Your standard Dragons. Well at least the conceit that people believe in dragons and as a hero you may be called upon to slay one.
And finished Antimatter Blues - made me a bit sad at times.
Is the movie worth a watch?
In part because of the Hero System game based on it, in part because it’s a free download from the Baen website, I read Monster Hunter International. It is at least a quick read, because it has very little else going for it.
Essentially a knock-off of Stalking the Night Fantastic / Bureau 13, M-Force and Ghostbusters, the Mary Sue main character, frequent undermining of any sense of peril, heavily telegraphed surprises, and deus ex machina—not to mention the expected level of gun fixation being turned up to intrusive levels—all make for a book that feels like a very adolescent effort, certainly not something that spawned a series.
2 out of 5: could do better, but I’m not going to read anything else by the author to find out if he did.
I read the Kate Daniels series (Ilona Andrews) and very much enjoyed it. Now I keep trying new urban fantasy series and getting turned off them about book 2-3, where the author has done the interesting world- and character-building and now it’s time for the great big battles of supernatural powers interrupted by moments of lust.
Have you tried the Rivers of London series? I’m enjoying it so far, although I’m only on book two so there’s definitely still time for it to go off the rails.
Kate Daniels is the bestest ![]()
I’ve successfully recommended it a few times to friends.
I also enjoyed their other series something something Emerald, Sapphire, very explicit covers…
At some point I really enjoyed the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire. But it got very long and unending and… I think for me it has overstayed it’s welcome. However, if you’ve never read it: it’s worth trying a few books. The audio is also worth mentioning as Mary Robinette Kowal quickly finds her footing. I think this is the first series she’s done and the first two books may be a bit on the ‘not quite there yet’ side but after that she’s amazing.
Seanan Mc Guire also has another UF series called Incryptid. It’s about a family of renegade cryptid hunters who have turned to protecting cryptids. The main character is a professional ballroom dancer ![]()
I loved the first Rivers of London book, though 2 was a fair old step down, quite liked 3, thought 4 was too obviously copied from a specific Doctor Who story, didn’t much like 5, and gave up after 6. Thanks for the recommendation, though!
Sorry @yashima I find Seanan unreadable. I just don’t get on with her writing at all.
I’ll jump in to say (as I probably have done before) that if you like Urban Fantasy along the lines of Rivers of London, Kate Griffin’s A Madness of Angels is fab.
I’ll save you the trouble. No.
I understand. taste and such ![]()
You are probably not her target audience. I liked the first 10 books of October Daye best .
Incryptid was one of those i read when i ran out of books
I remembered another series i enjoyed a few books of: Iron Druid something or other. it was fun i was just to busy at the time to finish reading it.
A few series I’ve enjoyed with “secret British government agency that deals with supernatural stuff” themes:
London Falling by Paul Cornell. Kind of a darker version of Rivers of London. I haven’t read the other two books in the series yet. (I’ve actually chatted to both Paul and Ben about the two series. Both being former Doctor Who writers, they obviously know each other and apparently joked about carving up London between them when they realised they’d both hit on the same concept accidentally).
The Rook by Daniel O’Malley. More on the comedic side and more superhuman abilities than supernatural. I loved the second book as well, but haven’t read the other two yet. Impressive at being set in Britain despite an Australian writer who studied in the US. Don’t bother with the TV adaptation.
The Clown Service by Guy Adams. Like a Bristish X-Files. Mundane agents investigating supernatural stuff. Probably my least favourite of those mentioned, but still very good.
Tchaikovsky is soooo prolific
I’m not familiar with those, but the Laundry Files series by Charles Stross falls under the same category. The I.T. geeks here might enjoy it particularly.
I would also recommend the Merchant Empire Series. It has been years however….
I need to read more Charlie Stross (again)
Light romantic fantasy, but with genuine emotion and the protagonists are grown-ups. An unexpected candidate for my book of the year.
Girdleness in fact gets one mention and Aaronovitch seems to hate Torry. Also he gets stuff about Aberdeen quite wrong.
He is, but I think he’s like Terry Pratchett, driven to write.
Being a euphemism for rammed full of books! ![]()
Ok. I think I’ve got it, but please PM which dr who story book 4 is.
You could have just said “Ka-Poel” ![]()