=========================================================================== BBS: Faster-Than-Light Atlanta Georgia USA Date: 02-07-95 (01:52) Number: 50 From: PAUL CASHMAN Refer#: NONE To: ALL Recvd: NO Subj: Best of 1994 Conf: (170) I-FantsySc --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Okay, since traffic seems to be slipping a bit here recently (we got beat in message volume by the SillyWalk conference last month! sheesh!), it's time.... ....for a poll. :) --> What were the best, worst and middlin' books you read during 1994? <-- --Or, if you're uncomfortable calling books 'best' and 'worst', then what were the most surprisingly good books you read in the last year, and which did you find disappointing? Which were just okay? NOTE: these can be books written at ANY time, just that you've read (or rediscovered) during 1994. SF, fantasy and horror titles would be most germane, but if an outside-genre book really struck you as being great or wretched, let us know! I'll start off: Pleasant surprises: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Storm Constantine, HERMETECH Future SF with an ecological thread running through it, but not eco-preachy. Like her excellent Wraeththu trilogy, Hermetech also involves hermaphrodism, psychic power through intercourse, exotica and other fun stuff. :) Storm Constantine, BURYING THE SHADOW (reading this right now -- an SF/fantasy reinvention of the vampire myth) David Feintuch, MIDSHIPMAN'S HOPE Overall, this one worked for me. Not quite as good as the Hornblower saga that undeniably influenced it, this was still a fun ride. I'll get the second book in April when it's published. , MAN-KZIN WARS III Thought I had read this a while back, but I'd only read part of it. Good stories in this one. Anne Rice, TALE OF THE BODY THIEF Better than Interview or Queen of the Damned, not quite as good as The Vampire Lestat. From me, that's pretty high praise. :) Tom Clancy, WITHOUT REMORSE Not as technogeeky and combat-driven as most of Tom's stuff, but unlike some of his readers, this doesn't matter as much to me. Instead it's a character study and a pretty good one. Ending left me a bit confused, though. Raymond E. Feist, THE KING'S BUCCANEER and SHADOW OF A DARK QUEEN Both of these were better than PRINCE OF THE BLOOD, which Ray himself regards now with some disdain. We're in for a good Serpent War series from Ray. :) Decent books: ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mark "vanyel" Shepherd, ELVENDUDE Wasn't expecting too much since the other books in Misty Lackey's urban fantasy series have tailed off of late. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised. Still somewhat preachy, but nowhere near as bad as others in this line, with workmanlike writing craft. Niven, Pournelle and Flynn, FALLEN ANGELS I ran hot and cold on this one in sections. Some parts had me cheering, and some had me groaning 'cause it got so darn silly. Disappointments: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Glen Cook, SWORDBEARER Not only was this a pastiche of Elric and Stormbringer, but it lacked any sense of the pathos Moorcock imbued in his doomed albino. Worse: Cook's writing wasn't particularly great, and in a few parts seems almost amateurish. Tom Clancy?, OP-CENTER Note the question mark. 'Nuff said. I'll-get-to-it-when-I-have-a-spare-week Dept.: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Robert Jordan, LORD OF CHAOS Have to re-skim THE FIRES OF HEAVEN first, and we're talking a major project, there! :) Okay, y'all's turn. --- SLMR 2.1a #pi QQQQQ Moderator, ILink F&SF Conference QQQQQ RNET 2.006: ILink: ExecNet Mt Vernon, NY 914-667-4567 =========================================================================== BBS: Faster-Than-Light Atlanta Georgia USA Date: 02-19-95 (16:26) Number: 170 From: JIM HENRY Refer#: 50 To: PAUL CASHMAN Recvd: NO Subj: Best of 1994 1/3 Conf: (170) I-FantsySc --------------------------------------------------------------------------- >--> What were the best, worst and middlin' books you read during > 1994? <-- >Pleasant surprises: >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy -- I started _Titus Groan_ it in Dec. '93 & finished _Titus Alone_ in April '94. Not the sort of book you "can't put down," but very good all the same. The last book, _Titus Alone_, was much better than I was expecting it to be since all the folks I had talked to on the 'net had said it went way downhill from _Gormenghast_. But it was actually very good. _A Million Open Doors_ by John Barnes -- I bought this without having heard anything about the author or book, and it turned out to be very good; excellent world-building, characterization, plotting and fair to good writing. The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe (4 vols) -- Awesome writing and world-building, and very complicated plotting. I need to read it again several times to tie all the plot threads together. _Time Machines_ by Paul J. Nahin (nonfiction, published by American Institute of Physics press) -- Everyone who gets involved in the periodic net.debates on time travel paradoxes and loops should read this book. It clears up a lot of philosophical confusions, surveys the physical theories that might actually allow time travel to happen, and includes a good (though of course incomplete) bibliography of time-travel stories. (I've sent him a list of some of the stories he's missing for inclusion in the revised edition (he gives his email address).) _The Dying Earth_ by Jack Vance -- Excellent writing and storytelling. _Impossible Things_ by Connie Willis -- An _excellent_ story collection. Two-thirds of the stories had me ROTFL, the other two-thirds had me on the verge of tears. (Yes, I can count.) _Little, Big_ by John Crowley. Probably the best fantasy book I read in '94. Beautiful, enigmatic, and very funny. _No Enemy But Time_ by Michael Bishop. One of the better time-travel novels I've read, maybe the best of '94. _The Guns of the South_ by Harry Turtledove - Another time-travel novel; someone is supplying AK-47s to the Confederate army. Very good alternate history. The meeting between Lee and Lincoln is priceless. _The Name of the Rose_ by Umberto Eco. A philosophical mystery set in a medieval monastery. Very good. _The Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics_ ed. Bryce DeWitt. This is the book upon which most sf alternate histories are based. Much of it was over my head, but what I could understand was very interesting. _If On A Winter's Night a Traveller_ by Italo Calvino. Not sf, but very very weird. This is a book about reading a book. The introduction tells about going to the bookstore, the first chapter describes what it is like to read the first chapter... Very odd, and surprising. _City of Truth_ by James Morrow. A story about a city where all the adults are conditioned to always tell the literal truth without admixture of metaphor. There is a harrowing scene in which a teenage girl is initiated into citizenship. The main story is about a man who discovers a need to lie and learns how. _The Harvest_ by Robert Charles Wilson. I believe I've mentioned this here before. _The Lathe of Heaven_ by Ursula LeGuin. The story of a man whose dreams change reality, and how his psychotherapist tries to use them to create a perfect world. The best of her novels (that I've read). _Collected Fantasies_ by Avram Davidson. Most of the stories have been collected before, but they're all good. _Soldier of Arete_ and _Soldier of the Mist_ by Gene Wolfe. A story about a soldier in the Persian war who forgets everything after about twelve hours. The book is his journal in which he writes things so that he can refresh his memory later. The theme is similar to that of John Varley's best story (IMO), "Just Another Perfect Day," but more fully developed. _The Wizard of the Pigeons_ by Megan Lindholm. A street person who lives in Seattle is defending the city from some supernatural evil that he doesn't understand. Very good. >>> Continued to next message * SLMR 2.1a * Internet: jim.henry@lightspeed.com =========================================================================== BBS: Faster-Than-Light Atlanta Georgia USA Date: 02-19-95 (16:26) Number: 170 From: JIM HENRY Refer#: 50 To: PAUL CASHMAN Recvd: NO Subj: Best of 1994 2/3 Conf: (170) I-FantsySc --------------------------------------------------------------------------- >>> Continued from previous message _The Digging Leviathan_ by James P. Blaylock. A nifty story about the quest for the underground passage to Pellucidar, with conspiracies, mad inventions, amphibious mer-men, and other oddments. Maybe his best, certainly one of his top 2-3. >Decent books: >~~~~~~~~~~~~ _Bridge of Birds_ by Barry Hughart - Quite good, a wonderful mystery and excellent evocation of medieval China. The first sequel, _The Story of the Stone_, is OK. Haven't read the third, _Eight Skilled Gentlemen_, yet. _The Fabulist_ by John Vornholt -- a fantasy autobiography of Aesop. Pretty neat, though not great. _Beasts_ by John Crowley - Not as good as his _Little, Big_ by a long shot -- not even the same kind of book -- but good. _Good News From Outer Space_ by John Kessel - Good, but doesn't live up to its awesome title. I plan to look for his other books, though. _Jumper_ by Steven Gould. The story of a boy who discovers he can teleport. Good story and characterization, OK writing. _The Quality of Mercy_ by D.G. Compton. A near-future story about a pilot flying reconaissance missions behind the Iron Curtain, how he discovers the real significance of his missions, and what he does about it. Very good character development and extrapolation of trends, but depressing. _Hart's Hope_ by Orson Scott Card - Very odd, very powerful. Not much like his other books. _Labyrinth of Night_ by Allen Steele. Pretty good near-future sf, but not as good as his earlier _Orbital Decay_ and _Lunar Descent_. _Big Planet_ by Jack Vance. Another neat world from one of the best world-builders. _Nifft the Lean_ by Michael Shea. Maybe baroque is the right word for this. It's certainly something. A weird fantasy, set in a far-future Earth (influenced perhaps by the _Dying Earth_ or Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique); three novelettes about Nifft, a master thief. Very richly written, don't take it too quickly. _Redshift Rendevous_ by John E. Stith. One of the few sf stories in which hyperspace is more than a simple shortcut. Stith puts a lot of thought into the nature of hyperspace, and much of the story takes place aboard an FTL starship and explores the consequences of the environment in hyperspace. The speed of light is only about 10 meters per second. The story and characterization are only OK, however, and other than hyperspace itself, the future world-building is not exceptional. _Assault on a Queen_ by Jack Finney. A good non-sf submarine story by the author of _Time and Again_. _Queen of Angels_, _Heads_, and _Moving Mars_ by Greg Bear. These are three separate stories though set in the same future history. They're very ambitious and often successful. The future dialect can get a bit confusing at times, but is rarely any more difficult than _The Moon is a Harsh Mistress_ or _The Demolished Man_. The stream-of-consciousness bits in _Queen of Angels_ can be very confusing, though. I recommend all three. _Count Geiger's Blues_ by Michael Bishop. A neat satire about a man who disdains popular culture and how he becomes a pulp superhero. Very funny and sad. _The Island of Dr. Moreau_ by H.G. Wells. Good, but not one of his best. The Lensman series by E.E. "Doc" Smith. Very good story, and much better writing and charcterization than I would have expected. _Night Relics_ by James P. Blaylock. Not at all bad, of course, but not as great as Blaylock's last few books. _Wyrd Sisters_ and _Witches Abroad_ by Terry Pratchett. Two of the Discworld books; these two should be read in this order, though for most of the series reading order doesn't matter. Very funny throughout, sometimes profound. _Strange Devices of the Sun and Moon_ by Lisa Goldstein. The fairies come to London in the late 16th century, and a number of obscure historical poets and playwrights (Christopher Marlowe is probably the most famous) get involved with them, along with some of the booksellers of London. _Turnabout_ by Thorne Smith. Smith was one of the more popular American fantasists in the '20s (James Branch Cabell was better IMO, but considerably less popular). This is a fun story about a husband and wife who are made to swap bodies for a few months. >>> Continued to next message * SLMR 2.1a * Internet: jim.henry@lightspeed.com =========================================================================== BBS: Faster-Than-Light Atlanta Georgia USA Date: 02-19-95 (16:26) Number: 170 From: JIM HENRY Refer#: 50 To: PAUL CASHMAN Recvd: NO Subj: Best of 1994 3/3 Conf: (170) I-FantsySc --------------------------------------------------------------------------- >>> Continued from previous message _The Stray Lamb_ by same. Mr. T. Lawrence Lamb changes into various animals at inconvenient times. >Disappointments: >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Raymond E. Feist, THE KING'S BUCCANEER and SHADOW OF A DARK QUEEN I read _The King's Bucaneer_, and wasn't especially impressed with it. Unless I hear people saying that the Serpent War series is back up to par with the Riftwar, I don't think I'll be reading any more of him. _The Hill of Dreams_ by Arthur Machen -- Dunsany and Lovecraft recommended him, but I didn't find this particular book all that great. Well-written, yes, but not great otherwise. Maybe some of his other books are better? _A Nice Day for Screaming_ by James H. Schmitz. I had heard this praised to the skies on rec.arts.sf.written, heard loud lamentations about its rarity, and when I went to the Library of Congress (and incidentally to some other neat places up there in Washington :), I spent most of my few hours reading it. It was good, one of the better single-author collections I've read, but it wasn't as great as the excellence of his novel _The Witches of Karres_ might have led me to believe. _The Redward Edward Papers_ by Avram Davidson - An OK collection, with one excellent story I hadn't seen before ("The Lord of Central Park"). But most of the stories had been collected before, and the other new story (the title story) was long, disjointed and apparently pointless. Still excellent writing, but not at all what I had come to expect from Davidson, especially his short stories. _The God Box_ by Barry B. Longyear. A promisingly bizarre fantasy that degenerates near the end into... I don't know what. Not as good as his earlier excellent work such as "Enemy Mine" and the Circus World stories. More ambitious maybe, but less successful. _Rain in the Doorway_ by Thorne Smith. Has some fun moments, but not very good overall. * SLMR 2.1a * Internet: jim.henry@lightspeed.com