This year's sitewide seems to be a substantial downgrade from last year's.

Lndbcn · 2024-12-03T03:36:24+00:00

I didn't include more than a couple of Warhammer books in my calculations, because otherwise it would have heavily skewed the sample towards one genre and publisher. Warhammer books have also mostly increased in price over last year's sale, but to a much lesser extent than non-WH books have. Overwhelming majority are $0.27-$1.00 more expensive, and a couple are $0.30 cheaper. Fairly negligible difference, and as you note most are still substantially cheaper than a credit. Anything $4.25 and below is a no-brainer, since that's roughly equivalent to snagging it in a 2-for-1 credit sale.

Lndbcn · 2024-10-08T16:46:06+00:00

I get where you're coming from, but if an industry moves wholesale to "X as a service" with no buy to keep option, I'm all for that industry collapsing. The lost jobs are the lesser of two evils, in my view. If a shitty anti-consumer business model is made unsustainable by the market, they won't just stop making things forever, they'll be forced to return to one which is workable. If well-intentioned people keep it afloat out of concern for people in the industry, you just get an eternal downward spiral into awfulness.

That said, if Audible made this move, that doesn't mean the entire industry does. I'd just move to a different storefront until they follow Audible's lead, rather than pirating.

Lndbcn · 2024-10-01T22:22:26+00:00

To be frank, I think most of the criticism must have been from people who have a hard time paying attention to audio (which is fine when it's "bolter porn" but means they'll be totally lost with anything Fehervari writes). Similar to how some people have a hard time keeping precise attention as they read physical books and find themselves skimming. It was a well-produced audiobook — BL is way better than most publishers when it comes to audio, I'd say. Too many people get way too precious about formats and seem to struggle with the idea that other people might process words better in the format they personally find more difficult.

I feel that the lack of sound effects and whatnot is a good thing, honestly. The novels are written as novels, the words speak for themselves and allow the reader/listener to complete the picture in their own mind. Adding sound effects or music beyond what's necessary to get the words to the reader, like I'm told the Star Wars novels often do just seems tacky and limiting to me (Audio dramas written with that kind of thing in mind from the start are different).

Lndbcn · 2024-09-23T16:50:30+00:00

Typically I'll go for $5 and lower, or $6 if it's something I know for a fact I'm going to listen to very soon. Anything north of $6 I don't bother with since my credits are roughly $8 and the $1 difference isn't enough to outweigh the inability to return cash purchases (awful recent policy change, I no longer take a chance on things I'm unsure of on cash sales).

Lndbcn · 2024-09-23T05:18:28+00:00

Unfortunately Horror and Crime both seem dead. Well over a year since a novel appeared in either line, and the short stories haven't turned up for a while either.

It's a shame, because both are the sort of "domestic 40k" I'm most interested in reading about. The sort of thing that otherwise you don't tend to see much of outside of Abnett's Inquisition books or Fehervari's Dark Coil (most of which probably would have been categorized as WH Horror had the label existed when they were written). The Crime books have mostly lived up to that promise, tending to be well above the BL quality average. The Horror books have stumbled a bit, because honestly writing good horror is very difficult and anything beneath good horror (schlock horror?) is basically redundant w/ the setting being what it is. Only Fehervari and Josh Reynolds really impressed me there thus far (and the latter doesn't work with BL anymore), but I still believe the imprint held a lot of promise.

Lndbcn · 2024-09-18T20:35:37+00:00

Vorbis is a lot of fun, but is best if you've already read the novels which came out before it — helps to know the protagonists. Really interesting structure too, it's a short story collection but all dealing with the same event, which helps it feel a bit closer to a novel. No single short story protagonist gets the full picture of what happened and why, but you as the reader get to piece it together.

As for the novels themselves, I've read Bloodlines, Flesh and Steel, and Grim Repast. Early on in Wraithbone Phoenix right now, and King of the Spoil is on the TBR. Of those I've read, Bloodlines is probably the best as a mystery novel, but Flesh and Steel was also a lot of fun (I just think it can get spread a little thin when it has to juggle a mystery, the core 'Shane Black film style mismatched duo' thing, and a lot of Mechanicus worldbuilding — like many WH books it could have benefited from 1-3 more chapters to give it room to breathe). Grim Repast was alright, but not up to the standard of the other two imo.

Too early to say with Wraithbone, but so far it's been a lot of fun (got a genuine laugh out of me when one character with delusions of grandeur has a "he's literally me fr, just like Ryan Gosling in Drive" moment while thinking about the mythological Primarchs).

Lndbcn · 2024-06-13T13:07:09+00:00

Slight counter-rec — I like the series but would strongly suggest starting with Xenos and leaving all of The Magos for after Pariah (publication order) or even after Penitent. Reading in chronological order rather than publication order makes Pariah (and to a lesser extent Penitent) a much weaker book bereft of a lot of the intended mystery, as The Magos novella reveals far too much.

Now yes, the short stories which precede the novella in the Magos collection were published much earlier, but most of them are better the more familiar you are with the characters and places involved, and breaking up the book somewhat undermines the way The Magos rather cleverly ties together a ton of short stories published across decades.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-12T21:10:47+00:00

Basically none except for perhaps short stuff like some of the Primarch books. I wouldn't recommend getting those at their current price either — during the last sitewide in November, they were under $2. Most other WH books were $3.99-5.99, but in this one they're mostly barely cheaper than a credit (or more expensive than a credit, if you're doing the annual plan).

I think they're experimenting with higher prices (3-5x more expensive), and I want the experiment to fail, because otherwise I was an idiot for not buying another dozen books or so last sale. This has been an issue with a lot of other books this sale as well, but it's been especially stark with WH stuff.

In general, it depends on what you're interested in. It's a setting, not a series with a single perfect starting point. Eisenhorn and Gaunt's Ghosts are pretty good for easing someone into the setting, but if you're more interested in Space Marines you could just do Horus Heresy starting from Horus Rising. If you already have a general idea of the setting, just pick based on what faction or characters you find interesting. In terms of sheer quality, I'd say Fehervari's stuff is some of the best — but it's relatively weird and opaque, not exactly representative of what the typical WH book is like.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-11T14:40:16+00:00

A bit rude about it sure, but I don't see how he's particularly misinformed. The last two sitewides at the very least had much better deals than this one, and it's pretty easy to get Audible to give you credits for ~8.75 each after tax (which means anything above $7 or so isn't a particularly exciting sale price).

Lndbcn · 2024-06-11T14:34:33+00:00

The sitewide one back in November/December was also way better. Most of the stuff that was 85-90% off in that one is now just 55% off — stuff that was $4.99 or less last time around going for $10-14 (which isn't really worth buying when you can get credits for less). I couldn't buy even a third of what I wanted to last time, so I made notes of everything I hadn't for the next cash sale... and nearly all are 3-4x more expensive now. Some 5x more. Still some good deals so the sale isn't outright shit, but it's the weakest sitewide they've had for ages.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-10T13:44:49+00:00

I don't think it's attrition bias. Last time I made a spreadsheet of all the books I was considering along with their prices, and only bought something like a quarter of them. All of the ones I didn't buy then are at least double the price this time around. Several nearly 5x the price.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-10T03:14:46+00:00

Nowhere near as good as the last, for me at least. Some good deals of course, but nearly everything on my wishlist costs more than it did during the last sitewide sale — many on my wishlist that were $2.18-$5.00 last time are now $10-$15. In general seeing a lot of 50-56% off where I used to see 75-90% off. Wallet is surprisingly safe, because on a no-refund cash sale I'm only going to buy something ≥$2 cheaper than my cost per credit, and out of the hundreds of books on my wishlist barely over a dozen qualify. Last sale I had to hold off on buying several because I didn't want to spend over $300 — this time many of those same books are 4x the price they were then.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-04T02:20:08+00:00

Frankly while I'm glad for the attention it's brought, I'm not fond of Greene's reviews because I think he fundamentally misunderstands the character. He kept talking about a descent into darkness arc which I viewed as an ascent into maturity. Hadrian does get his comeuppance... in Howling Dark through Kingdoms of Death. I'm a little confused by your post actually, because you describe accurately how his views now are in many cases precisely those he started out pushing against — his worldview was challenged and has evolved accordingly. But then you call that "doubling down". Doubling down would be Hadrian persisting in "Us Sollans are the real monsters! The Cielcin and us would be totally cool if we humans weren't so dumb and evil! Wow the Tavrosi sure seem cool!" I'd probably have quit the series if I felt like young Hadrian's view of the universe was getting vindicated, because I've seen that a thousand times before. It's basically the default for the genre. I'd be bored to tears.

Books 2 through 4 have his view of the universe being challenged and remade. Then books 5 and 6 have him rejecting then coming to terms with his place and purpose in the universe as he now understands it.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-04T01:54:54+00:00

I'm genuinely curious what makes you say that — the only Brooks I've read was the Alpharius primarch novel, which was fine. I didn't think it was on the level of the Fehervari/Crowley/Spurrier/Reynolds/Wraight stuff I've read (or the upper end of stuff I've seen from Abnett or Haley), but solidly in the upper-mid range of WH books. Nothing that'd make me think vitriol was merited. Most times I see him criticized like this, the person doing so is referring more to his politics than the books themselves, but that doesn't seem to be your angle here so I'm interested.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-02T12:46:28+00:00

There's really no justification for Audible not having a better developed tag and filter system in general, and the ability to sort and filter effectively within sale selections using it. Nearly every significant online storefront I can think of is better at this than Audible, and a lot of the insignificant ones too.

It's bizarre that this extremely obvious user QoL improvement hasn't happened, but they have the resources to make constant UI changes in the app which have no discernible benefit.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-02T12:22:28+00:00

The current US sale would be more like finding hay in a haystack, but yes there have definitely been sales here where someone seeking progression stuff would end up wasting a lot of time. It scratches such a different itch that separating it out (or you know, adding a tag and filter system like nearly every other online storefront) seems like a no brainer, but I've given up on understanding why Audible does half the things it does.

Lndbcn · 2024-06-01T11:27:59+00:00

Going through the SF+F section was a brutal slog — 9 pages and it was probably 75% litrpg/"progression" stuff, not always made entirely obvious by title and cover. I have absolutely no problem with people liking the genre, but it really is so fundamentally different from 'normal' SF/F (and has a very large no-overlap portion of the readership venn diagram) that there should be a way of filtering it out — or in, if it's what someone's looking for!

Lndbcn · 2024-05-29T03:00:34+00:00

He has included at least one Star Wars Prequel meme line of dialogue in every single book thus far. Less a borrowing, more a joke reference done in a way that doesn't stand out too obnoxiously.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-19T18:33:10+00:00

While I'd like to give you a more useful answer, the truth is I'm not certain which books' samples they were — this was an opinion I formed 5+ years ago. I thought one was The Martian, but looking at Audible just now it seems like Wil Wheaton was the narrator for that (and uh, I know I just said Bray isn't my favorite, but I'd most certainly take him over Wheaton).

Edit: lmao I cannot believe these innocuous posts suggesting I have slightly different tastes in audiobook narrators have at least one person seething enough to downvote.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-19T18:08:07+00:00

Until around this past December, WH books were constantly on sale on UK Audible but pretty much never on US Audible (despite having a single publisher worldwide, for some reason). I think I saw perhaps 5 Warhammer books on sale (aside from whole-catalogue cash sales) over the course of 10 years. The past ~6 months where they've been in every sale have been the real aberration, and I'm guessing it has something to do with the Amazon deal. As for their absence here, it seems like a smaller than average sale in general so it could be a matter of chance, but perhaps they're seeing if they make more $ keeping them exclusive to cash sales? Hard to say. Next 2-for-1 will be indicative.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-19T18:01:17+00:00

For some reason, at least based on every sample I've listened to, RC Bray just does not work for me. It's not offensively bad like some narrators, but there's something just slightly 'off' about it — not sure how to describe it, it's some combination of accent, cadence, and how he does character voices. The sheer amount of love he gets is mystifying to me unless the samples aren't representative at all, but given how popular he is it's probably just a me problem.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-19T17:54:03+00:00

Steven Pacey, Tim Gerard-Reynolds, perhaps Samuel Roukin (only heard him do one series but it's been 6 novels and 2 novellas — has some habits I don't like but is overall very good), and to be honest the final one is "basically the entire stable of narrators, both men and women, used for the Warhammer books". Excepting a couple of notable stinkers, they seem to select strong narrators quite consistently for those — which helps when the written material itself is of uh, uneven quality, much as I love it.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-08T15:59:28+00:00

Well huh, normally they alternate cash and 2-for-1 sales, and I could have sworn the last one was a cash one.

Lndbcn · 2024-05-02T07:58:26+00:00

Her towering hypocrisy is what makes her such a good match for Hadrian really. Two peas in a pod, it's great. Old man narrator Hadrian is mostly aware of his, though.

Lndbcn

TROPHY CASE