I'm not clicking the spoiler, but I will bump this up in the TBR pile upon seeing the positive reviews here. Before that though, I need to tackle Carrion Comfort. That one is third in que this month.
I'm not clicking the spoiler, but I will bump this up in the TBR pile upon seeing the positive reviews here. Before that though, I need to tackle Carrion Comfort. That one is third in que this month.
I only read Children of the Night so far, which I really liked... so I need to get me some more Simmons as well!!
Hey Michael,
ill trade you a signed limited sub press Hyperion and a signed advance reader proof of endymion both brand new mint unread copies for your UK saloms lot?
Hahaha, thanks for thinking of me Simon but I'd rather sell them - just like Tom I have a 'wedding fund' going on at the moment. But it's a great offer!!
Jean
I love The Terror. It's one of my all-time favorites. It is heartbreaking, and I too kept hoping for the same thing.
Only the gentle are ever really strong.
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I just ordered The Rise of Endymion. I'm finally ready to complete the Cantos. I'll miss it when it's done.
I'm close to 600 pages into Carrion Comfort and I'm sorry to say this, at this point I don't care what happens to anyone anymore, the "vampires" and Saul and Natalie. The action is super fast but there's just seems too much of it. Every time the story moves forward a little, he introduces a secondary character, the character dies, nothing gets accomplished, the story simply continues. Imagine you're watching Die Hard that's 8 hours long... how long do you think before you start start making popcorn runs without even pausing the movie because you know you can be gone for 5 minutes and not miss a thing? It's like this: protagonist gets involved, goes to NYC, DC, back home, dies. Other protagonists do the same but they also go to Israel (I'm still trying to understand why, everything was available in the US or even Austria), then to Mexico just to illegally return to the US. There are a few "vampires" too and they each have their stories, back stories, plots and sub-plots.
I make this seem like a bad book but it's really not. It's just too much of everything and it's the little sub-plots that dead end and all the inconsequential secondary characters that kill this book for me. It lacks the conscisness and meanness and leanneass of prose of Song of Kali, depth and eloquence of Hyperion Cantos (no popcorn runs for this one or you're lost, guaranteed), "literary merit" (or whatever) of Phases of Gravity, emotional connection to characters of Summer of Night.
Dan Simmons reads from his new novel The Fifth Heart:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtwbkl8NxG0
Watch the whole thing.
Thanks for this!
Author of The Road to the Dark Tower, Stephen King: A Complete Exploration of His Work, Life, and Influences and The Dark Tower Companion. Co-editor with Stephen King of the anthology Flight or Fright.
He starts around the 1hr mark. Best 1:10 I spent all day.
This is brilliant. The Ellison clip is hilarious and oh so typical. Excellent advice and insight for writers and aspiring writers.
Author of The Road to the Dark Tower, Stephen King: A Complete Exploration of His Work, Life, and Influences and The Dark Tower Companion. Co-editor with Stephen King of the anthology Flight or Fright.
This video made me look up more Ellison's clips on Youtube. I'm watching him on Dark Dreamers. What a mind!
He is a character.
Author of The Road to the Dark Tower, Stephen King: A Complete Exploration of His Work, Life, and Influences and The Dark Tower Companion. Co-editor with Stephen King of the anthology Flight or Fright.
His documentary was great
DREAMS WITH SHARP TEETH
Netflix has it.
I had the honor of presenting Dan with the Grand Master Award at the World Horror Convention in New Orleans last night. Alas, he was unable to attend, but sent me a thank you message to read to the gathering. My tribute to him and his career, "Dan Simmons: Grand Master of Everything," appears in the convention Souvenir Book.
Author of The Road to the Dark Tower, Stephen King: A Complete Exploration of His Work, Life, and Influences and The Dark Tower Companion. Co-editor with Stephen King of the anthology Flight or Fright.
Mr. Simmons does a Q & A on his forum:
http://forum.dansimmons.com/ubbthrea...149082&fpart=1
It's really cool he does stuff like that for his fans and readers.
Superb! Thank you so much!
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just finished The Crook Factory. This is my current Simmons reading order:
1. Hyperion Cantos (all four, no jump in point, you need to read them all)
2. Summer of Night & The Crook Factory (it's a tie)
3. Song of Kali
4. Muse of Fire
5. Children of the Night
6. Carrion Comfort
7. Phases of Gravity
8. Black Hills
Where is The Terror????
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Waiting for when I'm snowed in.
Give The Crook Factory a try. Nothing supernatural about it but damn, the ending killed me. The whole last chapter was heavy but the last line really did it.
I beg to differ a little:
1 - Hyperions Cantos (you can read them in pairs)
2 - Carrion Comfort - I love this book!
3 - Summer of Night - love coming of age stories.
4 - Ilium and Olympos and Muse of Fire - I love the Shakespearian connections
5 - Hollow Man - heart wrenching to read!
6 - The Joe Kurtz trilogy - as Hard Boiled as they come!
7 - Song of Kali - what an ending
8 - The Terror - loved it, but wished it were leaner
9 - Flashback - great idea, could be leaner
9 - Crook Factory - wonderful historical fiction
10 - Drood - good, but could be leaner as well
11 - Children of the Night - great read, but felt familiar
Need I go all the way down to Fires of Eden - UGH!
[QUOTE=DoctorZaius;798533] I don't think so. The story isn't finished after The Fall of Hyperion and without the prior knowledge of Salinas, the Shrike, Kassad, Techno-core etc., one probably wouldn't get the most out of last two books. I actually lent my boss the audio books and gave him Endymion instead of The Fall of Hyperion and he said, it felt familiar but a big piece of the puzzle was missing.
Let me clarify: you can read the first two and just stop. I feel the same about the revised version of The Gunslinger. It's self-contained enough. But I don't think you can start with Endymion. Too much happened in the first 1200 pages of the first half of the Cantos. I mean, when the Shrike makes the first appearance in Endymion when Anea appears at the tomb... I had gooseflesh all over. I don't think I'd have felt the same without knowing anything about it and what it can do, and what it does.