The Space Opera, Military Sci-Fi, and Interstellar Sci Fi thread

[Darth Richard II]

9 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

There is a bit much graphic sex in this for it to be considered "Christian Fiction".  Read it years ago.

Yeah, I think I read too much Baen type SciFi in the late 90s where as spoon as the badguys turn out to be evil Satanists in space I have an, uh, immediate reaction, which is to throw the book into the fire.

I'll admit  a lot of the ideas were neat, particually when you look when it was published. But man, I did not like the...400ish? pages I read.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

14 hours ago, Darth Richard II said:

Yeah, I think I read too much Baen type SciFi in the late 90s where as spoon as the badguys turn out to be evil Satanists in space I have an, uh, immediate reaction, which is to throw the book into the fire.

I'll admit  a lot of the ideas were neat, particually when you look when it was published. But man, I did not like the...400ish? pages I read.

I agree the ideas are more interesting than the writting.  It feels like reading Penthouse letters at times.

[Werthead]

On 02/03/2018 at 11:47 PM, Darth Richard II said:

Yeah i went a bit over the top there, I was just super dissapointed after being hyped up for so long, but the bad guys being Satanists who basically rape everyone for hundreds of pages combined with a protagonist that makes Kvothe look flawed did uh, not work for me. 

The "bad guys" aren't Satanists. There is the Lightbringer cult at the start of the first book but they very quickly stop being a thing (one of them remains a primary antagonist for the trilogy, but his creed is exposed as being total BS).

Who is the perfect protagonist? I'm assuming it's not Joshua, who is a monumental arsehole at the start of the book and only gets worse for a while before he gets some self-realisation (which isn't until about halfway through Book 2). He thinks that he's awesome, but no-one else really buys that and there's some good moments of other characters telling him to get a grip.

But yeah, if you're not keen on the writing or the high concept (what if the afterlife was real, we could prove it, and it turned out to shit?) there's not much to be done. The series eventually explains everything pretty well (and it's certainly not Christian propaganda, in fact it's implied that the religiously-minded have more problems in the Beyond than other people). Maybe a bit too well, the trilogy doesn't leave a lot to interpretation.

[williamjm]

11 minutes ago, Werthead said:

The "bad guys" aren't Satanists. There is the Lightbringer cult at the start of the first book but they very quickly stop being a thing (one of them remains a primary antagonist for the trilogy, but his creed is exposed as being total BS).

I'm guessing Darth Richard didn't get that far. For most authors 400 pages would get you well through a book but for Hamilton that's about the time the main plot is just beginning.

[Darth Richard II]

16 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I'm guessing Darth Richard didn't get that far. For most authors 400 pages would get you well through a book but for Hamilton that's about the time the main plot is just beginning.

This is true. And well I'm glad they aren't the main focus. The Christian Propaganda thign was me raging a bit oo much, but this one hit all my piss DR off buttons.

30 minutes ago, Werthead said:

The "bad guys" aren't Satanists. There is the Lightbringer cult at the start of the first book but they very quickly stop being a thing (one of them remains a primary antagonist for the trilogy, but his creed is exposed as being total BS).

Who is the perfect protagonist? I'm assuming it's not Joshua, who is a monumental arsehole at the start of the book and only gets worse for a while before he gets some self-realisation (which isn't until about halfway through Book 2). He thinks that he's awesome, but no-one else really buys that and there's some good moments of other characters telling him to get a grip.

But yeah, if you're not keen on the writing or the high concept (what if the afterlife was real, we could prove it, and it turned out to shit?) there's not much to be done. The series eventually explains everything pretty well (and it's certainly not Christian propaganda, in fact it's implied that the religiously-minded have more problems in the Beyond than other people). Maybe a bit too well, the trilogy doesn't leave a lot to interpretation.

Perfect may not be the right word but that man gets laid more than Kvothe at a ninja town.

[Darth Richard II]

That does make me wonder what it was about the late 90s that every major Space Opera had to have some kind of raping cult. Even David Weber had some.

 

Edit: Anyway, I was very much aware even when rage posting that my opinion was going to be unpopular. My goodreads friends all love this series to death, so, carry on people. Nothing to see here.

[Ghjhero]

Just finished Rendezvous with Rama. Fantastic book, I really liked it a lot. It’s a pity the sequels aren’t any good. 

[Werthead]

3 hours ago, Ghjhero said:

Just finished Rendezvous with Rama. Fantastic book, I really liked it a lot. It’s a pity the sequels aren’t any good. 

There's things to like about the sequels and things to very much not. The raging hate-on for them is a bit overblown - the original is hardly a paragon of good writing or deep characters - although I wouldn't go as far as saying they're good. Rama II is by far the best and they go downhill rapidly from there.