Re: Books by Stephen King
Lol Bryan, I think your mum has a bit of a missconception about scale if she believed it was possible for Jaws to fit in her sink .
I agree Dark Abomination, King can wander rather severely over miner characters, particularly harping on their various nafarious doings, that was one thing which surprised me about Doctor Sleep, that it actually cracked along at quite a pace, often too quickly as I said.
Interestingly enough, Salem's lot was the King book my dad (who got me into Steven king back when I was thirteen), recommended when I complained about King wandering, since my Dad stated that Salem's lot was the one King novel that started creepy and carried on. I admit though my over all patience has improved as I've got older, (I couldn't have got through the wheel of time if not).
christine is one of King's I've not read, though i'd be interested on your recommendation.
Gayman I really like, albeit reading Neverwhere as his first novel (after I watched the Tv series), was probably a mistake since having now read all Gayman's novels and short stories I still regardd NEverwhere and American Gods his best. My only issue with some of gayman is that while it's amazingly written, very poetic and has a wonderful sense of fantasy, a lot is too much of a skim. Stardust felt like this, it setup fantastically and then stopped, and while mystery is a wonderful thing sometimes Gayman's level of mystery is a little too much to tell a coherent story. Grave yard book was a wonderful read with some great ideas, ---- but it just felt like a collection of sketches, not a complete work, since the plot that tied everything together just felt far too thin in many places for all that the writing quality was so good that you rarely noticed.
china Mievelle I haven't read yet (though he's on my list of authors to try), however I know Clive Barker very well.
I really! enjoyed weave world, my first barker novel, however everything I've read by him sinse has just felt a come down, getting far too bogged down in rather too much x rated s/xual stuff, not merely in descriptions of incidents when they occur, (and they do frequently), but as over all themes in most of the rest of the book.
Great and Secret show I enjoyed, though had to zone out during much of it, and imagica was an absolute slog in places, though in both of those books there was enough of really nicely done speculative, poetic and just planely well written fantasy and philosophical edges to make up, however the Damnation game was a disappointment, and Sacriment I actually had to give up half way through, something I literally never do with books. After that I just decided I'd read the best of Baarker and didn't want to try anymore, which was a shame since I'd still regard We ave world as one of the finest works of it's type I've ever read.
Of course, I admit my genophobia makes it difficult for me to correctly assess books with such themes. For someone like Steven King, robbin Hobb, or George R R Martin, where descriptions can be extreme but occur infrequently, I can zone out enough while such things are being described for them not to bother me, however in a writer like Barker or Anne Rice where such things pretty much consume most of the book discomfort can just get a bit too much.
I've not heard of Libba Bray or Catharin M vallente before, but if you like stuff with the weerd, mythological edge, I can highly recommend Tim Powers, really weerd stuff with a historical and literary twist, especially the Anubis gates, On stranger tides and Dinner at Devient's palace. Dianna wynne jones is also pretty awsome for really twisted takes on fairy tales and alternative magic. Though her books tend to be young adult or nomainall y aimed at children, in terms of concept, characters and writing they are just fascinating, it also helps she can write, although probably her most famous novel, howl's moving Castle I regard as one of her worst. Still her chrestomancy series, the stand alone semi scifi Alternate reality novel A tale of Time city, and the novel Castle in the air, I can highly recommend. I also very much Enjoyed Tad Williams War of the flowers as an example of what I believe you mean by Myth punk, as well as Brandon Sanderson's mistborn series.
An author I also recently reacquainted myself with was Susan Cooper. most people know her Dark is rising series, but the book i read was Seaward, a more adult novel and almost in it's impressionistic and beautifully described setting of a journey by two characters across a fantasy world towards a highly unknown goal a prototype for series like The Dark Tower, although far shorter and more compact.
I'll actually be writin g a review of Seaward for www.fantasybookreview.co.uk in the next couple of days.
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