In the E-Reader Era, a Book a Year Is Slacking

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

I mean for me this is science fiction, the quintessence of it, and I don't think that you like the genre. The SF books that you might like I probably wouldn't consider SF.

Then you are wrong, science fiction is what I am primarily reading and what I like best. And I really like good ideas but now-a-days I require the ideas to be in a good book also. And it is not hard to find good science fiction that also are good books. Authors like China Meiville, Ian Banks, Geoff Ryman, and so on.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by orlok

Well I disagree. It is generally acknowledged that his best works are the early Alex Cross books, when he was putting them out at less than one a year on average.

Acknowledged by whom? I think that an author's worth should be decided by the fans.

Originally Posted by tompe

Then you are wrong, science fiction is what I am primarily reading and what I like best. And I really like good ideas but now-a-days I require the ideas to be in a good book also. And it is not hard to find good science fiction that also are good books. Authors like China Meiville, Ian Banks, Geoff Ryman, and so on.

This is my point: the first name that you thought of, China Meiville, doesn't consider his books science fiction.

Iain Banks and Geoff Ryman wrote other genres beside SF, and their SF books would contain elements of these other genres which you don't find in Asimov's work. Asimov wrote pure SF, and you don't like it.

[orlok]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

Acknowledged by whom? I think that an author's worth should be decided by the fans.

Of which I am (or was). Of which you are not.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by orlok

Of which I am (or was). Of which you are not.

Have you read his recent work?

[orlok]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

Have you read his recent work?

I've caught back up with the Alex Cross series, which is not of the standard of the earlier works (yes, in my opinion), and also read some collaborations. As of the last six months or so I have given up on him, though I have a number of titles that I may eventually get round to.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by orlok

I've caught back up with the Alex Cross series, which is not of the standard of the earlier works (yes, in my opinion), and also read some collaborations. As of the last six months or so I have given up on him, though I have a number of titles that I may eventually get round to.

What is lacking in his recent work?

[elcreative]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

Acknowledged by whom? I think that an author's worth should be decided by the fans.


This is my point: the first name that you thought of, China Meiville, doesn't consider his books science fiction.

But he does spend a lot of time at SF conventions talking about "his" Science Fiction though he often prefers Weird Fiction to describe his work...

Assuming you mean China Miéville of course, Mr Meiville may very well not write SF but then I've not found anything written by him anyway... and even Google directs you to Miéville when you search for the not so well known Meiville...

[ProfCrash]

What is good and what is lacking is always subjective. There are plenty of books that are deemed classics that I find to be boring or just plain bad.

I tend to find with series, no matter how quickly they are written, that the first two or three books will be good and then the quality lips. I found that with every series written by Orson Scott Card and Asimov. Jim butcher, in my opinion has done better. His Codex Alera was solid. If anything, the first book was the weakest. Dresden kept me entertained for the first 10 books and I read the others hoping that he would change his mind and wrap things up early. I won't be buying the new book. I would not have finished Wheel of Time if I had started it when it first came out. Starting it three years ago let me read at a reasonable rate, even the middle books which were repetitive.

I guess the book a year does not bother me dependent on the authors ability to actually achieve that goal. I enjoy series but don't like authors who do not stick to schedules. Set one that makes sense for your pace and style and be honest about it.

But just because I think Dresden should have ended three books ago does not mean that I am right because I am an all knowing whatever. It means Butcher has not developed the story in a way that makes me want to continue. I read the entire Foundation series and enjoyed it greatly. I think Asimov could have ended it sooner, the last books did not match the quality of the first books but I still enjoyed them.

To return to topic, I don't think an established author has to publish a book a year in the e- book era. I do think that an independent author trying to make money probably needs to publish more frequently in order to keep the attention of the folks who have read what they have published. I think that is because their audience is smaller and they don't have the marketing machine behind them reminding folks that there is a new book out there.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by elcreative

But he does spend a lot of time at SF conventions talking about "his" Science Fiction though he often prefers Weird Fiction to describe his work...

Exactly. And Embassytown is pure science fiction. But I can mention other authors like C. J. Cherry, Vernor Vinge, Ken MacLeod, Adam Roberts, Michael Flynn, Hannu Rajaniemi and so on.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by elcreative

But he does spend a lot of time at SF conventions talking about "his" Science Fiction though he often prefers Weird Fiction to describe his work...

Assuming you mean China Miéville of course, Mr Meiville may very well not write SF but then I've not found anything written by him anyway... and even Google directs you to Miéville when you search for the not so well known Meiville...

You could ask tompe, because I just copied the name the way he spelled it. I should have checked the name since I had noticed that tompe called "Iain Banks" "Ian Banks" but Google directed me to the right one, and I noticed the missing accent and didn't pay more attention than that.

Originally Posted by tompe

And Embassytown is pure science fiction.

I've read the preview on Amazon. There is no science in those 24 pages. Not even something as little as explaining why they would choose to count their lifetime in hours, possibly because it is completely retarded to do so.

[elcreative]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

You could ask tompe, because I just copied the name the way he spelled it. I should have checked the name since I had noticed that tompe called "Iain Banks" "Ian Banks" but Google directed me to the right one, and I noticed the missing accent and didn't pay more attention than that.


I've read the preview on Amazon. There is no science in those 24 pages. Not even something as little as explaining why they would choose to count their lifetime in hours, possibly because it is completely retarded to do so.

Errr... did you not also notice the I just saw a common typo and made a joke

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by elcreative

Errr... did you not also notice the I just saw a common typo and made a joke

You would have noticed it first in tompe's post.

[elcreative]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

You would have noticed it first in tompe's post.

And that means what??

The whole of my post was actually responding to your comment following tompe's where you said CM wasn't SF to which I made a point contradicting you and then a joke about the name typo as you'd continued to use it from tompe's post...

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

I've read the preview on Amazon. There is no science in those 24 pages. Not even something as little as explaining why they would choose to count their lifetime in hours, possibly because it is completely retarded to do so.

24 pages? That is way to little to see what a book is about. The book is rather pure idea based science fiction.

Also, how to count lifetime is only a convention and hour seems as good as any other way that you are used to. So I do not see why you think it is retarded.

(And yes, I am extremely bad at remembering the spelling of China's and Bank's other names).

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by tompe

24 pages? That is way to little to see what a book is about. The book is rather pure idea based science fiction.

Is there any scientific idea in that book?

Originally Posted by tompe

Also, how to count lifetime is only a convention and hour seems as good as any other way that you are used to. So I do not see why you think it is retarded.

No, it's not. Considering the lifespan of human life there is no logical reason to select something as short as an hour to measure it. Hours should only be used to measure the age of beings with lifespans of maximum a few days. We are almost 9000 hours older every Earth year. If you would change the unit of measure for the age of a person to something independent of units that are related to only one planet, it would make more sense to make a new unit based on a biological consideration, like the fact that the cells in out bodies are renewed every 7 years.

Then there is the fact that we cannot discard the year as a unit of measure, since the distances between stars and galaxies are best described by lightyears. Even if an Earth year would not be the standard, the alternative should be in the in the same order of magnitude and it would still be appropriate length of time to describe the age of a person.