A hearty “I second that” for the Malazan books. Best new fantasy series i’ve read for years.
As for Robert Jordan , i made it as far as Book 6.Got about 150 pages in. Realised i couldn’t remember who half of these people were and what was going on, and that frankly i didn’t really care.Put it down and i’ve never looked at another since.
The Camulod Chronicles, by Jack Whyte. It’s the Arthurian legend, fictionalised as if it were actual history. It begins with Arthur’s great-grandfathers as the main characters in Roman-occupied Britain in * The Skystone*. The second book, The Singing Sword, chronicles, as a minor point but a major event, the creation of Excalibur. the series takes all of the magic out of the King Arthur we know, but leaving in all of the events that we consider “traditional.” And Whyte’s writing style is beautiful; descriptive, without being so detailed that it gets annoying.
So far there are seven books out there, no news as to when the next is coming.
It is sad. He created a cool universe and some characters that were initally interesting. The story moved pretty well for the first few books…and it was a plot that was complex and involving. But what was once a positive soon turned into a huge negative. The plot is now so complex and there are so many threads that it had bogged down to a halt. I fully expect it to start moving in reverse soon. And with so many pages written, his flaws as a writer become more & more obvious. Too much description, he can’t write a believable female character, too many sniffs, too much braid pulling, an obsession with boobs…
Primaflora, another fantasy suggestion The Briar King by Greg Keyes. It just came out.
It has been suggested that Harriet Jordan is in the pay of Tom Doherty Assoc. (Tor Books). I doubt that, can anyone substantiate this as fact?
Dante, George R.R. Martin’s series began with “A Game of Thrones” continued with “A Clash of Kings” and "A Storm of Swords. His latest book is scheduled for release April 2003 (it will be called A Feast for Crows).
I wouldn’t call it a rumor, not when Random House has the scheduled release date up on their site.
That said, major new releases by fantasy authors can and do get pushed back. (Case in point, the latest Jordan was scheduled for November).
According to George RR Marting himself, the next book isn’t done, he doesn’t know when it will be done, and he doesn’t know where Amazon.com got their release date or page count. Amazon is kind of notorious for doing this so as to get as many preorders as they can.
It’s about halfway down the page; just search for “McDougal”.
To those who have noted that Jordan is wasting a good seting on badwriting: tell me about it. My first exposure to RJ was via the “Legends” anthology edited by Robert Silverberg - I read Silverberg’s introduction to Jordan’s contribution, which was basically a masterful recap of the conceits behind the setting, and I was hooked enough to read the actual story; once I read that, I hunted up the first volume of the series proper. He sets up a damn good story in the early volumes, but by volume 6, he completely abandons it. It’s a pity I kept reading as long as I did, but it was because of that setup that I did so.
I bought it expecting to be disapointed, and well, I was. Even less of a plot than Winter’s Heart, fer chrissakes. All the scheming is supposed to be rather subtle even for the characters inimately involved with the schemes, so how the heck am I supposed to figure out what’s going on? I can’t even remember who the known darkfriends are!
I will keep reading them though, if only because I’ve invested so much time into the series already.
Luckily I got The Silmarillion for Christmas. Now here’s an epic I won’t drown in.
Thanks for all the suggestions! I’ve read some of them, some of them are not yet available here but I’ll keep looking.
I did get the latest J V Jones as heavily recommened by our mate Jordan on the back cover from the library this morning but I’m not all that hopeful it will be any good. Everything recommended was of course out.
Whatever its faults, at least something happened in Winter’s Heart for the first time in several books…something finally got accomplished. I was hoping the story was back on the rails. Alas, judging by the comments & reviews, that was a false hope. I’ll wait for the paperback. Or not.
Another reason I’m not rushing out to buy the book. I can’t keep track of the play at all anymore.
One of the things that really pisses me off about Jordan is his tendency to describe what little pivotal events there are in flashback form, at least later in the series. In one of the books, we only discover the outcome of a huge battle (outside Cairhien I think) after the fact, as Mat sits at a cookfire thinking about how he vanquished the mad Aiel leader. I got disgusted with the series after finishing Path of Daggers. It doesn’t even have a pretense of a climax.
I finished the first book in a series by Ivan Irvine. Volume 1 of The View From the Mirror. It is called A Shadow On The Glass. I like it so far. I believe I saw 4 books of it at B&N. I would recommend it, It has potential at least.
I attempted to read the first WOT book three times and never made it past page 50. My god, it was like watching a painting of a guy watching paint dry dry. The reason I tried three times was because all these friends of mine kept telling me how good it was, but absolutely nothing about it grabbed me at all. I finally gave the stupid book away to someone else who had heard how good it was.
Most of those same friends who recommended it have given up on it. A few are still reading out of habit more than anything else. I’ve yet to hear from anyone who is actually reading and enjoying them.
Every time a new book is coming out, I sit down and read the old ones over again. For those of you keeping score at home, that means I’ve read EotW 9 times, TGH 8 times, TDR 7 times, and so on. I can’t keep track either.
Stopped after reading Fires of Heaven, never looked back. Pity, it came so highly recommended. My recommendation to anyone in the future will be to stop reading one book before I did.
a friend of mine has all the books and gave me the first one. I read it and enjoyed it. Then I saw all the other books, and how long they were…
I’m glad I stopped when I did.
(I’ll have to look up some of the other books mentioned here )
Just want to put in a good word for one of my favorite fantasy novels while I’m here and people are interested in other books to read while staying away from Jordan. Check out Blue Moon Rising by Simon Green. It’s not your typical fantasy novel, more like “The Simpsons” of fantasy novels, but I loved it and everyone else I’ve recommended it to liked it as well.
Green has written tons of books, notably the Deathstalker series, but I haven’t read anything beyond the novels set in the world of Blue Moon Rising so I can’t vouch for them. If he carried the style over then I’d probably like them too. Hmm, that’s an idea for library day this week…
Epithemus, it’s Ian Irvine and he’s an Australian author. I didn’t like the two of his I tried, I wanted to give them a decent editing as the style was too flowery for me. They are very popular though so it was a personal response I think.
I’m also in the camp of fans that are losing interest. I didn’t rush out and buy it as soon as it was available, and now that I am reading it, I feel no urge to devour it as I did some of the other books. I think I’m only on like page 300 something after 4 days…which is totally unlike me.
While waiting for the latest to come out, I found a site that had a list of questions they had submitted for RJ to answer. Here’s the link. I found that he came across as very comptentouse of his fans. Perhaps the way he came across has sullied the books a bit for me, but I have almost no enthusiasm for the series any more. Which really is a shame, as I did truely enjoy it, and think it had more potential than anything else I’ve read in a long time.
Oh well…I’ll finish this one, and as others have said, if there are only 2 or 3 more in the series, I’ll probably continue to read them, but I won’t be in line the first day to pick one up.
Oh, and like Dante, I sit down and re-read the entire series just before the next one comes out, although he screwed me up by pushing back the release date. So while I can keep track of most of the storyline, there are far too many characters with names that are similar. I tend to get some of the minor plot lines confused, as I can’t tell one character from the next.