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Author Topic: Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?  (Read 1813 times)

Mr. Analytical

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Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?
« Reply #30 on: October 06, 2006, 05:17:41 PM »
I just felt that if it had been about 400-500 pages instead of 800 it would have been fantastic.  It had that feeling of bloat that books get when writers become so succesful that they don't really need to listen to editors anymore and editors lose the balls to stand up for themselves.

It was also marked by the hardback having this fantastic cover which was like a zoom in on a single feature of a gas giant done in oil paints.  But when the paperback came out clearly someone went "people won't know it's sci-fi so what if people can see stars through the gas giant?" and promptly ruined the effect.

His next sci-fi one is a Culture one though so that's worth looking forward to even if the last one was pretty weak.

Balbinus

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Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?
« Reply #31 on: October 06, 2006, 05:19:59 PM »
Quote from: Mr. Analytical
I just felt that if it had been about 400-500 pages instead of 800 it would have been fantastic.  It had that feeling of bloat that books get when writers become so succesful that they don't really need to listen to editors anymore and editors lose the balls to stand up for themselves.


I'd agree with that, the Neal Stephenson effect I now think of it as.

Aos

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Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?
« Reply #32 on: October 06, 2006, 06:01:17 PM »
Quote from: Mr. Analytical
You mean the religious tyrant?  I thought he was so preposterous as to be camp.  He was like the Childcatcher from Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang he was so over the top.

I've never managed to finish Feersum Endjinn, much for the same reason that I've never read Trainspotting.  I hate that tricksy style of writing.


RE: the algebraist: no, the protaganist, he reminded me of a physicist friend of mine.

RE: Feersum Endjinn- the "trick style"  bothered me at first, but it eventually grew on me quite a bit.
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Netwyrm

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Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?
« Reply #33 on: October 06, 2006, 10:54:37 PM »
I think science fiction in the U.S. declined suddenly because the standbys have passed away, by and large, of late, and there was a long stretch in the '80s and '90s where the "hard stuff" detoured into near future social dystopian fiction and transhumanist esoterica.

Me, I've always loved the sci-fi about advanced alien races and strange new worlds, but it seemed like that got very lost for a good long stretch.

Kind of in the same way Star Trek turned inward from being outwardly-focused over much the same stretch of time--instead of "strange new civilizations" we got long dystopian conspiracies and pablum-matic hegemonic characters (who ironically were battling an even more homogenous hegemony much of the time).

Right now, the book I'm most interested in reading is "Boundary" by Eric Flint... I like the crypto-scientific genre.

(Oh, one more thing: does anyone else find "military science fiction" to mean David Weber? I think Honor Harrington in particular might just belong to the other team--she seems a perfect representation of a *paladin* more than anything else...)
 

fonkaygarry

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Most popular genre: SF or fantasy?
« Reply #34 on: October 06, 2006, 11:03:27 PM »
I voted for science fiction.

I don't read science fiction; at least not the novels.  I like scifi comics well enough and scifi anime has been a real blast for me (Uchu Senkan Yamato, Macross, Planetes (which is too hard SF for you), and countless other shows with SF trappings.)  Battlestar Galactica needs no introduction.

Fantasy's had a few winners in its corner (Tanith Lee's stuff, LotR, Record of Lodoss War,) but not really enough for me to say I'm a big fantasy fan.
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Mr. Analytical

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« Reply #35 on: October 07, 2006, 06:28:30 AM »
Quote from: Balbinus
I'd agree with that, the Neal Stephenson effect I now think of it as.


  Neal Stephenson's an interesting example of the bloat phenomenon.  Stephenson's by and large terrible at writing plot; his books start, go on for a bit and then suddenly end.  Admittedly he's taken to padding out these plots with hundreds and hundreds of pages of useless historical detail but I think this is worthy of more credit than your average fat fantasist's bloat simply because it is real historical detailing rather than stuff he's just made up.

So when he goes off on a tangent about 18th C science I'm more likely to be forgiving because it's based on research.  But someone who goes off on a hundred page tangent about some aspect of their own mythology is just a self-indulgent cunt who deserves a kerb stomping.

  Having said that, I've never gotten further than the first part of the Baroque cycle.

damster25

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« Reply #36 on: October 08, 2006, 02:41:16 PM »
I say FANTASY is the BEST :bow: :respect: :ninja: :unicorn: :scorpion: :domokun:
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flyingmice

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« Reply #37 on: October 10, 2006, 11:06:30 AM »
Quote from: Netwyrm

(Oh, one more thing: does anyone else find "military science fiction" to mean David Weber? I think Honor Harrington in particular might just belong to the other team--she seems a perfect representation of a *paladin* more than anything else...)


To tell the truth, I like Moon's Marque and Reprisal series much more than Honor Harrington. Mil SF =! Weber. Drake has been at it for years, as well as Pournelle.

Alt history SF is booming now as well.

I do miss the stories that really inspired me, though. Niven's still around but he hasn't written a non-Ringworld Known Space book in decades. Instead he's puttering around with fantasy and vanity projects. Cherryh's still going strong, but her Invader series is far more closed off than her Alliance/Union/Earth Space novels, or the related Compact Space novels, neither of which has seen anything new in ages either. Brin's output has fallen off dramatically. Vance is ancient - though everything he writes is a precious pearl of style and wit, there are too few new books, and they will all too soon stop forever. The rest of the greats are dead and gone, and no one new writes in this style anymore.

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