No.123
>>122I definitely want to read more classic pulp. Just started on Robert E Howard, with "The Shadow Kingdom". Only two chapters in, but I'm liking it a lot. Good strong, classic manly stuff that stirs up those primal feelings. Read about Half of King Solomon's Mines about a year ago, which I must get back to.
No.124
I use to own the majority of the Star Wars novel series. The comics I always thought were bullshit for kids but the novels I enjoyed up until the Yuuzhan Vong. I couldn't get interested with it afterwards and the prequels kind of killed whatever I still liked about the franchise. Gave those books to a cousin. I also have the entire Animorphs series which is sitting around somewhere at my parents'. Lord of the Rings was okay. I really liked George Orwell's stuff. I don't really do much with fiction, though. I don't see the point of being in imagination land when real history can be so interesting.
No.125
>>122>>123You fags wanna read something cool
>http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/texts/fiction/cb.aspxCheck out the transition from Lovecraft to Howard.
No.129
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>>125>that tie-in to The Shadow Out of Time.Cool. That's one of my favourite Lovecraft stories.
No.130
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>Here, indeed, was outré nightmare at its height-capricious fantasy at its apex. But even this vision of delirium was not what caused George Campbell to lapse a third time into unconsciousness. It took one more thing-one final, unbearable touch-to do that. As the nameless worm advanced with its glistening box, the reclining man caught in the mirror-like surface a glimpse of what should have been his own body. Yet-horribly verifying his disordered and unfamiliar sensations-it was not his own body at all that he saw reflected in the burnished metal. It was, instead, the loathsome, pale-grey bulk of one of the great centipedes.
>[Robert E. Howard]
>From that final lap of senselessness, he emerged with a full understanding of his situation. His mind was imprisoned in the body of a frightful native of an alien planet, while, somewhere on the other side of the universe, his own body was housing the monster's personality.
>He fought down an unreasoning horror. Judged from a cosmic standpoint, why should his metamorphosis horrify him? Life and consciousness were the only realities in the universe. Form was unimportant. His present body was hideous only according to terrestrial standards. Fear and revulsion were drowned in the excitement of titanic adventure.
Oh, that's funny as fuck.
No.131
Oops. Didn't mean to link that twice.
No.136
>Only the candles and the soap were of German origin. They had a ghostly, opalescent similarity. The British had no way of knowing it, but the candles and the soap were made from the fat of rendered Jews and Gypsies and fairies and communists, and other enemies of the State.
The world building is amazing. I'm so immersed.
No.177
>>138>drowning out actual discourse with gatekeepers makes the actual discourse disappearLol, no. That's why they ended up with shill like Fuentes who parrots most of the old talking points. They would have stuck with the cuckservatives if it was feasible.
No.179
>>177Why are you dragging basic bitch /pol/ talking points into a thread about genre fiction?
Yeah, yeah, the holocaust is probably bullshit. I don't care. Take it to /dup/.
No.181
>>138slaughterhouse-five was written in 1969 I'm sure Vonnegut would change those references if he knew they were fake.
No.210
>>179It's my kink and you just came dangerously close to shaming me. Tut-tut.
No.212
>half way through first book of book of the new sun
>it's boring
>literally nothing has happened
>dude it's so deep though did you get the bit where he was looking at a moon landing photo?
yeah nigger and the moon landing is fake do you expect me to believe in a future world that believes in obvious frauds like that? fuck off trash niggers
No.213
>>212I've been meaning to read that. Guess you don't recommend it then?
No.214
>>213Yeah i have no idea what people see in it. I could be wrong but srsly
No.236
>>179The holocaust *never* happened.
No.237
>>212The moon landing *never* happened either.
No.238
>>236Don't care. What do you think about pulp detective novels?
No.239
>>236>>237The atomic bombings *never* happened.
No.240
>>213I read the first two books and it's pretty hard to recommend over all the other stuff you could. There's a lot of weird choices though so maybe you might enjoy that. If I finish the series I'll write more.
No.241
>>240What would you recommend in it's place? I need to get around to finishing Lord of Light, speaking of sci-fi fantasy mashups.
No.274
>>241oh I just meant in general not specifically fantasy sci-fi.
No.310
>>281Read some of the classics. Frerik Pohl, Edgar Rice Burroughs, etc
No.313
>>281I like asimov. It's pretty much a sexual
No.329
>>327I read a couple of Soloman Kane stories myself recently. I think it's the first time I've experienced puritanism represented as something positive in a work of fiction. The upstanding man of moral character, who goes out into the world and fights back the evil things. I love shit like this. It's a kind of storytelling that can only be born of a culture that takes pride in itself.
No.348
I could swear there are older posts in this thread that didn't exist earlier this week.
>>337Go read it if you feel inclined in the least: her breeding material frame comprises a reduced amount of the book but martians die for getting in the way of Carter and the customarily almost naked princess.
Worse that can happen is that you finished a book.
>>122 gives glowing recommendation.
No.353
>>352Blah, the only kinky shit in those books is all the lesbo spanking. You want some fucked up kink fantasy read Terry goodkind's sword of truth series. Some sick shit.
No.360
Finished Lord of Light. Very good book, and I would recommend, though the set up was a little better than the pay-off, and there were certain things I wish had been elaborated on more. Though maybe that's the point. Just to give the smallest slice of a struggle against immortals that has been going on forever, and will continue to go on.
No.387
>>386>simple action stories>boundless optimism for science and freedom>science and freedom being one and the samelol, u dumb as fuck yo
No.390
>>389>just play cuckeo games broThis is /lit/, not /v/.
Why does the idea of masculine literature get your panties in a twist, anyway?
No.391
>>390>masculine litNow you're redefining your own descriptions. Read Cormac McCarthy if that's what you're after in regards to contemporary fiction. Oh, but wait, you need aliens and space ships and lazer guns too, right? Damn, maybe you need to try writing your own shit.
No.392
>>391>Now you're redefining your own descriptionsLol, you're the one who was going on about "big burly men," not me.
>Read Cormac McCarthy if that's what you're after in regards to contemporary fictionMcCarthy is exactly the sort of thing I was talking about when I was talking about pretentiously "literary" works. He writes like he thinks being depressing makes him smarter and more artistic. Sometimes you're in the mood for something like that, but sometimes you're not, and then you're just shit out of luck unless you want to trawl archive.org for poorly-encoded PDFs of old pulps.
>Damn, maybe you need to try writing your own shit.I've certainly been working on my own shit. In the meanwhile, are you aware of any markets that even take works like that anymore? Because I've been looking, and they do not exist. If you want to get published in the current year, publishers only ever want more literary works, even the genre publishers. Which brings me back to my original gripe: that there's no clear boundary between genre and literary anymore.
>inb4 "just start your own zine bro" No.393
>>392>you're the one who was going on about "big burly men," not me"Sometimes a man hust wants to read about the galaxy's buffest super genius…" Sure thing, bro.
>McCarthy is exactly the sort of thing I was talking about when I was talking about pretentiously "literary" works.I guess you and I have different description of pretentious. That's fine, though. Have you actually read every old pulp story, though? From Robert Howard to Clark Ashton Smith? You've gone through their whole bibliographies? There's a lot of stuff to read.
>are you aware of any markets that even take works like that anymore?Terror House if you want to get your stuff seen. They'll take anything, just look at the stuff Nobody got on there. If you want to get paid, GrimDark Magazine pays. "Grimdark" as a term has become a shield for violent/masculine stories. I know it's not exactly what you're interested in, but that's the closest thing there is, most likely. George R.R. Martin for example, who people call grimdark, is really just a pulp fiction author. Especially if you go through his short stories.
No.394
>>393>Have you actually read every old pulp story, though? From Robert Howard to Clark Ashton Smith? You've gone through their whole bibliographies?Of course not, though I've definitely knocked out a few big names and gotten started on a lot more. That doesn't mean I don't get to criticize modern trends.
>Terror House if you want to get your stuff seen.I have been published on Terror House, and read it most days. I was actually thinking of the "pulpy" works I've seen on Terror House when I said that modern attempts at pulp are inevitably cringey.
just look at the stuff Nobody got on there.
Cyber Punk was kino.
>GrimDark MagazineThat honestly looks like it's worth checking out. Still, there's that emphasis on darkness and moral greys there, pulling it towards "literary". I understand that a lot of older genre works had those elements too, and that most of these were perfectly enjoyable. But there were also a lot of older genre works that reflected a sort of optimism that isn't really found anymore outside of "humanity fuck yeah" greentexts on /tg/, and those were enjoyable too. Somehow it's just hard for modern authors to capture that essence properly. I know that I've tried to, and that the results are just plain bad stories. Works that are darker, more artistic, or more realistic have their appeals, but it would just be nice if the plain fun adventures hadn't died out.
No.395
>>394>Cyber Punk was kino.Cyberpunk was terrible.
>I have been published on Terror HousePost your stuff.
No.397
>>395Here
>>396If you want to shit on my shit, do it in that thread so this one isn't derailed.
No.400
>>389Just to interject, all of those games are ten to twenty years old at this point, and the hyper masculine video game hero with no strings attached, isn't even that common anymore.
No.402
>>395>cyberpunk was terribleElab.
No.1147
Just going to bump this thread to say I have been reading the Deathworld series by Harry Harrison lately, which I happened upon by luck. Very enjoyable if you're looking for some 60's pulp with a Captain Kirkesque womanising hero, and perhaps some subtly based themes.
They do one of my favourite things in the science fiction genre, which is to look into the ways that environment and culture can shape people. Think Frank Herbert, but less lofty and with more wit.
No.1197
I like Dragonlance. I haven't read it since I was about 13 or something like that, and I can hardly remember most of what happened in it, but I remember it being very engaging for my teenage mind. It does unfortunately contain Kender, however. Good high fantasy, though I think it's got something of a negative reputation in some circles. I know a lot of atheist neckbeards reviled the book for its focus on the religiosity of some characters.
Of the Discworld books I've read, I enjoyed most of them, though it's also been a few years since I touched them. The most recent one I read had Vampires in it. Good book. I also liked the one with the idiot savant travelling with the much diminished avatar of his god.
I'm finding that most of the fantasy stuff I read, I read while I was much younger. On that point, I read Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy just before I read Dragonlance. Must have been around 12 or something like that, but it gripped me. I especially liked what Lord Asriel does at the end of the book. A lot of Christians didn't like the series because of how the books depict what is essentially the fantasyland Catholic Church, and also how the heavenly court behaves.
No.1202
>>1197>he one with the idiot savant travelling with the much diminished avatar of his god.Small Gods, right? I remember liking that one a lot. I have a bunch of Pratchett books I've amassed over the years. Ought to read them, really.
No.1348
>>1202Yeah exactly. I liked it. It's pretty gay that it suggests that absolute adherence to scripture is not what God wants, but it's a fun story and I like that the main character is a retard.
It's hard to think of other fantasy I've read that's worth mentioning. I hardly read anything I'd feel is worth recommending to anyone these days, at least in the fantasy genre. I remember I checked out some book recommendation thread way back on 8chan and someone had recommended The Magician which I read. It was pretty boring at points. Alright, but not really worth reading given how long it was. The point of bringing this up is just to remind you to not take recommendations from imageboards.
I guess I'll just recommend genres to avoid instead. Ever read Chinese fantasy? Specifically the kinds known as Xianxia or Wuxia or the other one I can't remember the name of. They're all basically the same genre anyway, as best as I can tell. Every character in it is a perfect stereotype, one dimensional completely and usually irrelevant to the story. For some reason, they think it's a good idea to put over 1000 chapters in their shit books. It's always just dreadful powerfantasy shit with nothing redeemable about it. Fucking dreadful shit.
I was introduced to jap light novels by a friend in high school. I was running a server from home to bypass in-school proxies and he wanted me to upload this series I forget the name of now. It was some Isekai style book, about some fat jap neet who died and was reincarnated in a fantasy world and was instantly amazing at everything from the age of 2, but especially amazing at magic. A lot of jap light novels are like that. Most of them are, even. Still, if you have to pick between the Chink genres I've mentioned and these light novels, pick the light novels. They tend to be shorter, so your pain will be over quicker.
Later on, that same guy introduced me to my first piece of Korean fiction. I can even remember the name of this one. "Legend of the Moonlight Sculptor". It revolves around a man who has no personality other than being extremely miserly and being good at video games. It's about him going on to play a vr video game and again, it's just power fantasy shit. I don't understand how, but my friend had read like 20 books of this one story. I tried my best to appreciate it and got through three books or so. It fucking sucks balls. I later went on to check out other Korean fiction of different genres, but the common theme is that Koreans don't seem to understand that characters should have a personality. At least the Japs and the Chinks can give their characters more than one character trait at a time. Fuck Korea.
So my friend understands that I didn't like the korean series he recommended and then recommends me a western book, very much similar. It turns out that there is a genre about people who play games or live in worlds governed by video game mechanics, they call it LITRPG. The book he recommended this time was called "The Gam3". It's certainly better written than the korean book, way less long winded, the characters are actually almost characters. It still sucked massive balls and was still power fantasy shit.
Don't read Korean fiction, don't read Chink fantasy, don't read Jap light novels. Also do not read this LITRPG shit. It strikes me as the kind of thing that someone who has no experience with absolutely anything outside of fucking games would enjoy.
No.3254
>>3248>one of L Ron Hubbard's inner circleSounds good. I must read some of Hubbard's sci-fi, on that matter. I have one of his Mission Earth books sitting here unread. Seems not great, to be honest.
No.3477
>>3476As long as an author is earnestly communicating something they believe in, I feel like I'd rather have that than some one size fits all globohomo morality. That's pretty much why I don't like Reddit, or much of modern Western media, I guess.
No.3480
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>>3477At least that was the impression that I and other people had of the author, I never cared to search for any interviews.
First, it was a woman being nihilistic and butthurt with mankind that started to trigger the events in the books. The concept "lol let's all become one government and be friends with everyone" falls apart.
Maybe if you want to check up something with a bit of spoilers.
This jewtube is a nigger with fake glasses and seems to like some Breadtubers, but he rarely tries to turn his videos into something political and he has done sjws seethe at the past, I'm just warning.
No.3502
>>3501How do you even read that title? Is Hammer's Slammers the imprint?
No.3503
>>3502Hammer's Slammers is the title of the first book and the name of the series, then At Any Price is the subtitle. Like Star Wars: A New Hope.
No.3523
>>3521Interestingly, the books were apparently popular in Russia, since there are four more sequels, co-written by Russian authors, that have only been published in Russian.
No.3533
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>>3476>all aliens are evil! Be a paranoid autistic with zero social skillsI hate those hackers and their blackpilled view of the universe, same happens with The Killing Star and Starship Troopers
At least Dune doesn't have "muh evil aliens"
That's why Steven Spielberg is the biggest movie director of all time, he can't make good stories about aliens.
No.3537
>>3533I don't know if that's necessarily the point of Starship Troopers. It's just that there's a war on, and the exact motivations of the enemy are never fully elaborated on, because it's not really what the book is focused on.
No.3563
>>3533All aliens are evil, Xenu.
No.3564
>>3563>t. grey>>3541Sneedious, aka nuzach, one of the worst users from webring and a discord subhuman.
No.3686
Give me recommendations of good hard-scifi books
No.3690
>>3686"hard sci-fi" is one of those definitions I'm never sure I understand entirely. What marks the difference between pulp sci-fi and hard sci-fi seems kind of subjective to me. I've heard people refer to Alien as hard sci-fi, when to me that's a horror story about a rape monster.
I guess Arthur C Clarke is what would immediately come to mind though. Rendezvous with Rama in particular.
No.3696
>>3686The Three-Body Problem like already discussed here, read before it become mainstream because they will make a film or tv show about it.
No.3712
>>3686There's no such thing as good "hard" science fiction. "Hard" science fiction is the reddit of science fiction.
>>3696The Three-Body Problem is bad. It starts out like a modern Lovecraft story, and then he meets those guys in the bar and it just turns out to be retarded aliens.
No.3718
>>3712After five days what we get is this pathetic trolling attempt stinking as something from cuckchan.
No.3722
>>3718You got two legitimate recommendations. That's about the best you're going to get on a slow board.
No.3730
>>3718Stay seething. Maybe you want to read a technical manual for a device that doesn't exist, but the purpose of science fiction is to read about green-skinned space babes and zapping Martians with lasers.
No.3795
>>3712>>3730You really can't troll, it's a bit pathetic, maybe you should stay on discord with your shitskin friends instead of posting here.
No.3948
>>3766>>3795He's right, soyim. Scifi is supposed to be about the big terran cock conquering alien wombs. Nobody cares about your "deep" social commentary, the whole point of genre fiction is that all that gay shit is thrown out in favor of something actually entertaining.
No.4080
I'm only a few chapters into the first Wheel of Time novel. It's enjoyable and I like that it's not very pretentious like so many fantasy and science fiction novels can get. Just shameless escapism in a good way. But more importantly, does it really get lewd like these anon from ages past said?
>>353>>352It all seems so innocent…
No.4151
>>4148The only thing I'm gonna fit is my cock in your throat, faggot.
No.4169
>>4151Typical shitskin reply, pathetic.
No.4297
>>120Okay, ignoring the shit-flinging contest going on at the bottom, I'm looking to get into fantasy; the problem is what should I read? I'm looking for works that aren't just high fantasy epics that span multiple novels and volumes, but are more stand-alone/confined to the novel; they can come from any decade or century, though I would prefer those from the 50s-90s if possible.
what are some recommendations?
No.4299
>>4297I'm reading Book of the New Sun right now, which is very good. It is going to be at least 1000 pages to read all of it though.
For short fiction, Robert E Howard is always good.
No.4303
>>4297Some of Clark Ashton Smith's famtasy stories were written in the 50s-60s.
No.4304
>>4297The King of Elfland's Daughter by Lord Dunsany. It's an interesting mix between an old fashioned fairy tale and a modern fantasy novel. Plus the prose is top tier.
No.4614
Just a friendly reminder that Warhammer is based almost wholly on Michael Moorcock's work, an anarcho-communist male feminist who was saying Tolkien was a nazi, fantasy is racist and sexist, and Britain needed to get rid of white people in the 70s. Any optimistic fantasy was wrong because it oppressed the masses, and good fantasy must be subversive and awful to further "the cause". He was an SJW before SJWs and the creators of Warhammer unanimously agreed with and loved him.
I saw this in the 40k lore discussion thread. Is this true?
No.4783
>>4616> J.K. Rowling> Hearing about the Animorphs war crimes makes me want to experience it in the readers immersion.I would read "1984 with Dog Latin", if not Dog Latin part. Too ridiculousus.
No.4942
Does anyone here know anything about R. A. Salvatore or read his stuff?
No.4962
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Any good vigilante lit? The more puerile male power fantasy, the better, really.
No.4965
>>4962Old or more recent? The only one I can think immediately is a comic written by a Brazilian who hates communists.
No.5002
I just brought the six original Dune books, what should I expect?
No.5020
Gene Wolfe would be translated and released in my country, but my shitty government told them to cancel those plans, since Gene Wolfe was an evil "right-winger".
I guess is time to move to USA or Europe.
No.5065
>>5020Didn't even know he was a "right winger". I thought he was just a catholic.
No.5067
>>5065That's their logic.
No.5073
>>5067Where the hell do you live where they're banning catholic authors now?
No.5076
>>5073He's just making shit up
No.5084
>>5076Eat shit and die, /trannypol/.
No.5231
Who the fuck is John Scalzi and why he's being so fucking shilled as the biggest sci-fi author from this generation???
No.5365
Re-read Paycheck by Philip K Dick and Goldenman by him too.
I enjoyed more the last one. Its over for Louis K Dick and other nigger loves. The golden gods will take over the Earth.
No.5714
Jim
1,263 reviews · 82 followers
June 19, 2023
Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) is better known today than he was in life and perhaps best-known for his story that the movie "Blade Runner" was based on. For me, his book "The Man in the High Castle"(1962) is one of my favorite SF books, a book I first read when I was in 6th grade. I found Dick's depiction of an America under the control of German and Japanese conquerors to be disturbing…the idea of a defeated America was hard to accept for a kid who enjoyed watching John Wayne films!
"The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch" was published in 1964 and I first read it in the 90s. And even though I was an adult, I also found it disturbing. The story is about a man of mystery- Palmer Eldritch-who returns from a trip to the Proxima system bearing a gift for mankind. It's the drug "Chew-Z" capable of transporting people to illusory worlds. In the world of 2016 (when the Earth has heated up and Antarctica is a beach resort), the drug appeals especially to the lonely colonists of Mars. But this gift has a price…. I have to say I did not find the book so disturbing upon a second reading- in this the "real" year of 2016. The reason is that I find the reality of our political situation to be even more disturbing. Hopefully, however, Trump will not be another Eldritch Palmer!
No.5720
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I finished Kings of the Wyld yesterday, the book so hyped by gen x and some redditors. Isn't as great as they say, but this slut crying about the book improved a little bit my opinion since for me, the book was very reddit-like and full of Canadian culture aka gay and cringe.
No.5748
Recently finishied the first dragonlance trilogy, and I'm a big fan. It's not a flawless series, and there were clearly some issues with planning and worldbuilding. For example, the trinket that's the main objective of the good guys in the first book and supposed to be a major asset in the war, plays no meaningful role at all in the following works and is hardly mentioned again.
Also, the evil side is so absurdly superior until the very end that the war should have been very quick. I mean, they have swarms of dragons that spit out fire and ice, and the other side is shown to be almost helpless against one of these beasts. Reasonably, all the cities and forts should have been overrun in a few weeks, and that'd be the end of the story, instead of them inexplicably holding out for years. The two female authors were clearly not very adept at war.
You could also make an argument for the moral aspect of the setting being silly and overly simplified, with the sides of the war being explicitly evil and good, respectively, and worshipping a deity of the same alignment. Honestly, though, I didn't mind it.
Regarding what I liked, firstly, the problem solving of the group of adventurers that we get to follow through the story. They constantly run into troublesome situations and have to use their brains and improvise to stay alive. It was fun to pause in the reading and figure out how I would have handle what came up. The characters are great and likeable, even the rotten bastard ones. And honestly, the romance was very enjoyable too. So many waifus. Laurana's best girl, though. In her introduction, we learn that she still pines for her osananajimin fiance years after he's left, still wishing to marry him for life and, when he leaves once more on what's supposed to be a suicide mission, she follows him in secret to "not let him get away again." That's her in a nutshell.
Anyway, I mostly bring up my thoughts on this story to ask for recommendations. What are some other similar fantasy novels with sweet romance and a group of adventurers getting into trouble?
No.5766
I finished reading for the first time a book written by Robert A. Heinlein.
The constant seething done by leftist cattle about him seems unjustified.
No.5770
>>5766Starship troopers? What did you think of it?
No.5843
>>5829I've heard that it's a bit philosophical compared to typical modern fantasy slop, and almost as crazy as Might and Magic with the alien shit and fantasy mixed together.
I'll probably never actually read it, I'm trying to avoid reading fantasy, especially series.
No.5849
>>5843Prince Of Nothing is the first trilogy and it's a mostly grounded crusades-like Dark Fantasy setting. Although it constantly hints that shit will start going down soon.
It gets philosophical in certain parts, but it doesn't dwell on those themes too long. It prefers to keep a cinematic pace.
I'm not reading it so much out of love for Fantasy, as much as Bakker's prose being really good.