Fantasy Book Thread

[Rudy]

Reading the Powder Mage trilogy now. All 3 are finished and am starting with Promise of Blood. Over halfway through and it's really good. Wasn't sure if I would like guns being involved but there is a cool magic system and a good mystery developing.

[Rudy]

If anyone wants to read a good, classic epic fantasy (not gritty) that is cheap I would highly recommend Firehurler. It's a trilogy and the first book is under $3 and sometimes is free. Long Kindle samples too. The first book was the best but the last two books of the trilogy were pretty good. The twist in this is that there are "twinborn" characters. Characters that are linked across other worlds. I found it very interesting. His next trilogy was weak and I quit reading during book 2 but this was a really good read imo.

http://www.amazon.com/Firehurler-Twi...rds=firehurler

[Rudy]

Well I finished Promise of Blood. It was good but the last half of the book left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth. I loved the first half. The world, characters and magic are all very interesting. My biggest beef is that the plot twists weren't all that plausible in the second half. Quite often I was thinking - "Really? Does that make sense?" It felt like the author could just write anything down the stretch to make whatever he wanted happen. I know it's fantasy but it's not a Scooby Doo episode. The two main characters Tamas and Taniel also had 9 lives. While I don't think the author needed to go all George Martin on them, the inability of the bad guys to kill them off when they could felt amateurish. It bugged me a bit, especially since I really enjoyed a lot of the book.

I do plan on reading the next one but for now the score would have to be a 3.5 or 4 max out of 5.

[Rudy]

Decided to give the Malazan books a chance. 10 book epic series that is described as love it or hate it. Read book one Gardens of the Moon and I'd say it's average. Feels more like a good popcorn fantasy DragonLance book.

A couple complaints:
1) It's high fantasy. Tons of magic, wizards, talking animals, gods interfering with the people, etc. That's old school and I prefer the toned down fantasy aspects of the modern books. Plus it seems there are no limits to some things. A badass just appears and can do whatever he wants. Well what took so long then?

2) It's story driven at the expense of characters. There are a ton of characters but it's a fast paced story that takes the wheel. This leads to some confusion early on as they introduce a lot of characters, fast forward time twice and even include a quick flashback. As you just get comfortable a second wave of characters hits you. You do settle in half way and while some characters are unique and/or cool I never truly cared about any of them. Not like Kaladin in the Way of Kings. I would definitely recommend that series over this. Plus the author builds up the story in certain areas and it feels like it gets finished too quick.

So I didn't love it or hate. I don't think I'm going to read any of the other books at this point. We'll see. 3.5/5

My next book to read may be Grace of Kings (new book). Otherwise I will likely wait until the Queen of Fire (Blood Song Final Book in trilogy). I still may give The Blade Itself another chance. I liked the preview but haven't pulled the trigger on that one.

[JeffHCross]

It's sci-fi rather than Fantasy, but I've been reading The Fear Saga by Stephen Moss lately, and I've really enjoyed it. It may not be the best written series, but the story is enjoyable and right up my alley. The third book is more than double the length of the second, so I'm still grinding through it.

[oweb26]

Decided to give the Malazan books a chance. 10 book epic series that is described as love it or hate it. Read book one Gardens of the Moon and I'd say it's average. Feels more like a good popcorn fantasy DragonLance book.

A couple complaints:
1) It's high fantasy. Tons of magic, wizards, talking animals, gods interfering with the people, etc. That's old school and I prefer the toned down fantasy aspects of the modern books. Plus it seems there are no limits to some things. A badass just appears and can do whatever he wants. Well what took so long then?

2) It's story driven at the expense of characters. There are a ton of characters but it's a fast paced story that takes the wheel. This leads to some confusion early on as they introduce a lot of characters, fast forward time twice and even include a quick flashback. As you just get comfortable a second wave of characters hits you. You do settle in half way and while some characters are unique and/or cool I never truly cared about any of them. Not like Kaladin in the Way of Kings. I would definitely recommend that series over this. Plus the author builds up the story in certain areas and it feels like it gets finished too quick.

So I didn't love it or hate. I don't think I'm going to read any of the other books at this point. We'll see. 3.5/5

My next book to read may be Grace of Kings (new book). Otherwise I will likely wait until the Queen of Fire (Blood Song Final Book in trilogy). I still may give The Blade Itself another chance. I liked the preview but haven't pulled the trigger on that one.

Rudy our books taste are very similar..... Like scary similar or I read too many damn books.

The malazan books are okay, honestly you should have just skipped the first one it was an average book that is a average read...what he does extremely well is tie everything back together almost irritatingly so. The next book is pretty good but honestly I stopped at book three because I simply wasn't interested in any of the other 7...lol 10 books on one series is an investment I wasn't sure I wanted to make at the time.

I am on the fence about the last blood song book as much as I loved the first one the second one wasn't as good and not really that much valeyn in it. Might hold off for the paperback this time around.

Sent from my SM-N900P using Tapatalk

[Rudy]

Yeah, the first Blood song was great. Then he switched to multiple characters for part 2 and a lot of people were upset. Looking forward to the final book in July. Hopefully it finishes strong.

And Jeff please feel free to talk about sci fi as I like them too. Curious about the Martian.

[JeffHCross]

I knew you were okay with Sci-Fi talk (after all, most who like one tend to like the other), I just often forget to come to this thread.

I've been trying a lot of new authors lately, so right now I'm spread pretty thin among the number of series that I'm trying to complete. Stephen Moss, as mentioned, is the author of the moment, with Jack Campbell's Lost Fleet series something that I really need to get back to. Evan Currie's Into The Black series started off really well, and I thought he was taking on a risky, unique plot, but then it went in a different direction that I didn't enjoy as much, so it'll probably be a while before I rejoin that series.

And I'm really screwed when Disney starts releasing new Star Wars books in the fall to lead into The Force Awakens.

[Rudy]

Finished Queen of Fire and it was a disappointing end to the blood song trilogy. Way too many side characters and cultures and world/religion building. Vaelin is neutered and all the main characters are boring or repetitive. The story is just go from point a to b with the characters being poorly utilized. No memorable scenes or dialogue.

I will read the Martian or Vicious as my next fiction work.

[jaymo76]

Finished Queen of Fire and it was a disappointing end to the blood song trilogy. Way too many side characters and cultures and world/religion building. Vaelin is neutered and all the main characters are boring or repetitive. The story is just go from point a to b with the characters being poorly utilized. No memorable scenes or dialogue.

I will read the Martian or Vicious as my next fiction work.

Just read The MARTIAN a few months back. Not a deep read and not great writing but the story itself is a quick read and very entertaining. The protagonist is incredibly likable (though I just don't see why Matt Damon will play him in the movie...???). My wife read it too and enjoyed it which is surprising because it's not her type of book.

[Rudy]

Kindles on sale on Amazon. Ca. Paperwhite is just $119. My wife surprised me with a Kindle almost 3 weeks ago from staples. I just upgraded it to a Paperwhite two days ago although I haven't told her yet. I really like it but wanted the light for reading all the time. The base Kindle is too dark in poor lighting and definitely poor late at night. But mine was $139 and the older 212ppi compared to 300 ppi and $119 right now! It bugs me a little but the higher resolution is mainly beneficial for maps or pictures. Definitely a great device.

Half way through Vicious right now. Great book! It's a modern book that resembles Heroes with a mix of Flatliners. Excellent read so far and it's just a single book.

[Rudy]

Just finished Vicious. Great book. It's a tad dark (I liked this) but in the mould of Unbreakable/Heroes TV and Flatliners. It also bounced back and forth in time to flesh out the history of the characters but it worked great. It wasn't annoying. Just a single book about 360 pages or so. I loved it from start to finish with only two things that bugged me a little. Those things have me downgrade the score to 4.5/5.

Spoiler: show

The janitor of the University would never have let a kid into a professor's locked office - especially after seeing him try to pick the lock. Serena's motivation behind everything didn't add up but it didn't take away from the great story.

[oweb26]

Finished Queen of Fire and it was a disappointing end to the blood song trilogy. Way too many side characters and cultures and world/religion building. Vaelin is neutered and all the main characters are boring or repetitive. The story is just go from point a to b with the characters being poorly utilized. No memorable scenes or dialogue.

I will read the Martian or Vicious as my next fiction work.

I will read Queen of Fire at some point in the future, I read the amazon reviews ( since you can't trust the goodreads reviews) and they are all saying the same thing so I will probably pick this up on paper back at some point.....

I have no idea what my next read is going to be at this point, I really hate these moments when I don't have a story that is really capturing me and making me want to read the next book in the series.

I recently reach The Sword and the Dragon, which was an okay read I have the second book just not a strong desire to read it, plus it was a little to fantasy for me.

I completely re-read the parthian series by peter darman , which I think is offically ranks in my top 3 favorite historical fiction stories, the first book is decent the they get soo much better starting with the second.

So any suggestions? Maybe I will re-read the Ryria Revelations

[Rudy]

I haven't read the Ryvian Revelations. Grace of Kings is $2 on Amazon Kindle so I bought it. I will read it at some point. Mixed reviews a little and it's the start of a trilogy.

[oweb26]

I haven't read the Ryvian Revelations. Grace of Kings is $2 on Amazon Kindle so I bought it. I will read it at some point. Mixed reviews a little and it's the start of a trilogy.

I would have sent you a hardback copy of the grace of kings, for free (minus shipping of course). LOL I have it in my cube at work and I didn't even pay for it.

You should read the Ryria Revelations it's a pretty good series and seeing as how he has since released a few prequels it actually is something like 6 books now instead of three.

[Rudy]

What did you think of grace of Kings? Mixed reviews on it but $2 isn't bad.

[Rudy]

I may give the Mistborn trilogy a try soon. Gets great reviews and there is a sale for the boxed set although I will get it for my Paperwhite.

[oweb26]

What did you think of grace of Kings? Mixed reviews on it but $2 isn't bad.

For 2.00 it isn't bad at all, I thought it was just meh, probably worth a read at some point but I wouldn't put it ahead of anything else I want to read.

I may give the Mistborn trilogy a try soon. Gets great reviews and there is a sale for the boxed set although I will get it for my Paperwhite.

I haven't personally read the mistborn series my wife has and she loved it, I am a Sanderson Fan as I don't think I have read a bad book by him yet. I would probably read mistborn before I read Grace of Kings

[Rudy]

I didn't like Prince of Thorns as maybe some others did. Average fantasy imo. 3/5

Longer review below with no real spoilers.

Spoiler: show

This is actually a shorter fantasy book at a little over 300 pages. The author uses an anti-hero as the main character and the first person story is told through him. Much has been written about how awful a person Jorg is as he rapes two girls at the beginning of the book. Yes, this is terrible but the rapes are not described in gruesome detail, simply stated as fact. It doesn’t make this a less horrible act but this is a dark fantasy. Stay away if this is not a genre you care for. While this book has dark moments, it’s not as dark as the Game of Thrones so anyone that likes those books or TV shows and has a problem with this book is hypocritical.

This book is an average fantasy book. I’m really unsure of why people really recommend it. I found it hard to believe in the story of Jorg as the story starts out with him at 9 years old and covers the next 6 years of his life. He comes across as too smart, strong, cunning, etc for the age at which he is portrayed. He’s interesting in some scenes but also comes across as bi-polar as he does some things that also seem out of character.

There are odd elements in this book as well. It’s a fictional setting but one that also references Plato, Aristotle and current religions. It has some ghosts, necromancers (a bizarre scene with them) and strange creatures that bugged me a bit for their inclusion. I think this book could have been better without the higher fantasy levels but then so much of the main plot in the book wouldn’t have even been possible either. Some of this stuff feels invented just to make it possible to get from point B to C.

The story itself isn’t really that great. The motive of revenge is good but where the story goes and how it gets there was just average. There isn’t much mystery involved which I missed. A little too much of the main character can do anything and get out of anything. The writing isn’t bad but there is nothing special either. You will either like this book based on the story and main character or you won’t. I’ve read enough fantasy books now that average just doesn’t do it for me. I won’t be paying to read the rest of this trilogy. I didn’t hate the book but it just wasn’t special imo and I don’t feel compelled to read the rest of the tale.

3/5

I has started Grace of Kings but kind of quit reading after awhile. Wasn't sucking me in. I need something more unique and interesting.

[jaymo76]

It's not fantasy but my wife picked up a Walking Dead chronicles book for me. I am looking forward to getting into it at some point in the near future.