darrow or anyone else does bad things.Thats neat, sets up clear red lines and is creating narrative tension if Darrow does something evil. He might end up losing Mustang as an ally and so him doing bad things would compromise the Rising.

We then see Mustang go along with a number of events that are pretty much genocidal in character and described as such by the characters. These include, the massacre of civilians at Phobos, letting the Obsidian execute prisoners of war for no reason and the sack of Luna in which millions of the people they’re trying to free from slavery are killed. This is explained by Darrow as driven by pragmatism and an end justifies the means. They can’t punish the Obsodians because they are apparently indispensable. Now, Darrow also nukes Gannymeade killing (a suspiciously low number) of innocent Red civilians. But that is an exception because that seems to be a secret unlike all of the others where Mustang was present and would be aware of. Mustang just shrugs for all this stuff and doesn’t oppose him at all. The only time she has opposed Darrow so far was when he tried to escape arrest for something far more trivial and less serious about lying to the senate.

This is terrible characterisation. It amounts to wasting time establishing a characters motivation and building drama just to ignore that. I could say the same of Sevro who has a whole section of Morningstar dedicated to opposing the Rising hanging their own Golds which just gets completely ignored as Sephi and the Obsodians continue to commit horrific war crimes and massacre millions of Reds.

But what’s worse is that in Iron Gold we then have a scene with Lyria where suddenly Mustang is depicted as the principled character who opposes Lyria being tortured and says she wants to follow the law. Again, if the character has offscreen become pragmatic and approves of pretty much everything Darrow does then why is she suddenly have scruples about hurting a POV character? If the character thinks that then why would she have demanded the two Obsidian clans and Sephi be punished for massacring millions of civilians?

Like on the Sack of Luna. They would have to cut the Obsidians out if they did that. The Reds should not be okay with Sephi and the Obsidians. Like they should want them dead at that point and they should massively pressure Darrow to take action or find somebody who would. Like it isn’t pragmatic or morally grey. At that point they’re being attached and would demand vengence.

It’s really discredited the character and comes across as the author knowing this would just inconvenience his narrative if there was a conflict over this between Mustang and Darrow. Hence why there’s suddenly a break over a much more trivial issue of him killing an Obsidian who is with Rising oddly enough.

Far too many on the go...

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.
Splinter of the Mind's Eye by Alan Dean Foster.
Calculus Made Easy by Thompson & Gardener.
Thrawn by Timothy Zahn.
Fly Fishing by J.R Hartley.

 Shadow Walker wrote:

 Overread wrote:
The AoS book section of Black Library is still slow due to losing Josh! He's a writing machine and seemed to really like working in that setting and writing stuff that wasn't just "ties into latest release of whatever major thing is new hotness"

Whole BL is poorer because of him leaving it. His Fabius novels were one of the best 40k ones.

Agreed - he is a great world builder / character writer

Getting that same vibe as when Eric Nylund was booted from writing Halo books in favor of Karen 'Army Chad Fetishist' Traviss.

 LordofHats wrote:
Getting that same vibe as when Eric Nylund was booted from writing Halo books in favor of Karen 'Army Chad Fetishist' Traviss.

Oof, yeah. Noticed that one. Although it slotted in nicely with the Bungie -> Microsoft change in the main games, so the whole setting started going down the pan.

Got to the end of Iron Gold.

Very good read if very annoying that my first impression that Darrow is some Paul Atreides type is very much playing out. He’s a very bad man in this. I don’t think I was meant to enjoy his tears at the end quite as much as the author wanted. I think he wants Darrow as the morally grey figure with some room for redemption. I want to see him dead. It says a lot that it gets you to the point of making Lysander a palatable poison.

Having Ephraim and Lyria in the book was great. I really loved those two. They say the quiet part out loud and I really appreciated that we got them instead of sycophants or immoral arseholes. I want to like Sevro, Mustang and Victra but the author is determined to make that impossible. Like, it shocked me that Holidays response to “you guys have killed millions of children” is “Ephraim, what happened to you? How did you get so cynical.” Like that’s a serious accusation you aren’t replying to and you aren’t providing much actual pushback.

I do think the author is often ignoring the consequences and logical end points of the characters actions and attitudes. These are clearly highly militaristic, Stalinist and authoritarian characters that have no morality or principles whatsoever. It really doesn’t make sense that they wouldn’t just have a military dictatorship and be enslaving the Reds to work in armaments factories and have full purges of their political opponents. There’s a bit of a disconnect in that the pendulum swings between them being idealistic like not torturing Lyria and having no qualms about nuking ten million civilians (mostly Red so lots of little Eos BTW) because there might be a war. This comes across as the author having what he thinks are his own red lines that he thinks would render the protagonists entirely unsympathetic and outright evil even when that’s the logical direction they would go. Even small things like leaving it ambivalent whether Sevro killed an unarmed Pink who tried to stop him murdering the Ash Lord. Like he slaps her but we’re told in Ephrams chapters Pinks can die even to a Grey punching them never mind a Gold in full armour. You can very much hear the author going “well that is cruel, but maybe don’t him actually murder an unarmed Pink on the page.”. That sort of thing is quite recurring.

Reading the Malazan series again. It's pretty flawed, but I also feel like generally sticks the landing on a style of epic high fantasy that is rarely attempted.

I think my biggest issues with it is how bleak and cynical the world is. It's really relentlessly nasty and horrible. I prefer some hope and beauty in my fantasy nowadays, Tolkien style.

I think the bleak tone would be okay if most books didn't also have a comic relief character or sequence that I can just tell Erikson is so pleased with, that really clashes with the rest of the tone violently. Kruppe in book one or the intergalactic mages guild in book two.

He also needs an editor imo. The books are incredibly long and often at least one plotline is pointless, like the Kalam plot in book two.

But overall the scope and imagination at work saves it and he manages to hold my interest just to see how he'll pull off his next high fantasy twist.

See I rather like having some plotlines that are just fleshing out a character. I feel like they help make a character more real and the world itself more realistic. I think sometimes we get so fixated on everything having to serve and drive the main plot that it can make many fantasy worlds and stories feel very hollow when you pause and step back ;or when the author tries to do a sequel and suddenly has to flesh out parts of the world that weren't mentioned at all in the first story, but were in the same area or region and such. So it can feel like the story is just pulling convenient bits out to make the main plot work. I'd actually hold up a few of the newer starwars films as great examples of this kind of storytelling where everything conveniently happens to let the plot happen.


So yeah I enjoy trips into side quests within a story. Fleshing out characters, bits of the lore and setting. Sometimes all they do is help reinforce how skilled a character is when they later have to do something for the core narrative and its much easier to accept because you've already seen them doing that outside of the main plot.

I also enjoy that if I think the characters are interesting or well written, unfortunately many of Erikson's characters fall fairly flat for me, especially the Bridgeburners. He can do good ones, but sometimes they are just flat.

 Mr Morden wrote:
Just finished the 4th Josh Reynolds detective novel set in Legend of the Five Rings - A most enjoyable character based novel which explores the world but avoids the obvious Clan stereotypes quite often

I did not know these existed, and now must find them!

I couldn’t make it even a third of the way through Malazan book 2. The characters were boring and the plot tedious. I also had a bad taste in my mouth from the ending of book 1, the obvious writer’s-RPG-character insert in book 1, the bloat in book 1, and the many scenes of two unidentified characters obliquely discussing something unrevealed to the reader (as I’m guessing an attempt to build mystery?) in book 1.


What I’m saying is Malazan book 1 was a garbage fire to my sensibilities, and book 2 (or as much as I read of it) doubled down.

Also, didn’t book 1 have some guy turn into a living puppet and then do nothing with him? Why waste a Chucky?

I will agree that Malazan book 1 hits you right out of the gate with in-world concepts and by the end you can be a bit confused. It's honestly a book I found more enjoyable on a second read because I had the foreknowledge of the function of elements of the world that made it a lot easier to focus on the story.

The 2nd book can be a bit of a hit because its a whole new cast for the opening part until some characters from the 1st catch up.

The twig character does some stuff, but also lays the groundwork for that kind of magic being a thing which reappears later in big parts in the story (eg in Memories of Ice which is a freaking awesome book after books 1 and 2 built up too it).

I've tried to get into Malazan twice, the first time about 10 years ago and the last time fairly recently. I honestly think Gardens of the Moon is one of the worst books I've ever read. I can't fathom how anyone can read that novel and be like "oh yes, 9 more please!" I really wanted to like it too, as it's one of the most well loved fantasy series ever, but oh boy... Erikson couldn't give me a single character to get invested in throughout that whole book.

I'm currently reading Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb and I'm loving it so far.

Assassin's Apprentice is freaking awesome!

Just be sure once you finish that trilogy to go read the Liveship Traders BEFORE you read the next Fitz and Fool based trilogy. Liveships is a different style (multicharacter) and different region but it fleshes out a huge world chunk that becomes very important in the following fitz and fool series.

Robin Hobb is fantastic, and criminally under rated. The Farseer trilogy, the Liveship trilogy and the Golden Fool trilogy make a nine book run that is incredible from start to finish and has a really satisfying ending.

She wrote more books in the series after this, but I never read them because I was so happy with the trilogy of trilogies.

The final trilogy ends it beautifully. I really, really enjoyed it and the tonal shifts from series to series as the character grew and aged. It's really excellent.

I fondly recall getting and reading at least two of the books basically in a day and not stopping. She's indeed a very overlooked author by many, despite getting rave reviews whenever her work turns up.

“The End of Everything: How Wars Descend Into Annhilation” by Victor Davis Hanson

Basic premise: Take seriously when an enemy nation says its going to destroy you. Thebes, Carthage, Constantinople, Tenochtitlan, serve as examples.

-Never knew that Alexander pretty much wiped out Thebes after they rebelled following his rumored death in the north. Dude sent a message to all of the Greek City-states to not rebel before he took his fathers warmachine across the known world.

-Never knew Carthage more or less slept-walked right into their extinction. They had no clue how hated/feared they were by most Romans of all stations. The “anti-war” faction in Rome was interesting as well, seeing in Carthage an opponent that should be kept alive to constantly test Rome, lest it fall into lackadaisical decline. The brutality was pretty intense as well.

Currently starting the Constantinople chapter, which I am dreading. The slow decline of the Byzantines tugs at my hesrtstrings more than most historical collapses, and I’m not sure why.

It's often missed that while Rome lionized Hannibal as a great enemy they managed to defeat despite stiff odds, Hannibal and his entire family were controversial in Carthage. their political enemies shifted toward blaming the Barca's for the entire war and argued that Rome never would have fought if their family had instigated the conflict.

Dog sitting, and he’s all hot and sleepy caught up on some reading, specifically Scarlett Traces Vol 2 from the 2000ad Ultimate Collection.

A spinoff from War of the Worlds, exploring what happened to all that naughty tech left in the hands of the British Empire during its zenith.

Vol 2 is up to the 60’s and it pretty damned cool. Nice resolution which I shan’t spoil, and plenty of room for further tales in the same setting.

Catcha' in the rye

 Overread wrote:
Assassin's Apprentice is freaking awesome!

Just be sure once you finish that trilogy to go read the Liveship Traders BEFORE you read the next Fitz and Fool based trilogy. Liveships is a different style (multicharacter) and different region but it fleshes out a huge world chunk that becomes very important in the following fitz and fool series.

I'm going to dissent here. I didn't like the Farseer trilogy at all. Maybe I just have a hard time identifying with idiots as the main character. I liked the worldbuilding, but the characters - Fitz in particular - just seem to constantly be actively trying to suffer more. Except when they're just being completely passive playthings to whomever is currently exploiting them.

At least the characters in the Malazan series act mostly rationally. Well, except for the mad ones.

Currently on the pretty heavy, but surprisingly accessible, Origin of Species. I'm aware current evolutionary theory has moved forward quite a bit from the basics laid out here, but few books have had remotely as much impact as this one. It's worth a read because of that fact alone.

Bran Dawri wrote:

 Overread wrote:
Assassin's Apprentice is freaking awesome!

Just be sure once you finish that trilogy to go read the Liveship Traders BEFORE you read the next Fitz and Fool based trilogy. Liveships is a different style (multicharacter) and different region but it fleshes out a huge world chunk that becomes very important in the following fitz and fool series.

I'm going to dissent here. I didn't like the Farseer trilogy at all. Maybe I just have a hard time identifying with idiots as the main character. I liked the worldbuilding, but the characters - Fitz in particular - just seem to constantly be actively trying to suffer more. Except when they're just being completely passive playthings to whomever is currently exploiting them.

At least the characters in the Malazan series act mostly rationally. Well, except for the mad ones.

Currently on the pretty heavy, but surprisingly accessible, Origin of Species. I'm aware current evolutionary theory has moved forward quite a bit from the basics laid out here, but few books have had remotely as much impact as this one. It's worth a read because of that fact alone.

But wanting to scream at Fitz for making the wrong choice is half the fun!

Honestly I think it works in the books with him because they follow his character and let you look behind the thoughts of his actions. You can see the mistakes he makes, but you also see how he works out the logic behind those choices. You can see the flaws in his thinking here and there, but you can also see how its his personality, his experiences and who he is that leads him to make certain wrong or less than ideal choices. In many ways this makes him a very realistic character who has flaws, problems, issues and more. Because we ALL make really dumb, really stupid mistakes.

I dunno. I do enjoy books with flawed characters, but Fitz's reasonings often just seemed more like ridiculously far-fetched rationalizations by the author to justify heaping more misery and on the character than someone's actual thoughts.

As much as I dislike for example Martin's penchant for killing off protagonists, he doesn't generally torture them more than the plot requires.