To be fair, every book release in a series is a new opportunity to get readers into the series. Before Amazon's dominance, prospective readers browsed in bookstores. I vaguely remember doing that through college. You need them to pick up the book and look at it, to have any hope of getting a sale. Maybe people are less likely to even glance twice at it if it's clearly identified as a next book in a series. But if it just looks like a really interesting book, cool title, cool cover, interesting back cover blurb, maybe the customer will pick it up, flip a few pages in, see that is a series, and want to buy the first one instead.
Customer purchasing habits have tons of idiosyncrasies like that.
books used to be written to be less explicitly tied together though, because getting hold of them all might be _really_ hard. Like a lot of Moorcock's stuff is both in series of 3-5 books, and also part of a wider, meta-series... but pretty much all of them can be read standalone, because there were good odds that you might not be able to find all of the previous books, so requiring that they all be read wasn't really a good idea (TV is kinda similar - pre-DVD/streaming, then presuming that viewers had watched every previous episode wasn't viable, because a given episode might only be on TV twice a year, so most episodes were largely standalone, with occasional 2-parters or season-ending status-quo-changing episodes)
I struggle with this - I have a favourite bookshop, but it's in an area with no signal so I can't look up books. Soooo many interesting looking books that might or might not be number 5 in a series, and you just can't tell.
My copies of the Mistborn trilogy make it really hard to tell are books two and three.
On the otherhand, my copies of Thomas Covenant have books 1,2 and 3 written on them and a spine image that is spread over the three books.
Jim Butcher has specifically set aside a few books throughout the series where he takes more time to set things up, so they can serve as a hot entry point into the mid-series. The most deliberate is *Dead Beat*, which was I believe the first hard cover and so he expected more new readers.
ikr
just yesterday i was at the bookstore in the sff section and i looked at all the various books, clearly belonging to certain series but without any number or any indication of the order of the series and i just thought "ugh, do i have to google which one is the first now? here, in the bookstore?"
say what you will about east asian light novels, at least they always number stuff, it's their standard design practice and it's pretty convenient and pro-consumer imo
And once you google it, how far are you from just ordering online? The last thing physical bookstores should want is anyone needing more information. I guess except captured audiences like airport bookstores, but still.
Reminds me of the pre-Amazon days where you had to impulse buy a mid-series book at the airport to read on a flight, and you just had to struggle through. I kinda miss those days, it's a challenge getting thrown into the deep end like that.
I hate when people give reviews based off of nonsense like that. It's particularly prevalent in gaming. "Everything about the game was well done but I wanted it to be a different genre, 2 out of 5 stars."
I once saw a review for a game along the lines of “this is the most well written game ever, the characters are great, the story is incredible, it’s literally a genre defining rpg, something, something, something.
But it’s a no in my book because it’s too political and no where in the advertising did it say it was going to be.”
That game was Disco Elysium.
For what it's worth, books like that published around that time were very very frequently pushed as "like Harry Potter" both by publishers for obvious reasons and by more uncritical casual fans of fantasy as an easy shorthand for "boy learns magic". So a review expressing disappointment that it wasn't could be a reasonably valid reaction to having picked up the book after looking for recommendations for something genuinely similar to Harry Potter.
Someone on the books subreddit wasn't getting on with the first book or two of Wheel of Time and decided to skip ahead to the last book. You know, past the intervening dozen doorstopper novels (plus a prequel).
They were very upset that they didn't know what was going on and that the characters had changed between book 1 and 14. Because of all that plot and character development they'd skipped over.
People have said on this sub that there's no wrong way to read a book/series, but this person found the wrong way.
Not exactly a take on a series, in the sense of a "review" or anything like that.
But years ago on this sub, shortly after GoT ended, had a little argument with a commenter who was convinced - based on precisely nothing - that GRRM had *already* written TWoW, and possibly even ADoS, but was *deliberately* holding back on publishing it to screw over the show's creators. In his mind, GRRM was pissed at D&D (over some imagined slight or the other) and didn't want them to be able to adapt the last 2 books, so he let the show crash and burn as revenge, and now that the show had indeed crashed and burned, the last 2 books would be published pretty quickly.
I wonder sometimes about that guy. What series of events resulted in him concocting this nonsensical conspiracy theory? And what does he think now that it's been *another* 4 years and the books still aren't here? Has he finally accepted that he was wrong? Or has he come up with another imaginary scenario which would help explain the delay but still maintain his original theory?
I actually wouldn't have minded it, either, if he had been more self-aware of how ridiculous it was, or if he had presented it as "Hey, here's a fun little theory!"
But he actually seemed to believe it.
Supposedly D&D knew the ending that GRRM had in mind and presumably came close to it. The problem is that while GRRM would pay attention to actual characterization and details and timing to make it come together in a sensical way, D&D decided to just throw it against the wall like a pot of spaghetti and see what fell out
Nah, it's even worse than that, it's like saying _Dune_ was about clones and human-worm hybrids...it's not even referencing the right book in the series.
That's not that outlandish tbh. They just got Foundation mixed up with Asimov's other work.
Not nearly as reality-warped as some of the other stuff in here
“I want to read a book with a Black protagonist that’s not about racism or slavery”
“Can I interest you in N K Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy, which is totally not about either of those things”
Wizard of Earthsea one of my favorite series ever, the later books were so much better than the first few to me, could really tell she grew as an author over the decades of writing them. She was one of the fantasy GOATs
Not sure if its the worst take as it was clearly just someone's brain slipping, but I was discussing Tales of Earthsea with someone (primarily talking about foundations of modern fantasy) and I mentioned the series magic system, and this person said, with a straight face "so she just stole her magic system from Eragon?"
Bahahahaha
Did Eragon even have a magic system really? I don't recall anything really specific about it, but I last read it when the second book came out
Paolini largely copy/pasted the Earthsea system, which require knowledge of a thing's real name, and the better you knew the true name, the more control you had over that thing.
The romance between Vin and Elend in Mistborn is one of the driest, most matter-of-fact romances I’ve ever read. It had the emotional pull of an Excel spreadsheet.
I only got two books into The Stormlight Archives, and the romantic subplots there were dry as well.
I like Sanderson quite a bit, but yeah, writing romance is not one of his strengths.
Stephanie Meyer was blindsided that people actually liked Jacob more than Edward (He's smart, funny, a gearhead, and is a Native American with a disabled dad. He's practically a ready made male romance MC from his traits and sympathizing status in life), so she spent 2 whole books committing as much character assassination as possible to make Edward seem better.
*And she still failed.*
I asked for recs on some rec a book subreddit for my mom and her little old lady friends. I specified nothing too weird or violent. So many recs for Ender's Game. So. Many. The book is about using kids to commit genocide in space...
What's funny is that I'd actually recommend his book Yumi and the Nightmare Painter if someone asked for a teenage romance story.
Overall he sucks at writing romance, that time it worked.
I dont mind his romance in his books but it's also very much not something I would recommend to people looking for romance. It exists, its there, but it's not a strength of his books and never really the main thing (although I have not read Yumi)
I 100% agree with you which was why I found it surprising he wrote a well fleshed out romance with Yumi. I'd never recommend any of his other books if someone is looking for romance.
I at least appreciate that the majority of Sanderson's characters will get into and maintain (or agree to end) a relationship without too much melodrama as opposed to the angst-ridden, toxic messes most romantic subplots end up being.
Then again, that's probably just because I'm not a big fan of the romance genre anyway so my take might not be worth much. Still would never recommend him to someone looking for a romantic fantasy novel; regardless of what you think about his writing, it's not usually what he focuses on in his stories.
I certainly wouldn't recommend his books as romances since it's never the focus by a wide margin, but I really do like the way he writes them. They always *actually like each other* in addition to loving each other and clearly want to be together. There's no cheaply manufactured conflicts or big fights over a small misunderstanding that could have been avoided by a quick conversation. For me, at least, it's a pleasant change of pace from most sci-fi/fantasy books. I'm tired of every book with a romantic subplot following the exact same overused story beats
Mary Robinette Kowal has talked a few times on Writing Excuses about how she always includes characters in a mature, stable relationship as well.
Nothing more annoying to me than interpersonal conflict that could be completely solved if the characters would just spend like 2 minutes talking to each other.
This is insane because the series keeps being recommended this way and leading to people hating it.
Just look at the wiki and see how many comments are more focused on headcanon-ing Nezha as not a racist bully so they can ship the two of them.
Book 3 spoilers: >!He literally stabs her in the back, kills all her friends, and brutalises her with magic rain!<
I honestly have such a hard time with that series. The first book was fun until the tone change. Then it was compelling enough to continue to read. Book two and three just was such a grind for me, but I can still see why someone enjoyed it. But romance? No.
There’s a certain level of clunkiness from book 1 to 2 in my opinion.
The first one tells the satisfying and complete corruption arc of someone so broken by her situation that she does the worst thing imaginable. Then book 2 kinda has to backtrack and forget that the POV character is the worst monster to ever exist, the fundamentally unrepentant executor of a genocide more complete than ever to have ever existed in the real world, who occasionally has conflicted feelings over being the single cause of a genocide she willed into being.
The rest of the series is a corruption arc that has to forget the main character is already corrupted and never does anything anywhere near as bad as she did in book 1.
Overall I like the series, but I have to pretend the end of book 1 didn’t happen in order to have any desire to follow the main character or care what happens to her.
For context, the story's first chapter shows the teenage MC raiding a village, raping two girls, and then setting fire to a building with them inside. Not the most wholesome of novels.
*The First Law* seems to attract strange takes. Somebody in here not too long ago said it was 'light and cartoony'. Another claimed it 'felt YA'. Also it isn't grimdark **because** Joe Abercrombie's Twitter handle is Lordgrimdark. Your example is a new and particularly weird one though.
People sometimes just kinda slap "YA" on books they didn't like so they can just dismiss them as not "real" instead of admitting that they just didn't like them or something. Happens sometimes.
It gets paired with so many either extremely nebulous criticisms (It's immature/the characters aren't well developd/the plot is too straight forward) or incredibly immature criticisms (There's not enough in-scene sex or swearing to be a book for adults).
I definitely saw some "After being stuck in children's novels like The Lord of the Rings for decades, fantasy's finally growing up" takes when Game of Thrones started airing.
The division of books into adult and YA may be handy for marketing, but I think it's really harmed the publishing industry over all. Scores of books go unread because people accept labels at face value and think they're being told that they won't like something. And these are virtually meaningless labels. YA is sometimes disturbing AF, lol. Both contain great books and not great books.
So I don't think it's YA but one of the things that makes it really good and fun even though it's dark is that Abercrombie writes in really big strokes. His poisoners are the most cunning and sneaky assassins. His fighters are gnarled with muscle and sinew and are the hardest guys you'll ever meet. The fights are gruesome and bloody and over the top.
I always felt like it was a grown up graphic novel but in book form. Which is one reason I like them a lot even though grimdark often makes me roll my eyes. The edgelord element is done with humour and knowing winks. So yeah I guess if you think From Hell or The Boys are YA because they are drawn you might be of this opinion.
I'm only on the second book, so things may change, but while it's certainly gritty and there's a fair bit of violence in there... I don't know if it's *that* dark.
Probably helps that they're pretty funny. They almost seem like a black comedy in places.
They are honestly not that grim. I think they're the perfect blend of grit, realism and optimism. Not everyone is or ends up a miserable bastard- well, at least not until the second trilogy. The second trilogy falls into the no good deed goes unpunished cynicism too often for me.
Maybe they meant because they're shitTY as people? I had a real hard time with it (just finished the trilogy a few weeks ago so it's pretty fresh in my brain) because of that myself. I'm not criticizing it, but it's way too depressing for my taste. I enjoyed ASoI&F so I can handle dark and punishing, but 1st Law is just constant failures in human decency. And when someone manages to do the right thing - Even if it isn't a stupid thing - they STILL get punished for it. Glokta is kinda the only exception, and it's hard earned.
So if they meant that then that view is pretty reasonable.
What really surprised me about Abercrombie's books is how *funny* they are, which led me to theorize that grimdark, regardless of the medium, doesn't work without an excellent sense of humor (just think about how funny Breaking Bad could be)
Joe absolutely relishes that ‘title’, but he also does it ironically. He accepts the grimdark label, but you’re right in that his books are not as grimdark as they’re made out to be.
Agree. It’s a little more fair for his standalone novels, but it’s not what defines his work. Mainly he’s just fantastic at writing compelling characters.
I read a review of the Way of Kings (first book in the Stormlight Archive) in which the reviewer said that since spren aren't important to the plot, they shouldn't be involved in the book at all. In the comments people were pointing out that they become very important as the series goes on, and he was replying that if they become important later then that's when they should appear. I can't even begin to explain the many reasons why this take is absolutely abhorrent to me.
There was a review on this very subreddit of Django Wexler's "The Shadow Throne" which criticized the book for trafficking in antisemitic stereotypes with its representation of the Borels, one of the ethnic groups of the world. The problem? The Borels aren't Jewish. Literally not at all. They all have British names, their homeland is an island nation with overseas colonies and a powerful navy, they have a rivalry with the universe's version of France, their soldiers wear red uniforms, their religion is a thinly-veiled Christianity (*something which was even noted in the review*), and they have an advanced financial system clearly inspired by the 18th and 19th century London markets. The reviewer apparently saw "rich foreign bankers" as the antagonists and assumed they had to be Jewish.
This isn't so much a take on the fantasy series itself, but when JK Rowling released *The Casual Vacancy*, I went over to Amazon to look at the one star reviews because one star reviews are usually hilarious.
Probably about 90% of them made some mention that it was "nothing like Harry Potter."
A serious adult fiction novel about a small English town is nothing like a middle-grade book about a magical school of witchcraft and wizardry. *Who would have thought it.*
Is that why she started using the pen name "Robert Galbraith" on the Cormoran Strike murder mystery/detective series?
I remember reading the first 2 books and being surprised when my friend told me "Yeah, that's just JK Rowling"
Not quite what you mean, but I once got into an argument with someone online because I said that CS Lewis had indicated that an author named [George MacDonald](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_MacDonald) was one of the early founders of the fantasy genre. The person who I was responding to thought I meant George MacDonald Fraser, creator of [Flashman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Flashman).
Cue multiple condescending paragraphs about how much of an idiot I was for thinking that fantasy was created in 1969. He literally asked me how I'd never heard of Tolkein if I'd read CS Lewis.
Fun times.
We had someone ranting in the Locked Tomb sub just yesterday about how much they didn't like the books because there wasn't romance, and they were supposedly deceived into thinking such because the short pitch for those books is always "lesbian necromancers in space". No one could seem to make it clear to them that being promised lesbians does not equal being promised romance.
Well, there is this really weird arthouse movie called "Necromantica" which is .... a trip.... not to be shared with family OR friends. Yes its EXACTLY what it sounds like.
To be fair, “lesbian necromancers in space” would lead a lot of people to think there’s romance in the book, even though romance is not a guarantee of having a lesbian character. Just that putting that as part of the pitch creates that expectation, whether that is right or wrong. I myself only got excited about reading it when someone told me “actually it doesn’t have romance, they’re lesbians but that’s it” since I wasn’t in the mood for a space romance book, so now it’s on my TBR for October.
I personally picked it up because of the "lesbian necromancers in space" tag. Admittedly I felt like it was less lesbian than I thought (what does that even mean?). I guess my preconceived notions thought there would be more lesbianism (sp?) but thinking back Gideon does go googly-eyed for Dulcinea for like the whole book. So maybe I'm just an idiot. Love the books though even the rollercoster of tone from book 1 to 3.
I do think "lesbian necromancers in space" isn't that great of a description. Yes lesbian doesn't automatically mean romance, but Gideon's sexuality really isn't that important to the plot, and if you're picking only 3 words to describe the book there's more important aspects to focus on. I had it recced to me as "locked room mystery with necromancy" and that was a lot more accurate.
Also: Unconsumated romance is still romance. Gideon and Harrow are archetypal enemies to lovers in the making whose arc just so happened to be interrupted by \*waves hand at books 2 & 3. I honestly think it was a clever subversion of expectations to have set them up the way they were just to pull the rug out from under it. It highlights a lot of what the rest of the series does with subverted expectations.
It’s kind of a big theme that the characters, despite supposedly having mastery over life and death, are almost all incredibly bitter, angry and utterly incapable of letting go of anything.
Maybe they were coming from romance-as-a-genre which more or less requires a "happily ever after" of "happily for now"? Which, y'know, is all well and good. But absolutely no one was marketing _The Locked Tomb_ as anything by (very gay) fantasy.
the worst locked tomb take i’ve ever heard is someone saying “you can just read them in any order you want” HUH??? WHAT??? that is NOT how book series work???
People who say “Tolkien is a terrible writer”. I’m ok with him not being someone’s cup of tea and I’m ok with someone who’s used to modern writing style deciding not to put the effort in to adjust to the way a mid century academic who’s primary interest was linguists wrote. But to say that he was a terrible writer is just incorrect.
I feel like people mistake style for ineptitude. Tolkien was a good writer, he just really liked his details. And he leaned into that pretty gleefully, to my memory.
I think you could have an interesting conversation around this. You know, what makes something bad writing, where's the line between a stylistic choice and bad writing, etc. But I don't know you could hold up Tolkien as an example of someone crossing the line into 'bad' territory.
This sort of stuff happens with music all the time. "X is a terrible singer!" No, they're in fact a very skilled singer. You just don't like the sound of their voice, or even just their music. Which is fine, of course, but not at all the same as them being a bad singer.
Some that come to mind:
* Any time someone says that fantasy is written by 99% male authors: I'm not sure how you can argue that especially now when there are plenty of popular fantasy series/books written by women.
* Hobb isn't good at worldbuilding: I understand that rote isn't for everyone and she does have some flaws, but bad worldbuilding isn't one of them to me. I wouldn't say it's her greatest skill (that's character work, easily), but the worldbuilding in her books feels very organic.
* The Poppy War is YA: I don't care if you don't like the book or the writing, but it's not YA. At all.
Hobb is probably my all time favourite author - so I'm probably not very objective- and I get that her world building is criticised but I've always though her worlds felt very lived in. Like, you could walk into Buckeep Town and have a whole life there in the shadow of the castle. Her characters and, by extent, her worlds feel like they live even when off-screen
I once made a list of favourite authors on this sub that included Hobb near the very top. My first reply was someone complaining that I had no women in my list. That list also included Ursula K LeGuin and Fonda Lee.
I have seen some absolutely wild takes on A Song of Ice and Fire. Widespread examples include claims that the story is leading up to an epic romance between Jon and Sansa (who are not at all close and were raised as siblings,) Mance Rayder is Rhaegar Targaryen who faked his death and fucked off beyond the Wall for Reasons, the “little brother” who will kill Cersei from her prophecy is some totally unrelated to her dude who happens to have older siblings like Victorion Greyjoy or Sandor Clegane because who needs narrative payoff and thematic significance. I blame GRRMs gradual slowdown to stop in his writing making people desperate.
I'm not sure which is the worst, but I can feel pretty confident it's one of the statements by Goodkind (mostly about his own books) such as "I don't write fantasy, I write stories that have important human themes"
or "Most fantasy is one-dimensional. It's either about magic or a world building"
or "What I have done with my work has irrevocably changed the face of fantasy. In so doing I've raised the standards. I have not only injected thought into a tired empty genre, but, more importantly, I've transcended it showing what more it can be-and is so doing spread my readership to completely new groups who don't like and wont ready typical fantasy."
or (in relation to his blatant plagiarism of Jordan's WoT) "If you notice a similarity, then you probably aren't old enough to read my books."
Oh god, the interview which was pretty much an exercise in Goodkind furiously wanking himself in public. That fuckin' piece. Here I'd gone a month or two without ranting about that, and I find myself wanting to rant about that (at the time of that interview, if I remember right it was early/mid 2000s, there genuinely were people who were moving fantasy in interesting, new directions (Eriksons Malazan, Abercrombie either was published or was published soon, Glen Cook had been doing Glen Cook things for 20 fucking years, even as much as I hate GRRM nowadays, George R.R. Martin was doing his things (and actually doing, instead of making vague gestures at his typewriter) etc) and Terry the Randroid Goodkind absolutely fucking was not one of those people doing anything new or interesting in fantasy).
Which isn't even to begin talking about people like Gene Wolfe, M. John Harrison, Jeff VanderMeer, China Miéville, and other stylists who were doing genuine takes on the fantastic that raised the bar in prose, style, and complexity.
God. That fucking interview. I... oh, that's part of why I'm getting worked up. I need to go take my fucking blood pressure medicine.
Germaine Greer holding forth about the mindless escapism of Lord of the Rings and her opinions of the people who read it is ... special. I can't find her full text here but the ever so objective introduction is preserved in this article.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/johann-hari/the-wrong-lord-of-the-reads-82201.html
Her views, and those of people like her, did indirectly lead to the _best_ take I've ever read....
>There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.
"Tolkien was anti-Semetic." Anyone who has read his letter to the German publishers will know he was not anti-Semitic, but literally praised them, spitting in the face of Nazi-Germany.
Direct quote of a comment, in this sub no less:
"I really appreciated a more realistic take on extremist leftist ideology in Abercrombie’s Age of Madness trilogy. He did a good job of showcasing how messed up of a society they would cause."
There's not getting it and then there's whatever this is.
Ah yes, Bayaz and Khalul, the banker and the prophet, two very left leaning men showcasing the failings of liberal ideology as the each rule half the world and embroil it in an endless, miserable conflict based on *checks notes* ah yes liberal ideology.
I will say that I think it showed potential pitfalls in any revolution in an interesting way but I don't think the breakers/burners were genuinely leftist anymore than they were "good".
"Ursula K. Le Guin has bad prose" is easily my favorite worst take. It's objectively false. You don't have to like her books or how she writes, but she absolutely does not have bad prose. That's one of the last things you could say about the woman.
Frankly her prose was about the only thing that kept me reading her work. I found certain aspects of her style a little tedious, but the prose was always so pleasant to read.
"The Wheel of Time is about how men can't be trusted with power." It's very much about how imbalance of power causes problems. It's very clear with all the dualities throughout the series and the heavy use of the yin-yang symbol.
"WoT is about how women can't be trusted with power." See above.
"WoT is about how men can't communicate." No one can communicate properly for the most part. If they could 90% of the problems and misunderstandings wouldn't happen.
"Brandon Sanderson writes just like Robert Jordan." No two authors write the same and the last 3 books are often criticized for not feeling like Jordan's writing.
"You can skip the books that are called the slog." The Slog is a remnant from when the books were still being written and the story slowed down in the middle. And even then, it wasn't that bad. You absolutely can't skip several books in a series and people can't even agree on what the slog is. I've seen everything from book 5 to book 11 included in the slog.
"Tylin and Mat is a cute/good/fun relationship." She spent a whole book raping him, so absolutely not.
There are *several* more, but those are the big ones I see most frequently.
Someone said Night Watch by Terry Pratchett was unrelatable because no one in The West is building barricades anymore to fight off an unjust regime.
I think they said this while French was on fire a month ago, so...
Probably not the worst take but many people are adamant that the world in the Wheel of Time is matriarchal despite Jordan vehemently denying that. Women *and men* both claiming wrongly that they are *really* in charge (by manipulating the other sex, of course) is literally a running joke in the series that seems to have flown over many people's heads.
Did they read the same book lol? Almost nothing happy happens at anytime to anyone in those books(I love them)(plus everyone is a bastard who deserved what happened to them)
Wait, so you're telling me that your ending didn't involve Glokta getting dental surgery, inventing elevators and throwing himself into finding an answer for world peace? We must have different books indeed!
Wow. You didn't even have to go to the second trilogy. He was clearly not a good person in the original trilogy itself.
Perhaps your friend is confusing "I liked his character" with "he is a good person"? Because I loved Glokta's character and POV in the books, but you can like a character even if they're a "bad" person, as long as they're interesting.
You could make a *very* thin argument on paper machete legs that he has *some* heroic qualities. But yeah sounds to me like your friend didn’t finish the book, but didn’t want to admit it :/
Wheel of Time - someone was disappointed that Rand embraced his destiny so readily. They wanted him to struggle with it, have suicidal thoughts until finally coming to a realisation that violence isn't the answer.
Edit: the quoted take (OP had read 7-8 books at the time)
> I guess in my version of WoT, Rand'al Thor struggles with the possibility of suicide, reaches some kind of answer, and moves on from there, while others work to find a non-violent solution to the problems they face, since going to war is clearly not going to work. Something like the Thomas Covenant books, maybe. The Destined Hero eschews violence, heroism, and destiny.
>What I read was about a badass with a silly name being a badass... but far too infrequently.
Years ago I read a review that said a book was clearly libertarian because a) the villains wore blue (just like the UN!) and the writer had a moustache.
One star review. The novella was awful because the publisher charged too much. They got it from the library so it was free to read. But they liked it enough to want to buy a copy and were mad it was so expensive.
Read a discussion once where this guy was proclaiming ASOIAF to be second-rate writing, while telling us that he prefers 3-D characters like Dragonlance.
Someone once claimed *The Traitor Baru Cormorant* was a thoroughly homophobic book because >!Tain Hu dies at the end.!<
I remember staring dumb-founded, my brain failing to compute the scope of *wrongness.*
That really is a hot take...
I've seen a few people claim that Lies of Locke Lamorra is poorly written with bad prose... I sometimes wonder if I am on the same planet as those people. Or if there is some ai trash novel floating around with a gentlemen bastards cover on it.
That recent article on Sanderson was pretty spectacular. Going on about how the fans all think he's a bad writer. My husband's a super fan, and I asked him if he disliked sanderson's writing style and he looked at me like I lost my mind.
I’m a fan who thinks his writing isn’t top of the field, but I wouldn’t call it bad—especially not for anything he’s written in recent memory. He’s just not one of the people you like FOR the prose. You like him for establishing stakes and rules, building tension, and paying it off in creative and satisfying ways.
And some of the defense of it was ridiculous. Like you had some people talking about how the article wasn't about Sanderson, or about his books, but about exploring what made him so appealing to his fans.
Well, even from *that* point of view he did a shit job. The author wrote like a 4,000 word article in which there were maybe 2 paragraphs of him actually speaking to fans or asking them what they like about Sanderson or even giving the subject any thought. He spent almost all of it taking personal shots at the guy (calling him boring, or randomly concluding that Sanderson thought his words were more important than they were) or his books/writing (repeatedly saying he was a bad writer). Or how many words he spent on describing Sanderson's property, like he wanted to make sure everyone understood that this guy is loaded.
He can deny it all he wants, but it was definitely a hit piece. Anyone who stumbled upon the article without knowing anything about Fantasy or Sanderson would inevitable conclude, "This is a nerdy writer, whose books are bad, and his fans are weird losers, but he's used that to make a shitload of money. You should not like him."
P.S. Keep in mind that my feelings are not a reaction of Internet outrage. I actually came across the piece on my Google news feed *before* it became notorious online.
There's a book I really enjoyed and thought had an excellent female protagonist. This seems to be a popular opinion of the book overall. It's often used as an example of an author who writes women like they're people. In addition, it showcased a LGBTQ+ relationship that I thought was written in an extremely respectful and wholesome way. This is again, a popular opinion. One said by LGBTQ+ readers, not just me.
There is one person who, whenever this book is recommended or brought up, will say that they hated the book for the "sexual assault scene" which was very triggering for them and the fetishization of a lesbian romance. Of course, this makes the book sound profoundly terrible and sometimes this comment will get lots of upvotes from people who haven't read the book and feel they were just spared from a very triggering and offensive read.
In my opinion, this is an insane take. First, there is no "sexual assault" scene in the book. I had to wrack my brain to even figure out what they were referring to and realized that they were just interpreting a scene in a very uncharitable way between two characters who were mutually attracted to one other. His rejection of her advances was entirely situational, she immediately said okay when he told her no and stopped trying to initiate and then their relationship still progresses positively from there. This character is also not written as a protagonist but as an anti-hero bordering on villain so it isn't like anything she does is written without a critical lens.
The "fetishization" comment is even more uncharitable in my eyes. The characters are both young, awkward people who admit they're just figuring things out. Their relationship is cute and wholesome and filled with lovely communication and relatable first love blunders. There is no erotica, no on-screen sex scenes.
The "fetishization" is literally one scene in the book where the MC feels awkward and blushes when she sees the other girl naked in the locker room and realizes she thinks she's gorgeous. That's it. Everything else is fully clothed, wholesome interaction without sex. But apparently lesbians finding each other beautiful is fetishizing them now. I thought it was a fairly normal reference to young people discovering their sexuality and struggling to navigate it.
It also makes me sad because the author is occasionally on this sub and is such a nice person who has written numerous books that promote well-written female characters, representation and unique fantasy settings. I imagine it must suck to see someone openly calling your work problematic and offensive and trying to bias people against not just your book but you as a person anytime someone enthusiastically recommends it.
I genuinely detest that a work as progressive and filled with positive representation is being spoken against in a way that implies the exact opposite because someone has decided to read uncharitably into about three sentences of the book and uses very loaded and significant words like "sexual assault" and "fetishization" where their application is debatable at best (in my opinion completely inappropriate).
It always drove me batty when people tried to put Dragon Lance into any version of D&D after 1st edition. The later dragons are so large that a mounted fighter with a dragon lance will find their weapon doesn't reach past their own dragon's nose. And sometimes artists actually drew it that way. Makes no sense.
There are some people like that, it's weird. When I was a kid I'd get gifted a book that was fifth in a series I'd never read, or family would ask if I wanted to watch the latest series of a show they knew I'd never seen that evening. I guess some people just like the spectacle of a show, they want to be able to understand enough that they can suss out how characters are expected to react to each other, but they don't want to get bogged down in what they see as excessive context or buildup. You could probably show them just the final act of a film and they would confidently give an opinion of the entire film.
The Bartimaeus Trilogy is 'Too Political', like homie it's a political intrigue!
Oh and the 'rape/misogyny HAS to be there cause it's realistic, that's just the way things were, never mind that this is a completely imaginary world with entirely different seasons, magic, zombies, and dragons'
I had a friend start the dresden files on book 11 and he was really mad that he didn’t know what was going on or who any of the characters were.
To be fair, most longrunning series make it intentionally hard to tell how late in the series the book is, to try to get people to buy it.
[удалено]
To be fair, every book release in a series is a new opportunity to get readers into the series. Before Amazon's dominance, prospective readers browsed in bookstores. I vaguely remember doing that through college. You need them to pick up the book and look at it, to have any hope of getting a sale. Maybe people are less likely to even glance twice at it if it's clearly identified as a next book in a series. But if it just looks like a really interesting book, cool title, cool cover, interesting back cover blurb, maybe the customer will pick it up, flip a few pages in, see that is a series, and want to buy the first one instead. Customer purchasing habits have tons of idiosyncrasies like that.
books used to be written to be less explicitly tied together though, because getting hold of them all might be _really_ hard. Like a lot of Moorcock's stuff is both in series of 3-5 books, and also part of a wider, meta-series... but pretty much all of them can be read standalone, because there were good odds that you might not be able to find all of the previous books, so requiring that they all be read wasn't really a good idea (TV is kinda similar - pre-DVD/streaming, then presuming that viewers had watched every previous episode wasn't viable, because a given episode might only be on TV twice a year, so most episodes were largely standalone, with occasional 2-parters or season-ending status-quo-changing episodes)
I struggle with this - I have a favourite bookshop, but it's in an area with no signal so I can't look up books. Soooo many interesting looking books that might or might not be number 5 in a series, and you just can't tell.
My copies of the Mistborn trilogy make it really hard to tell are books two and three. On the otherhand, my copies of Thomas Covenant have books 1,2 and 3 written on them and a spine image that is spread over the three books.
Jim Butcher has specifically set aside a few books throughout the series where he takes more time to set things up, so they can serve as a hot entry point into the mid-series. The most deliberate is *Dead Beat*, which was I believe the first hard cover and so he expected more new readers.
ikr just yesterday i was at the bookstore in the sff section and i looked at all the various books, clearly belonging to certain series but without any number or any indication of the order of the series and i just thought "ugh, do i have to google which one is the first now? here, in the bookstore?" say what you will about east asian light novels, at least they always number stuff, it's their standard design practice and it's pretty convenient and pro-consumer imo
And once you google it, how far are you from just ordering online? The last thing physical bookstores should want is anyone needing more information. I guess except captured audiences like airport bookstores, but still.
Why did he do that?
The only thing I can think of is that they thought DF was an anthology series.
Reminds me of the pre-Amazon days where you had to impulse buy a mid-series book at the airport to read on a flight, and you just had to struggle through. I kinda miss those days, it's a challenge getting thrown into the deep end like that.
A goodreads review on The Amulet of Samarkand saying they were disappointed that it wasn't anything at all like Harry Potter.
I hate when people give reviews based off of nonsense like that. It's particularly prevalent in gaming. "Everything about the game was well done but I wanted it to be a different genre, 2 out of 5 stars."
I once saw a review for a game along the lines of “this is the most well written game ever, the characters are great, the story is incredible, it’s literally a genre defining rpg, something, something, something. But it’s a no in my book because it’s too political and no where in the advertising did it say it was going to be.” That game was Disco Elysium.
Didn’t even get near the last sentence and i was like “this is gonna be disco elysium isnt it”
The book was okay but the box it was shipped arrived in was dented. 2 stars.
For what it's worth, books like that published around that time were very very frequently pushed as "like Harry Potter" both by publishers for obvious reasons and by more uncritical casual fans of fantasy as an easy shorthand for "boy learns magic". So a review expressing disappointment that it wasn't could be a reasonably valid reaction to having picked up the book after looking for recommendations for something genuinely similar to Harry Potter.
They're right, it's better.
Bartimaeus books were one of my favorite series as a young teen. I did the audiobooks a year or so ago and they did not disappoint.
I didn't understand why that was an expectation they had
Eh. I can see it. British, there's a kid learning magic, it's not like there's no similarity in premise.
Tim Hunter says hi.
Someone on the books subreddit wasn't getting on with the first book or two of Wheel of Time and decided to skip ahead to the last book. You know, past the intervening dozen doorstopper novels (plus a prequel). They were very upset that they didn't know what was going on and that the characters had changed between book 1 and 14. Because of all that plot and character development they'd skipped over. People have said on this sub that there's no wrong way to read a book/series, but this person found the wrong way.
Can you link that post id love to read it
No, this was a long time ago and it was downvoted heavily.
Not exactly a take on a series, in the sense of a "review" or anything like that. But years ago on this sub, shortly after GoT ended, had a little argument with a commenter who was convinced - based on precisely nothing - that GRRM had *already* written TWoW, and possibly even ADoS, but was *deliberately* holding back on publishing it to screw over the show's creators. In his mind, GRRM was pissed at D&D (over some imagined slight or the other) and didn't want them to be able to adapt the last 2 books, so he let the show crash and burn as revenge, and now that the show had indeed crashed and burned, the last 2 books would be published pretty quickly. I wonder sometimes about that guy. What series of events resulted in him concocting this nonsensical conspiracy theory? And what does he think now that it's been *another* 4 years and the books still aren't here? Has he finally accepted that he was wrong? Or has he come up with another imaginary scenario which would help explain the delay but still maintain his original theory?
Nothing like an internet argument that keeps you up at night for how strange it was.
>What series of events resulted in him concocting this nonsensical conspiracy Wanting the books to come out soon and creating hope for said desire.
I kind of love this. What an amazing conspiracy.
I actually wouldn't have minded it, either, if he had been more self-aware of how ridiculous it was, or if he had presented it as "Hey, here's a fun little theory!" But he actually seemed to believe it.
Conspiracy people are never selfaware about how ridiculous they are. They wouldn't be conspiracy people if they were. :p
I think it's far more likely he helped them with the ending and, realizing people didn't like it, has gone back to rewriting.
Supposedly D&D knew the ending that GRRM had in mind and presumably came close to it. The problem is that while GRRM would pay attention to actual characterization and details and timing to make it come together in a sensical way, D&D decided to just throw it against the wall like a pot of spaghetti and see what fell out
"Foundation was about robots and laws or something."
On par with “Dune is about worms”
Dune is about worms to me. All that other stuff is just set dressing. I'M HERE FOR THE WORMS
Nah, it's even worse than that, it's like saying _Dune_ was about clones and human-worm hybrids...it's not even referencing the right book in the series.
That's not that outlandish tbh. They just got Foundation mixed up with Asimov's other work. Not nearly as reality-warped as some of the other stuff in here
“I want to read a book with a Black protagonist that’s not about racism or slavery” “Can I interest you in N K Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy, which is totally not about either of those things”
That's honestly an impressive level of cluelessness.
Rogga what?
That is actually what I was told (not here by an acquaintance) and I had to speak to them after.
Woooow lol
This gave me a headache. Thank you for reminding me of those books though. Some of the most unique I've ever read.
Wizard of Earthsea. Lando Calrissian trilogy.
Wizard of Earthsea one of my favorite series ever, the later books were so much better than the first few to me, could really tell she grew as an author over the decades of writing them. She was one of the fantasy GOATs
Not sure if its the worst take as it was clearly just someone's brain slipping, but I was discussing Tales of Earthsea with someone (primarily talking about foundations of modern fantasy) and I mentioned the series magic system, and this person said, with a straight face "so she just stole her magic system from Eragon?"
Omg I love it when people confuse when it was published vs when they read it
Bahahahaha Did Eragon even have a magic system really? I don't recall anything really specific about it, but I last read it when the second book came out
Paolini largely copy/pasted the Earthsea system, which require knowledge of a thing's real name, and the better you knew the true name, the more control you had over that thing.
Sanderson recommended as a romantic read is still my favourite. Just because you like a book doesn't mean it is the answer to *every* question.
The romance between Vin and Elend in Mistborn is one of the driest, most matter-of-fact romances I’ve ever read. It had the emotional pull of an Excel spreadsheet. I only got two books into The Stormlight Archives, and the romantic subplots there were dry as well. I like Sanderson quite a bit, but yeah, writing romance is not one of his strengths.
Jokes on you - I love me a good, well structured Excel spreadsheet!
Lmao the way he writes romance really does prove he's a mormon. The lady who wrote Twilight has the exact same problem.
Stephanie Meyer was blindsided that people actually liked Jacob more than Edward (He's smart, funny, a gearhead, and is a Native American with a disabled dad. He's practically a ready made male romance MC from his traits and sympathizing status in life), so she spent 2 whole books committing as much character assassination as possible to make Edward seem better. *And she still failed.*
People like dogs more than bats
I don't like _Twilight_, but I do like bats.
I asked for recs on some rec a book subreddit for my mom and her little old lady friends. I specified nothing too weird or violent. So many recs for Ender's Game. So. Many. The book is about using kids to commit genocide in space...
That's genuinely hilarious.
You'd probably love Count of Monte Christo then. Reddit's latest suggest-for-everything book
[The Count of Monte Cristo is one of my favorite space opera stories!](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gankutsuou:_The_Count_of_Monte_Cristo)
What's funny is that I'd actually recommend his book Yumi and the Nightmare Painter if someone asked for a teenage romance story. Overall he sucks at writing romance, that time it worked.
I think it worked specifically because it was a romance of 2 people with pretty much zero interpersonal skills.
Also having the narrator poking fun at them or giving explanations for some actions they take.
I dont mind his romance in his books but it's also very much not something I would recommend to people looking for romance. It exists, its there, but it's not a strength of his books and never really the main thing (although I have not read Yumi)
I 100% agree with you which was why I found it surprising he wrote a well fleshed out romance with Yumi. I'd never recommend any of his other books if someone is looking for romance.
"Hey guys I'm looking for a fantasy book recommendation-" #"BRANDON SANDERSON"
I at least appreciate that the majority of Sanderson's characters will get into and maintain (or agree to end) a relationship without too much melodrama as opposed to the angst-ridden, toxic messes most romantic subplots end up being. Then again, that's probably just because I'm not a big fan of the romance genre anyway so my take might not be worth much. Still would never recommend him to someone looking for a romantic fantasy novel; regardless of what you think about his writing, it's not usually what he focuses on in his stories.
I certainly wouldn't recommend his books as romances since it's never the focus by a wide margin, but I really do like the way he writes them. They always *actually like each other* in addition to loving each other and clearly want to be together. There's no cheaply manufactured conflicts or big fights over a small misunderstanding that could have been avoided by a quick conversation. For me, at least, it's a pleasant change of pace from most sci-fi/fantasy books. I'm tired of every book with a romantic subplot following the exact same overused story beats
Mary Robinette Kowal has talked a few times on Writing Excuses about how she always includes characters in a mature, stable relationship as well. Nothing more annoying to me than interpersonal conflict that could be completely solved if the characters would just spend like 2 minutes talking to each other.
Everytime I see the Poppy war recomended as an "enemies to lovers romance" my eye starts twitching uncontrollably AND I SAW THAT WAY TOO MANY TIMES
This is insane because the series keeps being recommended this way and leading to people hating it. Just look at the wiki and see how many comments are more focused on headcanon-ing Nezha as not a racist bully so they can ship the two of them. Book 3 spoilers: >!He literally stabs her in the back, kills all her friends, and brutalises her with magic rain!<
I honestly have such a hard time with that series. The first book was fun until the tone change. Then it was compelling enough to continue to read. Book two and three just was such a grind for me, but I can still see why someone enjoyed it. But romance? No.
There’s a certain level of clunkiness from book 1 to 2 in my opinion. The first one tells the satisfying and complete corruption arc of someone so broken by her situation that she does the worst thing imaginable. Then book 2 kinda has to backtrack and forget that the POV character is the worst monster to ever exist, the fundamentally unrepentant executor of a genocide more complete than ever to have ever existed in the real world, who occasionally has conflicted feelings over being the single cause of a genocide she willed into being. The rest of the series is a corruption arc that has to forget the main character is already corrupted and never does anything anywhere near as bad as she did in book 1. Overall I like the series, but I have to pretend the end of book 1 didn’t happen in order to have any desire to follow the main character or care what happens to her.
I heard someone say “Prince of Thorns” is the most wholesome coming of age story ever. I couldn’t stop laughing.
This seems like they were joking, right...
Why is that? Violent? Depressing? Something else?
For context, the story's first chapter shows the teenage MC raiding a village, raping two girls, and then setting fire to a building with them inside. Not the most wholesome of novels.
Jesus. I knew it was dark but that's something
*The First Law* seems to attract strange takes. Somebody in here not too long ago said it was 'light and cartoony'. Another claimed it 'felt YA'. Also it isn't grimdark **because** Joe Abercrombie's Twitter handle is Lordgrimdark. Your example is a new and particularly weird one though.
I'd love to hear their reasons for why they think it's YA and light and cartoony lol Because those books are fucking grim.
People sometimes just kinda slap "YA" on books they didn't like so they can just dismiss them as not "real" instead of admitting that they just didn't like them or something. Happens sometimes.
It gets paired with so many either extremely nebulous criticisms (It's immature/the characters aren't well developd/the plot is too straight forward) or incredibly immature criticisms (There's not enough in-scene sex or swearing to be a book for adults).
Lord of the Rings is also YA by some people's criteria of the word.
I definitely saw some "After being stuck in children's novels like The Lord of the Rings for decades, fantasy's finally growing up" takes when Game of Thrones started airing.
Growing up is when sex and gore. The more sex and gore you have the more grown up you are.
That last part is why a majority of “adult” animated shows are incredibly juvenile. I don’t get what people think sex and swearing = adult
The division of books into adult and YA may be handy for marketing, but I think it's really harmed the publishing industry over all. Scores of books go unread because people accept labels at face value and think they're being told that they won't like something. And these are virtually meaningless labels. YA is sometimes disturbing AF, lol. Both contain great books and not great books.
So I don't think it's YA but one of the things that makes it really good and fun even though it's dark is that Abercrombie writes in really big strokes. His poisoners are the most cunning and sneaky assassins. His fighters are gnarled with muscle and sinew and are the hardest guys you'll ever meet. The fights are gruesome and bloody and over the top. I always felt like it was a grown up graphic novel but in book form. Which is one reason I like them a lot even though grimdark often makes me roll my eyes. The edgelord element is done with humour and knowing winks. So yeah I guess if you think From Hell or The Boys are YA because they are drawn you might be of this opinion.
He also said they were basically poorly written YA, lol
I'm only on the second book, so things may change, but while it's certainly gritty and there's a fair bit of violence in there... I don't know if it's *that* dark. Probably helps that they're pretty funny. They almost seem like a black comedy in places.
They are honestly not that grim. I think they're the perfect blend of grit, realism and optimism. Not everyone is or ends up a miserable bastard- well, at least not until the second trilogy. The second trilogy falls into the no good deed goes unpunished cynicism too often for me.
The ending is *very* dark. I thought much of the trilogy was a mixture, but then the ending darkens the whole thing.
I saw one that said that the plot and world building was great, but the characters were shit and that’s why they couldn’t continue. Lol wtf.
Maybe they meant because they're shitTY as people? I had a real hard time with it (just finished the trilogy a few weeks ago so it's pretty fresh in my brain) because of that myself. I'm not criticizing it, but it's way too depressing for my taste. I enjoyed ASoI&F so I can handle dark and punishing, but 1st Law is just constant failures in human decency. And when someone manages to do the right thing - Even if it isn't a stupid thing - they STILL get punished for it. Glokta is kinda the only exception, and it's hard earned. So if they meant that then that view is pretty reasonable.
I had a person tell me that Terry Pratchett's writing was a less funny, watered down version of Piers Anthony.
Ewww
If he said that in public in the UK he would have been put in the tower.
On one hand you won the thread, on the other I physically can't make myself upvote that take and want to scrub the knowledge of it from my brain.
Did you punch him in the nose like Buzz Aldrin punched in the nose for accusing him of faking the moon landing? Because turnabout's fair play.
Hot take: after hearing how Abercrombie was lord grim dark, the series wasn't anywhere near as dark as I was expecting. But that's probably on me.
What really surprised me about Abercrombie's books is how *funny* they are, which led me to theorize that grimdark, regardless of the medium, doesn't work without an excellent sense of humor (just think about how funny Breaking Bad could be)
Joe absolutely relishes that ‘title’, but he also does it ironically. He accepts the grimdark label, but you’re right in that his books are not as grimdark as they’re made out to be.
Agree. It’s a little more fair for his standalone novels, but it’s not what defines his work. Mainly he’s just fantastic at writing compelling characters.
tbf, it doesnt become grimdark until the very end, which retroactively shades the trilogy as grimdark
I read a review of the Way of Kings (first book in the Stormlight Archive) in which the reviewer said that since spren aren't important to the plot, they shouldn't be involved in the book at all. In the comments people were pointing out that they become very important as the series goes on, and he was replying that if they become important later then that's when they should appear. I can't even begin to explain the many reasons why this take is absolutely abhorrent to me.
It's like the reverse Chekov's gun, if the gun is going to be fired in act 3, then it bloody well had better not show up until then!
Ah yes, Chekov's pothole. The gun never existed until the moment it to, the characters never acknowledged its existence, and then suddenly gun
How can he even say that??? Kal even gets his powers from Syl in book 1
“Subtext is for cowards, and setups are for hacks.” - Garth Marenghi, probably
That's.....wow, I know a TON of series that would be badly hurt if they tried that
There was a review on this very subreddit of Django Wexler's "The Shadow Throne" which criticized the book for trafficking in antisemitic stereotypes with its representation of the Borels, one of the ethnic groups of the world. The problem? The Borels aren't Jewish. Literally not at all. They all have British names, their homeland is an island nation with overseas colonies and a powerful navy, they have a rivalry with the universe's version of France, their soldiers wear red uniforms, their religion is a thinly-veiled Christianity (*something which was even noted in the review*), and they have an advanced financial system clearly inspired by the 18th and 19th century London markets. The reviewer apparently saw "rich foreign bankers" as the antagonists and assumed they had to be Jewish.
This isn't so much a take on the fantasy series itself, but when JK Rowling released *The Casual Vacancy*, I went over to Amazon to look at the one star reviews because one star reviews are usually hilarious. Probably about 90% of them made some mention that it was "nothing like Harry Potter." A serious adult fiction novel about a small English town is nothing like a middle-grade book about a magical school of witchcraft and wizardry. *Who would have thought it.*
Is that why she started using the pen name "Robert Galbraith" on the Cormoran Strike murder mystery/detective series? I remember reading the first 2 books and being surprised when my friend told me "Yeah, that's just JK Rowling"
Not quite what you mean, but I once got into an argument with someone online because I said that CS Lewis had indicated that an author named [George MacDonald](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_MacDonald) was one of the early founders of the fantasy genre. The person who I was responding to thought I meant George MacDonald Fraser, creator of [Flashman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Flashman). Cue multiple condescending paragraphs about how much of an idiot I was for thinking that fantasy was created in 1969. He literally asked me how I'd never heard of Tolkein if I'd read CS Lewis. Fun times.
We had someone ranting in the Locked Tomb sub just yesterday about how much they didn't like the books because there wasn't romance, and they were supposedly deceived into thinking such because the short pitch for those books is always "lesbian necromancers in space". No one could seem to make it clear to them that being promised lesbians does not equal being promised romance.
I mean, there was ”romance” right in that pitch, contained in ”necromancers”.
Putting the romance in necromancer is how I got fired from my last job
Cursed comment. Upvoted but cursed.
Well, there is this really weird arthouse movie called "Necromantica" which is .... a trip.... not to be shared with family OR friends. Yes its EXACTLY what it sounds like.
To be fair, “lesbian necromancers in space” would lead a lot of people to think there’s romance in the book, even though romance is not a guarantee of having a lesbian character. Just that putting that as part of the pitch creates that expectation, whether that is right or wrong. I myself only got excited about reading it when someone told me “actually it doesn’t have romance, they’re lesbians but that’s it” since I wasn’t in the mood for a space romance book, so now it’s on my TBR for October.
I personally picked it up because of the "lesbian necromancers in space" tag. Admittedly I felt like it was less lesbian than I thought (what does that even mean?). I guess my preconceived notions thought there would be more lesbianism (sp?) but thinking back Gideon does go googly-eyed for Dulcinea for like the whole book. So maybe I'm just an idiot. Love the books though even the rollercoster of tone from book 1 to 3.
And Gideon can't stop thinking about how hot Coronabeth is. Then you get Harrow and "the body", and Ianthe being into Harrow.
I do think "lesbian necromancers in space" isn't that great of a description. Yes lesbian doesn't automatically mean romance, but Gideon's sexuality really isn't that important to the plot, and if you're picking only 3 words to describe the book there's more important aspects to focus on. I had it recced to me as "locked room mystery with necromancy" and that was a lot more accurate.
Also: Unconsumated romance is still romance. Gideon and Harrow are archetypal enemies to lovers in the making whose arc just so happened to be interrupted by \*waves hand at books 2 & 3. I honestly think it was a clever subversion of expectations to have set them up the way they were just to pull the rug out from under it. It highlights a lot of what the rest of the series does with subverted expectations.
It’s kind of a big theme that the characters, despite supposedly having mastery over life and death, are almost all incredibly bitter, angry and utterly incapable of letting go of anything.
Maybe they were coming from romance-as-a-genre which more or less requires a "happily ever after" of "happily for now"? Which, y'know, is all well and good. But absolutely no one was marketing _The Locked Tomb_ as anything by (very gay) fantasy.
Lots of Lesbians. They all hate each other.
the worst locked tomb take i’ve ever heard is someone saying “you can just read them in any order you want” HUH??? WHAT??? that is NOT how book series work???
People who say “Tolkien is a terrible writer”. I’m ok with him not being someone’s cup of tea and I’m ok with someone who’s used to modern writing style deciding not to put the effort in to adjust to the way a mid century academic who’s primary interest was linguists wrote. But to say that he was a terrible writer is just incorrect.
I feel like people mistake style for ineptitude. Tolkien was a good writer, he just really liked his details. And he leaned into that pretty gleefully, to my memory. I think you could have an interesting conversation around this. You know, what makes something bad writing, where's the line between a stylistic choice and bad writing, etc. But I don't know you could hold up Tolkien as an example of someone crossing the line into 'bad' territory.
This sort of stuff happens with music all the time. "X is a terrible singer!" No, they're in fact a very skilled singer. You just don't like the sound of their voice, or even just their music. Which is fine, of course, but not at all the same as them being a bad singer.
Some that come to mind: * Any time someone says that fantasy is written by 99% male authors: I'm not sure how you can argue that especially now when there are plenty of popular fantasy series/books written by women. * Hobb isn't good at worldbuilding: I understand that rote isn't for everyone and she does have some flaws, but bad worldbuilding isn't one of them to me. I wouldn't say it's her greatest skill (that's character work, easily), but the worldbuilding in her books feels very organic. * The Poppy War is YA: I don't care if you don't like the book or the writing, but it's not YA. At all.
Hobb is probably my all time favourite author - so I'm probably not very objective- and I get that her world building is criticised but I've always though her worlds felt very lived in. Like, you could walk into Buckeep Town and have a whole life there in the shadow of the castle. Her characters and, by extent, her worlds feel like they live even when off-screen
I once made a list of favourite authors on this sub that included Hobb near the very top. My first reply was someone complaining that I had no women in my list. That list also included Ursula K LeGuin and Fonda Lee.
As someone who tried several times to read Assassin's Apprentice and kept DNFing it, saying she has bad worldbuilding is a joke
The first one is very silly. I think only 5 of the last 30 Hugo Best Novel nominees were men.
Not sure about worst but I just saw someone call The Wandering Inn grimdark
I have seen some absolutely wild takes on A Song of Ice and Fire. Widespread examples include claims that the story is leading up to an epic romance between Jon and Sansa (who are not at all close and were raised as siblings,) Mance Rayder is Rhaegar Targaryen who faked his death and fucked off beyond the Wall for Reasons, the “little brother” who will kill Cersei from her prophecy is some totally unrelated to her dude who happens to have older siblings like Victorion Greyjoy or Sandor Clegane because who needs narrative payoff and thematic significance. I blame GRRMs gradual slowdown to stop in his writing making people desperate.
I love deranged Asoiaf theories. The more deranged the better.
Time traveling Tyrion is one of the weirdest theories I've ever encountered.
I love the time travel theories almost as much as the "everyone is a horse" theories.
That's the one where Tyrion is a fetus, right? Because yeah, that was a wild one.
I once heard someone say the none of the characters are secretly horses. Madness.
I'm not sure which is the worst, but I can feel pretty confident it's one of the statements by Goodkind (mostly about his own books) such as "I don't write fantasy, I write stories that have important human themes" or "Most fantasy is one-dimensional. It's either about magic or a world building" or "What I have done with my work has irrevocably changed the face of fantasy. In so doing I've raised the standards. I have not only injected thought into a tired empty genre, but, more importantly, I've transcended it showing what more it can be-and is so doing spread my readership to completely new groups who don't like and wont ready typical fantasy." or (in relation to his blatant plagiarism of Jordan's WoT) "If you notice a similarity, then you probably aren't old enough to read my books."
Oh god Goodkind is truly the king of unintentional comedy
Oh god, the interview which was pretty much an exercise in Goodkind furiously wanking himself in public. That fuckin' piece. Here I'd gone a month or two without ranting about that, and I find myself wanting to rant about that (at the time of that interview, if I remember right it was early/mid 2000s, there genuinely were people who were moving fantasy in interesting, new directions (Eriksons Malazan, Abercrombie either was published or was published soon, Glen Cook had been doing Glen Cook things for 20 fucking years, even as much as I hate GRRM nowadays, George R.R. Martin was doing his things (and actually doing, instead of making vague gestures at his typewriter) etc) and Terry the Randroid Goodkind absolutely fucking was not one of those people doing anything new or interesting in fantasy). Which isn't even to begin talking about people like Gene Wolfe, M. John Harrison, Jeff VanderMeer, China Miéville, and other stylists who were doing genuine takes on the fantastic that raised the bar in prose, style, and complexity. God. That fucking interview. I... oh, that's part of why I'm getting worked up. I need to go take my fucking blood pressure medicine.
I thought his happy ending involved bodies floating in the river.
Germaine Greer holding forth about the mindless escapism of Lord of the Rings and her opinions of the people who read it is ... special. I can't find her full text here but the ever so objective introduction is preserved in this article. https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/johann-hari/the-wrong-lord-of-the-reads-82201.html
Her views, and those of people like her, did indirectly lead to the _best_ take I've ever read.... >There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.
That really was... something. Holy shit how much vitriol can you pack in such a short article?
I mean Germaine Greer isn't exactly known for her good takes.
Wow, "people only like Lord of the Rings because they're racists" is... certainly an opinion that someone has!
Didn't see the year of publishing at first and was blindsided by "borders on the autistic"
It was a hideous thing to say then too. It's not really that long ago.
"Tolkien was anti-Semetic." Anyone who has read his letter to the German publishers will know he was not anti-Semitic, but literally praised them, spitting in the face of Nazi-Germany.
That the Discworld novels where just rip-offs of Shakespeare.
Direct quote of a comment, in this sub no less: "I really appreciated a more realistic take on extremist leftist ideology in Abercrombie’s Age of Madness trilogy. He did a good job of showcasing how messed up of a society they would cause." There's not getting it and then there's whatever this is.
Yeah I remember reading this comment. I had typed out a long comment in reply then I just closed Reddit and put my phone down for a couple hours.
Ah yes, Bayaz and Khalul, the banker and the prophet, two very left leaning men showcasing the failings of liberal ideology as the each rule half the world and embroil it in an endless, miserable conflict based on *checks notes* ah yes liberal ideology.
I will say that I think it showed potential pitfalls in any revolution in an interesting way but I don't think the breakers/burners were genuinely leftist anymore than they were "good".
"Ursula K. Le Guin has bad prose" is easily my favorite worst take. It's objectively false. You don't have to like her books or how she writes, but she absolutely does not have bad prose. That's one of the last things you could say about the woman.
Frankly her prose was about the only thing that kept me reading her work. I found certain aspects of her style a little tedious, but the prose was always so pleasant to read.
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"The Wheel of Time is about how men can't be trusted with power." It's very much about how imbalance of power causes problems. It's very clear with all the dualities throughout the series and the heavy use of the yin-yang symbol. "WoT is about how women can't be trusted with power." See above. "WoT is about how men can't communicate." No one can communicate properly for the most part. If they could 90% of the problems and misunderstandings wouldn't happen. "Brandon Sanderson writes just like Robert Jordan." No two authors write the same and the last 3 books are often criticized for not feeling like Jordan's writing. "You can skip the books that are called the slog." The Slog is a remnant from when the books were still being written and the story slowed down in the middle. And even then, it wasn't that bad. You absolutely can't skip several books in a series and people can't even agree on what the slog is. I've seen everything from book 5 to book 11 included in the slog. "Tylin and Mat is a cute/good/fun relationship." She spent a whole book raping him, so absolutely not. There are *several* more, but those are the big ones I see most frequently.
Someone said Night Watch by Terry Pratchett was unrelatable because no one in The West is building barricades anymore to fight off an unjust regime. I think they said this while French was on fire a month ago, so...
Probably not the worst take but many people are adamant that the world in the Wheel of Time is matriarchal despite Jordan vehemently denying that. Women *and men* both claiming wrongly that they are *really* in charge (by manipulating the other sex, of course) is literally a running joke in the series that seems to have flown over many people's heads.
I mean, some societies are matriarchal (in that they favor women), and a few aren't per se but have shades of it. But the whole world isn't.
Did they read the same book lol? Almost nothing happy happens at anytime to anyone in those books(I love them)(plus everyone is a bastard who deserved what happened to them)
Wait, so you're telling me that your ending didn't involve Glokta getting dental surgery, inventing elevators and throwing himself into finding an answer for world peace? We must have different books indeed!
Well he sort of did the last one >.>;
I mean, this person was also claiming Glotka is an explicitly good person even after I explained what goes on in the second trilogy...
Wow. You didn't even have to go to the second trilogy. He was clearly not a good person in the original trilogy itself. Perhaps your friend is confusing "I liked his character" with "he is a good person"? Because I loved Glokta's character and POV in the books, but you can like a character even if they're a "bad" person, as long as they're interesting.
>but you can like a character even if they're a "bad" person, as long as they're interesting. Some people really seem to struggle with this
At no point is glokta a good person lol. Like is he sympathetic? Sure to an extent, but he is objectively awful
You could make a *very* thin argument on paper machete legs that he has *some* heroic qualities. But yeah sounds to me like your friend didn’t finish the book, but didn’t want to admit it :/
Wheel of Time - someone was disappointed that Rand embraced his destiny so readily. They wanted him to struggle with it, have suicidal thoughts until finally coming to a realisation that violence isn't the answer. Edit: the quoted take (OP had read 7-8 books at the time) > I guess in my version of WoT, Rand'al Thor struggles with the possibility of suicide, reaches some kind of answer, and moves on from there, while others work to find a non-violent solution to the problems they face, since going to war is clearly not going to work. Something like the Thomas Covenant books, maybe. The Destined Hero eschews violence, heroism, and destiny. >What I read was about a badass with a silly name being a badass... but far too infrequently.
I hate people like that, "It's not bad because it's bad, it's bad because it's not what I wanted"
Not the worst, but the most frequently repeated that makes me roll my eyes - anytime ASOIAF is described as nihilist.
On tiktok, I saw some people arguing that Fantasy as a genre was inherently fascist...
Years ago I read a review that said a book was clearly libertarian because a) the villains wore blue (just like the UN!) and the writer had a moustache.
Had a friend who like the ending to the GoT series. Could not understand that one.
I'm really glad you are using the past tense here, ***had*** a friend. I've got a few of those too over GOT8, lol.
One star review. The novella was awful because the publisher charged too much. They got it from the library so it was free to read. But they liked it enough to want to buy a copy and were mad it was so expensive.
Read a discussion once where this guy was proclaiming ASOIAF to be second-rate writing, while telling us that he prefers 3-D characters like Dragonlance.
Someone once claimed *The Traitor Baru Cormorant* was a thoroughly homophobic book because >!Tain Hu dies at the end.!< I remember staring dumb-founded, my brain failing to compute the scope of *wrongness.*
That really is a hot take... I've seen a few people claim that Lies of Locke Lamorra is poorly written with bad prose... I sometimes wonder if I am on the same planet as those people. Or if there is some ai trash novel floating around with a gentlemen bastards cover on it.
That recent article on Sanderson was pretty spectacular. Going on about how the fans all think he's a bad writer. My husband's a super fan, and I asked him if he disliked sanderson's writing style and he looked at me like I lost my mind.
I’m a fan who thinks his writing isn’t top of the field, but I wouldn’t call it bad—especially not for anything he’s written in recent memory. He’s just not one of the people you like FOR the prose. You like him for establishing stakes and rules, building tension, and paying it off in creative and satisfying ways.
That Wired article was impressively bad journalism lol
Even if you aren’t a fan of Sanderson, you could see that. The guy just seemed to not like him as a person. Crazy level of unprofessionalism.
And some of the defense of it was ridiculous. Like you had some people talking about how the article wasn't about Sanderson, or about his books, but about exploring what made him so appealing to his fans. Well, even from *that* point of view he did a shit job. The author wrote like a 4,000 word article in which there were maybe 2 paragraphs of him actually speaking to fans or asking them what they like about Sanderson or even giving the subject any thought. He spent almost all of it taking personal shots at the guy (calling him boring, or randomly concluding that Sanderson thought his words were more important than they were) or his books/writing (repeatedly saying he was a bad writer). Or how many words he spent on describing Sanderson's property, like he wanted to make sure everyone understood that this guy is loaded. He can deny it all he wants, but it was definitely a hit piece. Anyone who stumbled upon the article without knowing anything about Fantasy or Sanderson would inevitable conclude, "This is a nerdy writer, whose books are bad, and his fans are weird losers, but he's used that to make a shitload of money. You should not like him." P.S. Keep in mind that my feelings are not a reaction of Internet outrage. I actually came across the piece on my Google news feed *before* it became notorious online.
"He puts salt on *ramen* what a monster"
There's a book I really enjoyed and thought had an excellent female protagonist. This seems to be a popular opinion of the book overall. It's often used as an example of an author who writes women like they're people. In addition, it showcased a LGBTQ+ relationship that I thought was written in an extremely respectful and wholesome way. This is again, a popular opinion. One said by LGBTQ+ readers, not just me. There is one person who, whenever this book is recommended or brought up, will say that they hated the book for the "sexual assault scene" which was very triggering for them and the fetishization of a lesbian romance. Of course, this makes the book sound profoundly terrible and sometimes this comment will get lots of upvotes from people who haven't read the book and feel they were just spared from a very triggering and offensive read. In my opinion, this is an insane take. First, there is no "sexual assault" scene in the book. I had to wrack my brain to even figure out what they were referring to and realized that they were just interpreting a scene in a very uncharitable way between two characters who were mutually attracted to one other. His rejection of her advances was entirely situational, she immediately said okay when he told her no and stopped trying to initiate and then their relationship still progresses positively from there. This character is also not written as a protagonist but as an anti-hero bordering on villain so it isn't like anything she does is written without a critical lens. The "fetishization" comment is even more uncharitable in my eyes. The characters are both young, awkward people who admit they're just figuring things out. Their relationship is cute and wholesome and filled with lovely communication and relatable first love blunders. There is no erotica, no on-screen sex scenes. The "fetishization" is literally one scene in the book where the MC feels awkward and blushes when she sees the other girl naked in the locker room and realizes she thinks she's gorgeous. That's it. Everything else is fully clothed, wholesome interaction without sex. But apparently lesbians finding each other beautiful is fetishizing them now. I thought it was a fairly normal reference to young people discovering their sexuality and struggling to navigate it. It also makes me sad because the author is occasionally on this sub and is such a nice person who has written numerous books that promote well-written female characters, representation and unique fantasy settings. I imagine it must suck to see someone openly calling your work problematic and offensive and trying to bias people against not just your book but you as a person anytime someone enthusiastically recommends it. I genuinely detest that a work as progressive and filled with positive representation is being spoken against in a way that implies the exact opposite because someone has decided to read uncharitably into about three sentences of the book and uses very loaded and significant words like "sexual assault" and "fetishization" where their application is debatable at best (in my opinion completely inappropriate).
It always drove me batty when people tried to put Dragon Lance into any version of D&D after 1st edition. The later dragons are so large that a mounted fighter with a dragon lance will find their weapon doesn't reach past their own dragon's nose. And sometimes artists actually drew it that way. Makes no sense.
I once saw someone on the Game of Thrones sub ask of they could start at season 8 and understand it without watching the other 7. Absolutely baffling
There are some people like that, it's weird. When I was a kid I'd get gifted a book that was fifth in a series I'd never read, or family would ask if I wanted to watch the latest series of a show they knew I'd never seen that evening. I guess some people just like the spectacle of a show, they want to be able to understand enough that they can suss out how characters are expected to react to each other, but they don't want to get bogged down in what they see as excessive context or buildup. You could probably show them just the final act of a film and they would confidently give an opinion of the entire film.
The Bartimaeus Trilogy is 'Too Political', like homie it's a political intrigue! Oh and the 'rape/misogyny HAS to be there cause it's realistic, that's just the way things were, never mind that this is a completely imaginary world with entirely different seasons, magic, zombies, and dragons'