Favorite Genre

[Miles Lacey]

Does it have a dead body by the end of the first page? Is the protagonist a young female who isn't the victim of a sex crime? Count me in.

 

[The Dark One]

William Horwood?

Yes. It was quite good and quite different to so much other stuff - quite magical realist.

 

[The Dark One]

My last post was quite quite-y...

 

[Jackarandajam]

I think I'd have to say non-epic fiction. I've read many epic fantasy series and love several of them (malazan, Black Company, LOTR) but if I had to choose I'd say I love the hobbit more than LOTR. I love fairy tales, so I love stories that are more designed to be contemplated in their entirety, if that makes sense.

Narrowing it down more than that would be difficult. I haven't really carved into Mystery and I have no interest in Romance.
Basically if I find out a well-respected or awarded author, or one I'm just interested in, has a single novel at 70-100k I get excited. Not because I have anything against long books or series, but because I enjoy stories that are short enough I can sit around and chew on them after.

 

[JBCrowson]

Sorry, it was Hyddenworld. There's a series.

I read the first, my sister lent it to me. I enjoyed it, with the caveat I hold for most low fantasy - that someone would notice all this stuff going on in the background of the real world.

 

[JBCrowson]

Does it have a dead body by the end of the first page? Is the protagonist a young female who isn't the victim of a sex crime? Count me in.

Not the first page, though there is a car crash, and no there isn't a female lead, but no females were survivors of sexual violence. If you like fantasy set in the real world it's definitely worth a read.

 

[JBCrowson]

My reading is as broad as it gets... everything from sci-fi, through spec fiction to crime with mostly historical fiction in recent years. Usually enjoy biographies but mostly get bored once the subject gets famous.

Also read a lot of historiography (especially medieval and early modern) and also a bit of theoretical physics over the years.

I guess this is reflective of my writing genres having published crime, historical, spec fic and sci-fi. I am the Kubrick of novel writing.

Oddly enough, I used to read heaps of fantasy but hardly ever do any more as it tended to be so same-ish. Probably the last fantasy book I enjoyed was The Hydden which blended urban fantasy with an alternative England. Even that had it's issues - I remember writing to the author (something I NEVER do) to ask a few questions and a month or so later he sent a very polite reply.

What do you think of Robert Holdstock's stuff?

 

[pmmg]

Bad stuff happens, and sometimes it shows up in stories. You dont get kicked off my read list for that.

 

[Finchbearer]

Just read a sample of Mythago Wood and only three pages in and sexist. I’ll pass.

 

[JBCrowson]

Just read a sample of Mythago Wood and only three pages in and sexist. I’ll pass.

It's over 30 years since I read it, so forgive me for not recalling sexist vibes. Though the book hasn't changed, the world, and I have come along way in that time.

 

[The Dark One]

What do you think of Robert Holdstock's stuff?

Never heard of him. I'll look him up.

 

[Finchbearer]

It's over 30 years since I read it, so forgive me for not recalling sexist vibes. Though the book hasn't changed, the world, and I have come along way in that time.

You might not find it sexist, but as a woman reader, I would not carry on reading based on the language used. If I don’t think it’s necessary, then I question why it’s there. Especially when there are hundreds of other books I could read that don’t have that kind of tone. It’s a shame actually when that happens because it ruins the experience of a potentially good story.

 

[The Dark One]

You might not find it sexist, but as a woman reader, I would not carry on reading based on the language used. If I don’t think it’s necessary, then I question why it’s there. Especially when there are hundreds of other books I could read that don’t have that kind of tone. It’s a shame actually when that happens because it ruins the experience of a potentially good story.

This raises an interesting issue ... writing about different times with different laws/mores/conventions. Plenty of things have been acceptable in the past which are unacceptable now but writing about them is a minefield.

On the one hand I detest the presentist approach which ignores or judges these things from a modern perspective. On the other hand, are we really likely to derive "entertainment" in the C21 from such attitudes and actions if faithfully represented.

I struggled with this in my historical novel (which opens with mass murder and rape). That's what the Vikings typically did in England in the C11 so I could hardly suggest they were there for a tea party. None of the violence was described in action but it was clearly going on and the Vikings were laughing about it both before and afterwards.

There were other things too - the main male character hates the smell of shit and struggles to believe in god. I suspect both of these would have made him quite unusual for his time but they were ways of linking his sensibilities with those of a modern reader, given the world he inhabited.

Anyway... thread derail - sorry.

 

[Jackarandajam]

Just read a sample of Mythago Wood and only three pages in and sexist. I’ll pass.

You talking about the prologue?

 

[JBCrowson]

This raises an interesting issue ... writing about different times with different laws/mores/conventions. Plenty of things have been acceptable in the past which are unacceptable now but writing about them is a minefield.

On the one hand I detest the presentist approach which ignores or judges these things from a modern perspective. On the other hand, are we really likely to derive "entertainment" in the C21 from such attitudes and actions if faithfully represented.

I struggled with this in my historical novel (which opens with mass murder and rape). That's what the Vikings typically did in England in the C11 so I could hardly suggest they were there for a tea party. None of the violence was described in action but it was clearly going on and the Vikings were laughing about it both before and afterwards.

There were other things too - the main male character hates the smell of shit and struggles to believe in god. I suspect both of these would have made him quite unusual for his time but they were ways of linking his sensibilities with those of a modern reader, given the world he inhabited.

Anyway... thread derail - sorry.

It is a tricky issue - Shakespeare was openly, blatantly antisemitic as I believe a great many people of his day were. Yet Merchant of Venice is still read, performed, taught today and Shakespeare is regarded as one of the finest at his craft in history.

I think it is unfortunately true that racism and misogyny are still common enough in many places that writing stuff critiquing them and those who espouse them is needed. Doing that requires characters that say / do / think racist or misogynous things, which is going to feel uncomfortable for some readers.

 

[Finchbearer]

You talking about the prologue?

Yes, and upon a quick google many people cite the book series as deeply sexist and misogynistic.

 

[Finchbearer]

This raises an interesting issue ... writing about different times with different laws/mores/conventions. Plenty of things have been acceptable in the past which are unacceptable now but writing about them is a minefield.

On the one hand I detest the presentist approach which ignores or judges these things from a modern perspective. On the other hand, are we really likely to derive "entertainment" in the C21 from such attitudes and actions if faithfully represented.

I struggled with this in my historical novel (which opens with mass murder and rape). That's what the Vikings typically did in England in the C11 so I could hardly suggest they were there for a tea party. None of the violence was described in action but it was clearly going on and the Vikings were laughing about it both before and afterwards.

There were other things too - the main male character hates the smell of shit and struggles to believe in god. I suspect both of these would have made him quite unusual for his time but they were ways of linking his sensibilities with those of a modern reader, given the world he inhabited.

Anyway... thread derail - sorry.

I both agree and don’t agree. Tolkien wrote at a different time, and many cite his representation of women as flat or even sexist. I don’t see it that way at all. I like the female characters Tolkien created very much.

For me it’s a case of ‘I know sexism when I see it’. There’s a big difference between writing a character who is sexist or racist or what have you, compared to actually passing on your own bias’ into your work as an author.

 

[The Dark One]

I both agree and don’t agree. Tolkien wrote at a different time, and many cite his representation of women as flat or even sexist. I don’t see it that way at all. I like the female characters Tolkien created very much.

For me it’s a case of ‘I know sexism when I see it’. There’s a big difference between writing a character who is sexist or racist or what have you, compared to actually passing on your own bias’ into your work as an author.

Tolkien's a tough one. I had always assumed him to be quite racist given that everything that was good in TLOTR tended to be white and everything that was bad tended to be black. However I read, fairly recently, that he was about as far from racist as it was possible for a man of his time to be.

I might also have assumed him to be open to social mobility given Sam's character arc - especially re the other hobbits (Merry and Pippin) where he went from very servile to equality and occasionally superior in his treatment of them. Yet having read many of Tolkien's letters he is clearly judgmental of working class non-intellectuals.

It's never quite what you think it is...

 

[Finchbearer]

Tolkien's a tough one. I had always assumed him to be quite racist given that everything that was good in TLOTR tended to be white and everything that was bad tended to be black. However I read, fairly recently, that he was about as far from racist as it was possible for a man of his time to be.

I might also have assumed him to be open to social mobility given Sam's character arc - especially re the other hobbits (Merry and Pippin) where he went from very servile to equality and occasionally superior in his treatment of them. Yet having read many of Tolkien's letters he is clearly judgmental of working class non-intellectuals.

It's never quite what you think it is...

He describes the harfoots, the ancient hobbits, as darker skinned, but apart from that he does appear to make the antagonists not classically white. I don’t think it was his plan to come across as racist, and I personally think it was more to do with light / dark in more of a biblical sense. We have a dark lord who uses dark races to be an oppressor, so of course that can also come across as darker skinned folk being inherently bad, which is of course untrue.

I don’t know about his letters, but I don’t see his writing to be classist. He had a gardener as the unsung hero of the whole thing. And he also makes little speeches about how the everyday small people can make the biggest difference. About as socialist as you can get. But he moved in learned middle class circles, so he probably had attitudes that showed that.

 

[The Dark One]

I don’t know about his letters, but I don’t see his writing to be classist. He had a gardener as the unsung hero of the whole thing. And he also makes little speeches about how the everyday small people can make the biggest difference. About as socialist as you can get. But he moved in learned middle class circles, so he probably had attitudes that showed that.

But would he have wanted his children to marry a gardener?

In his letters there are several examples of he and the Lewis brothers laughing at the inability of the uneducated to keep up with their discourse. They had an appalling habit of putting shit on bartenders - possibly the alcohol talking - but in vino veritas, and he was presumably sober when writing letters about these incidents.