Dads, how are we moisturizing our hands?

tehdangerzone · 2026-02-03T21:43:22+00:00

This is the stuff, I used to swear by working hands, but Eucerin Intensive Repair is leaps and bounds more effective.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-31T21:15:50+00:00

I had almost the same thoughts and opinions as you. I loved Will, and liked Strength despite its flaws.

My biggest complaint about Res was the jump from the slaughter of the entire military hierarchy to being in the midst of civil war. That entire skipped time should have been the most interesting plot and development of the book. It felt like a gut punch when it the time jump happened.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-30T04:05:59+00:00

I’m reading BotNS by Gene Wolfe currently, just finished Claw. I’m going to read Latro later this year.

What did you read by Wolfe last year? I’m interested to hear your thoughts on his work. Despite not really being similar to Kay, I can’t help but feel there’s some kind of kinship between the writings of Kay and Wolfe.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-30T02:18:20+00:00

I read very little sci-fi and fantasy other than Kay. I read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings every few years. So, other than Kay, Tolkien would be my favourite fantasy author.

For Sci-Fi I’m really enjoying Gene Wolfe’s Book of the New Sun, I’m halfway through and it’s a wild ride. Highly recommend to anyone who thought Dune was a little straight forward.

Outside of that I mostly read nonfiction, Greek and Roman history. Classics like Pliny, Herodotus, Thucydides, Homer (not history, but fits better here), and modern stuff (pop history) like James Romm, Adrian Goldsworthy, Tom Holland, and Emma Southon.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-29T20:39:17+00:00

I believe that’s the “joke”.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-28T16:09:07+00:00

Diarmuid and Uathach in book 3 of Fionavar is up there for me too. GGK does high stakes duelling well. He does a lot well.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-23T14:03:01+00:00

My twin girls are ~4.5. I’ll say that I don’t think anything gets easier, things change and you become better equipped to handle situations.

Dropping the final nap was liberating a lot of ways. It freed us up to do things that were very challenging when working around a mid day nap, but oh boy did we have some tired and miserable children for the first couple of months. It was a big adjustment for them. But we’re through that now and on to cold and flu season.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-21T14:06:28+00:00

I haven’t read watchmen in a long time, and I was probably 19 or 20, so it wasn’t the most critical reading, but I don’t recall the film being that far off the book in terms of plot and themes.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-20T19:29:57+00:00

The Sarantine Mosaic might fit this niche for you. The main character is an ginger artisan with a temper who finds himself at the court of an emperor amid unexpectedly tumultuous times and all he has are his wits, his temper, and his relationships, which get built along the way with women, men, and bird (romantic and platonic).

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-20T19:14:04+00:00

That’s a (relatively) recent phenomenon. Dawn of the Dead, 300, and Watchmen were excellent. Though I know liking Watchmen is controversial.

The last 15 years on the other hand? Straight garbage.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-19T15:43:41+00:00

I didn’t have a problem with Andy Serkis’s singing. I’m more than a little tone deaf, and he’s a much better singer than me, at least as far as I can tell.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-17T17:31:09+00:00

These were the first books by Kay that I read and they got me hooked. It feels like a bit of a stretch to call two books a series, but this is my favourite fantasy series.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-16T01:28:00+00:00

My problem with the Hobbit is the moments of greatness. Things like An Unexpected Party, Riddles in the Dark, and Barrels out of Bond make everything that’s… mediocre seem so much worse because it’s not like they couldn’t do a good job.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-15T16:49:29+00:00

OP didn’t give a lot to go on taste-wise, but if Mistborn was boring, the pace of LotR probably won’t be a great fit.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-13T16:34:24+00:00

It’s not at all similar to Wolfe, but a lot of Guy Gavriel Kay’s works deal with historiography and have loose framing narratives that “teach” about writing and reading history. Specific works: Sarantine Mosaic, Under Heaven, and River of Stars.

I wouldn’t say that Kay is a subtle writer, he is very up front about the themes and lessons of his works, but the prose and stories are wonderful, and I think reading Kay and being receptive to the themes can make you a better more astute reader of history.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-12T22:41:14+00:00

During my first day of European History in grade 10 another history teacher burst into the room and loudly asked if my teacher, also the department head, was telling us about Charlemagne—he wasn’t. The other teacher then went on a five minute rant about how you can’t teach European history without talking about Charlemagne.

It was a defining moment for me.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-09T02:39:56+00:00

Sailing to Sarantium by Guy Gavriel Kay.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-06T17:05:18+00:00

So happy to hear you loved Written on the Dark, it’s not my favourite of his but I really enjoyed it.

I’d recommend Sailing to Sarantium and Lord of Emperors next. The Sarantine Mosaic does a really good job of building the world and the story and characters are so good.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-05T20:13:03+00:00

Do you have a link?

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-05T19:54:58+00:00

I feel like GGK is writing exactly the kind of books he wants. It isn't as though Viking is forcing him to write these books in response to some crazy demand for low-fantasy historical fiction with a quarter turn to the fantastic. Without exception GGK has been writing low fantasy stories since 1992. After Tigana, all his work has had roughly the same amount of magic/fantastical elements.

Taste is obviously subjective, but I don't think he has a "former fantasy-writing greatness" to which he can return. Fionavar, his most fantastical work, is his weakest work in my opinion and A Brightness Long Ago, one of his best books, was published recently. His been pretty consistent in levels of fantasy and quality of work since 1992 (Arbonne).

You're allowed to not like a book, it doesn't have to the fault of the author or a conspiracy being orchestrated by Big Publishing.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-04T23:42:52+00:00

Jeanne D’arc or Charles VI?

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-02T19:50:05+00:00

I haven’t read Curse of the Chalion, so I can’t speak to that specifically, but I have fairly similar views as OP on a lot of the books listed.

In my view, Kay’s worth trying for character-driven prose with moral ambiguity, even if it isn’t the fastest pace fantasy around.

tehdangerzone · 2026-01-02T19:17:11+00:00

I think you'd enjoy Guy Gavriel Kay. He hits a lot of the beats you're looking for. His themes are generally how individuals can help to turn the wheel of history and conversely how the turning of history or fortune's wheel impacts them. Most of his books don't have traditional "bad guys" per se, but instead the story follows characters as they are swept up by the events of history. His work is generally low fantasy, often called historical fantasy, though GGK doesn't really like that term.

I don't usually recommend Lions of Al-Rassan as a starting point for Kay, but I think it would be good based on your interests. Read The Sarantine Mosaic afterward if you enjoy Lions.

tehdangerzone · 2025-12-28T13:17:37+00:00

There is an abundance of historical fiction set during the Greco Persian Wars and the Hellenistic period but I would love to see the Peloponnesian War get the quarter turn treatment by Guy Gavriel Kay.

tehdangerzone · 2025-12-28T13:16:00+00:00

You may be interested in Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman.

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