Fantasy or Sci-fi author

[hildea]

Originally Posted by crossi

The Penrod and Desdemona series by Bujold starting with Penrod's Demon. They are all good and as they are only novella length inexpensive.

I love those novellas, but I'm not sure they are good for someone who's looking for simple English.

Originally Posted by The beginning of "Penric's Demon"

The morning light sloped across the meadows, breathing pale green into the interlaced branches of the woods beyond, picking out shy pink and white blossoms here and there among the new leaves. The spring air hung soft with promise. Penric’s mother, before she had gone off in the wagon with his sisters to oversee the final preparations, had turned her face to the cool blue sky and declared it a perfect day for a betrothal; surely the gods were smiling upon the House of Jurald at last! Penric had refrained from pointing out that the learned divines taught that the gods did not control the weather, and been rewarded for this filial forbearance with a sharp maternal injunction to hurry up, finish dressing, and follow! This was no time to be dragging his feet!

"interlaced", "filial forbearance", "maternal injunction" -- it's possible to understand the paragraph without understanding every single word, but it gets exhausting to read when too many of the words are unfamiliar. At least, that's what I found when trying to improve my German by reading novels.

[fathead]

John Scalzi has an easy, straightforward writing style which never gets in the way of the story.

Ditto, Adrian Tchaikovsky.

[Owl_]

Great guys! Many thanks

[Pajamaman]

Philip Jose Farmer - a private universe
Philip Jose Farmer - to your scattered bodies go.
Jack L Chalker - Midnight at the well of souls

John Christopher - The White Mountains (this is YA)

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by fathead

John Scalzi has an easy, straightforward writing style which never gets in the way of the story.

Ditto, Adrian Tchaikovsky.

I cannot say about Adrian Tchaikovsky, but I do agree with John Scalzi being a fairly easy read with good stories.

[ReadingManiac]

For someone learning English, the biggest problem in SFF would be weird names. English speakers have enough trouble with them. I can recommend:

The Time Shifters Chronicles by Shanna Lauffey

The Rebel of the Sands series by Alwyn Hamilton

The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks

[ReadingManiac]

Originally Posted by hildea

Like you, I've improved my English by reading a lot of science fiction and fantasy. That results in a weird vocabulary -- I realized once that I knew half a dozen synonyms for "wizard", but had no idea of the English word for that thing with wheels you push around when transporting a baby (The word is "stroller", someone told me.)

In USA it's stroller, in England it's pushchair.

An essential word to learn is 'Grok'. Any science fiction Fantasy fan needs to know that one. It's basically to fully understand something and comes from a classic science fiction novel, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by ReadingManiac

In USA it's stroller, in England it's pushchair.

"Pram" here.

[koboy]

it's still called a Pram in England if your old.

best wishes koboy

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by meeera

"Pram" here.

In the UK, it's also pram. It's not pushchair even if you are young.

[koboy]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

In the UK, it's also pram. It's not pushchair even if you are young.

wrong. pushchair is used by the younger generation they would (never) say pram. the older are more likely to say pram and will also say pushchair.

best wishes koboy

[curtw]

Originally Posted by koboy

wrong. pushchair is used by the younger generation they would (never) say pram. the older are more likely to say pram and will also say pushchair.

best wishes koboy

I like to push the PRAM A LOT!

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by koboy

wrong. pushchair is used by the younger generation they would (never) say pram. the older are more likely to say pram and will also say pushchair.

best wishes koboy

I asked my wife and she says it's pram. So given that my wife is from the UK, I'd go with her.

[koboy]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I asked my wife and she says it's pram. So given that my wife is from the UK, I'd go with her.

unlike your wife i'm still in England or as you call it the UK. no one under the age of 30 perhaps even 40 would call it a pram. a pram which is short for
(perambulator) was a completely different style from way before you or i were born. https://medium.com/@kidsemporium/his...r-5c3f1356784b scroll down near the bottom of the page the key part to read = Early 1980s in the UK Pushchair was the popularly used term. When the “Buggy” became the trend with a more compact design between its invention.

best wishes koboy

[WillAdams]

Susan Cooper's _The Dark is Rising_ pentalogy is a wonderful story, beautifully written in prose suited to young adults.