The Fantasy/Sci-Fi Books Thread Book • Page 189

I saw that and debated getting it too lol. I kept forgetting the Lackey one but then kept extending it so I kept putting it off. Then I suddenly remembered when there was only 1 minute left on the timer and panic purchased the bundle. Then they extended it again haha

No idea how all that works but glad I picked it up either way

 

The Detroit Tigers had a Fourth Wing game night last week and the game sold a ton of tickets. I’ve never had more FOMO. I kinda want to read them to see what the hype is about…even though I’m not into romance books, even if dragons are in it.

 

I read the first one and couldn’t continue. Terribly written and so many cliches. But that’s just my opinion.

 

If you are a vibes or romance reader, I’ve heard it’s fun. If you’re a more normal fantasy reader, it collapses on itself very quickly.

(I’ve read all three…not because I’m vibes or because I like them. Morbid curiosity.)

 

Do you have Libby? I listened to the audiobook for free with it.

 

I'm completely okay not reading the romantasy books that are popular. I don't see myself ever investing the time into fourth wing / a court of thorn and roses etc. I know too much about the books through social media that just scream not for me.

 

Yeah they just seem so corny

 

I enjoy a romance novel from time to time (I've read all of Emily Henry, for one example). There's just something about mixing romance and fantasy that doesn't always seem to work for me. The balance of genre is off.

I read a Holly Black YA romantasy that was pretty decent, but the romance didn't really work for me.

Yarros is just... not good. I get why the average romance reader likes it, because I'm sure it does feel a bit different with the dragons there... but I also don't understand why it reached the heights it did at all.

SJM is an interesting case because she's sold double the amount of books of Sanderson, I'd argue she can write circles and circles around Yarros, and before she went full smut, her fantasy worldbuilding was actually deep and not window dressing (you could remove the dragons and fantasy from Fourth Wing with about two days editorial work and just stick it at a boarding school and you'd never know). The first two Throne of Glass books kinda suck, but the next five are legitimately good to excellent (even when the smut appears out of nowhere). I tapped out on ACOTAR after the first "trilogy" - the writing was good, but I didn't care for the fantasy plot nor the romance. I never gave the Crescent City books a chance, but I heard the fantasy was pretty good, but the smut ramped up even more. I don't need that.

 

I don’t mind romance, not even romance in fantasy (some fantasy series I like have more romance than usual), but romantasy is a different beast

 

In fourth wing the main character is such a whiner and the sex is written like a teenager who’s never had sex before wrote it. I have not read many books where sex was a main part of the plot so maybe it’s all like that but it was definitely not for me the way it was presented in that book.

 

Yeah, there's much better ways to write sex in fiction than the lightning bolts.

 

The chapter in Children of Ruin where the parasite takes over Lortisse is such great psychological and body horror.

 

I read One Dark Window because it was pitched as 'romantasy for people who don't read romantasy' and it was a very meh 2/5 star read. Wooden characters, zero worldbuilding. Magic system was kind of cool.

 

If you want an anti-romantasy check out The Poet Empress. Fucking great book.

 

I have this one on my TBR, but I didn't know it was romantasy

 

Finished Blood Over Bright Haven last night, from @theagentcoma during the Christmas exchange.

Thanks for giving me yet another impossible literary standard to make me feel even worse about my own writing.

 

I still think about this book several times a week and it's been like 10 months since I've finished it

 

I just finished The Last Contract of Isako. Absolute masterpiece. Cannot recommend it enough. It's the type of book that retroactively hurts other books that i have read recently because, if I am being honest, they just aren't quite as good.

I am someone who almost always gives a book a super high rating on Goodreads, because if I made it all the way thru then I definitely liked it, plus recency bias and all that, but this book is absolutely positively five stars, 100%, no questions asked. Incredible stuff.

Snagged this at the library yesterday because I had a feeling I would finish Isako today -->

 

I was already sold on Isako but I also feel like our tastes jive quite a bit. Bumping this way up in the TBR

 

Excited to start Isako once I finish the library books I have so I’m not making people wait.

 

Isako’s premise is not for me but it is Fonda Lee so I will give it the benefit of the doubt

 

I'm dying to know what the rest of you think

I really can't recommend it enough

 

I had planned on starting it already but a bunch of holds came in from Libby

 

I grabbed Bright Haven yesterday, and I just got notified that There Is No Antimemetics* Division just came in at my library - I usually try not to bogart more than one book from the library, but I've been on a tear and I'm gonna just try to finish them both (or at least the first one) very fast

*as a nurse, I can't help but read this word as "antiemetics" as in what you take for nausea/vomiting haha

 

I’ve got:

Wolf Worm (horror) enjoying it.
Daemon (post cyberpunk) solid
The Photonic Effect (sci-fi) has the most people waiting and I haven’t started lol