Books 2nd Edition, Foreword by m0r1arty Options

[maian]

I'm really looking forward to the film now. I was interested after seeing the trailer, and reading Sostie's comments on it here, but I'm now really interested in seeing how it transfers to the big screen. I imagine that it'll be a lot leaner than the book, even though it's still two and a half hours long.

[Shack]

I'm really looking forward to the film now. I was interested after seeing the trailer, and reading Sostie's comments on it here, but I'm now really interested in seeing how it transfers to the big screen. I imagine that it'll be a lot leaner than the book, even though it's still two and a half hours long.

What he said.

[gulfcoast_highwa...]

'The Amber Spyglass' was marvellous! Breathtaking in it's scope, but still very human.

Has anyone read the sort-of-sequal 'Lyra's Oxford'? Is it worth getting hold of?

[Outatime]

Yes, I've read the other one too, it's a blue book and it's about Lee Scoresby. Definitely worth a read but they are very short books.

Edit: It's called Once Upon a Time in the North.

This post has been edited by Outatime: Mar 4 2010, 02:50 PM

[Jessopjessopjess...]

Set in the Bas-Lag universe of Mieville's earlier novels, Perdido Street Station and The Scar, Mieville this time introduces his bizarre and wonderful steampunk/epic fantasy fusion to the world of the Western, as he spins a story about the eponymous Iron Council, a collection of rebels and prisoners who stole a train years before the main events of the story and, by laying down track and travelling through the harshest environments in the world, escaped the fascistic reach of New Crobuzon. Now, with civil unrest and war threatening to tear New Crobuzon apart, a group of political activists set out to find the Council in order to warn it of impending doom.

Yawn!

You should maybe try Richard K Morgan's 'The Steel Remains' if you are disillusioned with fantasy in general, it's a brutal and modern take on the genre.

[Serafina_Pekkala]

I struggled very much with Mieville. I also found it rather 'undergrad' in terms of politicks.

Has anyone read anything by Nicola Barker? I've heard good things.

[Chapman Baxter]

I struggled very much with Mieville. I also found it rather 'undergrad' in terms of politicks.

Worse than that, it's 'post-doctoral'.

[sweetbutinsane]

Triage by Scott Anderson.

Quite gripping. I can't wait to see the film.

[Serafina_Pekkala]

Worse than that, it's 'post-doctoral'.

I knew about that. He would have gone down a storm in 1968.

[maian]

Yawn!

Oh, you. I did enjoy it, and felt that it rounded out the trilogy nicely, but I think the move away from small, character driven stories set against the backdrop of huge events to huge events that happen to have characters near them was a big problem with it.

You should maybe try Richard K Morgan's 'The Steel Remains' if you are disillusioned with fantasy in general, it's a brutal and modern take on the genre.

I tried reading one of his books a while ago (I think it was Altered Carbon) after you mentioned him but just didn't get on with it at all. Something about his style failed to click with me. I'll probably try again, though, since as a rule I always finish a book I start.

[Sean of the Dead]

I thought I'd go for a thematic double bill of alternate histories by reading Fatherland by Robert Harris and Making History by Stephen Fry. The former was an excellent, gripping and hugely entertaining detective story elevated by its unusual and brilliantly realised context, with Hitler's Germania depicted as a world of the clandestine and eerily kitsch masking dark and terrible secrets. The latter was enjoyable and often very funny, with the added bonus of having my home city depicted, but it felt a little inconsistent.

[maian]

I thought I'd go for a thematic double bill of alternate histories by reading Fatherland by Robert Harris and Making History by Stephen Fry. The former was an excellent, gripping and hugely entertaining detective story elevated by its unusual and brilliantly realised context, with Hitler's Germania depicted as a world of the clandestine and eerily kitsch masking dark and terrible secrets. The latter was enjoyable and often very funny, with the added bonus of having my home city depicted, but it felt a little inconsistent.

I recommended it to you on Facebook, but in context of the other books I will again recommend The Man In The High Castle by Philip K. Dick. Like a lot of Dick's novels, it's a bit spotty but the ideas behind it are terrific. His version of how the world might have turned out if the Nazis had won is very odd.

This post has been edited by maian: Mar 4 2010, 10:49 PM

[Igmeister]

Oh, you. I did enjoy it, and felt that it rounded out the trilogy nicely, but I think the move away from small, character driven stories set against the backdrop of huge events to huge events that happen to have characters near them was a big problem with it.



I tried reading one of his books a while ago (I think it was Altered Carbon) after you mentioned him but just didn't get on with it at all. Something about his style failed to click with me. I'll probably try again, though, since as a rule I always finish a book I start.

'The Steel Remains' is excellent, not really like Morgan's other work as in it's not hard sci-fi. A similar sort of gritty, brutal fantasy like Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy. Their writing styles are very different but they are both very much grounded in character and events.

[Serafina_Pekkala]

Dick's novels, it's a bit spotty

Hehe

[maian]

You should maybe try Richard K Morgan's 'The Steel Remains' if you are disillusioned with fantasy in general, it's a brutal and modern take on the genre.

'The Steel Remains' is excellent, not really like Morgan's other work as in it's not hard sci-fi.

Hmm, if it's not that similar to the other stuff he's done then I think I'll give it a go. That's not to say that I thought that the other stuff of his I have read was bad, just that I didn't take to it.