tBotNS ref

I cobbled together what I /expected/ to be a cache of terrible science fiction I could detest beneath an umbrella, and instead it proved so excellent I've nearly exhausted my store. The Eyre Affair, apparently a part of some larger series, is sci-fi of such a constrained genre that I wasn't even aware it existed: romantic, /literary/ sci-fi, for people who like stories about time travel, alternate universes, and classic literature where the protagonist gets married at the end. Ridiculous. Endearing. Like an exorbitant designer truffle too rich to eat in plain view. Also! There is an old series - both of these books are pretty old, actually - by an author named Gene Wolfe called "The Book of The New Sun." I believe it was originally four books, but they've been compiled into two <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312890176/qid12374369/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/102-9811043-1345707?v=glance&s=books&nP7846> volumes <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312890184/qid12374369/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl14/102-9811043-1345707?v=glance&s=books&nP7846> - you may click those without fear, they are not "make me rich" links. I saw the cover, the one with the stern-looking scary sword guy, and declared aloud, "Yes! This is /sure/ to be overwrought!" but found nothing of the sort. It's science fantasy the equal of which I've never read. I've also got Orson Scott Card's Seventh Son, a kind of early American fantasy as I understand it, and I tremble in the hope that I'll be three for three on this book thing.

Seth Lombardi wrote: Maru: I'm a big penny-arcade fan and would have missed this otherwise. You do, however, need to put a hyphen in www.penny-arcade.com . And also that link will be obsolete as of Monday, in which case people will have to go to the old news post for that comic.

For those who don't know, Penny Arcade is a long-running webcomic strip obstensibly about video games but also about just about anything smart people who play video games might find amusing, and seeing as how the average age of gamers is 29, that's quite a lot these days. Tycho is the writer of the comic - and plays the part both in fantasy and reality as the ridiculously erudite and cerbral PC gamer, as contrasted against the artist console-gamer. I'd kind of assumed that he'd be a Wolfe fan, but it's good to know he finaly got around to finding him.

seth ***************************** Seth Lombardi sethlombardi at hotmail.com http://sethlombardi.blogspot.com/ AIM: melombardi "Two faces are alike; neither is funny by itself, but side by side their likeness makes us laugh" -Pascal

On Apr 2, 2005 7:58 PM, maru <marudubshinki at gmail.com> wrote: I realize none of you probably care, but seeing a reference to The Book of The New Sun in a relatively mainstream media is so rare I feel compelled to pass it on. From www.pennyarcade.com <http://www.pennyarcade.com>:

I cobbled together what I /expected/ to be a cache of terrible science fiction I could detest beneath an umbrella, and instead it proved so excellent I've nearly exhausted my store. The Eyre Affair, apparently a part of some larger series, is sci-fi of such a constrained genre that I wasn't even aware it existed: romantic, /literary/ sci-fi, for people who like stories about time travel, alternate universes, and classic literature where the protagonist gets married at the end. Ridiculous. Endearing. Like an exorbitant designer truffle too rich to eat in plain view. Also! There is an old series - both of these books are pretty old, actually - by an author named Gene Wolfe called "The Book of The New Sun." I believe it was originally four books, but they've been compiled into two < http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312890176/qid12374369/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/102-9811043-1345707?v=glance&s=books&nP7846 volumes < http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312890184/qid12374369/sr=8-2/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i2_xgl14/102-9811043-1345707?v=glance&s=books&nP7846 - you may click those without fear, they are not "make me rich" links. I saw the cover, the one with the stern-looking scary sword guy, and declared aloud, "Yes! This is /sure/ to be overwrought!" but found nothing of the sort. It's science fantasy the equal of which I've never read. I've also got Orson Scott Card's Seventh Son, a kind of early American fantasy as I understand it, and I tremble in the hope that I'll be three for three on this book thing.

~Maru The Pope is dead! Long reign the Pope! _______________________________________________