/lit/ - Literature

First for meme authors

Rhythm of War is still better than Oathbringer.

>>17038931
I had such a hard time reading it that that stuff didn't even register or at least I forgot about it.

>Moash didn't show up to Talk no Jutsu Shallan instead

>>17061179
One day that'll be me.

>>17061141
https://www.deviantart.com/uthp/journal/The-Legend-of-Twilight-Zelda-Princess-part-I-348420007

>>17061257
A meme author?

>>17061274
Yes. I've decided I will never really make it or be great, so being a meme is a much more realistic goal.

Tried reading City at the End of Time on anons rec. Had to uninstall after a 100 pages cause I felt like I'm pushing through Stephen King dipped in molasses. Too many YA choosed one misfit characters, too little interesting worldbuilding of the far future, too many sentences like "the paint smothered the walls with it's dreary brown".

KILL YOUSELF, MY MAN!

>>17061274
That's the plan.

Fuck E William Brown's Coof

>>17061261
>https://www.deviantart.com/uthp/journal/The-Legend-of-Twilight-Zelda-Princess-part-I-348420007
Mildy amusing if you swap one word for another that has the same first letter as you read.

>>17061281
Yeah it takes a while for anything to happen and the ending is lackluster. What are you looking for exactly along those topic lines?

>>17061332
I was looking for novels with a "humanity's last stand" theme cause I really enjoyed Night Land.

The original Dune Novels
Aeon by Greg Bear
The Foundation Series and Caves of Steel by Asimov
The Stars my Destination by Bester
The Culture Series or any Ian Banks
China Mieville's Perdido Street Station and a couple of the other books on that series
Vonnegut wrote some good scifi
Alistair Reynolds wrote a few good novels like Revelation Space

17th for Sanderson needs a new NEW editor to tell him to knock off his nonsense and trim his stories.

I read ubik, didn't like it too much
Read electric sheep, pretty good.
What's my next dick?

>>17061533
how deep do you want to get dicked?
you're not even warm yet

Oh hey apparently Renarin's gay for Rlain.

>>17061533
Timothy Archer
then the BIGDICK VALIS
and finally Balls-deep Exegesis

>>17061536
I didn't really like the platonic stuff in Ubik, so ehhh if it's a book just about that. I liked sheep cus I'm a sucker for depressed men depressedly depressing.
Medium dick, I guess?

Finally finished LOTR.

The scourging of the shire took me by surprise. Pippin had big dick energy. They tried placing him under arrest, but like the gigachad he is, he's all, "fuck you - I'm not under arrest, you are. Lay down your weapons" and they listened.

>>17061550
Are those all about his schizo experiences? I was hoping for some time travel if he has

I'm playing around with that Azgaar map generator posted last thread. (Or it might have been in /wg/) Anyone have any other good generators or just map making tools?

Are there any books that capture the same sense of adventure into the unknown as the beginning of the Disney Atlantis movie? I don't mean a band of adventurers going into the wild I mean a well-funded expedition and a large ensemble cast.

I love every second of that movie until they actually got to Atlantis

>>17061635
I know it gets recommended to death, but that's Book of the New Sun's entire deal.

>>17061635
Rendezvous with Rama, but the ensemble isn't the strongest. The actual exploration is really great, however.

>>17061561
try
>the penultimate truth
>a maze of death
>time out of joint
>lies, inc
then when you want to get some wild freaky stuff
>the three stigmata of palmer eldritch
>martian time-slip

>>17061561
A Scanner Darkly felt hard schizo to me, but I haven't delved into the deep Dickings yet.

>>17061279
I don’t know if being a meme author is easier than being a good one.

>>17061513
>not liking 100000 page books

What are you? A normal person?

Jokes aside, I wish we had a chapter filler list for his books.

>>17061739
no list needed, is it a female pov? if so, skip. nothing of value was lost.

>>17061739
>100000
oh no sweetie

Nth for Bakker is probably dead.
No-God never ever, bakkerfags

>So far in the future it's actually the past!

>>17061785
>pages

Oathbringer was shit

>when you're 9 books deep into a 12 book fantasy series and you're sick of it and you're craving some sci-fi palate cleanser but you're too autistic to drop it
anyone else knows this feel?

>>17061845
Read nonfiction

>>17061845
I couldn’t know, I dropped the Shit of Time on book 4.

>>17061787
Sanderson will write the ending

>>17061861
swing and a miss
i was never as miserable reading wot as i am now

>>17061861
Could it be Shit of Truth instead?

I'm in need of milfs.

Recommending this post again
>>17061000
>>17061000
>>17061000

>>17061969
try Witches of Eastwick by John Updike.

Infact, try all John Updike, he is pretty good not sffg and has a ton of hot milfs.

>>17061885
How the fuck did you not see that he was going to write the exact same book over and over again until the end when you started book 4? It’s just mediocre vanilla fantasy where nothing happens until the end of each book.all you get is travelling a braid tugging.

He just copied Tolkien. Only interesting character was the dice guy whose name I forgot.

Anytime I read something that's not Blindsight or Echopraxia, I feel pain in my brain.

>>17062022
it was my first fantasy series. anyway, whether the plot progressed enough to my satisfaction or not is irrelevant. the character interactions made the wheel of time more charming and enjoyable than the books i'm reading now. and while this author is definitely better than jordan at prose, it's stalling and dragging things out where he completely blows him out of the water.

>>17060075

I know it might be hard to believe, but this is genuinely not bait. Your reasoning why there is no jewish fantasy is entirely correct, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating, nor does the fact that what unique culture we do have looks embarrassingly goofy.

I've got some ideas for what a setting would look like, but it would take an enormous amount of effort to turn the setting into a story and write it when I'm already struggling with other writing stuff

>>17062275
Different anon. Have you not heard of Lavie Tidhar or the various other writers doing Jewish sff?

What are some good books with a lot of xeno-perspectives on humans? Either alien POVs on humans or culture-shock between magical and mundane, I can't get enough of POVs finding the ordinary exceptional. I've read CJ Cherryh's Foreigner series, David Weber's Multiverse, and also found a lot of this in Scalzi's Old Man's War series but I'm trying to find more.

>>17062076
Why?

I was reading UNSOULED when shit went hentai plot all of a sudden
>Abruptly, my sister rose to her feet. “That’s up to you. I have some ideas, but I need a living target with a functioning core if I want to try them out. That means you.”
>“You can disable my spirit, but it won’t do much. I can hardly defend myself to begin with.”
>Kelsa stretched first one arm, then the other. “That’s not what I mean. The manual mentions that he had to achieve purity for the technique to work. We don’t have time for that, so I’ll be pushing my madra into your core until I get a feel for the technique.”

>>17062347
not him specifically, though I have heard of other writers. What I haven't heard of is jewish scifi/fantasy having its "wakanda" (i.e. a work of jewish fantasy that focuses on what might have been had we never been in exile, or focuses on the unique aspects of our culture before the diaspora)

>>17062609
older sister or younger sister. this is very important.

>>17062076
This but also Bakker.

>>17062727
little sister

>>17062375
seconding this

>>17062748
unfortunate

So... has anyone read Axiom's End?

>>17062375
xeelee

So apparently nautical fantasy is almost nonexistent, but I found a couple good candidates. Anyone read this or any of Hobb's books? Worth checking out after I finish my current book?

I bought a shitty isekai light novel today.

>>17063326
I love hobb but this is the second trilogy of a longer running series and only this one has heavy nautical themes. it's mostly self contained save for greater series plot points so it can be read on its own

>>17063326
Hobb is good but suffers from woman writer syndrome sometimes. Hyperdrama and suffering. I don't know of a good nautical fantasy. I've read some good space battles, but nothing touches Napoleonic nautical.

>>17063375
Should've pirated it from the collection that has almost all officially published ones.

>>17063515
It was only $3 used at my local book store.

>>17061513
I like the length but the Eshonai stuff was pure filler. You already had the interludes for pointless side stories mormon man, what the fuck are you doing

What tropes do you hate and/or are tired of seeing?

>>17061317
Nazis to niggers?

>>17062609
They actually fuck?

>>17063850
certes

>>17063812
I've been sick of "nooooooo you can't kill your enemies unless they're swinging a weapon at you, that's dishorabu" for 20 years now and I shall never stop hating it. Apart from that I dunno, the genius inventor stuff maybe? It's not exciting to see things that already exist in our world get invented in a fantasy world, like who the fuck cares. Oh also fuck hacking in sci-fi stuff. It was fun at first but I'm over it

I don't like it when /lit/ shits on my guilty pleasure books.

>>17063880
Then don't read the posts.

>>17063856
No, that's just a very delusional anon.

>>17063812
>Young country bumpkin with a hidden heritage who’s good with a bow
>female tomboy thief
>any and all kinds of assassin characters

>>17063862
Imagine not slaughtering children, let alone adult bystanders, that happen to be in the way. All's fair in getting your way.

>>17063862
>I've been sick of "nooooooo you can't kill your enemies unless they're swinging a weapon at you, that's dishorabu"
i really agree with this. it's very annoyinng.

>>17063812
The worst is humans, but really any sentient life. Not nearly enough inanimate objects as the protagonist.

>>17063928
you...you hate all human characters in books, anon?

>>17063915
It's not about what's fair, it's about what works. Leniency frequently backfires, ruthlessness gets results and actually saves more lives in the long run

>>17063382
Thanks, maybe I'll try the first of the first trilogy and see how it goes.

>>17063513
I'll keep that in mind, but sometimes I like reading female protagonist urban fantasy with romance subplots, so I think I can handle woman writers.

Any good space battles you'd recommend? The only real space battle series I've read is The Lost Fleet, which I did quite like. For some reason, space doesn't scratch quite the same itch. But I'm definitely not against it.

>>17064059
I liked Star Force though it brings the cheese and for riper cheese give lensmen a try. Lensmen is a kind of apex nerdery. For WWII navy with catgirls I liked Destoryermen, but it dragged on and I disengaged.

>>17063901
>anon is delusional for reading chink light novels and expecting incest

I’m sure this is asked in literally every thread, but what other books will scratch my Conan itch?

>>17064319
The Eye of Argon

>>17064329
>The Eye of Argon
Why are you like this?

If only were to read one of those chink cultivation novels, which should it be? My impression of them from what I've heard over the years is that they go on for too long and tend to have shitty endings.

>>17064329
It's not a book.

>>17064346
Cradle is the only mainstream Westernized one.
Otherwise, check out Coiling Dragon (popularized the genre) and Desolate Era, both by the same author.

>entire book is filler

Who are the authors that are doing new and interesting things in the genre?

>>17064418

>>17064418

>>17064418
Took me a while, but here is a list.

>>17064418
Genre craved normalization forever but when it got it it found it could no longer play the outsider. There is no literature today that can play the role sff played in its youth. Everything is coopted.

>>17064028
Def need to more ruthlessly ban many posters in these threads. It would lead to great results.

>>17064132
Uh, no that's a series of novels by an American.

>>17064319
Conan O'brien is a hard itch to scratch.

>>17064527
yes but also heavily influenced by chink webnovels
without even looking, I bet the author is a happa

>>17064361
I don't care about westernized, I'm into chink shit to begin with. I mostly care about it not having a disappointing ending.

I read through Three Body Problem, Dark Forest. Didn't finish Death's End. First time I've personally experienced media that got perceptibly worse every new entry.
Why write a book with a main character who literally can't make a single good decision, with side characters that are just as bad?

>>17064549
Conan isn't funny though. Craig Ferguson, now he was a late night host.

>>17064418

>>17064597
Crag Funguson? No.

>>17064581
Your life is going to have a disappointing ending.

>>17064418
My diary desu ne

>>17064643
sasuga keikaku

>>17064638
rude

>>17064678
Yet sadly all too true.

This talk of incest has got me craving a story with actual incest, you bros got any reccomendations?

>>17064698
Game of Thrones

>>17064698
Better off just reading some fapfiction shorts.

>>17064418

>>17064698
>talk of incest
where???

>>17064804
In his head.

>>17064840
I AM NOT SCHIZO

>>17061141
Librarything is better

space cats

>>17064876
All schizos say that.

>>17064910
space buns

>>17064698
Abercrombie

>>17061787
Does it trouble you, Proyas?
> D-does what... trouble me?
To know that Bakker burns in hell.

>>17061880
Damnationspren

>>17061141
Four-Day Planet, a Federation novel - H. Beam Piper (1961)

On the planet Fenrir, whose days last two thousand hours, alternating between blazing heat and glacial cold, almost everyone on the planet lives in a single underground city built for a quarter million people. A thousand colonists remained, as almost all considered the colony an abject failure, and over time the population grew to its current twenty thousand.
The protagonist is a seventeen year old journalist, the only one on the planet. While trying to find a story for his father's paper he overhears the rumors about tallow-wax, the source of almost all revenue for the planet, and the corruption that may be involved with its pricing and distribution of profits. Everyone involved in its obtainment is part of a worker's co-op, but it's anything but cooperative now.
One thing leads to another and our intrepid protagonist finds himself on a high seas adventure hunting down Jarvis's sea monster, which average 150 feet in length, and from which the tallow-wax is harvested. Treachery and excitement follow!
Basically a YA novel from 1961, which several saying it's similar to Heinlein's series of Juveniles.
The covers could be better and I couldn't find a nice version of this cover, so I used the art that was used for the cover.
Rating: 2.5/5

>>17062375
I haven't read the novel but Annihilation but the Netflix adaptation kinda touches that, a bit. so I'd assume the novel by VanderMeer is similar in this sense

>>17062375
Dawn, Lilith's Brood by Octavia Butler

After reading Dying Earth and the Lyonesse trilogy, what other Jack Vance books do you recommend?
His prose is pretty great.

Any sci-fi or fantasy with ladyboys?

>>17065213
So many words that mean roughly the same, but each with a different connotation.
transgender
trans
mtf
shemale
dickgirl
ladyboy
heshe
kathoey
...and so many others.

>>17065213
I'm convinced it's only a few at most anons that keep asking for fetish material.

>>17065102
No alien POV, yes culture shock fever dream. Tho the alien doesn't really have a culture.

>>17065213
Bakker

>>17065272
Most people in the thread don't actually read. The anons posting that are usually just bumping the thread and don't even want real recs. Maybe just a bit of shitposting out of it.

>>17065478
Where are there ladyboys in Bakker?
Aside from Cnaüir's "lady friend," the Thing-called-Serwë.

>>17061513
>nth for pretending to enjoy reading while also bitching about having to read too much

>>17064418
Fantasy peaked with Tolkien and science fiction with asimov.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzyZKLBy2Do&ab_channel=SlowlyRed

BAKKERBROS LETS FUCKING GOOOO

>>17065508
Idk know how to spoiler so stop reading if you must

Xerius’s mom

I can't stop reading cultivation kino bros

>>17064698
Bakker

>>17065508
xerius mom, serwe and conphas is a bit of a bishonen twink

/sffg/, I don't know if I can survive another winter

>>17065630
Then don't.

>>17065588
I love the comparison of Kellhus with Neo, also he pronounces literally everything different from me

>>17065492
It's too bad the threads can't be self-moderated because of what would happen if they were.

>>17065588
>Bakkerbros
>Bros
"Then you see that you are my brother?"
"No...." the Anasürimbor replied again. "Where you fall as fodder, I descend as hunger."

The Bakker shilling and sameposting has been really strong lately.

>>17065709

>>17064922
>the universe came
>and so have I

>>17065715
The Bakkersult is at least 5 of us. Maybe more.
Deal with it, Bakkerposting is infinitely superior to the Sandershittery that constantly subsumes these threads.
>>17065723
Masterful. I've actually been re-reading this scene this evening. It's hilarious how Cet'ingira is so butthurt that Kell doesn't freak out over muh inverse fire, and what a little bitch Aurax is.

>>17064910
So is this just a pulp cover meant to get teenagers attention for a normal book or is it actual smut?

>>17065723
TFW curse likaro becomes bless likaro

>>17065715
we like the books sue us, gonna post an excerpt just to own you


>Kellhus plunged down another stair, into pitch blackness. He blundered through a brittle wooden door, felt the air bloom into emptiness about him, smelled stale cistern waters. The skin-spies hesitated. All eyes need light. Kellhus spun about the room, his every surface alive, reading the warp and weft of drafts, the crunch and rasp of his sandals scuffing stone, the flutter of his clothing. His outstretched fingers touched table, chair, brick oven, a hundred different surfaces in a handful of instants.

>He fell into stance in the room’s far corner. Drew his sword. Motionless. Somewhere in the pitch, a wood splinter snapped. He could feel them slip through the entrance, one after the other. They spread across the far wall, their hearts thudding in competing rhythms. Kellhus could smell their musk roll through the room.

>“I’ve tasted both of your peaches,” the one called Sarcellus said—to mask the sounds of the others, Kellhus realized. “I tasted them long and hard—did you know that? I made them squeal ...”

>“You lie!” Kellhus cried in mimicry of desperate fury.

>He heard the skin-spies pause, then close on the corner where he’d thrown his voice. “Both were sweet,” Sarcellus called, “and so very juicy ... The man, they say, ripens the peach.” Kellhus had punched his sword point through the ear of the creature that glided before him, lowered it as soundlessly as he could to the ground.

1/2

>>17065820
>“Eh, Dûnyain?” Sarcellus asked. “That makes you twice the cuckold!”

>One bumped into a chair. Kellhus leapt, gutted it, rolled under the table as it squealed and shrieked.

>“He plays us!” one cried. “Unza, pophara tokuk!”

>“Smell him!” the thing called Sarcellus shouted. “Cut anything that smells his smell!”

>The disembowelled creature flopped and flailed, screaming in demonic voices—as Kellhus had hoped. He ducked from under the table, backed to the wall to the left of the entrance. He pulled free his samite robe, tossed it onto the back of a chair he couldn’t see—but remembered ... Kellhus stood motionless. The drafts came to him, murmuring. He could feel their bestial heartbeats, taste the feral heat of their bodies.

>Two leapt at his robe before him. Swords swooped and cracked into the chair. Lunging, he skewered the one to the left in the throat, only to have his blade wrenched from him as the creature toppled backward. Kellhus leaned back and to the left, felt steel whip the air. He caught an arm, exploded the elbow, blocked the knife-bearing fist that hooked about. He reached into its throat and jerked out its windpipe.

>He jumped backward. Sarcellus’s sword whistled through the blackness. Twisting into a handstand, Kellhus caught the back of a chair and vaulted to a crouch at the far edge of the trestle table. The gutted skin-spy thrashed immediately below him. Even still, he heard the thing called Sarcellus bound out of the cellar. Flee ...

>For several moments Kellhus remained still, drawing long deep breaths. Inhuman screaming resounded through the blackness. It sounded like something—many some-things—burning alive. How are such creatures possible? What do you know of them, Father? Retrieving his long-pommelled sword, Kellhus struck off the living skin-spy’s head. Sudden silence. He wrapped it, still streaming blood, in his slashed robe. Then he climbed back toward slaughter and daylight.

2/2

>>17065820
> sue us
Please dox yourself so that I'm able to do so.

I've become addicted to chinkshit webnovels

>>17065869
based but for me it's the three chinkdoms tv series. can't believe it took me so long to bite the bullet and watch it. definitely going to read romance of the three kingdoms after i'm done, to see how the show differs

>>17065848
my name is hunter biden

>>17065789
>rent free
I like Bakker too, and even if I didn't I wouldn't snidely bitch about people liking things I don't like :^)

>>17064840
>>17064698
>>17064527
>>17064361
>>17064346
>>17063901
>>17063856
>>17062727
>UNSOULED doesn't have inces-
>Kelsa placed the elixirs carefully on the ground, then grabbed him by the shoulders. She leaned forward, her face inches away from his, dark eyes heavy with concern

>>17062375
Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson

>>17061141
>Goodreads removed their developer API and I've come here to say that I'M ANGRY
Explain.

>>17065790
>actual smut?
You know nothing.

>>17066057
Anon she’s just protective of her useless oniichan

>>17065263
the minimalist man needs only one word to obviate those and many more terms: degenerate

>>17064698
Not really sffg appropriate but it is a fantasy in an extremely vague way, Ada by Nabokov

Do you guys still do book club stuff? It's been two years since I last existed and I've been out of touch since then.

>>17064346
>tfw you've been marathoning classic kung fu and wuxia films and get the urge to read some wuxia novels then quickly remember they're most likely autistic as fuck and nowhere near as entertaining as the movies

>>17064319
If you haven't already you can read non-Conan stories from the same author.

>>17064698
The Broken Sword

>>17061635
Gateway by Fred Pohl will hit some of those notes, although the exploration parts make up a fairly minor part of the book

You want also want to try Blindsight, The Many-Coloured Land and Ringworld

Newfag to this board. I flipped through the megas book suggestion pics and found a lot of stuff to check out. I was wondering if you had anything similar for military science fi? I enjoy david weber, john ringo, and ian douglas if that helps any.

>>17066478
Check out the Galaxy's Edge series. The premise is basically 'Star Wars, but the Stormtroopers are the good guys.'

>>17066478
forever war is good

>>17066498
>>17066503
Thank you both. Work let's us listen to mp3 players so I am always looking for new stuff.

>>17062375
The High Crusade

Did you ever read science fiction written before the 20th century? Did you like it?

I've read this one. I liked it, but it feels so much more fantastical than science fiction, though I know it is because of how much science changed since then.

>>17065588
>spoiler free
yikes

>>17066768
spoiler reviews seem less useful than non spoiler reviews, the main purpose of reviews is, imo, for people interested in checking something out to get an idea of what it's like.

Holy shit this edition (Hodder) of Dune Messiah is so bad. Typos on almost every other page.
>Freman
>Chanl
>Iruian

Really don't know why I bought this one after reading the first book from the same publisher (it had some problems too, though not as many). I guess I'm a sucker for big fonts.
Don't recommend it.

> Good morning to everyone but Nersei Proyas
Post Sorweel memes
Post Cishaurim memes
Fuck Kucifra
Consult literally built for BDC
Ajokli was here check 'em

>>17067215
HOW LONG HAVE YOU SERVED GOLGOTTERATH?

>>17067215
>Proyas paused, realized he was panting. He felt crazed and confused, as though he suffered some residue of the fevers. The great, age-worn stones of the barbican seemed to wheel about him. If only, he thought madly, Triamis had built these walls with bread!

>>17067215
>Stupefied, Conphas stared at the Scylvendi, his fingers kneading his pommel. He’d been roundly defeated. And so swiftly . . .

>“Time for another scar on your arms!” someone cried, and laughter boomed through the amphitheatre. Cnaiür graced the assembled Inrithi with a rare fierce grin.

>>17067215
Just reread Proyas' death scene. Peak Bakker. It perfectly sums up the tragic, nihilistic irony at the heart of his writing.


The Skeptic-King of Conriya suffocates. Light and image dissolve. His lungs cramp. A burning flashes from his bones. His flailing astonishes him, for he had counted his body dead.
But then the animal within never ceases battling, never quite abandons hope … Faith.
No soul is so fanatic as the darkness that comes before.
This is the lesson we each take to our grave—and to hell.

>>17061141
Space Viking, a Federation novel - H. Beam Piper (1962)

The novel is what it would seem like it's about, but maybe not as much as you'd think. It begins with the protagonist suffering a great loss and swearing lifelong vengeance on his nemesis who has fled into the hinterlands of the galaxy. Centuries ago the galactic government collapsed and with it the civilizations of most planets, which having lost their technological knowledge, have fallen into neobarbarism. Without protection from a greater power, these worlds are mercilessly raided and plundered by SPACE VIKINGS, which the protagonist has now become. It's a bloody and rapacious way to live.
It's not quite the kind of space opera that I'd prefer, but it works well enough. Eventually the protagonist tires of the life and changes his ways to civilization building, forming what will be in many years hence the core of the next, but not last, galactic government.
Rating: 3.5/5

>>17067426
I don't get it, is it saying his soul/will to is weaker than the primal animal instinct to fight even when it's hopeless?

People like to bag things, particularly when they don't like those things. The person who walks their dog without a baggie is the person who leaves his or her dog's shit on the lawn.

People like to bag things because bags have handles, and handles make complicated things easy to handle. Bags are handy-dandy tools.

Grimdark is a bag. All genres are bags.

The question of what can be put into this bag is simply a question of interpretative juice. Anything can be called 'grimdark,' even dear old Gramma, given enough interpretation. If we don't put Gramma in the bag, it's because we don't want to get dog shit on her, not because dog shit has to be in there, but because it takes less interpretative juice to put dog shit in there, and so there's a chance we'll be packing Gramma with said feces.

Anyone who argues the 'essence' of grimdark has confused a handy-dandy tool for divine revelation, and should seek counselling immediately.

Anyone who argues that the term 'grimdark' can't be a bag because the term was originally used for X, should, on the pain of inconsistency, cease using all terms which do not possess their original meaning. Silence, as they say, is golden.

Anyone who argues that the contents most easily placed in the grimdark bag are the wrong contents because they are 'stale' should be congratulated for so scrupulously checking the best-before dates. Where might these be found again?

Anyone who argues that the contents most easily placed in the grimdark bag are the wrong contents because they are 'immoral' should be congratulated for standing closer to God. Where does she stand again?

Anyone who argues that the contents most easily placed in the grimdark bag are the wrong contents because they 'distort history' should be congratulated for growing up comfy, safe, and warm, surrounded by many soulful encouragements and benevolent sentiments, then sent to a Syrian refugee camp.

Grimdark is a bag, one most easily filled by frightening and troubling things. It gives us a way to handle them.

I appreciate that some people don't like frightening and troubling things, but please... Don't blame the bag.

t. Bakker in response to

>Last year some of gritty fantasy's authors dialled down the grit in their new releases. Has "grimdark" had its day in the sun, and if so, what might come after? Has "peak grit" been reached? Or is it a broadening and shift in how people "do grit". What does it all portend? Should I buy shares in Apple? Sell Shell? Tell me the answers goddamnit!

based or cringe?

>>17067752
I've improved your post. You're welcome.

Everyone enjoys bagging things, especially when they don't like those things.
Bags have handles which make complicated things easy to handle.
Grimdark is a bag, as are all genres.
What ought to be put into this bag is a matter of interpretation.

Anyone who argues that...
...there is an 'essence' of grimdark has confused a tool for revelation.
...grimdark can't be a bag because the term was used for X, should cease using terms that don't possess their original meaning.
...they are 'stale' should be congratulated for so scrupulously checking the best-before dates. Where might these be found again?
...they are 'immoral' should be congratulated for standing closer to God. Where does one stand again?
...they 'distort history' should be congratulated for growing up comfy, safe, and warm, then sent to a Syrian refugee camp.

Grimdark is filled by frightening and troubling things.
Some don't like frightening and troubling things, but don't blame the bag.

>>17066435
Nobody has done one in a while. Hardly anybody was reading the books, and the few people who were reading would get yelled at for discussing it. The autist running it only wanted you to discuss the book in the last thread of the month instead of talking about it as you read. It was a disaster and it's better off dead.

>>17067997
>>17066435
It never ended, it just isn't done in the thread any longer.

>>17068056
If it isn't in the thread then it is as good as over.

>>17068082
It's been far more active outside than the thread than it ever was in it. Having discussion in a general just doesn't work. Maybe if they were separate threads, but then the problem would be the post rate. The reason why it was always contained to a single thread at the end of the month was so that people didn't have to look at multiple threads, they knew when it'd be, or having a marking to look at the archive. The main problem is always lack of participation though.

>>17067742
He’s saying even when you want to give up and die, your animal brain still wants to live.

>>17066748
I thought it was cool. Ending fell a bit flat.

>>17066748
>>17068435
I've also read Gulliver's travels, which was also cool and actually had stakes, even though the protagonist is kind of dull and none of the other characters had much personality. The cultures themselves feel like personalities, though.

>>17068378
>The main problem is always lack of participation though.
I stopped participating because I was actively told not to discuss the book. If you want one thread to be THE discussion thread that's fine, but constantly giving me shit for talking about the book as I read it was obnoxious. At the end of the day the book club was run poorly and a faggot was running it.

>>17065611
i'm not sure shapeshifting rape hands count as dick girls

Anybody know some books by authors who appreciate thighs?

>>17068468
There isn't any way to run it that would be acceptable to everyone.

>>17068634
>Not canceling the petrifaction only on her feet
Gay

What are some things that make you instantly drop the book?
>mythological/latin names used in far future settings for no real reason other than to sound pretentious
>protagonist is younger than 30

>>17068712
>>protagonist is younger than 30
This is preferable. I don't like reading about decrepit old people.

>>17064418
Ada Palmer, Greg Egan, Peter Watts, off the top of my head. There are authors who are still carrying the torch into the darkness, but you won't find them getting talked about much here. Try finding a real life sff enthusiast group.

did the mf just summon a tulpa

>>17068776
Are Three-Body books worth reading if I consider chinks soulless bugs incapable of feeling anything?

>>17066478

I really don't get why people drool so much about The Expanse being super realistic. By my count the setting, in order to be workable, needs a) the magic Epstein drives to hand wave most of the actual problems with rocketry b) magic drugs to make high gee maneuvers in a spaceship using said magic drives not kill you c) magic life support systems to make massive deep space colonies like the ones in the Belt possible in any way, which manage to both exist AND be so shitty that the Belters need to worry about their water supply despite mining fucking asteroids. That, and d) everyone in the setting being retarded enough to use said massive deep space colonies for fucking asteroid mining instead of doing it with unmanned probes and maybe a small crew. There's e) that "stealth ships" and sneaking up on space work at all which is arguably the laziest one since it's there purely for narrative convenience. I'm also pretty sure the way Earth is depicted makes no economic sense and that just 200 years to even partially terraform Mars is off by orders of magnitude. And apparently they have all that tech for terraforming and life support in space but they can't fix Earth with a snap of the fingers

And then it's basically just a normal space opera, but duller

>>17068893
When they say 'realistic', they mean 'women are boring and men are sexless'.

is chinkshit good for you?

>>17068819
they're okay so far, very cinematic a lot of the characters are cold.

>>17067752
Grimderp failed by not focusing more on Horror and instead went for subversion and shock-value.

>>17068712
>author is trying WAY too hard to let you know his book is super bad ass
>see: The Grey Bastards
The writer cusses IN THE DEDICATION PAGE before the story even starts and it only gets worse from there. I'm all for gritty fantasy, but shit like this reads almost like a parody.

>>17067940
What confuses me is that Bakker apparently thinks grimdark is a genre. I get that he tries to cover it with
>...grimdark can't be a bag because the term was used for X, should cease using terms that don't possess their original meaning.
But okay, linguistic drift exists. That doesn't mean grimdark by itself tells me anything about a piece of media, whether that's plot or tone. I can in theory have a very happy romance book set in a 40k paradise world, yet accurately call the setting in the background grimdark. If I let enough information come in through the cracks, it doesn't even need to be a technicality. I can have a grimdark buddy cop movie (Dredd was arguably this), I can definitely have a grimdark comedy (early 40k was often satirical and cheesy in a metal-album-cover way and the Ciaphas Cain books exist), a grimdark Super Robot mecha anime (Evangelion), definitely a grimdark over-the-top macho military scifi story since that's most BL stuff etc. Grimdark if you disassociate it from 40k tells me nothing except that the setting is "grim" and "dark" for some definition of "grim" and "dark". Settings that are both grim and dark by most definitions are not usually called grimdark. I can say the latter third of Accelerando is grimdark because humanity is reduced to essentially a pest living off the scraps of a posthuman civilization and the Great Filter turns out to not only exist but to have taken out multiple other similar posthuman civilizations in the past, but if I did that I would be rightfully called a dumbass because that's not actually what people mean by grimdark

I mean, it's not like saying your book is a mystery, a thriller, a period piece, a character study etc. All those labels would tell you very important things about how to approach a book even before picking it up. Getting this worked up about "grimdark" is making a mountain out of a molehill

So I just finished The First Law trilogy. The ending was pretty anticlimactic. It feels like Glokta was the only character who got a proper conclusion. Especially egregious was how things ended with Jezal, Ferro, and Bayaz.
Was it ever explained what the "Bloody Nine" was? I'm guessing Logen was possessed by some type of spirit considering he had the rare ability to commune with them.

>>17069281
No, not really. There's a bit more about bloody nine in his origin story in sharp ends.

>>17069297
Huh. Usually I like that kind of obscurity, but for some reason I don't in this case.

>>17061141
https://www.deviantart.com/uthp/gallery/74409255/ant-farm

>>17068819
>if I consider chinks soulless bugs incapable of feeling anything
that was exactly the impression I got from every single character after reading half of 3bp. soulless, poorly translated bug drivel

>>17069281
I actually really liked what happened with jezal and bayaz

>>17062275
At the turn of the nineteenth to twentieth century there was some attempt at a specifically Jewish fantasy literature and art, it was a kind of byproduct of haskalah and zionism. Of course it borrowed heavily.

>>17068414
>>17067742
>>17067426
I think this is why for Bakker, every soul goes to Hell. The soul isn’t the angel of our better nature— it is a thrashing, animal, desperate thing, encompassed on all sides by the darkness of unknowing. Proyas was motivated by Faith his whole life, a faith for which he would gladly commit atrocity. Even when he accepts physical death, the animal called faith still clings on. Delicious soulfood for the hungering Gods.

>>17069454
Why's that?

>>17061580
Yeah, that was one of the three things I was unhappy about that was removed from the movies. The tom bombadil, the hands of a king are the hands of a healer, and the scourge of the shire all got left out.

>>17063202
I haven't, tell me about it anon.

>>17061141
Hello, does anyone know some fantasy books set in the fantasized age of discovery or just the age of discovery in general, or do I need to write it myself?

>>17065591
>Idk know how to spoiler
Lurk for at least two years before posting.

Right lads, I don't really read fantasy, and I only bought this because of the funny Dickensian names and because the prose is meant to be good. Hopefully without spoiling too much, does anyone fancy giving me an outline of what this is all about? I know it's set in a big old castle and the titular character is basically just an infant throughout the whole things, but that's it, that's all I know.

>>17070238
You bought the book, just open it and read it instead of posting here you fuck.

>>17062375
Animorphs

>>17070263
I'm reading something else right now you plonker

Alright I just finished Unsouled, give me another cultivation chinkshit novel

>>17070605
Soulsmith

>>17061179
I'll take the bait. Why is he a meme author?

>>17070744
I don't want to continue the series

Just about finished with my reread of the underland chronicles. The first book was kind of rocky, but the rest of it was fantastic. It didn't even end badly

I need to become a real author so I can deliver something this good

Why is fantasy always about saving the world or having some epic war for all creation? This problem doesn't exist for science fiction where monumental stories are well balanced by personal adventures, small scale conflicts, character studies etc. But I'm literally not aware of a single fantasy book that isn't ramping the stakes as high as they can get. Why isn't there a fantasy Ulysses about a day in life of a cucked minotaur or something?

Sanderson really needs a new editor. I’ve read 700 pages of filer and only now are things actually unfolding.

I read this book close to 10 years ago and still think about it sometimes.
What a good book. Damn.

>>17070898
Becuase you only look at the most popular stuff and you're bad at finding stuff.

>>17070802
Desolate Era

>>17070955
I don't think it's just his editor's fault. He's fallen into the trap of expectation. People want these doorstoppers, and Sanderson has to shit out enough words to get there.

do you guys think Sandersama reads as many pages as he writes?

>>17071146
yes because he most definitely rereads his own shit while editing

>>17066475
I hated the protagonist too much to enjoy Gateway. I haven't found a Pohl novel that wasn't full of fear and loathing.
I think Blindsight turned out great by accident rather than authorial intent. Watts' other work is mediocre.
Ringworld is a cute novel for kids.

>>17071163
how many pages do you think he reads of stuff that's not his?

I'm gonna write my own wuxia with INCEST, you'll all see!!

>>17068712
You'll never know if the use of classical names is pretentious or not if you drop it instantly

>>17071218
The only books where it's not pretentious i.e. relates directly to the plot, are Ilium and Olympos

>>17071009
Epic is inherent to the fantasy genre though. If youre making something small in scope you might as well have it set in the real world.

>>17071179
Watts has the issue that he constantly trips over himself in order to make his novels believable, nearly excises everything cool about the initial concept, and while he's in the middle of the tenth useless infodump he pulls some "hurr the vampires evolved to eat humans and are able to hibernate for decades because protocadherin deficiency" tier bullshit anyway. Blindsight is good enough in spite of that that it doesn't matter, Rifters doesn't hit that stage until the sequel, and the biggest victim is probably the Sunflower stuff where he has a bizarre mishmash of impossible supertech (the nanotech crops, Chimp's londsdaleite backups, the reactionless drive, artificial wormholes, suspended animation for literal millenia, the explicitly physics-breaking transhumans/aliens) and strict realism (in spite of all that tech they still need to stick their bullshit reactionless drive into an asteroid, and the entire reason for the human crew being there is kind of nonsensical and convoluted)

>>17071260
Did you drop BOTNS on the first page?

>>17071320
not that anon but yes
not permanently though, I just wasn't interested at the moment

>>17071320
>Gene Wolfe flexing his latin under a flimsy excuse of "lmao I cant translate this mystical world any other way duuuude"
Yeah totally valid reason not simply because Terminus sounds cooler than Finisher.

>>17071369
Especially since theres no reason for latin to exist in that world. Garbage.

Octopi do not have any bones with the exception of their beaks. So if you are responsible and depraved enough to be literally the life support of your 8 limbed friend, you can debeak it like how you’d declaw a cat and then push your member into its feed chute.

You can then let it subsist on your baby batter.

The Octopus is smart. Very smart. It will learn that without its beak, it cannot feed on anything else but your human seed that has to be milked from you.

Every morning, you will feel your clothes slide off and a damp weight on your lower half.

The sensation creeps up on your body until most of the jiggly mass has enveloped the entire length. It will start pumping as fast as it can for it is hungry.

The animal gyrates its empty stomach and the folds of its brain rubbing on your glands, begging for nutrition.

You climax and give the marine creature’s breakfast. The pumping slows down but doesn’t stop to milk out the last few drops of its meal.

Looking into its yellow animal eyes, it looks back with a thousand-yard stare. This will be routine for all of its meals for the rest of its 3-5 years on this god forsaken planet.

>>17070898
Le Guin has a lot of short stories about ‘small’ stakes. Tehanu, Book IV of the Earthsea series, really embraces this idea of fantasy opposed to epics high heroics.

>>17071401

same desu

>>17071401
okay

>>17071409
I don't count short stories since they're conceptual by nature. Otherwise yeah Borges exists.

>>17065600
i found unsouled to be pretty boring, tired of the mary sue, are there any actually good cultivation series?

>>17071401
and people wonder why god fucked off of this planet a long time ago

>>17071397
>Especially since theres no reason for latin to exist in that world. Garbage.
Urth is literally Earth a few million years in the future. Terminus Est was explicitly held by the Torturers, who are heavily implied to have once been a Catholic monastic order. The framing device for the series is that it's an apparently very freewheeling translation of Severian's journals by Wolfe, rather than his creation wholesale. Even beyond that, whether characters get their name from a saint/latin sources in general or from another mythology, particularly greek, always tells you at least one very important piece of information about them.

>>17064698
Your sister

>>17071542
Also, this is all stuff you should know if you finished the first book and remotely paid attention

>>17071058
I’d much rather have more view points and main characters in such a large book. It’s tiresome the way he is focusing only on the same 5 people.

>>17071542
>whether characters get their name from a saint/latin sources in general or from another mythology, particularly greek, always tells you at least one very important piece of information about them.
You know, I always hated that. In fantasy or not. Names should just be accidental just like they are in real life unless there's a narrative-related reason for them to be a meaningful name, or at worst chosen for aesthetic purposes, obviously nobody wants a villian named Larry. Literature is an artistic medium, sure, and the rules of reality can be bent to serve a specific goal, but it doesn't mean you should cram meaning into everything starting with names. It's cheesy and dumb, you don't get a smartboi cookie for naming your character after some biblical fag who did similar things for le reference.

>>17071623
BotNS does kind of have a justification. The series is very much aware of its own medium. It's actually meant to be reread, and Wolfe leans on the fourth wall pretty often. If you don't have that in mind while reading you're prone to miss a lot of stuff, namely the jokes

>>17068487
That’s like... your opinion man

>>17071671
Sounds like it's a mess desu. Not something a professional writer would be proud of.

>With the briefest of farewells they marched to the village of the lizard folk, where they slaughtered the males, filed the teeth of the females, dressed them in garments of reeds, and installed themselves as lords of the village.

>>17071725
Have you read it?

>>17071725
>meta-narrative justification for artistic license is "a mess"

>>17071756
Is it not fair to call it a mess?

>>17070898
There's plenty of smaller scale fantasy adventures with Terry Pratchett and Glen Cook.

And Jack Vance's Dying Earth is beyond saving. People are just making the best of their time left.

>>17071774
BotNS is absolutely not a mess.

>>17071781
>time travel
>fourth wall breaking
>disjointed

>it's not a mess though
Is this one of those emperors new clothes type of situations?

>>17071029
>check this out
>'it's a series, oh looks like a few books, how many'
>find a compendium
>desolate era books 1-45
>FORTY FIVE
jesus christ what the fuck.
is this actually worth giving a shit about, at all? how many goddamn pages is this? how much story could it possibly contain?

>>17071837
it is very complex but intricately woven, has excellent prose, if i had to describe it in a negative way i might use the word dense, but i'd never call it a mess.

>>17071284
Why was Freeze-Frame on a complete quantifiable level of quality higher than the other entries in its series?

>>17071878
You could start with Coiling Dragon first but I found Desolate Era to be better.
There's A Thousand Li but it's meh.

>>17071837
Maybe Bransan Danderman is more your speed

>>17070978
I need to start reading the old dudes

>>17067752
Ok well this just makes me not want to read Bakker after I thought I should try him

>>17072107
>judging the author and not the work

> combat art
> autonomous drones
> continent-spanning fungal brain
Highly recommended.

>>17072107
Don’t mind Scotty, he’s just a big-brain autist, the kind who gets dense multi-paragraph shitpost wars in Wittgenstein threads on a Saturday night. Doesn’t change the fact that PoN/TAE is a work of art.

>>17070978
clifford d simak is severely underrated, city and way station are exceptionally good sci-fi.

>>17072147
QRD? Never read him

>>17072059
Picture related is my favourite science fiction book of all time.

>>17072151
he's an old sci-fi writer, wrote a long time ago, he was ahead of his time in a jules verne kind of way but has a different style. city and way station are both good places to start if you liked hg wells time machine or any of the verne novels.

Can anyone who's read this one recommend something similarly comfy?

>>17068819
It will not change your opinion. But there are very, very cool concepts. I would only recommend it if you have previously enjoyed books with great concepts/tech/events but shitty flat characters.

>>17068893
Creating some form of propulsion similar to an Epstein drive is a lot more feasible within the next couple centuries than making a warp drive that allows for close to light speed or FTL. So it's relatively realistic, which is why people call it that.

> magic drugs to make high gee maneuvers in a spaceship using said magic drives not kill you c) magic life support systems to make massive deep space colonies like the ones in the Belt possible in any way
These are both totally feasible tech advances. It's the future mang. neither are impossible by the laws of physics

> There's e) that "stealth ships" and sneaking up on space work at all which is arguably the laziest one since it's there purely for narrative convenience.
How is that not realistic? Do you have any idea how hard it is to see shit in space?

> I'm also pretty sure the way Earth is depicted makes no economic sense
Someone isn't a member of the Yang Gang

> and that just 200 years to even partially terraform Mars is off by orders of magnitude.
Probably.

> And apparently they have all that tech for terraforming and life support in space but they can't fix Earth with a snap of the fingers
Like you mentioned just before this, they've been terraforming Mars for centuries and it's not even close to done. They aren't even trying to terraform anywhere else, they just live in domes or underground.

TLDR It's realistic af for people used to Star Wars and Star Trek as popular scifi. Hard scifi is not popular usually, the Expanse is the exception to the rule which is part of why it rocks, beyond just being a great series.

>>17072205
That's on my tbr but isn't it kinda glum and wild with her being an outcast and the tone gets psychedelic? Not strictly sff but Hild by Nicola Griffith also has a heroine making her place in the world. Also, The Night Circus about a woman coming into her magic powers.

>>17072153
Cool I'll check it out.

>>17072310
I didn't find it glum at all, though there's some fairly dark matter in it. It describes a post-collapse semi-technological society in which free love predominates and most characters are presented as deeply caring and compassionate. It includes a cautionary story about drug use as a core plot element, and some moralizing about sex education. Overall very hopeful and very wholesome, and not too slow. I think it'd be a good book to recommend to a teenage girl interested in science fiction and medicine.

>>17071878
Wuxia is often published as webnovels. Since writers have to appease the algorithm they publish chapter daily. Do this long enough and your story will be twice as long as the Wheel of Time.

>>17071272
You are genuinely stupid. Truly, truly stupid.

>>17070898
Because all you read is epic fantasy, retard.

>>17066252
keking at the premise for this, thanks for the funny read anon

>>17064922
>look for pic related on libgen
>find nothing
>find it on amazon and see the price
>mfw

incest

>>17064922
>joystick is a smiling dick

>>17071369
terminus means border, limit

is r.f kuang any good

>>17071745
based Vance

>>17061141
>Goodreads removed their developer API and I've come here to say that I'M ANGRY
was going to write a tool using it. now I'm glad I got drunk instead

>>17073170
The Poppy War (The Poppy War, #1) - R.F. Kuang
5 /sffg/ ratings
5 stars: 1
4 stars: 1
3 stars: 3

I can beat everyone itt

just finished Rhythm of War. verdict :

>way longer than it needed to be, like usual
>nothing bad happens to anyone except teft
>navani's entire ark was fucking stupid except for the raboniel parts (legitimately a good anti-villain)
>venli/eshonai flashbacks added nothing of value to the story
>a toddler could have predicted how the lasting integrity ark was going to end
>kaladin's super saiyan 4 moment was underwhelming
>shallan is still a character

overall, just another formulaic "inflate the balloon then burst it" story by sanderson. markedly worse than oathbringer, which was the best of the series by far but not great

basically reading for completion at this point. might not bother with the next installment

/sffg/, I love the intricate and clever ideas behind discworld but I loathe Terry's prose and plot progression so much that I can't enjoy it. Is there anything that will give me a good read?

>>17073319
Try listening to it. My mum can't stand reading Pratchett but she really enjoys the audiobooks narrated by Nigel Planer

If you're listening to an audio solely for the narrator's voice, then the book itself is irrelevant. That's like the people who say, "I'd listen to them read the phone book."

Books where the main enemy is monsters who eat people with graphic description. If there's a book that captures the paranoia of The Thing. The feeling of helplessness and grptesque horror in the scenes from AOT. When a character is about to be/being eaten.

>>17073348
The request for fetish material never ceases. This time for cannibalism.

>>17064698
Book of the New Sun

>>17073365
>This time for cannibalism.
It's called Vore

>>17073365
Now any horror I read I'm going to have to fight off the thought "someone faps to this".

>>17073466
People will fap to literally anything. It's just a matter of how common it is and whether you ever run across them.

>>17061141

>>17064922
>>17072711
Where can I find a copy of this?

>>17061141

>>17061179

Wolfe or Bakker, who's the better writer, which is the better series?

>>17073652
Are you for real?

>tfw giant, disgusting red wart on my finger that refuses to die no matter what remedies I use
Any body horror kino for these feels?

>>17073693
nightingale by alastair reynolds

>>17073698
I meant something good.

>>17073698
Wow you read that quickly.

200 pages is the optimal length because I can comfortably binge that shit in a day and be fetishposting the next

Need some recommendations for books to buy with Christmas money. Already getting Wolfe's Island of Doctor Death, Dhalgren, and Borges' Collected Fictions. Short story collections and one-off novels, if you please.

That feel when you pause a book and then think about it while watching movies and reading other books.

>>17074284
That's a stupid thing to do and you deserve that happening to you.

>>17071058
Yeah it definitely feels like there's a pattern in his book he's kinda forced to do now. Flashbacks aren't so bad usually (although the one in RoW are worthlesses), but now it's pretty much a given every SA book will end by at least one character swearing oaths and turning the tide of the climatic battle. About two third of the way through RoW I thought "oh cool, there's no Wit story this time, best not to abuse it". Literally the very next chapter I read was The Dog and the Dragon.

If he wants to write 400 000 words books, that's good for him, but after 4 books you can start seeing the crutches.

>>17071058
It definitely feels like he's writing these huge novels because people expect them to be huge and no other reason. His early books weren't this ridiculously massive. There's no reason for Stormlight Archive to be so self indulgently big.

Death came swirling down.

>>17071401
god i wish that were me

>>17074458
The Thread fell away, and Hell came rushing up.

>>17068819
>Are Three-Body books worth reading if I consider chinks soulless bugs incapable of feeling anything?
i think the same about burgers, but some still make good books.

Three-bodies is imo the best sci-fi series of the last decade.

>>17073318
I fucking hate the Navani chapters, they’re nothin more than info dumps.

>>17073348
prince of nothing

Is it worth reading the rest of Gibson's trilogy? I'm done with Neuromancer but I'd rather read Burning Chrome than buy the rest of the books.

How are Count Zero and Mona Lisa compared to Neuromancer?

>character's title is "Defiler of Princesses"
you can't make this shit up

>>17075064
Didn't read the sequels but Burning Chrome is great, arguably better than Neuromancer, so you should def check it out if you haven't

I'm %20 in Rhythm of war and seriously considering DNF'ing it and whole series. This is strange because I really liked first two books. What do you recommend fellow sanderfags? Is slog rewarding enough?