I am not a SciFi/Magic/Supernatural fan. Star Trek was fun in a popcorn sort of way. I could not stand Picard so that did it for Next Generation, Voyager was meh! and I could barely stand Enterprise because I am a fan of Scott Bakula. I have no idea what Serenity is all about and I think Cylons are the modern cousins of the Wizard of Oz’s Tin Man (The Tin Man miniseries was cool though.) I think I own no “traditional” SciFi books and the only thing redeeming from the fires of SciFi Fan Hate is that I have actually watched 2001: Space Odyssey over 20 times and the best SciFi ever made for TV is a tie between Quantum Leap and Babylon 5.
So here comes Larry Correia with MHI and I love the darn book. Still I will not give up and call myself a SicFi fan but a Correia fan. The MHI books are fast, funny and can’t-put-down. But if you are expecting another episode in the M.H.I saga, you’ll be disappointed. Hard Magic is a monster of a totally different species, standing all on its own and even in a tract of history that is alternative to what you should know if you paid any attention in school. It is alternative history where Magic has thrown a monkey wrench on what we know and the world is now dealing with it. It is much darker than MHI and also slower and with good reason: this smells like a series of books around a theme that cannot be just explained and resolved in 500 pages, maybe not even in 5,000 pages. Hard Magic is a preamble of things to come and told from an era where Good and Evil were clearly defined and not the blurry “everything is relative” B.S. so cherished by modern authors. It was time when you might be wrong, but the fixing of the wrong was important thing and not making excuses for it.
Get your copy of Hard Magic. Book I of the The Grimnoir Chronicles, a good sofa and isolate yourself from this world since you will be needing all your concentration reading about that world.
FTC Warning: The only thing I got from this book is the satisfaction of a good reading. Larry refuses to gimme any goods or services for my reviews.
I have a copy on order.
“the best SciFi ever made for TV is a tie between Quantum Leap and Babylon 5”
I like B5 as much as the next guy, but Firefly beats the pants off of it.
B5 was never SciFi 😉
It was staged around SciFi but it was more about Human frailty, the evolution of one self, maturity and redemption than flying space ships or aliens.
Take G’Kar and Londo out of the show and you have just another Laser Killing SciFi show.
And if you disagree PPGs at 20 paces! (throws gauntlet) 🙂
Been a fan of Larry’s since before he started writing. We have mutual friends, though we’ve only communicated via email.
I’m a big fan of SciFi and Fantasy, always have been . I read Hard Magic as an eARC, and absolutely LOVED it. Though I would characterize both MHI and HM as more contemporary fantasy than sci fi, since the science part is lacking (read non-existent). I love alternative history as well. Harry Turtledove is still the King of AH, but Larry has made a great debut in that as well.
God Bless!
Oh, almost forgot:
Was never a B5 or Star Trek of any kind fan. B5, as far as I was concerned was a ST knockoff. (ducking and running for cover). Battlestar: Galactica was a cool remake of a shoddy series that was trying to cash in on the Star Wars craze. B:G (the new one) clarified a lot of plot holes and inconsistencies from the original, and was pretty well done, though I’ve not managed to get into Caprica at all. Serenity was an effort by Joss Whedon (one of the best creative minds in Hollywood) to tie up the Firefly TV series after it got canceled in a fit of Obama-esque stupidity by the network. Watch all the Firefly episodes, THEN watch Serenity, if you still have any questions after that, lemme know, I’ll square you away! lol One thing I admire about Joss Whedon is his loyalty. When Firefly got canceled, he managed to integrate just about everyone from the series into one of his other on-going series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And he made it work.
Caprica started good but jumped the shark way too fast IMHO. And as I stated, my SciFi knowledge is so bad I can’t tell if the Wizard of Oz is in the same category as the human fish movie with Kevin Costner…. I forget the name.
Waterworld, AKA Fishtar. lol
Aliens, spaceships, and/or hi tech along with no magic = SciFi.
Swords, sorcery, etc, = Fantasy.
Star Wars is both, since the Force qualifies as “Magic”.
You guys make this crap too complicated..LOL
If you think that’s bad, science fantasy, steampunk, new weird, sword and planet, and other such sub-genres will give you migraines.
I wasn’t going to even go there. Miguel would have an aneurysm!!