Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Yeah, my experience is that books that you are following come out and you get notified 4 or 5 days later. At the least.
I am technically following my own books and was notified almost a week later that it had come out. I have always found it rather odd, and perhaps reassuring, that even though it’s the same login for author/buyer, they can’t seem to put two and two together to realize that I really don’t need to buy my own books. Even though of course, I do so I get the full reader experience (or nightmare as the case was with the Kindle PW’s).
However, what is more annoying is they often forget that I have purchased a book and will continue to send me emails about it after I’ve bought it, read it, etc.
Hi,
I have signed with [url=http://www.tantor.com]Tantor Media[/url] for the audio books for Volume I and II. Volume III and later, with Tantor, depend on how good the sales of I and II are.
Tantor is an imprinted of Recorded Books, the largest independent audio book publisher. To get an idea of who/what all they publish visit the site link above and select categories and then whatever genre, e.g. Fantasy or Science Fiction you want.
One of their biggest Fantasy authors is L.E. Modesit Jr. Most all of his books appear to be with them. They also have Harry Turtledove as well as many other well known and independent authors.
The books will be available on Audible/Amazon and iTunes and several other channels, it will be more broadly available than if I had just done it through Audible alone.
The narrator for Volume I is [url=https://www.acx.com/narrator?p=A3E4CQHCVGZHOD]Stephen Bel Davies [/url] the link takes you to some of his Audible samples. We had a good call today and went over the pronunciation of various names and what characters should be like/sound like. Really pronouncing some of this is rather complicated, and it only gets worse as the books go on.
He hopes to have production of book 1 done by the end of the month, then some unknown magical post production time at Tantor and then a release….
He hasn’t gotten book 2 from them yet, so not sure how that will be scheduled.I have created a new audio book Forum for discussions.
T-A-G
Yeah, we specifically went over that one! [laugh]
If I decide to go the dark side, I might write a scene where Wylan and Fiernon (the two agents of Oorstemoth in book 1) have a discussion about serving warrants in the Mogradin Association against the Modgriensofarthgonosefren.
Actually, just explaining the proper way to say Oorstemoth is also surprisingly tricky.
Well, serious metaphysical work is overstating it.
What I mean by that is that it explores, in more depth, the logic of “the devil” and the inherent contradictions in popular belief. If he is there to punish the wicked, then why does he try to corrupt people and make them wicked. It seems to me, if he’s encouraging rebellion against god in mortals, why would he punish them for doing exactly what he asked them to do? Etc Etc there are lots of confusing points to answer. There are also key points to answer about immortality, end games, the nature of heaven and hell. And in that book, I tell them from a Christian centric mythology rather than a pagan one, like DoA.
[quote=Iume;6569]About a decade ago Baen offered CD bound in copies of their hardback books. You buy the hardback and the CD contains a collection of FREE, COMPLETE novels — often related to the author whose book you bought.
Also, Baen encouraged people to distribute the CD’s. Not the individual books mind you, but the entire CD or ISO was free to distribute.
I mention this because at several points David Weber released books and his hardbacks had the entire Honorverse collection to to that point.
You can still grab the ISO at http://ebooks.thefifthimperium.com/ with Baen’s permission. Just don’t redistribute individual books after you download the ISO.[/quote]
Yes, someone (maybe it was you) mentioned this on my Amazon Forums and I looked it up, they were very cutting edge on the e-book front. Great deal! And actually now, a better deal since there are devices to read them (taken off the CD) much easier. Sure, I had my Cassiopeia E-125 around that time, but while nice enough, still not ideal for book reading.
I should also note that [url=http://www.baen.com/catalog/category/view/s/monthly-baen-bundles/id/1999]Baen now has these bundles of upcoming book[/url]s.
You can buy the bundles starting about 3 months before publication for $18 with about 6 books per bundle. The first month you get 1/2 of each book, second month you get 3/4 of each book and last month/release date you get full book (However, you have to buy in advance and can’t buy afterward)
Books are DRM free and can be used on any device.
They also sell/publish ARCs
[quote=Christopher Cope;6554]Wow, where are the classics of fantasy?
Chronicles of the Black Company – Glenn Cook
Chronicles of Thomas Covenant – Stephen Donaldson
Elric, Corum, Hawkmoon series – Michael Moorcock
Chronicles of Amber – Roger Zelazny
Belgariad – David Eddings
Riftwar saga – Raymond E. Feist
Fafhrd and Grey Mouser – Fritz Leiber
Sword of Truth – Terry Goodkind (This is a love or hate series, latter for me, but is indelibly part of the fantasy landscape)Other notable series
Tale of Malazan book of the Fallen – Steven Erikson
Blood Song – Anthony Ryan
Jhereg – Steven Brust[/quote]Yep, all very very classic. Loved them all. But don’t forget Zelazny’s Chronicles of Amber, probably the best multiversal novels not written by Michael Moorcock.
[quote=GameGraphix;6555][quote=Christopher Cope;6554]Wow, where are the classics of fantasy?
I enjoyed the Riftwar saga by Raymon E. Feist and the subsequent spin-off series, and used to buy each new book (many times in Hardcover) when released – until he started to kill off my favorite characters from the first books – I gave up on the books when he killed off Jimmy the Hand – I don’t think I’ve even gone back and re-read any of the previous books since that happened.
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant drove me nuts – just consistent whining from the MC about him being sick and not believing anything he saw.
[/quote]
[/quote]Ditto on Riftwar.
As far as Covenant: Loved the first 3, in part because TC was such a despicable hero. It was just very different, and in part because when the first three were first published they had this gold box on the back with a review of the books and it called it the “best in modern adult fantasy” and that enticed and frightened me at the bookstore. I looked at it time and time again before getting brave enough to read it. I was in Jr. High, and that word “adult fantasy” made me fear it was porn, and I was scared to death my parents would see that on the back and think I was reading something I shouldn’t be. This was probably 1979 when book 3 was published.
Now of course, other than the rape scene, I don’t recall much sex, but it really was not something suitable for younger audience in terms of overall themes.
I went into shock when the second trilogy started appearing because for some reason I thought the first three were “ancient history” and didn’t realize it had only been about a year between the first and third trilogy. So when I saw it in hardback, I flipped my mind and used every penny to buy it.
It took everything I had to get through the second trilogy. If TC was dark, Linden Avery was a black hole of miasma. It was like pulling teeth to read. I never did read the third quadrology which were written much later.
You know, I think I read that…a very long time ago…have to go digging through my physical books to see if I have it, but I think I would have gotten it from the library at my Jr. High.
Strangely, I have had trouble getting into LitRPG, despite the obvious similarities.
And my motto is: “If I have time to read, I have time to write.” So have not been reading much since I started pushing books out.
However, I did read [url=http://a.co/4YO3yvB]Dungeon Born (The Divine Dungeon #1) [/url] which is a seriously weird take on LitRPG.
In that, it’s NOT litRPG, except that all the characters “think” in RPG terms, literally, they sound exactly like the people sitting around a table or with laptops playing RPG’s as their characters, but using player terminology/thinking. It has a pretty cool essence system not that dissimilar to my animus and mana.
The main character is a newly born Dungeon (who was formerly a human killed by necromancers) It’s wacky and fun.
Now, I will take being from DOS, as long as you don’t tell me I’m from Primos. That was a seriously wacked out mainframe OS. Every time you made a mistake at the command line it dropped you to a lower privilege level restricting what you could do, until finally, all you could do was type “exit” a bunch of times to go back up.
However, that was a multiuser system, so it could multitask.
Will check those out, but won’t be for a while. I am trying to make headway on the three books I’m working on but I keep getting sidetracked by the end of the world…but hey that will be over shortly…and then I can get back to work, I hope, unless it doesn’t stop ending…
I can only speak from experience.
Caves, like Tom’s are dark to human eyes, but rocks and the ground tend to be a bit warmer than the air, and this provides infrared light that demons can see just fine by. Same is true in Doom, and now that it’s started, there is plenty of infrared light to see by, it was rather dark when we got there, which is why the D’Orcs had fires and torches and glowing rocks.
And now, the actual lighting system is back on/available.
The sky emits a broad spectrum of visible light that tints red and as far as I can tell is perpendicular to the ground acting pretty much like your sun (which comes in perpendicular given the distance)
If one assumes the Abyss is infinitely flat, than this light plane must be infinitely flat as well. In terms of distance vision, since all the light is perpendicular to the ground, then as you look to the distance, the light over that region would appear to be at an angle to you, much like when your sun is overhead and you look towards your horizon, however, while similar, it is different because there is no corresponding curvature. So it’s less pronounced.
Now, that being said, there are flashes of light from flames and plasma balls that also affect vision, or at least cause ones pupils to sometimes have to adjust. If the burst is close to you, it can sometimes temporarily blind you if you aren’t careful. This is a problem for newbies.
Yes, this has come up before and it does seem to be a problem in the way you are looking at it
–however—
I cannot repeat this enough. Demons of Astlan is a single book split into lots of parts. It has to be looked at in the whole, not in the parts. Taken book by book as you do here, you will not see the forest because of all the trees in the way.
I actually would consider the “book” Demons of Astlan to be a “coming of age” tale, not a quest per se. And while there are several people coming of age (at various ages) it is about Tom finding himself and eventually taking charge of his life.
So, you are eminently correct in your analysis. He’s very passive, and he has to be continually kicked in the butt to do anything. Which, I might add, is what you have to do to most teenagers and young adults.
Very few people really “get their act together” until they are forced to by circumstances. When they finally are out on their own, not in school and not living with their parents. And even then, the first few years “on the job” are passive until they get things figured out and understand what they want.
Tom starts the book near the end of his 16th year, about 2 earth months later, he turns 17 around the Oath Taking ceremony. One month later he has to rescue people from the Unlife and meet up with people who think he is screwing with them.
So, my argument is, he’s got all this crazy shit coming at him, and he’s barely had the chance to get his feet underneath himself, let alone to assert himself. However, I think you will see in book 4, he starts to assert himself, however, as in book 1, it is still under some false pretenses as he will be acting as Orcus. He needs to define who he is, resolve this phoenix cycle business and come to terms with his situation. And there will be a new adviser to help him/annoy him with exactly this. Someone with a more Zen like philosophy/perspective.
He’s basically going to be doing that through the rest of the books, the biggest “shocks” have now come, for the most part.
