Late last year I set myself a goal to read the entire, as of yet published, Malazan series. This includes three sub-series. Malazan: Book of the Fallen, totaling 10 volumes and thousands of pages, by Steven Erikson. The Tales of Bauchalain and Korbel Broach, a series of short novellas, also by Steven Erikson, and lastly Tales of the Malazan Empire, a much shorter series of novels by Ian C. Esslemont.
This massive series, as of this post totals 17 (soon to be 19) volumes published by Tor, or 19 (soon to be 21) by Subterranean Press. This curious publishing scheme has given me no end of fits. As I am a book collector as well as a reader, I first sought to collect all of the books in Hardcover. This proved to be prohibitively expensive, Tor published the series in hardcover sporadically, and many of the volumes are not in print any longer in that format. Subterranean Press has begun issuing high quality hardcovers as part of a subscription series but they are extremely expensive for some one on my budget. I settled for Trade Paperbacks instead. Tor, as is their wont, changed cover design with volume 9, reprinting to my knowledge only volume 1, Gardens of the Moon, in the new style, and further allowing volume 3, Midnight Tides, to slip out of print in that format totally. The Bauchalain and Korbel Broach novellas are only available in hardcover through Subterranean press, and anyone who is familiar with them know they tend to publish in limited quantities and to be very expensive, usually about 25-30$ for a 100-150page Novella. Thankfully Tor has reprinted these novellas in trade-paperback, something which not every author who releases stories through Subterranean gets, much to the chagrin of a many a K.J. Parker fan.
Having settled on the Trade-paperback format, I spent December collecting all of the volumes then published, leaving me with a total of 13 novels and 4 novellas to read before the 4th of Ian C. Esslemont's Tales series, Orb, Sceptre, and Throne, is published.
To say that the going has been slow is an understatement. Though these books are enormous in length, none of the novels being shorter than 400 pages, they don't seem to suffer from the needless padding that other door stopper fantasy series do. Where as other series fill their pages with moralizing philosophical tirades (Goodkind), endless repetition of neurotic behavior, pointless side-quests, and obnoxious platitudes (Jordan), or discussions on economics, religion, technology, sociological observations, and ocean travel (Drake, Elliot, and others.), this series simply piles on more and more onion like layers to the over all story. I began reading the series in January, and have thus far only completed about half of the series. Granted I've had, arguably more important, school work to finish which has held me up. That being said, depth of the storytelling present in these books has also created it's own series of roadblocks to my typical pace. To say it is dense is to compare a poundcake to a black hole.
For one, this is a shared universe, though in very narrow terms, being as I'm only about 50-60% finished with the series as it currently stands means I've not even uncovered the full story yet, but as it stands it is about the return of a Prometheus like god, who is orchestrating various power grabs all over the world in a bid to awaken another god which will free him and destroy the world in the process.. or something like that..
The series is dark (Volume 3, Memories of Ice, has as it's protagonist a migratory empire of cannibals who also rape you to death while eating you..) but it is tempered with such a variety of characters and archetypes it never feels completely hopeless even at it's darkest.. for every dastardly evil-doer, or corrupt anti-hero there is a truly heroic character, or especially a conflicted character who rises to be a hero when the need calls. It is very, very, reminiscent of Glen Cook's "The Black Company" in that regard. The other series which it frequently reminds me of is Roger Zelazny's "Chronicles of Amber". This is frequently repeated, and for very good reason, the mark of these two series on Erikson and Esslemont is immediately, and persistently present, almost from the very beginning. If I had to compare it to another current series though, the only one I can really think of would be A Game of Thrones, but imagine the happenings of Westeros except on a global scale and stripped of the lush descriptive language down to bare bones sentence structure, which conveys only the minimum of what the reader needs leaving maximum amounts of questions unanswered.
It's effectively impossible to try and sum the series as a whole up, but I think out of all the big door stopper series, if you are a fan of Sword & Sorcery, you will find a lot to love in this world. I really really recommend the series to anyone who loves Fantasy fiction, but if you are looking for a lot of scenes of women smoothing their skirts, tugging their braids, and sipping tea while pontificating on the philosophy of free market capitalism.. then the series probably isn't for you.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Classic City Roller Girls V. Chattanooga
Tonight was the last Home Game for the Classic City Roller Girls until August, and I just couldn't miss it. Arrived a bit early and hung around outside for a while until the bout started. When it did, both teams really performed well, but the Chattanooga girls got an extremely heavy lead very very early. They shot up by about 30pts in the first 5 minutes of the bout, and completely shut down the local team. The Athens team tried their best to catch up, and wound up getting about a 1-2 final score, but it was no close match for sure.
If you've never been to a Roller Derby match, you are missing out on something unique. It's an extremely fast paced and exciting sporting event where you don't have to worry about low scores. Plus, you get your hand stamped with 70's porn staches' for re-entry into the venue should you leave at any time. It's quirky, quick, and only lasts about an Hour and a half tops. If you're not sure your city has a team, you can check Google, it seems as if most midsize cities have at least one team, while larger cities like Atlanta occasionally have more than one.
Tonight the CCRG was also working hard to raise money for Camp Kasem, and organization run by UGA to send kids who's parents have cancer to Summer camp. I chipped in what I could as I felt it was a good cause, anyone who's had to deal with a parent who's ill, let alone a prolonged illness deserves a break now and then.
All in all another fun night out in Athens, and another reason why even though I really have no use for the state of Georgia.. I'm glad I live where I do.
If you've never been to a Roller Derby match, you are missing out on something unique. It's an extremely fast paced and exciting sporting event where you don't have to worry about low scores. Plus, you get your hand stamped with 70's porn staches' for re-entry into the venue should you leave at any time. It's quirky, quick, and only lasts about an Hour and a half tops. If you're not sure your city has a team, you can check Google, it seems as if most midsize cities have at least one team, while larger cities like Atlanta occasionally have more than one.
Tonight the CCRG was also working hard to raise money for Camp Kasem, and organization run by UGA to send kids who's parents have cancer to Summer camp. I chipped in what I could as I felt it was a good cause, anyone who's had to deal with a parent who's ill, let alone a prolonged illness deserves a break now and then.
All in all another fun night out in Athens, and another reason why even though I really have no use for the state of Georgia.. I'm glad I live where I do.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Trivium @ the Georgia Theater.
Last night was a something of an odd experience for me. It was the first concert I've been to in about 4 years or so, but it was also the first Metal show in the newly rebuilt Georgia Theater, which burned down rather spectacularly several years ago.
The show featured three groups which I really didn't have much experience with. A local band from Athens: Savagist, a group from Atlanta: Dead to the World, and then the headliners, Trivium. All three groups put on spectacular shows, and I look forward to seeing more from all of them.
Savagist ~
Dead to the world ~
Trivium also did a very good cover of Mettalica's Creeping Death during their encore.
Next show I'll be going to see Clutch.
The show featured three groups which I really didn't have much experience with. A local band from Athens: Savagist, a group from Atlanta: Dead to the World, and then the headliners, Trivium. All three groups put on spectacular shows, and I look forward to seeing more from all of them.
Savagist ~
Dead to the world ~
Trivium also did a very good cover of Mettalica's Creeping Death during their encore.
Next show I'll be going to see Clutch.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
What speed do you read?
I scored 669 words a minute, or 168% above the national average. Though typically I don't like to read that quickly, unless it's for school work.
Accelerated Readership
I'm sure most of my readers already check out Black Gate, but if you haven't, please check out this review.
Yeah, well, I hear you saying, what's so special about this review? Why should I take the time out of my busy day to read a review of some zombie book written by someone I've never heard of before?
You see, dear reader, this review was lovingly crafted by someone I went to school with. By some one who has worked extremely hard to get to this point. By someone one who was present almost at the very beginning of my ceaseless Fantasy reading binge. By some one who was my closest competition in our school's Accelerated Reader program, ergo encouraging me to read, both more quickly and in greater quantity, if I wanted to stay ahead of her. By some one who is in my Dungeons & Dragons campaign. By someone who, though DUNE is the only book we both think is great, is my friend regardless.
So, if you haven't already, please check it out, and be sure to keep an eye out for more from her in the future.
Yeah, well, I hear you saying, what's so special about this review? Why should I take the time out of my busy day to read a review of some zombie book written by someone I've never heard of before?
You see, dear reader, this review was lovingly crafted by someone I went to school with. By some one who has worked extremely hard to get to this point. By someone one who was present almost at the very beginning of my ceaseless Fantasy reading binge. By some one who was my closest competition in our school's Accelerated Reader program, ergo encouraging me to read, both more quickly and in greater quantity, if I wanted to stay ahead of her. By some one who is in my Dungeons & Dragons campaign. By someone who, though DUNE is the only book we both think is great, is my friend regardless.
So, if you haven't already, please check it out, and be sure to keep an eye out for more from her in the future.
Saturday, May 12, 2012
My sort of Avengers Review.
Spoiler Alert! Don't click this link if you haven't seen Serenity, Avengers, or the first season of Game of Thrones..
Tor asks what about Death in Fantasy makes fans Rage?
This is perhaps an even better question than the recent one in Salon Magazine inquiring about the lack of heroic characters on Television.
Alas I'm not a very good person to discuss this particular topic. I'm among the group who dislikes both Whedon and Martin for the exact reasons stated in the article. I feel they kill characters off for no reason except to shock their audiences. The same way William S. Burroughs and Thomas Pynchon randomly add Non-sequitur buggery into their books..
This brings us to George R.R. Martin. I enjoyed A Game of Thrones until nearly the end. That ending however so soured me to George R.R. Martin, I've never bothered to read any of his other works. I expected, upon going into the series, that Eddard would be the main character throughout the entire character. The same way Rand Al' Thor was in the Wheel of Time. Instead, I found myself at the end of the first volume with no main character, and as a result no reason to continue reading the series. Unfortunately for me, I'd listened to some one who liked the series and bought all 4 volumes sight unseen based on their recommendation. Volumes 2-4 have yet to have their spines cracked. I'm not going to say that Martin has no right to kill off his characters, technically I got exactly what I paid for, but I certainly have a right to be perturbed by it. I bought a book and was entertained throughout 90% of the book, but the ending basically nullified my enjoyment of the whole. It made me angry that I had now "Wasted" time which I had previously enjoyed.
I think, in my opinion, that is the reason why this causes so much trouble among fans. The "Main character" or "Primary POV" becomes an almost surrogate. Eddard then, is the reader, thus it is the reader who is beheaded. I know I've heard from other people that other characters are the "Real" main character. Everyone from Daenarys to Jon to Arya to whomever you please. Heck, when I first read the book I assumed Bran would be the main character, I was actually highly unhappy when he was injured, and only once I realized "Oh this is a plot device for his father's story" did I continue to read. Killing off fan favorite characters is something which the other man referenced, Joss Whedon, is well known for.
I feel I need to be honest here. Basically, well.. I've never liked Joss Whedon.. So I don't honestly care when he kills off his own characters. He can kill off as many Buffy characters or Firefly characters as he likes. I never got into Buffy, Angel, Serinity, Dollshouse or any of his other series. I don't care about Cabin the woods or his run on Spider-man. I simply dislike the guy, his writing style, his penchant for including random show tunes, and most importantly I dislike the feel of his work. I liked Avengers in spite of Joss Whedon, not because of him. (I feel exactly the same way about everything Tim Burton has done since Batman).
I enjoyed the Avengers, mostly, all except for the one scene referenced in that article. I felt it was pointless. I felt the movie was called the Avengers, and that it was inevitable that the Avengers would assemble, regardless of any one specific event. None of those characters was going to let Loki and the Skitari conquer the world. Simply put, it was stupid. They killed off a fan favorite character for effectively no reason except to make people angry, either the Fans or the Characters.. regardless of what little logic this contains. This isn't the same thing at all as killing of Tara, a character that Joss Whedon Created. Coulson was a character created for Jon Favreau's Ironman and I for one am very disappointed in Marvel for allowing the character to be killed off in this way. It's something I feel wouldn't have happened if Favereau had been tapped to direct the Avengers (which, again, in my opinion would have been only fair and fitting since without his stunningly good Ironman, we wouldn't have gotten to where we are now).On the flip side to this problem is, by Kevin Feige's admission and Joss Whedon's own assertion, Whedon wasn't responsible for this. It was a choice made at Marvel, written into the original script even. Would it have still happened if the guy who created the character had directed the movie? I don't know, and it is unlikely we will ever know. All I do know is, I'm sorry that we won't get to see the human honey badger on screen anymore.
This brings up a problem though. With a specific scene which I dislike so much, and a director I dislike so much.. How come I enjoyed the movie so much? So far this year, I've seen two films, both from Disney, both capable of transporting me to nearly euphoric plateaus of fun. The first, John Carter, had me quite nearly cheering at the screen. It was such a good movie, and in my opinion faithful adaption of the spirit of the source material, that I couldn't wait to see it again and nearly bought another ticket that same night. Avengers I've seen twice already inside of it's first week!. The only other movie I've ever done that for was "Fellowship of the Ring".
Granted, like John Carter, there are parts of the Avengers which I simply don't like. The bit which launched this article being the main one, but also because I just felt the movie didn't really fit that well with all of the preceeding ones. Maybe it's because I was disappointed they didn't give more information on what happened between the endings of the other various films and this one. How long had Captain American been working for shield? How long had Dr. Selvig been working for shield? How did Bruce Banner get from his cabin in British Columbia to India. Why did they reference so many things from the deleted scenes of the other movies? What the heck happened to War Machine to make it so he didn't show up? Were him and General Ross dealing with other threats? I realize most of these things are not questions the casual viewer would even consider, but to me, they are important.
It was still a good movie, and I look forward to being able to sit down and watch all 6 of the films in some sort of order.
Right now I'm leaning towards the following.
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
Captain America
"A Funny thing happened on the way to Thor's Hammer"
Incredible Hulk
Thor
"The Consultant"
Incredible Hulk and Thor seem to both have taken place about the same time.. "The Consultant" which takes place during Thor, explains why it was Tony Stark and not Nick Fury or Agent Coulson who goes to talk to General "Thunderbolt" Ross also.
Tor asks what about Death in Fantasy makes fans Rage?
This is perhaps an even better question than the recent one in Salon Magazine inquiring about the lack of heroic characters on Television.
Alas I'm not a very good person to discuss this particular topic. I'm among the group who dislikes both Whedon and Martin for the exact reasons stated in the article. I feel they kill characters off for no reason except to shock their audiences. The same way William S. Burroughs and Thomas Pynchon randomly add Non-sequitur buggery into their books..
This brings us to George R.R. Martin. I enjoyed A Game of Thrones until nearly the end. That ending however so soured me to George R.R. Martin, I've never bothered to read any of his other works. I expected, upon going into the series, that Eddard would be the main character throughout the entire character. The same way Rand Al' Thor was in the Wheel of Time. Instead, I found myself at the end of the first volume with no main character, and as a result no reason to continue reading the series. Unfortunately for me, I'd listened to some one who liked the series and bought all 4 volumes sight unseen based on their recommendation. Volumes 2-4 have yet to have their spines cracked. I'm not going to say that Martin has no right to kill off his characters, technically I got exactly what I paid for, but I certainly have a right to be perturbed by it. I bought a book and was entertained throughout 90% of the book, but the ending basically nullified my enjoyment of the whole. It made me angry that I had now "Wasted" time which I had previously enjoyed.
I think, in my opinion, that is the reason why this causes so much trouble among fans. The "Main character" or "Primary POV" becomes an almost surrogate. Eddard then, is the reader, thus it is the reader who is beheaded. I know I've heard from other people that other characters are the "Real" main character. Everyone from Daenarys to Jon to Arya to whomever you please. Heck, when I first read the book I assumed Bran would be the main character, I was actually highly unhappy when he was injured, and only once I realized "Oh this is a plot device for his father's story" did I continue to read. Killing off fan favorite characters is something which the other man referenced, Joss Whedon, is well known for.
I feel I need to be honest here. Basically, well.. I've never liked Joss Whedon.. So I don't honestly care when he kills off his own characters. He can kill off as many Buffy characters or Firefly characters as he likes. I never got into Buffy, Angel, Serinity, Dollshouse or any of his other series. I don't care about Cabin the woods or his run on Spider-man. I simply dislike the guy, his writing style, his penchant for including random show tunes, and most importantly I dislike the feel of his work. I liked Avengers in spite of Joss Whedon, not because of him. (I feel exactly the same way about everything Tim Burton has done since Batman).
I enjoyed the Avengers, mostly, all except for the one scene referenced in that article. I felt it was pointless. I felt the movie was called the Avengers, and that it was inevitable that the Avengers would assemble, regardless of any one specific event. None of those characters was going to let Loki and the Skitari conquer the world. Simply put, it was stupid. They killed off a fan favorite character for effectively no reason except to make people angry, either the Fans or the Characters.. regardless of what little logic this contains. This isn't the same thing at all as killing of Tara, a character that Joss Whedon Created. Coulson was a character created for Jon Favreau's Ironman and I for one am very disappointed in Marvel for allowing the character to be killed off in this way. It's something I feel wouldn't have happened if Favereau had been tapped to direct the Avengers (which, again, in my opinion would have been only fair and fitting since without his stunningly good Ironman, we wouldn't have gotten to where we are now).On the flip side to this problem is, by Kevin Feige's admission and Joss Whedon's own assertion, Whedon wasn't responsible for this. It was a choice made at Marvel, written into the original script even. Would it have still happened if the guy who created the character had directed the movie? I don't know, and it is unlikely we will ever know. All I do know is, I'm sorry that we won't get to see the human honey badger on screen anymore.
This brings up a problem though. With a specific scene which I dislike so much, and a director I dislike so much.. How come I enjoyed the movie so much? So far this year, I've seen two films, both from Disney, both capable of transporting me to nearly euphoric plateaus of fun. The first, John Carter, had me quite nearly cheering at the screen. It was such a good movie, and in my opinion faithful adaption of the spirit of the source material, that I couldn't wait to see it again and nearly bought another ticket that same night. Avengers I've seen twice already inside of it's first week!. The only other movie I've ever done that for was "Fellowship of the Ring".
Granted, like John Carter, there are parts of the Avengers which I simply don't like. The bit which launched this article being the main one, but also because I just felt the movie didn't really fit that well with all of the preceeding ones. Maybe it's because I was disappointed they didn't give more information on what happened between the endings of the other various films and this one. How long had Captain American been working for shield? How long had Dr. Selvig been working for shield? How did Bruce Banner get from his cabin in British Columbia to India. Why did they reference so many things from the deleted scenes of the other movies? What the heck happened to War Machine to make it so he didn't show up? Were him and General Ross dealing with other threats? I realize most of these things are not questions the casual viewer would even consider, but to me, they are important.
It was still a good movie, and I look forward to being able to sit down and watch all 6 of the films in some sort of order.
Right now I'm leaning towards the following.
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
Captain America
"A Funny thing happened on the way to Thor's Hammer"
Incredible Hulk
Thor
"The Consultant"
Incredible Hulk and Thor seem to both have taken place about the same time.. "The Consultant" which takes place during Thor, explains why it was Tony Stark and not Nick Fury or Agent Coulson who goes to talk to General "Thunderbolt" Ross also.
Monday, May 7, 2012
Update:
So thanks to a last minute intervention by the Dean of Mathematics at my school, I was allowed to take a different profficiency test, instead of the Computer - COMPASS, I was given the Pen & Paper CPE. I scored an 86% on the CPE test.
I get to keep my C in Math, and I get to go on and take college Math, and continue to go to school!
Thanks everyone for the emotional and moral support.
I am so relieved now, It was such a horrid feeling thinking that my entire college career was shot down before I even finished being a freshman.
I get to keep my C in Math, and I get to go on and take college Math, and continue to go to school!
Thanks everyone for the emotional and moral support.
I am so relieved now, It was such a horrid feeling thinking that my entire college career was shot down before I even finished being a freshman.
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