Moments when a piece of entertainment completely lost you.

[rasmuswagner]

I would buy the abridged Malazn version, i.e. "just the Bridgeburners and Karsa Orlong fucking shit up".

[Schleiermacher]

I think Malazahn completely lost me when it devoted half a book to some girl becoming a willing sex slave.

Hang on, when did that happen? It's a long time since I read this series but I don't remember that -are you thinking of Felisin? Because if you are, she wasn't exactly willing and it didn't exactly last long.

[Kaelik]

I think Malazahn completely lost me when it devoted half a book to some girl becoming a willing sex slave.

Hang on, when did that happen? It's a long time since I read this series but I don't remember that -are you thinking of Felisin? Because if you are, she wasn't exactly willing and it didn't exactly last long.

1) Yeah, she was a slave, and she willingly became a sex slave, and it got so bad that she cried over the corpse of the guy who raped her the most. The whole coercion aspect doesn't make that better, it makes it worse.

2) It lasted half a book. 2 pages would have been too long, half a book was way way to long.

[Starmaker]

The last straw for me was Some Guy's Virginity. The only sympathetic character (the barbarian chief) died a book ago. The sex slave plotline was bad. The fat bitch abusing her surrogate mother was absolutely fucking disgusting, and I'd have quit there and then if I wasn't so inured to random guro by that point (I have a way higher tolerance for disgusting shit happening to protagonists than for disgusting shit committed by protagonists). "Lolololol I'm so feminist that in my fantasy world women can be rapists too", seriously, what the fuck. Then, several characters are IN SO MUCH SPIRITUAL PAIN for no fucking reason; they aren't raped or anything, they're just moping like the dumb assholes they are. And the matter of Some Guy's Virginity was so much American Pie and so much not modern guro fantasy that I actually came to my senses and dropped the book like a hot potato.

I have a rule of thumb now: if I'm not comfortable discussing a book with a hypothetical someone face to face, it's not worth reading.

[Maxus]

On the other end of the literary spectrum, I finished that awful, awful book, The Crimson Claymore.

I've put a review up on Goodreads, and the author's apparently aware of his online presence so he may try to engage me on the subject. I've got solid reasons for feeling like I do, though, so I'm ready for him.

Guys. Going in, I knew this book would be poor. I did not expect this unpolished turd. There's just so much wrong. It actually made me think about how much work goes into a well-done book, the research and beta readers and reality checks that should happen. And there's so many levels he fails on. Like, if I had a highlighter or had had the presence of mind to bookmark some particular odious passages, I'd quote them here, like people do with the Sword of Truth. Once I've had a day or two to read other stuff, I might go on and do that for the edification of the audience.

The -idea- isn't bad, it's just generic fantasy. Our Hero, Searon, his family was killed in a raid by lizardmen. Now he's out for revenge or death and doesn't care much which until a wizard with a longer-term plan recruits him to head up an army to yadda yadda.

Nothing original there, really. But that's okay. If you can tell a story well, you can pull it off. It worked for David Eddings.

It was not told well here.

Seriously. I read this and thought, "I can do better." So I guess I've gotta write something, if only to put my money where my mouth is. Because if this hipster can make sales, I know I can.

Yes, I'm calling him a hipster. He OUTS himself as a hipster.

He is your typical fantasy author, He has a beard, a typewriter, he enjoys the occasional tobacco from his long stem pipe, and he loves listening to classical music on his record player.

I knew he was a pipesmoker because every damn male character smokes a pipe and it describes what they fill up with. Terms like "whiskey spice" and "delicious Cavendish blend" are thrown around. We're repeatedly told the wizard's smells like 'honeyed cinnamon' and Searon, Our Hero, he must have a damn bale on his zebra (yes, he rides a zebra. What else do you call and a black-and-white striped horse) because he's not only got tobacco for a smoke every night at the campfire, he's got -selection-.

And the research. He just didn't do it. At one point early on, Searon hunts a boar and shoots it. It tumps over dead from a single arrow to the heart.

Boars don't do this. Especially not from something as sissy as a heart wound. It was gonna die, it was just going to spend the last five to twenty seconds of its life fucking something up and making a lot of noise.

He brings it back to the camp and roasts it over the fire.

I don't know if you realize this, but roasting an entire pig on a fire takes all damn day. We're talking eight or ten hours.

After it's roasted, he THEN cuts it and guts it.

And that's where I had to set the book down and go do something else for a bit. See, gutting the pig is the FIRST thing you do. And the thing that comes first is removing the intestines and related organs. Otherwise the pigshit boils inside the pig and it'd smell terrible and almost certainly give you a spectacular case of the runs if you were enough of a dumbass to eat any of the meat.

I told my dad about this. He shook his head and said he wouldn't eat any pork cooked by this author. I wouldn't either.

But it goes on. Leagues-high walls, a saxophone in a medieval tavern, titanium shields and daggers. All kinds of research failures. And it's also got bad dialogue, flat characters, plot holes, and just plain bad writing.

So, uh, if you ever decide you want to write a fantasy novel, go for it. You gotta be better than this guy.

[Hadanelith]

...wow. I'm all set to read a rage-view of this novel now. This sounds like a trainwreck that I wanna hear about, but not experience first hand.

[Whipstitch]

God knows this guy probably doesn't know a pig from his asshole, but for the sake of being a pedant I will say that you can actually one shot a boar very cleanly if they're quartering away and we're not talking about a 200+ pound animal. Their bad rep comes from their tough skin, size and weird stubby body shape--deer are easier to broadside because their hearts are further back behind their legs. With boar the heart is really low and almost directly above their forelimbs so it's really easy to shoot them right in the shoulder muscle.

[Maxus]

...wow. I'm all set to read a rage-view of this novel now. This sounds like a trainwreck that I wanna hear about, but not experience first hand.

I was being...fair and kind on Goodreads, so for here I'll find direct quotes.

LOOK FORWARD TO:

THE NON-CHARACTER

THE OPPOSITE BROTHER

THE LOST CITY

THE WITTY BANTER

THE WIZARD KNOCKUP

THE TASTY KISSES

[angelfromanotherpin]

I was checking out a recommended new-school game book: DestinyQuest – The Legion of Shadow. This thing is fucking huge, 656 pages, 939 numbered sections, and so on. It looked promising: lots of material, an interesting character sheet, like 12+ pages of special ability reference text in the back... and it's a World of Warcraft simulator in the worst way.

Okay, other players don't somehow grief you and camp your body, but:
• You get a full heal between each fight, so there's no building tension as your resources deplete and no particular reason not to always press on.
• There's no death penalty, at all. You are literally directed to either respawn at the map hub or at the exact reference you just died at. Except at least WoW has some kind of in-game justification, this book just has you pop back to life, fresh as a daisy, for no reason.
• Because of the above points, combat is almost entirely a time-wasting formality, which is a shame because it's middling-interesting as far as gamebook combat goes. But unlimited retries on the same playthrough mean that there's no actual consequences for defeat, and so victory is guaranteed and meaningless.
• Even given that all combats are formalities, it could still be interesting if there were meaningful choices, but so far there aren't. Like WoW, there are a bunch of quests to walk over to and do or not do, and none of them have any consequences on anything else in the world.

Now, I'm still pretty early in the book and it could redeem itself, but I don't have high hopes. It is a god-damn shame.

[Prak]

Sinfest

The anvil-dropping of Sinfest gets to me sometimes, because it's, well, anvil dropping. But I stick with it.

However, this, better not fucking lead to a "wacky misunderstanding!" subplot, because Fuscia is a fucking devil, and should recognize Evil!Slick as being a split off personality from Real!Slick as Real!Slick is trying to improve himself. Or at least recognize that "ranting fuckboi who looks like Slick" is some kind of devil bullshit and not actually Slick. Because another "'Nique is pissed off at Slick!" story plot is... at least 10 of those too much, especially when there's an "ongoing" subplot about Slick trying to be a better person.

But, fuck, that might infringe on anvil dropping, right?

[Ancient History]

Sinfest has had some great runs (Crimminy invades hell!) but it's been a bit allergic to plot-advancement or character development lately.

[Prak]

Which is a shame, because it's planted some great plot seeds, like The Devil actually being Lily's dad, the feminists meeting the fae witch, or even just the old woman being a witch herself. Fuck, even the 'Nique/Fuschia bit is good, including 'Nique's empowerment.

Oh, and Slick's self improvement. Because there needs to be representation of men recognizing what is wrong with them and fixing it, not just men never bettering themselves and women putting upwith it or cutting them out of their lives.

[CapnTthePirateG]

ARGH!

I just finished The Deed of Paksenarrion, and my god is that book an incoherent mess.

The Good gods are dicks who don't deserve worship, which is balanced out by the forces of evil being stupid dumbasses with no endgame but a love of torturing people. The setting and magic is ripped off from D&D with no attempt to file off the serial numbers. The heroine is boring and by the end of the book is spouting platitudes and following the voices in her head which make her do magic things that solve all problems forever. It has the same problem as Malazan of throwing incoherent magic bullshit about, but without the interesting mechanics and fun of deciphering them.

[GreatGreyShrike]

ARGH!
The setting and magic is ripped off from D&D with no attempt to file off the serial numbers.

It really takes this to unprecedented heights. That one village in Paksenarrion that's a direct rip from Temple of Elemental Evil's Hommlet is sort of hilarious.

[JigokuBosatsu]

On the other end of the literary spectrum, I finished that awful, awful book, The Crimson Claymore.

He is your typical fantasy author, He has a beard, a typewriter, he enjoys the occasional tobacco from his long stem pipe, and he loves listening to classical music on his record player.

As a bearded fantasy author who is literally smoking a churchwarden full of "delicious Cavendish" at the moment I am writing this, I could not in a million years think of a more pretentious lump of horseshit for an author bio.

[Prak]

Jigoku, you should print a new edition of your books with an author photo of you just looking as much like Alan Moore as possible, with a giant pipe. Like, Hans Landa in Inglorious Basterds giant pipe.

[JigokuBosatsu]

I just thought of a way to make it sound more pretentious- I would mention the fact that I carved this pipe myself by hand, like the dirty hipster that I am.

[phlapjackage]

I just thought of a way to make it sound more pretentious- I would mention the fact that I carved this pipe myself by hand, like the dirty hipster that I am.

Yes, but what music are you listening to and how is it being played ?

[JigokuBosatsu]

Robert Johnson's "They're Red Hot" on a 78....

(ha, I wish!)

[Chamomile]

Still looking forward to the full and proper rageview from Maxus.

[Prak]

I just thought of a way to make it sound more pretentious- I would mention the fact that I carved this pipe myself by beard, like the dirty hipster that I am.

Fixed that for you, Jigoku.

[Maxus]

Still looking forward to the full and proper rageview from Maxus.

I've been going through with a highlighter.

It -hurts- to re-read this closely, much less type it out fully. But it -is- coming.

Incidentally, I did the review on Goodreads and the author, to his credit, took the criticism like a champ and said he sorry I didn't enjoy the book but he appreciated the honest feedback. Our mutual acquaintance says he had some sort of surgery recently so he's on painkillers. They must be -really- good for him to be that mellow about it.

But still, I'll give him a nod of respect for it. Not for the ego-pandering, but for being a responsible adult about finding a review where someone went down to cases about why things didn't work and how they could have.

[Maxus]

The Crimson Claymore

The brave warrior Searon is haunted by the deaths of his wife and children at the hands of the savage reptilian draeyks, who are on a bloodthirsty rampage. He walks the land of Calthroia alone and thirsty for vengence. He hunts the creatures down one by one, showing no mercy.

But Searon is a one-man army, and no match for the legion of murderous draeyks. Lucky for him, the powerful wizard Karceoles finds him during his travels and enlists Searon in this coming war. Karceoles believes Searon can unite the races to defeat the draeyks once and for all.

Searon discovers he can do more damage with Karceoles and a band of warriors they find along the way. But as the war rages in earnest, Searon must make a choice: Is it more important to destroy the draeyks at costs, or will his quest for vengeance endanger the lives of his new brothers and sisters at arms?

That's the back cover of the Crimson Claymore. It set off some warning bells in my head, and so did this timeless poetry when I opened the book to a random page and found this:

The music was still light when the two dancers walked up to their table. Both smiled and looked from Searon to Karceoles.

"You two seem like you have seen a long journey," the brunette said.
"Yes,we have. Too long," Searon smiled.
"It is but fate that we travelled so long and so far to stumble into this place. Both of you are so skilled with graceful dance, and beautiful faces, that it puts our mind at ease after such long traveling. We may now rest east this night knowing we sleep in an inn where there are kheshlars or angels, for surely you must be one of the two because your beauty and grace surpasses all," Karceoles said.
Searon turned to glare hard at the wizard, but he seemed not to notice as his attention was turned toward the dancers with a courteous smile. There seemed to be an aura of charm about the wizard, and he seemed to glow. His face was stern and his smile genuine, but no wrinkles stained his face as Searon had thought did on the road. It was a clean face, still without beard or mustache, and it seemed to be mature, as if he knew more about the world than anyone.
"You are too kind," the blonde said, curtseying at her knees. "What is your name?"
"I am Karceoles, and what are such fine women as you two called?"
"I am Berethana and this is Annettera. We are both pleased to meet you," the blonde said.
"My name is Searon," he said, but neither seemed to notice him in the slightest.
Both were blushing as they looked at Karceoles with large smiles on their faces. Searon shook his head and took another long drink of his whiskey.
"Perhaps we'll see each other again," Annettera said shyly.
"I count on it."
The two women giggled and walked off, with glances over their shoulders at him, and holding hands to whisper in each other's ear.

That excerpt should tell you a lot about the author, and about my superhuman patience at reading this.

So here's the deal. Crimson Claymore could have been a decent story. Really. It could have been fun, but everything -except- the base idea is badly done. The last time I read dialogue that bad, it had been written by a man who was 80% deaf. No joke.

I've talked about the boar-roasting scene, but that's just pieces of it.

See, Searon has superhuman strength, speed, and senses. Or so we're told. Once, when they're being chased by critters, he smells granite and marble and steers the group to, it turns out, an ancient lost city in the capital. It's this large, organized, stone city, utterly abandoned. The palace, we're told, is immense, with "walls rising for leagues in height".

Fuck, man. Fuck. This, supposedly, is not far from a capitol city. How could they NOT notice the black needle off in the distance and gone to look when they moved in?

Or, ooh, how about the non-character! The party splits up, and run into kheshlars and--

--what is a kheshlar? I suppose I'll have to explain that. Kheshlar are elves with light-blue skin, silver eyebrows, and the female lead of the novel is THE kheshlar with the biggest rack of her race. No. Seriously. Character description and everything. All the characters get a profile in the back of the book. You, dear reader, wouldn't find out what a Kheshlar is in this book until several pages of 'you're near kheshlar lands' and all that. It mentions the word several times but you never find out what they are until you see one turning heads around with a hammer.

Starlyn
Kheshlar-320 years of age
Birthplace: Sudegam
Appearance: Bright Blond hair, electric gray-blue eyes, thin eyebrows, cunning smile especially when the stars are about. Pointed chin and high cheek bones with the fullest bosom of all the kheshlars. She wears midnight blue chainmail under golden bronze and blue hued plate mail.
Weapon: Large steel hammer with spike on backside.

--So anyway, they run into a Kheshlar patrol and the captain, who knows and respect Starlyn, offers a loan of the best archer he has, Erenuyh. We're told he's taciturn and he doesn't interact with anyone very much. The party gets attacked by wolves, the backup hero, Andron, loses his pinkie, the archer loses two fingers because wolves come flying by like bullets or something. Later, they try to talk to him, he gives monosyllabic answers. Then they're attacked by creatures made of translucent crystal that only attack at night when they're -fuck hard- to see, he shoots the critters with arrows to make out heads and arms and such, and then gets his head pulled off. And the warrior elf with the big hammer somehow isn't shattering the crystal men all over the place.

That's seriously the character's involvement and reason to be in the book: Get them past a fight with critters that aren't mentioned before, and aren't mentioned again, in the book. Then he's killed.

As for bad characters, you meet Searon's brother. Searon wears crimson and gold armor. His brother wears blue and silver. And his brother's name is Noraes.

Yes. 'Searon' spelled backwards. And no one mentions this. The brothers do not catch each other's eye and groan about the travesty their parents inflicted on Noraes.

I could really go on. Give me more time and I might just do that. There's all kinds of things, like how Starlyn's rack reduces all men to staring, drooling nitwits for minutes on end, and the graceful way a mage (not the wizard) handled this. Or how the author can't find the trigger on Chekov's gun. Or the fallout of the excerpt at the top, where it turns out the wizard, being such the charmer he is, sleeps with both the dancers at once and knocks up one of them, and how he handles that.

But also how the enemies somehow pop up like JRPG random encounters in a pine forest.

This one irks me. We have pine forests around here.



Imagine a pack of six or eight human-sized creatures running up on people by surprise in that.

Oh, right, plot, I forgot about that. The book has one, in as much as it has a sequence of events and they follow more-or-less logically, but that'll be for the next rant.

[Mask_De_H]

If 4chan has taught me anything, it's that huge elf tits turn men into drooling nitwits for minutes, even hours at a time.

[DSMatticus]

Searon shook his head and took another long drink of his whiskey.

I feel you, buddy. After reading that, I could use a drink too.

I'm always surprised by how incredibly not hot people's "look ma, I seduced a woman" fantasies can be. I mean, fucking seriously. Imagine those words coming out of your mouth. Do you feel sexy? No? Hm. Try tipping your fedora. Is it working yet?

Even briefly setting aside the issue that the dialogue is cringy as fuck, I can't empathize with the mindset that would make the author want to write it that way in the first place. If I were fantasizing about talking a girl (or two) out of her panties, that is not at all what the words in my fantasy would look like. Even when taken as shameful self-insert fapfodder, it's so bad.

Why do people write scenes like that? It's not an uncommon thing. Is it just a kind of trope? People repeat it because they've seen it? Or does it have some actual appeal I'm not aware of?