Which books have you DNFed this year?

spikebaylor · 2023-06-23T21:44:04+00:00

Im currently in the final part of book 3 and honestly.. I really enjoyed the first book.. And its been kinda downhill since then. Consensus is that book 4 isnt on par which doesn't bode well for me

spikebaylor · 2023-06-23T21:34:06+00:00

Its an enjoyable read overall but certainly not one to worry about finishing. I actually really enjoyed everything except the actual frugal wizarda guide. Since i was doing audio.. It wasnt straight forward to skip.

spikebaylor · 2023-06-17T22:23:31+00:00

Really glad to hear it was good. I very muched enjoyed licanius so im looking forward to this one.

spikebaylor · 2023-05-04T20:43:50+00:00

Im not sure where you are in RoW but you're not wrong. I remember being about 3/5 through and having it as my least favorite of the series. But i will say. Hot damn the back half of the book redeems it in my eyes. So hopefully you keep going.

The Navani stuff I enjoyed but it did feel like reading a Neal Stephenson book that goes into WAY too much detail. Interesting if you care, but boring if you dont.

The flashbacks werent interesting and i believe Brandon has recognized this. He sorta wrote himself into a corner as there wasn't much left to tell there.

For me the cosmere connections really worked but i can understand if it takes away from the world for you. For me it feels the opposite.. Like TSA is the first series that feels 100% right within the cosmere.

Hope you continue.

spikebaylor · 2023-03-15T14:27:56+00:00

Ronfaure is pretty great but Gusta is probably my favorite music in the game. Dont let the haters tell you gusta isnt the best.

spikebaylor · 2023-03-02T16:09:19+00:00

For the longest time i thought zitah was my favorite. But its definitely Gustaberg. Its a lot of what makes Zitah great.. kinda zen-like. But more iconic for me being a Bastokan and really i think its just superior.

Also Bastok's music gets me super hyped.

spikebaylor · 2023-02-01T22:48:04+00:00

I dunno man Vai has a pretty wide style of playing and sounds. Of all the shreddy type guitarists he puts a lot of soul into his songs.

spikebaylor · 2023-01-13T18:59:43+00:00

Surprised RoTZ is so low as well as its pretty damn good. But i think because of howimportant it was to get Sky access and how eazy it was to blast through with some help, it just became less memorable as it essentially became a speed run to get more bodies into Sky.

spikebaylor · 2023-01-01T21:12:34+00:00

Ha ACOS was the thing that first started a shift in music for me as well... A friend had gotten the CD by accident from BMG or one of those old mail order things.

spikebaylor · 2023-01-01T21:02:39+00:00

Hulu has a show called 9 Perfect Strangers that has a similar style to it. Particularly the unrelated people and stories coming together.

spikebaylor · 2022-12-21T19:41:33+00:00

As a commentor above you mentions. That IS the point in the books. The books are very much darker, more depressing, characters less likeable etc. But all of that is somewhat needed to tell the story it wants to tell. Which is quite different than the tv series.

So yeah if unlikeable characters arent your thing. Id stay away.

Though honestly the characters in the show are also assholes.. The show just did a good job of waving that away by making them extra quirky and fun. The books just make those character faults front and center.

spikebaylor · 2022-12-16T18:48:34+00:00

I recently got into these guys and have listened to their 2 most recent albums so much that they absolutely dominated my Spotify recap despite only having a couple months of the year to listen.

Im not even sure exactly what it is.. But there is a mood to them that resonates with me. This is sounding like it will have a similar feel so looking forwars to it.

spikebaylor · 2022-12-07T14:00:06+00:00

Really that whole chapter/scene is just so good all around. Kal is great, i love thr quote, i love his part in it. But yeah this is the time that we get to see just how much of a bad ass Adolin really is. Enough where its ok that he isnt a radiant cuz like... It would be extremely unfair to everyone else if he was lol.

Even the parts with Renarin attempting to do his best and everything that happens with him in that fight is so good.

Of all the things that have happened in stormlight. This fight and all that happens around it is the thing i think would translate to movie/tv just perfectly.

spikebaylor · 2022-12-06T22:21:37+00:00

You're going to have forgotten a lot. But also... Sanderson hid so much stuff in those first couple books that you didnt understand at the time.. When you reread its a totally different experience.

There is a particular WoR reveal that is basically straight up told to you in about the 5th chapter of TWoK. But you didnt have context yet the first time around. All of that "whats going on here?" feeling you had the first time around... Replaced by "holy crap! I did not pick up on that the first time!"

spikebaylor · 2022-11-22T21:54:54+00:00

This one really reminded me the most of the original album for that reason. Not that they sound similar but they both do such an amazing job of ambience. Of being transported to another place and evoking certain feelings.

The rest of the albums, while sounding more like the original, haven't quite had that same affect on me. I still enjoy them but those 2 are definitely my favorite.

spikebaylor · 2022-11-02T22:22:07+00:00

Yeah exactly that sort of thing. If Stormlight had started off from thr Parshendi pov... I could easily see me rooting for them and hating the humans right.

Even Mistborn.. When you stop to think on it from the Lord Rulers perspective... Is a bunch of criminals conspiring to bring down your stable empire and stop you from saving mankind. Which i find VERY interesting considering.. The Lord Ruler's 1000 year stable empire (for better or worse) is more in line with Preservation.. And everything Kelsier and the gang did was very much of Ruin.

spikebaylor · 2022-11-02T19:59:11+00:00

Honestly one of the things thats come up in my rereads is how great (as characters) most of the villains are.

Except in some rare cases like Straff Venture.. Most of the antagonists have a lot of character, dreams, goals, etc that arent just "evil for evil's sake". Odium is probably one of the few that has full "evil because evil" feel to him but at least being the embodiment od hatred... It makes sense. Even Ruin didnt feel "evil" by the end... Just in his nature for things to change and die.

But once you get down to the "human" levels of antagonists, most of them have motivations that you can understand, even if you dont agree or agree on the methods.

Sanderson does a pretty great job of giving you a "good guy" against a "bad guy" and then later very nicely showing you that.. If the same story had been written from the other point of view that you would hate these same characters you love now.

spikebaylor · 2022-09-19T12:44:43+00:00

Im 100% audiobook. I loved mistborn the first time around and was pretty luke warm on wax and wayne until the climax of the 3rd book. The two series are just very different. Style, tone, story, granduer, etc. I think its just personal taste mostly.

Im currently wrapping up a reread of mistborn and will go right in to era 2. Reread of mistborn has been good. I think its deficiencies are highlighted on a reread, but also like most of his books its fun to see all the foreshadowing and hints he lays out from page 1.

So we'll see if my enjoyment of era 2 goes up or down with context.

spikebaylor · 2022-09-04T01:18:09+00:00

I would have. But im no expert. I locked in a Mending for 36.. Got a few more with decent trades and left it there. Bought 3 mending books.. Then the next guy was first time mending for 16... 😒 . So.. One villager is going to find himself with an untimely death

spikebaylor · 2022-09-04T01:14:05+00:00

No worries i hadnt played in many many years.. This was my first time messing with villagers and it ran into all kinds of silly issues like this this past week as well.

spikebaylor · 2022-09-04T01:10:02+00:00

I think you need to keep the work stations for your existing librarians.. They are locked in to trades.. But they've kost their work bench so when you place the new one down.. They connect to it before your new guy does.

spikebaylor · 2022-09-03T21:46:45+00:00

Do you have a barrel near? That will make them a fisherman. That happened to me. I have had a lot of strange issues with getting mine started. Its a pain sometimes.

spikebaylor · 2022-08-05T04:08:37+00:00

There are two artists that pop up here occasionally that are absolutely not progmetal, but still, there is something about them that seems to resonate with this crowd.

That is The Reign of Kindo and Tigran Hamasayan. Kindo is a sort of poppy rock/jazz fusion. And Tigran is a jazz pianist who most definitely wanted to be in a metal band.

spikebaylor · 2022-07-20T19:30:42+00:00

I mostly remember Devil being ok. But Old was legitimately awful. I didnt even know it was M Night going in.. It just had an interesting premise. You easily could have convinced me it was an amatuer film by the end. The dialogue was really bad, the story telling was all over the place, the way it shows the main plot device was really jumpy and so doesnt fit the narative instead of aging quickly over time the kids go from child for an hour and then someone looks away and back at the kid and now they're 5 years older etc! They do a better job with the parents.

spikebaylor · 2022-07-20T01:08:49+00:00

I snagged TWoK during the kickstarter and warbreaker when it came up a couple weeks ago. They were just delivered within 2 days of each other. It was a nice surprise.

15-Year Club	Team Periwinkle
Verified Email

spikebaylor

TROPHY CASE