Read a couple of pretty good short stories last night:

Wasted on the Young by John Brunner
My Object All Sublime by Poul Anderson

Haven't been around much, but I've been continuing through Malazan. Finished up Return of the Crimson Guard (Esslemont) and Toll the Hounds. First half of TtH was a slog but it really made up for it in the end.

So you’re reading them in chronological order? That’s cool.

RotCG is the first Esslemont book that really shined, IMO.

The final acts of Toll the Hounds are some of the finest points of the series. The convergence that occurs at the end is epic.



Dust of Dreams and the Crippled God are LOOOOOOOOOONG but, DoD is awesome.

The book is also heartbreaking in general. Cuz, Erikson. He really does laugh at George RR Martin when it comes to gut-wrenching ends for characters he’s made you love.

Poul Anderson is a master, thanks for the recommendation.

Agreed on TtH. I just finished Dust of Dreams and have Crippled God on order. Some of the series has been, as you say, a slog. Just too many characters and too many attempted story lines with occasional pages of needless dialogue. Better editing owuld have served.

But all in all it's been a very enjoyable read with some great world building and very likable characters. I'm glad to have made the journey.

Why read when you can listen?

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I plan on reading his "The Queen of Air and Darkness" soon.







Any one read any of the Star Trek books? They're fast-food fiction, of course, and I'll be the first to admit that they're not great literature, but for fans of the older shows who want new stories, some of them are worth checking out. I've read more than 430 of the damn things over the years.

https://i.imgur.com/pj3gH7Z.jpg



My favorite TOS novels:

Troublesome Minds (End of original 5YM era)
Ghost-Walker (original 5YM era, I think. Hilarious cover art)
To Reign in Hell: The Exile of Khan Noonien Singh
The Lost Years (Pre TMP)
Ex Machina (post TMP)

There are two trilogies written by Kevin Ryan that are worth checking out, too. They are called "Errand of Fury" and "Errand of Vengeance." The plots of both trilogies are very good, but be warned: both scripts suffer from poor editing and proofreading. Both stories take place during the original 5YM.



https://i.imgur.com/GWDgn4f.jpg



My favorite TNG books:

The Forgotten War (set during series)
The Devil's Heart (set during series)
Engines of Destiny (Post Generations Scotty/TNG story.)
A Time to Kill & A Time to Heal (duology set between Insurrection and Nemesis)




My favorite Voyager book:

The Nanotech War

There are a series of books by Kirsten Beyer set after the end of the series and after the Destiny trilogy of books that have been very well received by fans of the series. I'm not a huge fan of the show, so they aren't my favorites, but if you're a fan you will probably like them.



My favorite Enterprise books:

Daedalus & Daedalus's Children (Not related to the awful season 4 episode. Trip fans should like these two books)



https://i.imgur.com/81RNtau.jpg



My favorite Deep Space Nine Books:

The DS9 series was relaunched after the series ended and they were pretty damn good imo. Basically, it's a season 8 of the show.

If you want books set during the show, I recommend:

The Never Ending Sacrifice (the ultimate Cardassian world building book. Probably my overall favorite trek book.)
Prophecy and Change (an anthology of short stories)
Terok Nor: Day of the Vipers (a prequel about the Cardassian takeover of Bajor)

DS9 Relaunch book recommendations.

https://i.imgur.com/WSCHOlH.jpg

These books are serialized so you have to read them in order. Season 8 is a series of about ten books running from the excellent opening duology "Avatar" and ending with "Unity." Avatar is very good and anyone who enjoyed the series will likely enjoy it. Another highlight of season 8 is "Twilight" by David R. George.



Recommendations for Klingon stories:

The Final Reflection (this is a pre TNG book that does some interesting things with TOS Klingon culture that is quite different from what was developed in the movies and later series.

TNG Diplomatic Implausibility (this is a pilot for the four I.K.S. Gorkon books by Keith R. A. DeCandido. They're pretty solid reads.)



Mirror Universe Recommendations:

The MU books are so much better than what we saw on screen. Particularly the ones written by David Mack. "Sorrows of Empire" is a great follow-up to TOS's "Mirror Mirror."


Mini-series Recommendations:

The Destiny Trilogy by David Mack is excellent. It's set several years after Nemesis, and even though I hadn't read up on any of the current continuity, I still thought they were awesome.

The Prey Trilogy by John Jackson Miller. A very good post Nemesis, post Destiny TNG story.




https://m.imgur.com/gallery/X0KBFgB

I’ve dabbled a little in Star Wars books over the years but the three recent Thrawn books are legit pretty good.

My local bookstore owner has been trying to get me to check out the original Thrawn trilogy for a while now, but I'm not a huge SW fan (outside of the first two movies and KOTOR) so I may need to give them a shot.

Since the tv show is coming in the not-too-distant future, I just started listening to the Witcher books on audible. The first one ain't easy to get through. All short-stories.

I liked them very much back in the day but someone did say the original Thrawn trilogy hadn't aged well (Dane, maybe?), so take that for what it's worth. I would say that if you have never read the trilogy, give them a ride at least once.

If you're a fan of hard science fiction, then Robert L. Forward's Dragon's Egg may appeal to you.

It's the story of a race of intelligent beings living on the surface of a neutron star; the star is careening through the solar system at the time of the story.




(I mistakenly posted this in the Tarantino thread this morning. And I had already had two cups of coffee, so I don't have a good explanation for how that happened.)

Even though I like Sci fi movies, I've never really been into the books. However, I recently decided to read the Expanse books. I just finished the third book (Abaddon's Gate) and it was so friggin' good. They have all been good reads so far and the first books in a while that I have read that I end up staying up way too late because I can't put them down. I've heard they drop off some as the series goes on but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it, I guess.

I had actually put this off because I was expecting a pretty heavy read but the books to me seem more of the equivalent of "popcorn" movies - heavy on the action and light on the hard science. I also want to go back now and watch the TV series again. I watched all three seasons and enjoyed them but wasn't always clear exactly what was going on. It's a lot clearer now. :)

I don't think the Expanse books drop off as much as they just...change a bit. The fourth one, the one the upcoming season is based on, is pretty crazy. And the the fifth one is a fairly big departure from the earlier series, but not, I think, in a bad way

That's good to know. The weird thing is that, so far, each book is a bit of a different theme - the first is basically a detective/mystery story, the second is a political thriller and the third is an espionage thriller, all on the back drop of the protomolecule stuff. Pretty cool.

Yep.

The fourth is really cool, and a total departure from the other three.

What starts to happen, and I'm going to spoiler tag this just in case you really don't want to know anything it all, is...