Sci-fi/Fantasy recommendations

[The Brain]

Dune was good. Never bothered with the sequels.

[Darth Wagtaros]

I thought Dune itself was great, and very innovative.  I never finished the sequel, due to its lack of originality (and, really, its being completely unnecessary) and never tried the subsequent novels in the series, nor was seriously tempted to do so.

I think of the Dune series like I think of the Martrix movie series:  the original would be remembered fondly if they hadn't attempted to exploit its popularity by adding dreck with an associated name.

This.

grumbler's centuries of experience let's him be very perceptive every now and again.

[Queequeg]

I think we can recommend Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood, then.

I generally agree with Grumbler's thesis, but I like God Emperor a great deal, and Herbert's The Jesus Incident, while not as well written as Dune, was HUGELY influential, perhaps as much as Dune.

[Razgovory]

I don't get why Dune was consider all that good either.

Dune's good, but (even though I've got all 5 of the original series) I never really got the spooge over them.  Actually, I can take that back- fans tend to go gaga over Children of Dune.  For my part, I probably enjoyed the last two (Heretics of Dune, Chapterhouse: Dune) more than the others, though Children of Dune runs closely behind them.

For sci fi, I do tend to read some heavily serialized authors- Jack L. Chalker (Well of Souls), Lois McMaster Bujold (Miles Vorkosigan series), Timothy Zahn (Cobra; he's actually done pretty well outside of his Star Wars books).

I never even tried to read the other books.  I found the first one dull, and not well written.  We are frequently told about a character's personality or abilities or traits rather then shown them.  We are told a guy is a traitor before he betrays anything, we are told the Baron and the Emperor are adept politicians but never really shown that.  In fact their plot to destroy their mutual political rival is absurd.  We are told a guy is a tyrant and inept and a "Beast" but we really only have the main characters word on that.  I also found a lot of the plot points underwhelming.  We are told ahead of time that a character has has been conditioned to be incapable of causing any harm, but the bad guys found a way around that.  What is it?  They kidnap his wife.  Nobody else in the thousand years of prior to this thought of that?

[Siege]

I finished Directive 51, and going now into the second book, Daybreak Zero.
This trilogy is called the Daybreak series or somzing.

[Siege]

Daybreak core idea is about the US Constitution and the possible constitutional crisis when the POTUS, the Vice-POTUS, the Speaker of the House, and the Senate leader dude, are taken out simultaneously.

[Grey Fox]

Siege forgot to add the "A modern plague destroys the industrial world" selling point.

[Barrister]

I don't get why Dune was consider all that good either.

Dune's good, but (even though I've got all 5 of the original series) I never really got the spooge over them.  Actually, I can take that back- fans tend to go gaga over Children of Dune.  For my part, I probably enjoyed the last two (Heretics of Dune, Chapterhouse: Dune) more than the others, though Children of Dune runs closely behind them.

For sci fi, I do tend to read some heavily serialized authors- Jack L. Chalker (Well of Souls), Lois McMaster Bujold (Miles Vorkosigan series), Timothy Zahn (Cobra; he's actually done pretty well outside of his Star Wars books).

I never even tried to read the other books.  I found the first one dull, and not well written.  We are frequently told about a character's personality or abilities or traits rather then shown them.  We are told a guy is a traitor before he betrays anything, we are told the Baron and the Emperor are adept politicians but never really shown that.  In fact their plot to destroy their mutual political rival is absurd.  We are told a guy is a tyrant and inept and a "Beast" but we really only have the main characters word on that.  I also found a lot of the plot points underwhelming.  We are told ahead of time that a character has has been conditioned to be incapable of causing any harm, but the bad guys found a way around that.  What is it?  They kidnap his wife.  Nobody else in the thousand years of prior to this thought of that?

It's a product of it's era, and how it helped to re-define that era of sci-fi.  Much of what made Dune unique is now commonplace.  The very far-future setting, the epic scope, the detailed world-design.

[The Brain]

Warhammer 40k (the world).

[Barrister]

Warhammer 40k (the world).

40K was very obviously inspired in some part by Dune (it also came out 20 years later).

[The Brain]

Warhammer 40k (the world).

40K was very obviously inspired in some part by Dune (it also came out 20 years later).

Indeed. I mean heresy.

[Razgovory]

I don't get why Dune was consider all that good either.

Dune's good, but (even though I've got all 5 of the original series) I never really got the spooge over them.  Actually, I can take that back- fans tend to go gaga over Children of Dune.  For my part, I probably enjoyed the last two (Heretics of Dune, Chapterhouse: Dune) more than the others, though Children of Dune runs closely behind them.

For sci fi, I do tend to read some heavily serialized authors- Jack L. Chalker (Well of Souls), Lois McMaster Bujold (Miles Vorkosigan series), Timothy Zahn (Cobra; he's actually done pretty well outside of his Star Wars books).

I never even tried to read the other books.  I found the first one dull, and not well written.  We are frequently told about a character's personality or abilities or traits rather then shown them.  We are told a guy is a traitor before he betrays anything, we are told the Baron and the Emperor are adept politicians but never really shown that.  In fact their plot to destroy their mutual political rival is absurd.  We are told a guy is a tyrant and inept and a "Beast" but we really only have the main characters word on that.  I also found a lot of the plot points underwhelming.  We are told ahead of time that a character has has been conditioned to be incapable of causing any harm, but the bad guys found a way around that.  What is it?  They kidnap his wife.  Nobody else in the thousand years of prior to this thought of that?

It's a product of it's era, and how it helped to re-define that era of sci-fi.  Much of what made Dune unique is now commonplace.  The very far-future setting, the epic scope, the detailed world-design.

People could write better in the 1960's.  Far future settings, epic scope and detailed world design were all done before this (I question the detailed world design.  You have desert world, water world, prison world etc). Olaf Stapledon and E.E. Doc Smith both proceeded Dune by quite a bit, and covered many of the same ideas.  The Lensman series takes place over a billions years in the future.

[The Brain]

Wow. A billion years? Has this ever been bettered? Maybe in 20-30 years we'll be able to write stories about 10 billion years from now (!).

[grumbler]

It's a product of it's era, and how it helped to re-define that era of sci-fi.  Much of what made Dune unique is now commonplace.  The very far-future setting, the epic scope, the detailed world-design.

What made Dune so fresh was its future mix of science and "magic" psychological effects.  While the writing included a lot of "telling, not showing" elements, much of what the audience was told was false and many of the narrators unreliable.  I enjoyed the way that Herbert had the reader and the characters discover a number of misapprehensions together.

[Razgovory]

Wow. A billion years? Has this ever been bettered? Maybe in 20-30 years we'll be able to write stories about 10 billion years from now (!).

People didn't know you could count to a billion before 1930.  By 1960, the limit was 30 billion. This was discovered by having everyone on Earth count to ten which made about 30 billion.  I've head at CERN they are working on a program to find the highest number possible by having everyone in the world count to a hundred, but they have run into a lot of problems due to large swaths of the population being unable to count beyond the number of fingers and toes they have.