The late 90s: bigger, bolder, and brighter

[petronia]

1) Legend of the Seeker: no one ever mentioned that Sam Raimi was producing a TV adaptation of Terry Goodkind's books... at least, not until naanima like two weeks ago. WHAT I DON'T EVEN ETCETCETC

This and Robert Jordan were my first online fandoms! Back when everything happened via Usenet and private mailing lists! The Goodkind ML taught me the meaning of the word "spoiler" when I uhh jumped the gun on a who-killed-Dumbledore moment before everyone had finished reading. Or it may have been my BFF at the time, I no longer remember. (The same one I watched Star Trek with. We later fell out of touch; I went into anime and she into Buffy.) In fact I still own the first books in guise of souvenir from another friend who moved off the continent a decade ago, but whom I still hear about via mutual circles. And who is visiting Montreal next week, apparently, so this may or may not be a harbinger of epicness. As with Jordan, Goodkind was one of those cases where in the interim between books coming out I uhh sort of grew critical taste, but the TV series has merits. XD

2) Lilith Fair 2010: this is, literally, the ONE SINGLE SOLITARY THING I've always been pissed off at missing during the 90s, because they never played Montreal and I couldn't blow town by myself. Well, now that has changed.

I guess this whole "shiz I was into age 17 coming back: exciting" aspect of pop culture today means I am OFFICIALLY OLD etc.

Comments

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

I REMEMBER ROBERT JORDAN! But wasn't Goodkind more hard core. Do people even write books like this anymore, or has it become passe

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Yeah Goodkind eventually got kind of "my SM dominatrix fantasies, let me show you them, also fascism would solve these pesky political issues" and, well. Jordan was more epic though! I keep forgetting he's dead, and then I feel sad. Today's equiv is probably G.R.R. Martin (is that like the difference between JoJo and GioGio) but he is a way better writer than those guys, objectively, even if I can't really take his books. XD;

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

Gosh I loved the eye of the world!!!! Did Jordan even finish his bloated opus. I am thinking not? I now feel a little sorry for having abandoned it, but high fantasy is really not my dish;;;;;

Jordan (and, I will assume, Mr. Goodkind!) may not have been prose artists, or uh for that matter plot artists, but they knew how to do characters. Millions of characters oof! I know Jordan has caught a lot of flak for his females, but I liked that the women did thangs and had um lesbian cabals? I seem to remember. I would argue that -- since everybody has sort of read Jordan -- young sff lady authors today who are equally ill at ease with writing women tend to write them like he did. Lol

I have heard that GRR Martin is dece, but I would rather pick up some par historical fiction. He is always quoted on the covers of new fantasy books though, presumably because he is a legend of wizard and dragon stories.

[canis-m.livejournal.com]

Martin is worth a try imo. His project strikes me as very different from Jordan's (granted I only ever got through 1/3 of the first Wheel of Time book before I threw it across the room). Not to mention yeah, he's a way better writer. Although if you're going to read Song of Ice and Fire you might as well wait another couple decades or whatever until it's finished before you start.

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

Idk whether Jordan's opus is worth being called a project. It was mostly aimless flailing for which he made crazy bank. BRO FIIIST that is what I call a career.

Hahaha you threw it across the room

I feel like I have missed the moment in my life when Martin would have taken me by storm! And that makes me a little sad. Very likely I can't stomach tolkien-type high fantasy anymore. Unless it's a cutting pastiche, like, Pratchett Prime, but self-aware high fantasy seems like an oxymoron

[canis-m.livejournal.com]

It's not really Tolkien-type, though. It's not mythic, it's not Good vs. Evil, and it's not in RPG-style quest mode at all. There are dragons on the fringes etc. but the heart of it is cutthroat familial/dynastic intrigue. War of the Roses, not Germanic sagas. Lots of domestic settings. In terms of worldbuilding it reminds me more of something like Swordspoint (w/o the gay--iknorite what's the point) although the storytelling is not like Kushner's. Idk think Solidor family reunion where everyone is trying to kill or at least depose each other. Anyway, it's not possible to feel squishy about it when Martin is so unrelentingly brutal to all his characters, and it's not a wellspring of joy and moe or anything but like I said, I think it's worth one's time even if one isn't going to adore it.

A million edits: sorry, not trying to insist READ IT if you aren't interested, but my own preconceptions about the series turned out to be pretty far off from the reality, so.

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

PFF I WAS ABOUT TO SAY. I sort of grasp the premise -- I have quite the past of reading Amazon synopses having made my shameful purchases and clicked on the Customers Also Bought strip -- and this doesn't seem like your sort of story! Everyone is mean!

I do love me a Manner Drama to ridiculous extents though. It's just that I read (on Amazon obv) that someone was a wizard in this. And that someone was fighting dragons possibly? It may have been somebody else though, though they may also have been a wizard. Or I may be totally misremembering. I hated the Fall of the Kings by the way, so I guess gay isn't always enough or even the point, how depressing :C

[canis-m.livejournal.com]

No, it's not my sort of story! Everyone is mean and Martin is mean to everyone and there are no unicorns. Consider it a tribute to his skill that it holds my delicate flower-like attention despite these things. *wheeze* I do continue to find it surreal that I'm able to read the series while Sabina isn't.

Like I said there are dragons/sorcery/magic on the fringes but they aren't the heart of the business. It's possible they might become more central in forthcoming books. After more of the main cast have murdered each other.

Speaking of Manner Drama wiki sez Jennifer Ehle aka ELIZABETH BENNET will play Catelyn Stark in the tv adaptation aaaaahaha

Did anyone really like Fall of the Kings idk. Career academics, maybe.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Did anyone really like Fall of the Kings idk. Career academics, maybe.

Ooohhh, BURNS. Also true.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I just don't care for this stuff very much in high fantasy for some reason; I'm not sure why. XD; (I couldn't really get through the Amber books either.) I think I was too much of an actual European history buff as a teen, and of course the steady trickling diet of Chinese imperial court TV dramas from parental end. The sort of thing the Japanese love doing light shoujo fantasy versions of, except they always kind of get it wrong, because the real Chinese shiz is invariably BRUTAL and UNFAIR and VICIOUS and BAD END FOR ALL.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

the real Chinese shiz is invariably BRUTAL and UNFAIR and VICIOUS and BAD END FOR ALL

HENCE the need for light shoujo versions of same. Corrective, because the Chinese stuff alone is suicide-inducing.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I have liked many of these series, but there is always an underlying disbelief. XD; The Chinese cultural imperative toward unhappy endings is as strong as the Western cultural imperative toward happy endings.

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

EDITER

i am an editer

[motorbike.livejournal.com]

Well if you are so taken with thissss idk probs once I finish reading every Michael Chabon book, pausing only to cry girlishly into a hand kerchief.

Watch in like a month I will be all into it, after all you recommended Swordspoint to me gush gushgush

Though ikr, Fall was like sitting through a mediocre seminar filled with the sort of people who get so so so excited about everything that happens. Also according to Ellen Kushner the premise was inspired by THE FORMATION OF CHINA

Re: i am an editer

[canis-m.livejournal.com]

Lol after all that you'll probably hate it. Then you can blame me! So satisfying.

[vureoelt.livejournal.com]

Cool. I have a similar history with Robert Jordan although I never dabbled in Usenet.

I guess you'll be going to the concert, then!