I can precisely pin point the exact moment the puns became too much for me. The -tics.
That and I missed Bink.
Several years ago i noticed a new medical condition called “Piers Anthonys Disease” which seems only to afflict authors. The symptoms are:-
If the victim has enough good ideas for 1 book , they write a trilogy.
If they’ve enough material for a trilogy they write a 10 book series.
Their’s also an offshoot of this known as “Eddings Syndrome” where the sufferer manages to create 1 really good story, then repeats that same story over and over again with minor cosmetic alterations each time.
Thanks Fenris - I might have guessed you’d be the one able to identify that series.
To continue the hijack, the Belgeriad was ruined for me when I asked what a friend thought of the series and she said, “you know, I could only take so many jokes about someone getting thrown off a cliff.” 
But, although their books do cover the same ground, they are entertaining writers. Equiv. of cotton candy.
Finally, the above post was my first coding error and my first simulpost. I’m so proud :rolleyes:
re: Eddings.
I read The Belgariad as it came out, and was amused by it. Not impressed, but amused.
When the first book of the next series came out (The Mallorean?) I picked it up, thinking he would continue on with some of the plot threads he had left from the first series. Like, the finding of the Mourning God’s people still alive in the slave pits, the birth of a new leader for the cave people whose parents had actually left the caves, the identity of the Errand kid and his place in the restructured pantheon, etc.
When I found that they had not noticed one smudge in the Codex said “Do it all over again” and they were going to actually just do it all over again I put the book down and have never been tempted to pick up another one of his works.
re: Anthony
I used to like his output, but then again I used to drink, too.
Oh, and the second Apprentice Adept book was , IIRC, Blue Adept with a nice Rowena cheesecake cover.
In defense of Eddings, his characters are very entertaining and varied. In the Belgariad/Mallorean, that is. There’s a feeling of sameness in the Elenium/Tamuli that isn’t limited to the same character types in both series.
He also doesn’t use puns.
Try reading The Redemption Of Althalus afterwards if you really want a feeling of Deja-vu.I bought it when it first came out as the spiel on the back cover made it sound different. I get 100 pages in and oh dear its a several 1000 year old protagonist. Leading the same identikit group that he uses in every book.
The thing that most annoys me is the whole Prophecy business he uses over and over again. As usual in this book the hero’s command vast powers (one of the party’s even a goddess), he’s actually upped the ante in this one so far as to give them the ability to travel through and freely manipulate time. But they aren’t allowed to just destroy the villains in half a dozen immediatly obvious ways, because there’s always some prophecy that says no , not allowed , you need to defeat them in some stagey manner involving a quest instead.
Now i realise that the whole point of this is so that the hero’s can’t immedialty smite the bad guys and their’s a story to tell.But can’t he do something different!? You know a story where his characters aren’t Uber-powerful demigods, maybe with a new plot even.
It’s just a shame because he can write entertainingly
Actually the xanth pc game I played was more like the kings quest series It was made by legend … The book it was based on was the characters entered xanth through a computer game of some sort
I wish I could find the book tho I have it here somewhere …
But If you read the book you could beat the game in a hour or so
The book in question is Demons Don’t Dream.
Note to self: from now on advocate Anne McCaffrey on message boards.
Interestingly, I’ve only seen one of Piers’ short stories listed - “In The Barn”. I think he’s a better writer when constricted to a shorter format. But then again, I’m a short story fan in general.
Anthonology (OOP) It includes “In The Barn” and 1 or 2 stories from the next two collections.
Prostho Plus a dentist is captured by aliens and works on exterrestrial dental problems. Fairly enjoyable.
Hard Sell is another collection of stories where the protagonist gets involved in “hare-brained schemes”. I liked Prostho Plus better.
Of his other stuff:
Of the other series listed by Osiris ( thanks!)
- Ox, Orn & Omnivore (3 books) - read these many moons ago - OK
- Battle Circle - not read
- Tarot series - vague memory ??
- Cluster series -not read
- Incarnations - best of the bunch IMHO
- Apprentice Adept series - read a few, didn’t make much of an impression
- Xanth - enjoyable as a teen, but now - fluff I’ll re-read when I don’t want to have to think.
- Bio of a Space Tyrant - might have read the first.
- Mode series - vague memory ??
As noted, Anthony has churned out a lot of formula teen/pre-teen fantasy which really isn’t very good. However, if you avoid the Xanth series you can find some very interesting ideas amongst his ouvre. In particular, anything he wrote up through about '82 is usually gripping and very creative, with insights about religion, theology, and psychology that are worth the price of admission. He was also writing about non-Western cultures (“Steppe,” “Hasan,” “Pretender”) before a lot of other folks, and he did a generally good job of making the aliens in his sci-fi series truly alien. Post-early '80’s, a lot of his writing has gone downhill, but the stuff he works at can still be pretty good (“Tatham Mound” and the GeOdyssey books are pretty neat and well-grounded in anthropology, and “Ghost” has always been one of my favorites.)
Ultimately, it’s hard to blame the guy for churning out book after book of the Xanth novels, all of them the same, when they sell so damn well. If someone wanted to pay me enough to buy half of North Florida for doing very little work I don’t think I’d say no, especially if it meant I had enough free time to work on other books which I considered more important.
As noted above, Anthony does seem to have some sexual preoccupations, especially with regard to young girls, but given that he is writing fiction here, I think we can forgive him this, especially since (with a few very notable exceptions such as “Firefly” and “The Caterpillar’s Question”) both the audience he’s writing for and the male characters are of about the same age as the girls in question. And Anthony does indeed try to write strong female characters, although I wouldn’t say this has been an unqualified success. The heroine of the Mode books is a suicidal teen rape victim who pulls herself out of her depression in order to save her life, and several of the female characters in the Incarnations books are not the bubbleheaded love interests that are so common in boys’ adventure fiction.
As to the Incarnations series in particular, I thought “For Love of Evil” was one of the strongest of the bunch; “And Eternity” was no more than OK, but given the subject it had to be a damn tough book to write and, once he decided to do “Evil” he was pretty much committed to a seventh volume.
I’d recommend Cthon, Steppe, Macroscope, Triple Detente, Tatham Mound, Ghost, the Cluster series, and the first Apprentice Adept series (first 3 books) in particular. The first Bio of a Space Tyrant book is, I think, a not-inaccurate picture of what life can be like for actual refugees. Other earlier books are good, and the stuff pitched to an older audience since can be, although not always.
–Cliffy
I still like most of Anthony’s early science fiction, Macroscope, Cluster, Tarot, Mute, Bio, etc. Early Xanth is pretty good, too, if you lower your expectations. The rest…eh. Haven’t tried reading too many of the newer. It’s not worth the pain and suffering that realizing yet another cherished childhood memory is hollow (cough Star Wars cough). 
The PC game based on Xanth, btw, is “Companions of Xanth.” I believe he even based one of his later Xanth books on it.
I liked that game.
As someone who owns almost every one of his books, I’d have to agree with the general sentement that most of his recent writing (i.e. the Xanth series, etc.) is pretty much the same old stuff repackaged and reformed, but he has done some amazing work. Usually, the first (and most of the second) books in his series are the best. After that, I don’t read them (but I buy them anyways, to complete my collection.)
As to the OP, who wants to know what makes him tick, I’d agree that he seems a strange one indeed, but I’ve seen his personality type listed as INFJ. That would explain a lot of his apparent standoffishness with his fans and his predisposition to hold grudges and nitpick (I’m an INFJ as well, and that may well be the reason I find his books so to my liking, although I didn’t know this until after I’d already had about 2/3 of them).
As far as the Xanth series, I think the original idea was quite novel and exciting. I too miss Bink and Chameleon, they were my favorite characters. While the newer books contain much recycled content, there’s something almost comforting about knowing what to expect, though. I don’t look to the series for intellectual stimulation, it’s a cheap escape, no thinking required. So sue me if I’m a sucker for a bad joke.
If you’re only going to read a few of his books, though I would have to suggest With a Tangled Skein, & On a Pale Horse from the Incarnations of Immortality series, or any of the Geodyssey series.
My personal favorites are For Love of Evil and Firefly, but then again I never claimed to have good taste.
I am always amused at the brow beating done to popular authors in the Spectulative Fiction genre.
Stories that do not follow a formulistic pattern and have a truely unique story line are rare and take brilliance to compose. Not to say that these authors are stupid- but come on, they are writing escapist novels. Entertainment. Sheer pleasure.
They are not Asimovs, Clarks or Vonneguts. They are writers, giving an audience a time away from reality. Like the mystery novel, or the billions of romance novels out there- they offer a story in a format that people enjoy. Some people like the quest with only minor variations. Light reading people.
That said- I don’t care much for either author. I prefer the heavier reading and like new things. However, even I like to enjoy the occasional light reading. I envy said authors, and hope that someday I have similar success. If what it takes is to sell out and write a few formulistic novels to support myself while I write something heavier, then so be it- I would be happy.
I just hate it when people call them brilliant, and the best novelists out there. (Snicker)
I first read him with Upon a Pale Horse, the first of the Incarnations series. The best story in a series that slid slowly downhill and started reading like you were watching someone play a puzzle-style computer game.
I also was an early reader of the Apprentice Adept series and enjoyed the first couple books but though later books were too been-here-done-that.
Bio left me dry after one book, Firefly was an interesting idea for a predator but the pedophile stuff left me too freaked out.
Xanth was one of the last series I read and I didn’t get beyond book 2 or so before I stopped reading. I might have enjoyed them when I was younger but they were pitched, IMO, at the JV market.
I’ve pretty much stopped seeking his stuff out. I’ve read enough and haven’t found much new. I still enjoy Sci Fi, and even the light stuff (Alan Dean Foster), but I’m not reading more of him.
Strangely, I believe that Anthony has claimed that the Xanth books are not written for adolescents, despite the fact that they are full of juvenile humor and rarely appeal to anyone who encounters them past their teenaged years.
Many young fantasy fans go through a Xanth phase in middle or high school, and most end up a little embarassed about it later.
Drop me an e-mail if your quest becomes fruitless. I have a copy of that I’ll be happy to send ya.
I believe we have grounds for a transaction. Email in your profile?