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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   2230 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for September 1, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I forgot how god damn fun the series Cradle by Will Wight is. Something about the cultivation/progression fantasy genre just really speaks to me, inspires me in a way other fiction doesn't do often enough.

On the non-fiction side it's rarer to find a fun book, but I remember really liking Moonwalking with Einstein, where a journalist learns to become a memory champ.

What are some of the most fun things you've read, fiction or non fiction?

A Practical Guide to Evil is a great deconstruction of fantasy. 12 Miles Below is an action-packed sci-fi progression fantasy. Super Supportive is supposedly a book about superheroes but really takes a turn--I'd call it more of a modern fantasy story. The Game at Carousel is a horror movie litRPG.

All highly recommended, those are the first things that come to mind when you mention fun.

+1 on the 12 Miles Below rec. It was one of the best progression fantasy books I've read in awhile. The pacing was superb and the writing was as good as progression fantasy gets (low bar, but still).

Have any other recommendations for someone with the following tastes?

  1. Decent writing
  • I'd say something like at least highschool level and with at least some attempt made at proofreading
  • Sadly, it seems less than 25% of the books pass this bar.
  • If I have to read another book that includes the dreaded "As you know..."
  1. Novelty
  • I've read probably 100 progression fantasy books. I don't need to read yet another inferior Cradle clone.
  1. Respectful of reader/subject matter
  • None of the writers in this genre are skilled enough to pull off breaking the 4th wall
  • Similarly, their attempts at "humor" usually are so bad they break any immersion.

As an aside, having a genre with many non-native speakers and authors I imagine are under the age of 15 does lead to some unintentionally funny situations. Earlier this week my girlfriend and I had a good laugh at a MC applying a tourniquet to his neck because his head was bleeding :)

+1 on the 12 Miles Below rec.

I enjoyed 12MB, but mostly because of the unique setting. The protagonist lucks into all the things that give him power progression, as opposed to planning, training, or using his own unique cleverness to problem solve. IIRC, despite being characterized as a brainy engineer, his major contribution to his own success is using a few Bash commands.

While I would disagree that he is that helpless, I actually think this one of the better aspects of this story.

Most MCs in progresssion fantasy fall into one of two tropes:

  1. Hardest worker/never back down (this often makes little sense given how growth & power is exponential. If progress was that linear many more people would be grinding, but I digress)
  2. Boy genius. Sometimes this works, but often it is the redditor meme: “In this moment, I am euphoric. Not because of any phony god’s blessing. But because, I am enlightened by my intelligence.”

so it is nice to see something a bit different.

12MB is definitely a much slower burn. Rather than a chapter of being worthless (or just a paragraph in many Isekais), the character is weak for almost all of the book. Weak in terms of power and weak in terms of decision making. He is very much an imperfect character who makes stupid decisions that have heavy costs. I personally like this aspect because it makes the progression feel more meaningful. I don't want to praise the pacing too much since it is still just the first book and there are still plenty of ways the author could ruin it.

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