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Just finished another Ford "novel" Casting Fortune. It's a collection of two short stories and a novella set in the shared world of Liavek, a sort of Lankhmarian city state filled with magic, weird cults and the like. I'd previously read a few other stories set in this universe, including a...

Currently reading The Separation by Christopher Priest, my first by this author. Liking its gentle, mannered prose and hints of strangeness that, I'm promised, are eventually going to send this book into quite mind-bending territory. Also enjoy the strong sense of place that Priest manages to...

Indeed. No need to put the word "literature" in inverted brackets here. As a novelist and storyteller he's of the very highest quality.

Picked up a couple of Flashman remainders in a favorite haunt of mine today, Flashman's Lady and Flashman at the Charge. This brings my sum total up to six at the moment. Also picked up Ian Fleming's Thunderball, one of the few Bond novels I've yet to read.

I've long been intrigued by a number of Priest's books, but have never thus far picked one up. Reading the comments in this thread he seems like he'd be right up my alley. Am I right in saying that he shares a lot with the magical realists? That's the impression I'm getting.

I don't see how an entire genre can consist of only one real character, and remain meaningful.

I wasn't that impressed with the film, to be honest. Just found it all a bit too unrelentingly glum and dour. The TV series on the other hand, I loved, and having now read the novel feel did great justice to the source material.

Still on a bit of spy kick, finally got round to picking up Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by le Carre, which I'm loving at the moment. Much more accessible than I thought it would be, and a great example of how a novel can be gripping without resorting to huge amounts of action, with much of the...

I'd definitely recommend The Final Reflection then. It's short, well-paced, complex without being confusing, and the relative familiarity of the universe it's in takes away a little of the mental legwork needed to orient yourself while allowing Ford to refer to things/people/events outside the...

I wouldn't condemn him so fast as that. Ford's works are never easy, like I said, but they're all varied enough that not liking one doesn't necessarily mean you won't like or even love another. One of the problem with people's first exposure to Ford I think is that his most well known and widely...

Thought it might be worthwhile to get a discussion going on this somewhat under-read but brilliant author. Ford, who passed away in 2006, is probably best known for his fantasy cum alternate history extravaganza The Dragon Waiting, which was recently published under the Fantasy Masterworks...

That's one thing I'll say about de Camp: he was always readable. Which may sound like a bit of a back-handed compliment but isn't, really. He also had a knack for injecting a genuine sense of fun into a story the way Pratchett is (or was) able to do.

Leiber has one of those idiosyncratic styles that takes a bit of getting used to. I didn't really gel with a lot of his work earlier on, though I recognised it for its originality, skill and general verve. I'm still not wholly a devotee of his, but I find I can get a lot more out of his work in...

Currently reading The Company: A Novel of the CIA by Robert Littell. It's a real monster of a book, nine hundred pages of smallish type, but a page-turner for all that. The book's a semi-fictionalised retelling of various events the CIA played key parts in, including the Hungarian uprising and...

Technically, perhaps, though the two genres are so niche and have so many parallels that I wonder if there's really any point in differentiating them. Brackett's Stark tales, for example, share much more in common with Howard, Moore et al than they do to even early science fiction, and I'm not...

I haven't been reading much SF this year so I have quite a bit of regular fiction on the list. Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates - brilliant unflinching tale about a prickly suburban couple living in 1950s America and their dreams of a better life. I never thought I'd enjoy a novel like...

I haven't read this one yet, though I've read a couple of his other novels so I can see where you're coming from here. Ford was by all accounts an incredibly complex individual and his works require tremendous concentration and careful (re)reading to fathom out; nonetheless I find the experience...

The Weird is available as both a book and a kindle ebook. If you have a laptop, you can download an app for PC or Mac that reads kindle books. Well worth it, especially if you're a fan of the Tartarus Press books, which can be had much cheaper than if you were to order the print books.

Although I'd agree that the Deptford Trilogy isn't magical realism in the strict sense, it's just so bathed in the feeling of the numinous that it works on many of the same levels, where it's not so much the overt magical elements that appeal but the overall atmosphere of the piece (its...

Obvious choice, but the Flashman series by George MacDonald Fraser is a series which I can wholeheartedly recommend to anyone who likes fast-moving, richly detailed adventure fiction of any kind. Martin is a big fan of this. Start at the beginning and work your way through, or skip straight to...