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Author Topic: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?  (Read 4362 times)

Vector

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #15 on: June 12, 2011, 11:19:47 am »

The audience is a bit young, but the stuff by Jane Yolen is still excellent.
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ChairmanPoo

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #16 on: June 12, 2011, 12:10:30 pm »

Patrick Rothfuss and Brent Weeks are decent. Their style is somewhat reminiscent of Robin Hobb's. (In particular the Robin Hobb of the AA trilogy, which I liked. Not the Robin Hobb from Tawny Man, which I didn't like at all)
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Greyejoy

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #17 on: June 12, 2011, 06:00:48 pm »

Frank Herbert's Dune is a classic Sci Fi novel/series. One of my all time favourites as well. You could also check out the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson. Tales of the Otori by Lian Hearn is good. The Book Of The New Sun by Gene Wolfe is also very nice. I'll let you know if I think of some more.
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Vector

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #18 on: June 12, 2011, 07:30:36 pm »

I was going to add:

Gibson and Stephenson for massive amounts of cyberpunk.
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Zrk2

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #19 on: June 12, 2011, 07:42:10 pm »

Steven Erickson's The Malazan Book of the Fallen comes highly reccomended by me, Ian C Esselmonts related works, decidedly less so.

Franks Herbert has been interesting so far.

L E Modesitt Jr writes good sci fi, I enjoyed them more than the parts of The Saga of Recluce that I have read.

EDIT: Oh, look:

Frank Herbert's Dune is a classic Sci Fi novel/series. One of my all time favourites as well. You could also check out the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson. Tales of the Otori by Lian Hearn is good. The Book Of The New Sun by Gene Wolfe is also very nice. I'll let you know if I think of some more.

My points almost all covered.
« Last Edit: June 12, 2011, 07:44:34 pm by Zrk2 »
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Bohandas

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #20 on: June 12, 2011, 11:56:15 pm »

Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy series.
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Logical2u

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #21 on: June 13, 2011, 12:01:18 am »

L E Modesitt Jr writes good sci fi, I enjoyed them more than the parts of The Saga of Recluce that I have read.

EDIT: Oh, look:

Frank Herbert's Dune is a classic Sci Fi novel/series. One of my all time favourites as well.

My points almost all covered.

Ah, I had forgotten about L. E. Modesitt Jr in my post. Thanks for reminding me!

Also, I loved the first Dune book, but the ones after that got worse and worse in my opinion. (I should DL the miniseries sometime...)
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Bohandas

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #22 on: June 13, 2011, 12:08:03 am »

Oh, also any of a number of books by Christopher Moore, especially Coyote Blue.
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ChairmanPoo

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #23 on: June 13, 2011, 04:08:01 am »

Quote
Steven Erickson's The Malazan Book of the Fallen comes highly reccomended by me, Ian C Esselmonts related works, decidedly less so.

My take on this: Steve Erikson's novels, I read through. They're entertaining, but a bit confusing at times.

I began to read Ian C Esselmont's "return of the crimson guard" and abandoned it halfway through. It's terribad.

I should have gotten suspicious, in hindsight, when in the intro to the book, Steve Erikson said that Esselmont's novels are not "Malazan fanfic". Excusatio non petita...
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Farmerbob

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #24 on: June 13, 2011, 04:10:58 am »

Goodkind
Donaldson
Feist
Eddings (Belgariad/Mallorean era stuff - newer stuff is meh)
Moorcock
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Enzo

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #25 on: June 13, 2011, 04:20:23 am »

Gibson and Stephenson for massive amounts of cyberpunk.

I support this recommendation. Neuromancer and Snowcrash, specifically, are the crash course in cyberpunk.  Very good books both, but I would personally recommend Stephenson as generally awesome.
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Lord Shonus

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #26 on: June 13, 2011, 06:23:50 am »

Dune is okay, but vastly overrated. I think Herbert's best work was Greenslaves.
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BowlSoldier

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #27 on: June 13, 2011, 06:54:46 am »

Try Iain M Banks for Sci-fi. If you like his stuff, maybe try Iain Banks for general fiction. Yes, they're the same person.
Was going to mention him myself, his sci-fi books are surprisingly good I find. Just finished reading Surface Detail there, less complicated than most of his works but still a good read.

I found Dan Simmon's Illium duology to be interesting, definitely different. It starts off as a science-fiction version of Homer's Illiad, where the Olympian gods' powers are based on science. Needless to say it goes into a lot more, and ends up as a kind of meta-literature. Got a lot of my knowledge about Homer's works from those two books.
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DJ

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #28 on: June 13, 2011, 10:37:06 am »

Now that you mention him, Hyperion/Endimion series was pretty good.
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Nivim

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Re: Good Fantasy / Sci-Fi / Alt. History Books?
« Reply #29 on: June 13, 2011, 11:04:03 am »

 The Dragaeran series by Steven Brust is one I can highly recommend. ...I can't really think of anyway to sum it up other than, "he makes things real". Also, you can play the Find Devera game in all his books he didn't get from Paarfi.

L E Modesitt Jr writes good sci fi, I enjoyed them more than the parts of The Saga of Recluce that I have read.
I second his Imager Portfolio (as the only thing of his I've read) for rather small amount of flaws and sci-fi nature. The fact that he used to work in politics shows; his understanding of people's interests, actions, and all their relations is vast.
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