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Here's an official thread for it. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get it before Saturday, but hopefully it's at the nearest barnes and nobles so I don't have to read it in an E-book format or wait for the library to get it from another library on the other side of New Jersey.

If you're gonna talk about the actual book, please change the subject bar above and add in '[Spoilers]' or something. Thanks ^_^

What pages are you guys on? I am around 164.

 As I said in the other thread, the first chapters were very bad, the POV's made it confusing and it just wasn't written good enough. It also seemed a bit unrealistic that they would believe a guy who tells them he traveled across from another world xD Once they travel to Fionavar, it does get better. 

The way the plot was going on C1 made me almost want to put my book down.

But my eyes seem to agree with the US Navy Chant.  "I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN!"

I gave up. >_<

*Gasp*

Why?

Shallow characterization multiplied by too many viewpoint characters. I just didn't care enough about any of them to keep slogging through mediocre prose.

It really drove home the virtues of a limited third person POV, so... I guess I got something out of it?

Pretty much what I thought when I was reading it too, it does seem to get a little better though.

Oof damn. At least it was a vote though, so it's everyone's fault! :D not mine

Anyone else's thoughts on it so far? I'm probs gonna try to read it anyhow.

Should've picked Night Watch.

The die rolled :P

Got the book now, I'll be starting it soon.

FUCK IT, I QUIT.  This just too DAMN unreasonable for me to go on reading any more.

I just can't...no.

I know this was made in 1984, but the plot seemed so random, as if all the events were randomly made.

Hurrr, let's get on with and...ur...dur surm murgic....hurr...

...hurrr i rapeed human woman hurr...ohnurr i might get kid with demon power too hurr...

-.-

-.- (\

-.(\

Not too far into it, but I didn't think the first chapter was that bad.

...Brighter lights ahead people! (I hope) XD

Nope, it just gets really, really, really bad towards the end.

...man, now I almost want to read the rest of it just to see how bad it gets. XD

Well I'm around the middle since I haven't had much time to read but it's got better from the first chapter. Guess I'll see how the first book ends then I assume shortly after we all pick book two (I'm guessing not the rest of the series from ppls reactions lol

I wouldn't mind reading the rest of it to be honest.

I'll be reading the whole thing (all the books) since I want to see where it tries to lead but I already have them all in 1 big book and it will only take me 1 or two days where I actually get reading time so I should have it all read by the time we pick the next book.

I also gave up shortly after I began reading it. I'm sure I'll force myself to finish later but I won't be enjoying it as much. It's not that horrible but it's written strangely.

I dunno, I enjoy it.

@Sethaniel brought up a good point. I'll just be honest and say I'm not a super Tolkien fan, but I'm liking the book so far.

It's very Tolkien-influenced.  I can see the amount of mythcrafting that must have gone into it, but the writing style is tough to get invested in.

Skip this part if you don't want to hear an old man complain:

You kids today have no idea how great you have it.  When I was 14, there were no kids or teen fantasy books, there wasn't even a teen section in the library.  If you wanted to read fantasy, this is what you got.  I look back at series I loved in high school, like Thomas Covenant, and I wonder how the hell I put up with that writing style.  But they were all like that.  It's like they hadn't learned that you don't have to write like Tolkien to create worlds like he did.

Basically, this just isn't how fantasy books are written any more.  It might be a really great story, but it feels outdated because of the language used.

I didn't find the writing itself bad, but the plot...everything's so counter-intuitive...it looks like the author rushed to get all the story events lined up just right to make it move forward, but failed to cover it up so the attempt would actually look plausible.

I finally got time to actually sit down and read it all properly, and honestly, it wasn't that bad overall. The intro and the outro were both fell flat unfortunately. The POV's could be a bit confusing sometimes and the writing throughout, generally lacked a bit. It also seemed just....unrealistic, they enter this world and near the end they seem to act as if they had always been there. Overall though, it wasn't bad and I would like to continue The Fionavar Tapestry.

So, are we all either finished reading, or gave up on the book?

I should be done today

I finished.

I'm a slow reader. Typically only get pages done weekends haha.

I felt rushed and pressured to read it xD I suppose next time I will relax a bit.

That's great though. Sorry about that haha. Good work Madbrad, unfortunate we can't discuss it yet.

Should be done today, I haven't had much time sadly though I'm really seeing what Seth meant about the older style, I grew up on Tolken and War and Peace so the more I have read of this the more comfortable it has felt style wise.

So, just finished the book yesterday, and I have to ask Morgan and Swift one question.

How could you not like this book?! It was fantastic, ha ha. I absolutely adored some of the characters (specifically, Dave, Taroc, Diarmuid, and Paul)

I'm like 20 pages from the end of the first book and I can sum up my experience easily:

Didn't like the first chapter or two and the little bit following, I was like "Just hard to read, why did he write it like this?"

Then I read Seth's comment and thought about it. I read hundreds of books in this style when I was young. I just need to turn off my "I WANT INSTANT GRATIFICATION" part of my brain that modern writing appeals too.

I then read up till now and loved it, Really enjoying Dave's story the most

Yeah, first chapter was hard to read, the rest was fantastic. Didn't really like Jennifer as a character, but everything else was pretty good.

I'd say Jennifer was my least favorite, too.

Who was your favriote?

Not sure.  I kinda feel like I'm supposed to like Dave best.  Which makes me like him less.

I thought Kevin was pretty cool. He was also Jewish, and got the most tail, so that's probably why. Dave was awesomer though.

Paul was... Odd.

Aman took my copy, so I'm gonna try to finish it today.

About 100 pages in. Kind of confusing, but not bad at all so far.

Like I said: "Shallow characterization multiplied by too many viewpoint characters. I just didn't care enough about any of them to keep slogging through mediocre prose."

If I'd kept slogging, maybe I would've gotten to the point where I cared about the characters. But then I would've had to slog through the whole damn trilogy, so yeah... no.

For what it's worth, my standards are a hell of a lot higher than they were when I was in high school. You would not believe the tripe I used to read and like... or how few books I actually bother to own, these days. :P

I'd kinda believe it if it was high school students being ported to Fionavar, but COLLEGE STUDENTS?!

These are supposed to be people with great intellect pursuing a goal mostly FOR INTELLIGENT people and apparently, some so-called Fate is going to control them and easily snatch them out of Earth?

And then there's also the fact with Jennifer is holding Maugrim's child, which could or could not end up being a pretty DAMN powerful ally should s/he grow up?  Where was the thought in Maugrim?  Why would he risk his entire progress just to satisfy his gonads?  Would've been better for him if he just focused on outright killing everybody like his role as a deity describes him.  I know this was the 1980's but...everything happens a little too perfectly, Or maybe it's just Fate.  Or the author's arbitrary decisions.

Not incredibly impressed that the author decided to recycle old legends into some new tales, though the writing style I was fine with.  The original story of King Arthur was thrown into some child fantasy, in my opinion.

That's part of the whole book, ha ha. Everything is directly linked to the tapestry, and all the pieces fall into place. And it goes both ways. In [spoiler] Dave's sequence, they barely survive because FATE lead the group directly into the massive group of villains[/spoiler]

Not really a spoiler for me, since...

...you do realize I talked about Jennifer's rape, right?

... Yes?

Well I thought it started out slowly, taking its time over the introduction of characters and why you should care, this was the prevalent style of fantasy, and a lot of literary writing for decades , and the books old, so while annoying I see why he did it. Once I realized it was written in an older style I got through it happily, till mid book where the writing made up for itself and I found it really interesting and a good read. Reached the end very happy with the book and defiantly going to read the rest of the series.

The thing that I thought was hardest to grasp was all the wacky names haha. I didn't even think the first chapter was all that bad, but the influx of names was hard to organize and remember, even with the cast page on the flap.

It's funny, because I have this problem with a lot of fantasy type stories. The names are hard for me to remember and to keep track of.

Luckily I get the names fairly easily. I think I don't think of them as names but rather shapes which I then assign to the char. Then each time I see a long name like DxxMxxD I just think of the character. Then I don't need to remember the full name necessarily, just it's shape on the page. (Which is actually how most people read but that's a different discussion) usually then it just takes a few chapter for the rest of the name to naturally sink in.

you should read War and Peace, amazing book but over 60 pages at the start are just char intro of endless people at a party...

By the end of the book I start to remember their names, but a lot of the chars could have names that start with the same letters. Usually I try to remember names based off of the first letter, but it doesn't help all the time haha.

Like, in this book, there was a shit ton of 'A' names that I kept confusing.

... I think I'll stay away from that until my brain matures XD

And in War and Peace, they're all Russian, so they all have names like Pyotr Kirillovich Beuzhkov (aka Pierre,) or Princess Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya.  And also because of the Russian, nicknames can be hard to pair with the long name.  Like Mikhail = Mischa, okay I get it, but Aleksander = Sasha. 

Wut