Introduce Yourself!

[paulgoatallen]

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Kelly3 wrote:
Hello all, I'm slowly venturing into the SF genre though I have read a few series that have come to be some of my fave books. Anne Bishop and Laurell K Hamilton are two that i love to read and re-read. I just would like to know another series that I can delve into, I like the fantasy but nothing so far fetched I guess, if that even makes sense. I've wanted to read RA Salvatore and some other well known authors that have a good size series, but I just never know where to begin!! I've read LOTR and even took a class on it in college which I found utterly fasinating. Can anyone help me?!

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Kelly:

Toni is right about R.A. Salvatore's Drizzt Do'Urden novels – they are classic adventure fantasy. If you liked LOTR and enjoy "good sized" sagas, I'd suggest Moorcock's Elric novels, Salvatore's entire Drizzt sequence, Terry Brooks' Sword of Shannara, and Raymond E. Feist's Midkemia sequence. All of these are arguably some of the very best fantasy out there...

Paul 

[Crystalwizard]

An introl post. Okay, let's see. I've been reading sci-fi since my mom introduced me to it in the early 70's. The first book I remember reading was A for Andromeda. That turned into just about everything by Bradbury mingled with stuff by Clarke, Asimov and whatever other author looked interesting on the library shelves.

I didn't start reading fantasy till my senior year of highschool however. But one day in the school store when trying to buy a pencil I spotted a copy of the Hobbit and my sci-fi addiction turned into a sci-fi/fantasy addiction.

Message Edited by Crystalwizard on 11-10-2008 09:11 PM

[Kelly3]

Thanks Toni for the suggestions! I will look into those titles for sure!

Kelly

[Kelly3]

And thank you Paul as well! I'm so excited to go check out these books! I love having new books to look forward to!

Kelly

[Stargate_Libra…]

My name is Deb; I'm 56, and a librarian with the USAF (hence my adoration of SG-1 and friends).  I've always loved Sci-Fi & Fantasy, but I just don't seem to have much time to read anymore, but I love to hear what eveyone else is reading! I have a fearless beagle (Sam) and I'm taking riding lessons.       

[Nelsmom]

Welcome Deb,

I wasn't in the Air Force but I was Army.  My Father-Inlaw was retired Air Force.  Check out The Currently Reading Thread to find out what is going on.  I hope that you enjoy being with us.

Toni

[Stargate_Libra…]

Thanks!  I look forward to getting lots of great reading suggestions for our library & I'll definitely promote your discussion group and authors with our patrons.

[pagemaven]

Hi, all!

   I like this idea of self introduction. I'm a long-time reader of all fiction, but science fiction and fantasy are my first loves. There seems to be a lot of stuff out there that kind of blurs the lines between genres, and I think that's just fine, but it does make a little hard to catagorize yourself as a reader. F. Paul Wilson is a favorite of mine,  (horror/fanatsy?) so is Diana Gabaldon -(romantic/historic/fantasy?) I like Terry Brooks" Genesis of Shannara series, but I'm a real "hardware" fan also.

    Anyway,   I'm happy to find this board, lots of like-minded people, and a great way to find new writers.

[paulgoatallen]

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pagemaven wrote:

Hi, all!

   I like this idea of self introduction. I'm a long-time reader of all fiction, but science fiction and fantasy are my first loves. There seems to be a lot of stuff out there that kind of blurs the lines between genres, and I think that's just fine, but it does make a little hard to catagorize yourself as a reader. F. Paul Wilson is a favorite of mine,  (horror/fanatsy?) so is Diana Gabaldon -(romantic/historic/fantasy?) I like Terry Brooks" Genesis of Shannara series, but I'm a real "hardware" fan also.

    Anyway,   I'm happy to find this board, lots of like-minded people, and a great way to find new writers.

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pagemaven:

F. Paul Wilson, Diana Gabaldon and Terry Brooks? That is an impressive range right there! Wow – I've read Wilson and Brooks extensively but no Gabaldon. When I managed bookstores, she was always a huge bestseller... I think (at the time) the Romance tag dissuaded me from reading her...

Paul 

[dhaupt]

Hi Paul,

while it's true that Diane Gabaldon's novels are love stories, I don't know that they really belong strictly in the romance genre, they involve a lot of violence and a genuine feeling (not that I would know personally) of the era that they are written about including torture and general cruelty. So if you guys out there really enjoy a thrill a minute read linked by an occasional love scene  told by a world class storyteller by all means widen your horizons.

[pagemaven]

Hi, Paul, thanks for the welcome.

   First I feel compelled to defend Gabaldon. I mentioned her because of the time-travel aspect of the Outlander books. Dealing as they do with the time of the Scottish settlement of the "colonies" there is a certain amount of rather rough behavior, but I really wouldn't use the word "torture"  in any but one instance that I can think of. There is certainly not a pathological dwelling on the subject, especially compared to lot of what we are exposed to lately.

   After re-reading my first post, I realized that there were a lot of "favorites" that I had neglected; Jim Butcher, S.D. Stirling (the Dies The fire books) Dan Simmons, from Hyperion to Summer of Night and The Terror,  and one of my all time favorites, Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Robinson Stanley. I highly recommend it to any fan of alternative histories. I'm sure I'll think of lots more ( oh, yes, Eifelheim, but I don't recall the author right now.) I'm going to browse the threads now. More later.

[eugleenna]

Hi All,

I picked up my first fantasy book from my uncle's bookshelf when I was a teenager and I was hooked.  I read tons, but this is my favorite genre.  A military spouse we live in small town North Dakota (for now) and were ecstatic to see B&N open it's doors a few months ago.  I scour the store and the website looking for new fantasy and sci fi books to read.  Needless to say, I was thrilled to find this book club.  I've spent the last hour adding all the good books you've suggested to my wish list.

And maybe you guys can help me.  I read a book many many many years ago and I can't remember the name or who wrote it.  It was one of my early fantasy reads, so the description I can give you is fairly generic, but I'd appreciate any suggestions on what you think it might be.  It was about a group of friends from "our world" who find themselves taking on the characters from their D&D game.  I only remember one was a thief and one was a wizard.  The rest of the plot totally escapes me.

I missed the first two episodes of Legend of the Seeker.  Does anyone know where I can watch them?

[Nicodaemon]

Good Morning,

My name is Nicholas Jacobs, I'm 42 and I live in Fairbanks Alaska where I am an assistant manager for B&N.  Working in a bookstore has been a natural progression for me since I have been a voracious reader all my life.  It is still gratifying to me to see people walking through the store with an armload of books and kids who are excited to read, I just love that.  I think it also runs in the family, one grandfather was an author, and the other was a journalist, so publishing seems to be something that we gravitate to.

I was introduced to fantasy/sci-fi early.  At 10 I read Terry Brooks, the Sword of Shannara and was completely hooked. To this day I remember the page count because at the time it was the longest book I had ever read (726).   Then my brother and I got a gift certificate for the holidays and we bought every Heinlein book on the shelf.  Wow, they went farther back then  

Since then my tastes have broadened somewhat but I think that I will always love scifi.  Beside the classic sci-fi authors like Asimov, Pohl, Poul Anderson (who else remembers Ensign Flandry), Heinlein (of course), I also enjoy fantasy especially when the author has a good sense of humor like A. Lee Martinez or Jim Butcher. Also the first Thomas Covenant trilogy was one of my all time favorites, I read it several times.

Well that's a little about me thanks for making discussions like this possible.

Nicholas

[Stargate_Libra…]

I lived in Fairbanks too once upon a time (1978-1983) and worked at The Bookstore (it was an independent bookstore at the mall that was on Airport Way (???) across from Ffred Meyer -- I think).  That job was sooo much fun -- the owner of the store was Lynn Taylor 

[paulgoatallen]

Welcome Nicholas and eugleenna – glad to have you! Nicholas, I think you may be our first visitor here from Alaska, although there are a ton of anonymous lurkers here so for all I know there could be hundreds of Alaskans here.

And eugleenna, I know that I've read books before where the plot involves characters actually being thrust into an alternate D&D type realm. D&D nuanced novels were big for a while but I'm drawing a blank as to titles. Let me see what I can dig up...

Paul

Message Edited by paulgoatallen on 11-16-2008 07:47 PM

[TiggerBear]

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eugleenna wrote:

Hi All,

I picked up my first fantasy book from my uncle's bookshelf when I was a teenager and I was hooked.  I read tons, but this is my favorite genre.  A military spouse we live in small town North Dakota (for now) and were ecstatic to see B&N open it's doors a few months ago.  I scour the store and the website looking for new fantasy and sci fi books to read.  Needless to say, I was thrilled to find this book club.  I've spent the last hour adding all the good books you've suggested to my wish list.

And maybe you guys can help me.  I read a book many many many years ago and I can't remember the name or who wrote it.  It was one of my early fantasy reads, so the description I can give you is fairly generic, but I'd appreciate any suggestions on what you think it might be.  It was about a group of friends from "our world" who find themselves taking on the characters from their D&D game.  I only remember one was a thief and one was a wizard.  The rest of the plot totally escapes me.

I missed the first two episodes of Legend of the Seeker.  Does anyone know where I can watch them?

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I'm sorry. I need more details this is bringing up memorys of about 5 different series. So any other details might help me to help you.

[Shalafi]

Hello all! This is the first time I've posted something in one of these forums. I am a 22 year old student going to school to be  a high school english teacher. I wasn't introduced to the fantasy genre, believe it or not, until my freshman year in high school. Our teacher had us read The Hobbit instead of To Kill A Mockingbird. I couldn't put The Hobbit down! When I finished it, I went out and got The Lord of the Rings trilogy and flew through it. From MiddleEarth I found myself in Narnia. Now when I go into a bookstore I make a beeline for the fantasy books. Everytime I shop, I easily spend forty to sixty dollars on new books.

"Thats the thing with magic. You've got to know it's still here, all around us, or it just stays invisible to you"

[Jilseponie]

Hey!  I'm a total book junkie and I somehow ended up leaning heavily into Fantasy.  I think it might have started when I was very little & I would read my Dad's Asimov magazine.  (Is that still even published?)  So I started with Sci-fi, but as I've gotten older I find I enjoy Fantasy a bit more. 

Favorite Fantasy books & authors are Sharon Shinn (great for Romance readers), Kim Harrison, Robert Heinlin, The Ranger's Apprentice series (actually Young Reader), R.A. Salvatore's first Demon Trilogy (the second just wasn't as good), Dune (such a classic!), and Jane Yolen's Pit Dragon Trilogy.  Oh, and Susan Cooper's Seaward (that might be out of print). 

I do work seasonally at a B&N in Arizona and thank God for that!  It helps to support my habit and gives me a good look at new stuff.

Message Edited by Jilseponie on 11-22-2008 05:14 PM

[Nelsmom]

Welcome Jilseponie,

You are definitly in the right place with all of us other Book Junkies.  You might also like to check out the Paranormal Book Club.  Have a lot of people that do both to feed there habit.  I'm one of them.  Dive right in the water is great.

Toni

[paulgoatallen]

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Jilseponie wrote:

Hey! I'm a total book junkie and I somehow ended up leaning heavily into Fantasy. I think it might have started when I was very little & I would read my Dad's Asimov magazine. (Is that still even published?) So I started with Sci-fi, but as I've gotten older I find I enjoy Fantasy a bit more.

Favorite Fantasy books & authors are Sharon Shinn (great for Romance readers), Kim Harrison, Robert Heinlin, The Ranger's Apprentice series (actually Young Reader), R.A. Salvatore's first Demon Trilogy (the second just wasn't as good), Dune (such a classic!), and Jane Yolen's Pit Dragon Trilogy. Oh, and Susan Cooper's Seaward (that might be out of print).

I do work seasonally at a B&N in Arizona and thank God for that! It helps to support my habit and gives me a good look at new stuff.

Message Edited by Jilseponie on 11-22-2008 05:14 PM

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Glad to have you, Jilseponie. Yes, Asimov's is still being published – http://www.asimovs.com/ – Asimov's and other mags are something that initially got me interested in the genre as well. When I was a kid, my dad would read Omni and, man, that magazine was awesome! Does anyone remember Omni?

Paul

Message Edited by paulgoatallen on 11-22-2008 10:26 PM