What books are you reading now?

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Jan 14, 2013 6:20 pm

I'll be honest, Demandred was cool, but I have no idea why you guys think Graendal proved to be a badass in this book. Literally all she did was use compulsion on some people, exactly like she and others did in the previous books. Oh yeah, and she "fought" with lots of good channelers as long as your definition of fighting is running away until for reasons completely unrelated to her, she outnumbered them.

And you are totally wrong about her face, one person. She cares so much about looking pretty that she in fact her end goal is explicitly "use compulsion on every single person in the universe so that they think my new face is pretty."

No, Graendal didn't come off any more badass than Mogehiden, Semihrage, Graendal, and Lanfear have all come off in other books.

Not badass, but I think other than Demandred, the Forsaken who comes off as actually deserving the reputation is Lanfear. The retconnish plan to always have Rand in a position to kill the Dark One before intervening was pretty nice, and that her final downfall was underestimating the Power of Love(TM) in a way that was way the fuck less forced than every other time the Power of Love has been invoked. Lanfear never knows love, and therefore underestimates it is totally a good ending.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Mon Jan 14, 2013 6:49 pm

Well, two reasons.

She used compulsion really impressively. It is her thing like commanding armies is Demandred's thing. Yes, she and others used compulsion previously, but getting the greatest generals in the world to intentionally throw fights with the same skill their allies were counting on to win is much more impressive than the previous uses. I mean, her enemies managed to avert the total destruction of their armies at almost literally the last possible moment in three out of four cases, and the other case had her schedule constrained by time dilation.

Also, everyone does hit-and-run in battles between elite channelers. Rand did it, Rahvin did it, Demandred did it, Ishmael did it, etc. Graendal did it well, and started stealing enemy channelers when the Red Veils provided a nice shiny distraction.

As for the new face thing, she actually always wanted to use compulsion on everyone in the universe like that. I got the distinct impression she did not much care about her actual appearance (certainly she didn't use the Mask of Mirrors to touch it up) and only pretended to in order to get the other Forsaken to dismiss her as irrelevant, much like her supposed addiction to luxury that meant she was pretty sure no one would look for her spartan bolthole.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Mon Jan 14, 2013 10:56 pm

name_here wrote:Well, two reasons.

She used compulsion really impressively. It is her thing like commanding armies is Demandred's thing. Yes, she and others used compulsion previously, but getting the greatest generals in the world to intentionally throw fights with the same skill their allies were counting on to win is much more impressive than the previous uses. I mean, her enemies managed to avert the total destruction of their armies at almost literally the last possible moment in three out of four cases, and the other case had her schedule constrained by time dilation.

Also, everyone does hit-and-run in battles between elite channelers. Rand did it, Rahvin did it, Demandred did it, Ishmael did it, etc. Graendal did it well, and started stealing enemy channelers when the Red Veils provided a nice shiny distraction.

As for the new face thing, she actually always wanted to use compulsion on everyone in the universe like that. I got the distinct impression she did not much care about her actual appearance (certainly she didn't use the Mask of Mirrors to touch it up) and only pretended to in order to get the other Forsaken to dismiss her as irrelevant, much like her supposed addiction to luxury that meant she was pretty sure no one would look for her spartan bolthole.

1) That really seems exactly the fucking same as everyone else's compulsions, I mean, fuck, Hashima was totally just doing the same thing to Egwene to the same effect.

2) Yes, she used hit and run and captured other channelers. When she suddenly got an army of channelers so she outnumbered them. Basically she is exactly as cool as Taim, except that she uses Compulsion instead of turning, so she can do it faster, color me unimpressed.

3) No, she really does care about her looks. She doesn't use the Mask of Mirrors because she is forbidden to cover her ugly face as punishment. Really, again, the whole "not caring about her looks" thing is basically just yo being wrong. That is directly contradicted by Graendel herself in the book.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 6:54 am

So, I got someone pushing the Sword of Truth books at me.

I seem to remember something about "evil pacifists" and doom chickens and I'm too lazy to search.

Yea, nay, read it drunk (which means, to me, not to read it at all; I don't drink), read it for the lulz, or what?

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 8:40 am

First one was OK. Second one didn't make me hate it much. Third one made me throw the book at walls. Literally.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 2:29 pm

read it for the lulz. I remember just going through the chapters finding scores of bad editing.

A sword of truth abridged would be hilarious.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 2:36 pm

According to a friend of mine the first book is good, the second book is mediocre, the third is crap, and after that it becomes fucking ridiculous.

There was a thread on it here if you want to see what some Denners had to say about it.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 6:28 pm

Which I'd commented in...Huh. I remember hearing that now that I'm reminded.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Tue Jan 15, 2013 11:32 pm

Please don't remind me that Goodkind exists.

I like to think that the world only allows novels to be published and released to the world so that reading them can be a soul-enriching experiance for both reader and writer; mind and soul.

Terry throws a serious wrench in that dream.

Mistborn · Post by **Mistborn** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 4:48 pm

I just finished reading A Memory of Light it lived up to my expectations, and that's really all there is to say on the matter.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 1:10 am

I haven't really read any Wheel of Time novels past the 3rd one because it turned to shit. But I can totally see the new books being good because the new author, Brandon Sanderson is pretty damn talented.

In other news, I've been reading C.J. Cherryh's fantasy series "Fortress of *insert phrase here*" series.

A good high fantasy low magic setting. Sure the later books start to show more instances of magic, but it's still limited and seem to mostly be on the level of EPIC spells.

Only criticism is that Cherryh seems to just elaborate on background mentioned in prior books in such a way that the stuff in the earlier books seems to be disregarded.

Emerald · Post by **Emerald** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 2:43 am

Cynic wrote:I haven't really read any Wheel of Time novels past the 3rd one because it turned to shit. But I can totally see the new books being good because the new author, Brandon Sanderson is pretty damn talented.

Honestly, 3-4 and 10-11 are the main patchy parts, 3-4 because that's when it turned from a trilogy into a longer series and 10-11 because it was supposed to be one book but was split into two and so nothing happens for a good part of each. If you can get over those humps, reading through to the end is actually worth it. Sanderson definitely breathes some much-needed life into things after 10-11 and is just awesome all around, though.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:15 am

I bought a Star Wars novel today. It's about Reven from Knights of the Old Republic.

It ultimately appears to be a novelization of the game. I haven't actually started reading it, per se, but I'm curious as to how they handle making a novel out of a large, open choice game like KoTOR.

To quote Korgan0,

This will either be amazing or awful. It cannot be anything in between.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:27 am

Cynic wrote:I haven't really read any Wheel of Time novels past the 3rd one because it turned to shit. But I can totally see the new books being good because the new author, Brandon Sanderson is pretty damn talented.

But Sanderson's real genius is in building settings and plots, both of which Jordan had already done. I've only read though the first of the Sanderson books, and it wasn't noticeably better than the rest of the series.

For comparison, I have read Sanderson's other books.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:29 am

Shrapnel wrote:I bought a Star Wars novel today. It's about Reven from Knights of the Old Republic.

It ultimately appears to be a novelization of the game. I haven't actually started reading it, per se, but I'm curious as to how they handle making a novel out of a large, open choice game like KoTOR.

To quote Korgan0,
This will either be amazing or awful. It cannot be anything in between.

Dude, there's a novel of X-COM. By Diane Duane.
How is KOTOR even a challenge?

http://www.amazon.com/X-COM-UFO-Defense ... xcom+duane

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:33 am

I blame DarthRabbitt for filling my head with poisonous lies.

In fact, I blame DarthRabbitt for everything.

I still stand by Korgan's quote, though. That applies to really any adaptation ever, be it book, movie, or... whatever else things are adaptated to.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 3:44 am

I didn't even know there was a book about Revan.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 2:37 pm

It appears I was wrong: The book is actually about Reven's adventures two years after KoTOR. Started reading it last night, and so far, it's okay. (I can't really tell if a book is good or not until I've read the whole thing.)

One thing of note: Reven is apparently married to Bastila.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 6:04 am

The Book of Cthulhu, an anthology I got for Christmas the year before last.

My favorite story in it is "The Crawling Sky", which has been put up (legally) for free.

Sort of a Weird West story. Very awesome. I need to track down the book which features Mercer.

The Crawling Sky

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 2:02 pm

I'm going to say that comic-books count, because they do.

I've been reading the collected series of G.I. Joe vs. the Transformers, by Devil's Due Press.

It's a great example of a cross-over done well.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 2:36 pm

Of course, comics count. Sometimes it takes longer for me to read a OGN than a book of similar size because you revel in all the details of the art and text and how the two work so well together.

Ancient History · Post by **Ancient History** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 2:37 pm

"The Wet Nurse" by Michael Dubisch

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 2:46 pm

Only you, AH, only you.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 6:15 pm

Shrapnel wrote:I'm going to say that comic-books count, because they do.

I've been reading the collected series of G.I. Joe vs. the Transformers, by Devil's Due Press.

It's a great example of a cross-over done well.

Are you shitting me?

That's the one where

Cobra Commander kills Starscream and Shockwave with plastic explosives

Anything that requires us to take Cobra as being as serious as giant robots is inherently stupid.

Cynic · Post by **Cynic** » Sat Jan 26, 2013 9:31 pm

Speaking of comics, I'm really enjoying "Starman vol 2". You really don't need to read Vol 1 to get into this. The writer, James Robinson, loves his words and his descriptions and the story is moody and more like "Sandman" than like a super hero book. It's moody and it runs back and forth in time. I came by this book because someone recommended the new "Shade" series and I really didn't know anything about Shade or starman and was curious about them. So I started reading vol 2 which is where Shade was introduced. But it became more than a primer to start reading "Shade."

Incidentally this isn't Shade the changing man but just some other shade.

I'm not even going to get into my anger and annoyance at how the new 52 just turned the changing man into another superhero. Did I mention they did this to Constantine as well. Fucking Peter Milligan...