Wprst Sci-Fi & fantasy books EVER

Shadowhawk · Post by **Shadowhawk** » 2003-01-10 06:00pm

The Watch. I don't remember who wrote it.
It was actually a reasonably good book...until the end. The author obviously went with a completely unexpected ending just to piss off the reader. The ending simply ruined the entire book for me.

Frank Hipper · Post by **Frank Hipper** » 2003-01-10 07:14pm

I actually made it all the way through Battlefield Earth. The way L. Ron compares himself to the "greats" of Sci-Fi by claiming them to be his inspiration was, shall we say, ofensive?
His naive terminology and naming was irritating. "Kerbango sauce", "Psychlos" etc.

It was dull.

It was goofy.

It made one hell of a great movie, though!

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-01-10 07:20pm

It made one hell of a great movie, though!

Do you want the icepick in the groin or in the mouth?

My picks:

Sci-Fi: The Ringworld Engineers. W...T...F?

Fantasy: The Sword of Truth. Terry Goodkind is a worthless plagiarizing piece-o'-shit hack who should be impaled upon a pointy mound of his own worthless asstowel books.

Enlightenment · Post by **Enlightenment** » 2003-01-10 07:40pm

Anything about B5. Joke. I've never read any B5 books so I can't comment.

Iris. Scifi in print form with a strong emphasis on T&A.
Rama Reveiled.
Legacy, Eternity (prequal and sequal to Eon)
Contact.

Post by **Beowulf** » 2003-01-10 07:58pm

I can't remember the exact name, but it was something like Alpha Centauri... In anycase, I threw it away in disgust, which is something I rarely do... Then again, I've tried to avoid reading Robert Jordan

Darth_Shinji · Post by **Darth_Shinji** » 2003-01-10 10:51pm

The alpha centuri books ending was compleatly stupid to me. Another bad sci-fi novels is the Doom novels. They all suck.

Captain tycho · Post by **Captain tycho** » 2003-01-10 11:20pm

Stormbringer wrote:
Captain tycho wrote:
Stormbringer wrote:Any of the Shannara Books by Terry Brooks. The best is mediocre but the worst are painful. Especially for some that loved Tolkien.

The Skies of Pern. Way to draw out the death agaony of a series that should have ended well and gracefully a few novels back. It offers nothing meaningful and no conflict or concern except for those invented in the book and it's just plain pathetic.
Well, I read the Shannara books and liked ;em.
Sure, no Lord of the Rings or nothing like that, but they weren't bad.
They tended to be repetitive though.
They were the same basic story for each of them. Awful, after the third one I quit reading them for a long time. I picked the next few up for a long car and they were just as dull.

Not too mention Shannara really is Lord of the Rings with the serial numbers filed off.

Most fantasy books these days are Lord of the Rings-copiers.
The first one was fine, second stunk, 3rd one was fine, then *bweech!*
Battles were cool though.
Of course, the plot was always 'destroy this in this place, travel there, kill that' nothing new.
My favorite fanatsy novel is LOTR of course, but second I would have to say The Thousand Orcs. Dirzzt Do'Urden can't be beat.

Captain tycho · Post by **Captain tycho** » 2003-01-10 11:22pm

Darth_Shinji wrote:The alpha centuri books ending was compleatly stupid to me. Another bad sci-fi novels is the Doom novels. They all suck.

Most novels based on games DO suck.
Some exceptions are several of the SC and Warcraft novels.

Seggybop · Post by **Seggybop** » 2003-01-10 11:50pm

LotR!!!

Incrediby tedious...

Alex Moon · Post by **Alex Moon** » 2003-01-11 12:13am

-Terry Goodkind's SoT books
The man is a sick fuck, and a bad writer.

-Forever Peace and Forever Free, by Joe Haldeman
The endings for both of these ruined what would have been decend books otherwise

-Sword of Shannara
Too cheesy in my opinion. Reads too much like a RTS game or roleplaying game written down.

-Any of the "standard" fantasy series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman.
When they write in worlds that don't stick to the Dungeon's and Dragon's type fantasy, they do pretty well, but the Dragonlance/Sovereign Stone stuff is ugh

As for Jordan, I like WoT, and Crossroads of Twilight actually moved along pretty well and it seemed to tie up, or set up to be tied a lot of plot threads. Plus, Jordans editors have seemed to take a heavier hand, because certain phrases are noticbly fewer in number this time around.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-01-11 04:11am

Captain tycho wrote:
Darth_Shinji wrote:The alpha centuri books ending was compleatly stupid to me. Another bad sci-fi novels is the Doom novels. They all suck.
Most novels based on games DO suck.
Some exceptions are several of the SC and Warcraft novels.

I thought that there were some good Wing Commander novels. (one of them was written by Mercedes Lackey herself!)

Post by **Lagmonster** » 2003-01-11 08:50am

Captain tycho wrote:
Darth_Shinji wrote:The alpha centuri books ending was compleatly stupid to me. Another bad sci-fi novels is the Doom novels. They all suck.
Most novels based on games DO suck.
Some exceptions are several of the SC and Warcraft novels.

I rather enjoyed the Aliens novels. 'Earth Hive' was the best in that series.

SylasGaunt · Post by **SylasGaunt** » 2003-01-11 10:18am

"Shadow of the Xel'Naga" one of the Starcraft books. God I wish I had read the 'About the Author' page before I bought that steaming pile.. then I would have known that the 'author' was really Kevin J. Anderson and his wife and avoided it like the plague it is.

Post by **fgalkin** » 2003-01-11 02:43pm

The last book of EarthSea. God, why did that bitch have to end the friggen series on that note.

And anything of Le Guin's work after that. Boring, worthless drivel.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

Sokar · Post by **Sokar** » 2003-01-11 04:03pm

Lagmonster wrote:Dune.

Hoo-WAH but that book stunk on ice. I'm glad I avoided its many sequels.

"Pets and Children of Dune."
"Dune, Meshugganah."
"Dune: The Unfortunate Continuation."
"Chicken Soup for the Fremen Soul"
"10 Stupid Things Harkonnen Do to Mess Up Their Lives"
"Mentats for Dummies."

LOL , thoes are good. I very much like the Dune Books, but at times they do drag a bit

jegs2 · Post by **jegs2** » 2003-01-11 04:28pm

Captain tycho wrote:What is the absolute WORST sci-fi or fantasy book you have read?
I'm not talking about merely mediorcre, I'm talking something you downright HATE.
The worst one I read is the Postman by David Brin.

the L. Ron Hubbard books, Target Earth or something like that -- was a 12-book series (not Battlefield Earth, which I did like)...

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2003-01-11 10:18pm

Worst: Battlefield: Earth. The only sci-fi book I have ever given up on (literally).

The books mentioned previously I like:
Dune
Neuromancer (the first time confused me, the second time I liked it)
the PERN series (other than Masterharper and Skies, I was disappointed in those)

Enlightenment · Post by **Enlightenment** » 2003-01-11 11:02pm

Captain tycho wrote:Most novels based on games DO suck.

End Run, one of the early (first?) Wing Commander books, was half-decent. There are certainly much worse stand-alone books out there.

Most fantasy books these days are Lord of the Rings-copiers.

"Extruded Fantasy Products," as they are occasionally called on the SF/fantasy writing newsgroup.

Stormbringer · Post by **Stormbringer** » 2003-01-11 11:33pm

Enlightenment wrote:
Captain tycho wrote:Most novels based on games DO suck.
End Run, one of the early (first?) Wing Commander books, was half-decent. There are certainly much worse stand-alone books out there.

The Wing Commander novels are one of the few exceptions to that rule. Mostly because the Wing Commander games had a good solid story in addition to the game.

Enlightenment wrote:
Most fantasy books these days are Lord of the Rings-copiers.
"Extruded Fantasy Products," as they are occasionally called on the SF/fantasy writing newsgroup.

I'd call the carbon copy crap.

Peregrin Toker · Post by **Peregrin Toker** » 2003-01-12 05:47am

Stormbringer wrote:
Enlightenment wrote:
Captain tycho wrote:Most novels based on games DO suck.
End Run, one of the early (first?) Wing Commander books, was half-decent. There are certainly much worse stand-alone books out there.
The Wing Commander novels are one of the few exceptions to that rule. Mostly because the Wing Commander games had a good solid story in addition to the game.

Another factor is that the Wing Commander novels actually are written by decent authors.

The_Nice_Guy · Post by **The_Nice_Guy** » 2003-01-12 08:00am

End Run and False Colours were the best WC books, IMO.

On the other hand, the books based on the game itself were a bit weak.

The Nice Guy

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2003-01-12 02:28pm

While L. Ron Hubbard is bad, someone tell me that an entire book series based on the graphic rape and enslavement of women is not purchance the worst thing out there.

Sure, it's one of the series listed in the back of the DMG as a key inspiration for AD&D, My first reaction to Dark Sun was (Oh, wow, someone decided to make a PC combo of Gor & Dune)

Guy's I have to wonder, have any of you gone through the masochistic or horny adolecent process of actually trying to read John Norman?

Post by **NecronLord** » 2003-01-12 02:36pm

The Yosemite Bear wrote:While L. Ron Hubbard is bad, someone tell me that an entire book series based on the graphic rape and enslavement of women is not purchance the worst thing out there.

Sure, it's one of the series listed in the back of the DMG as a key inspiration for AD&D, My first reaction to Dark Sun was (Oh, wow, someone decided to make a PC combo of Gor & Dune)

Guy's I have to wonder, have any of you gone through the masochistic or horny adolecent process of actually trying to read John Norman?

?

Sindai · Post by **Sindai** » 2003-01-12 03:02pm

SylasGaunt wrote:"Shadow of the Xel'Naga" one of the Starcraft books. God I wish I had read the 'About the Author' page before I bought that steaming pile.. then I would have known that the 'author' was really Kevin J. Anderson and his wife and avoided it like the plague it is.

I second this. I could have written a better SC novel. I still weep for my money.

Books mentioned so far that actually kick ass:

-The Dune series. (Well, the first three or so. Then I got confused.)
-Neuromancer. Gibson's prose is a freaking work of art, even when it's confusing. He's one of my favorite 3 authors of all time, easily.

Sriad · Post by **Sriad** » 2003-01-12 03:09pm

Oh, Neuromancer, right. I was thinking Snow Crash for some reason, and couldn't imagine how anyone could have a hard time getting through it...

But I agree a little; I've always found Gibson's books a little hard to get through.

The WORST sci-fi book (that -I've- read mind you, I'm sure there are others) would be Number of the Beast by Robert Heinlein. Okay, maybe "read" is the wrong word; I put it down in frustration after fifteen pages; the characters were indistinct mouthpieces, they all talked the same... it was like someone had stuck the last half of Heinlein's works in a blender, strained out all the good parts, and published what they had left over.
After I stopped reading the book, I checked out some reviews and felt justified in my decision.

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Wprst Sci-Fi & fantasy books EVER

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