Darcula vs Hitler by Patrick Sheane Duncan. He definitely gets the “voice” of fin de siecle literature right – my editor’s eye is all red pen on those adjectives, adverbs and words other than said. I also don’t think he much likes any of his characters, but especially not Lucy or Harker. Maybe he likes Renfield. If nothing else, Renfield is entertaining as hell. (I needed light. I just finished Bloodlands and Black Earth.)
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I read that rather recently (the Dunk and Egg stories). Straight up high fantasy, with hints of what’s to come in the history of Westoros. I have not read any of the Wild Card series, though.
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Not really much fantasy involved, except for the presence of dragon’s eggs and the suspicion of a person being a sorceror.
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Sure… more swords, not much sorcery. All background for ASOIAF.
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My theory is GRRM really doesn’t much like magic, but the genre of “made up history of fictional land” would not draw nearly as much readers. You could purge all the magic from ASOIAF without all that much change to the story. Except for perhaps fireproof blondes. (A great band name btw)
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I’d add the various resurrections (in the books and show), face changing assassins, and lady pregnant with smoke monsters (which represents some of the inner workings of a faith)…
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None of which are present in this particular book.
My point is you would not need to be very clever to write a non-magical way to the same plot points. IE, the smoke monster assassination could be done with a poison dart and the effect would be exactly the same, eliminating Renley and causing Lady Stark and Brienne to go on the lam. There are very few magical plot devices in the books that this couldn’t be done with, the white walkers primarily. I’m not a big fantasy reader, but a lot of them could not survive this, the magic is what it’s about.
Sure… it’s still an imagined, mythical “past” based an imaginary British Isle where magical stuff is at least part of the characters worldviews. I’m not sure what other genre it would fit into.
I chalk that up to GRR Martin’s great writing and his ability to tell a great plot driven story that doesn’t depend on magic too much, even if it’s part of the universe.
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Finished off Jon Grimwood’s Arabesk Trilogy with Felaheen, now I’m onto N. K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms - been following her for a while on Twitter, figured I should try some of her novels and this seemed to be the best place to start.
Also flicking through Simon Stålenhag’s Things from the Flood today - loving it as much as I did Tales from the Loop.
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I have to figure out and articulate why Ian Banks’ Matter irritated me so much. The plotting, primarily. Perhaps I “just don’t get it.” But it seems rather fucked up to me.
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Did the shellworld remind you of a quarry?
I love the Culture books, but to be honest they peaked early (books 2, 3 and 4).
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No Redrobe?
I read that and Remix years ago. Just never got around to reading anything else by him until recently.
Ah, I’ve read everything except the second and third books of his fantasy series in Venice.
Well, and his first novel which he refused to reprint. Remix and Redrobe were sort of sequels to it.
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Sounds about right for Iain Banks.
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Sounds About Right sounds like a frigate who’s kind of an asshole.
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Finished American Gods. Nice writing as always from Gaiman, but like most fantasy (and mysteries) for me, ultimately my reaction is “meh”. The rules of his world there are pretty amorphous, I did not quite get how a god comes to be. Seemed like they could evolve from a person or just pop into being. I’ve liked some works that dance on the borderline of fantasy & SF like ‘Lord of Light’, but in this one the ideas didn’t amaze me and I wasn’t entertained enough by the metaphors.
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I consider it his weakest work. Of course, his weakest work is better than some published authors’ best work, but that’s some pretty small praise.
I liked The Graveyard Book, but then I’m a Kipling fan. The audiobook was read by Gaiman, which was delightful.
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