Larry wrote:Well fellow gentle readers, I am now in a quandary. I have polished off Shadow of Victory and At the Sign of Triumph. The elections are over and no truly stunning technological revolutions appear in the offing. Having read all the books on my waiting list what am I to do with my spare time now? Oh sure there's the boring little matter of home repairs and school and work and helping out with my aging and ill relatives, but what I mean is What can I do for fun? Honestly All I see now is chores. Somehow now that I don't have the anticipation of waiting on the next DW missive I, well I just don't know what to do? My gosh, must I return to <Dare I say it> reality???
But it seems so grey, and dull!
Sigh
Larry
I have a light reading project to fill the time, by reading, and watching, the Sword Art Online series by Kawahara. The underlying concept is interesting, and the story is engaging, though there are times that the quality of concept and consistency of characterization varies. This was originally written as a contest entry for a Japanese short story contest, but the author exceeded the allowable length and set the story aside for a few year - but did publish parts on the net (shades of The Martian). He was picked up by a publisher via another story, and the publisher asked if he had any other work they could publish. This turned out to be a home run for the publisher and author, and the series now exists as light novels, manga, anime, and is being turned into a live action movie/series in the US.
There is the original series of books not in chronological order, a manga partially reordering the novels, and an anime series that switches to chronological order. The author is now writing a more detailed chronological series covering the events skipped in the first series, and also is writing a second set of manga dealing with some of the principle secondary characters.
Engaging, and an interesting concept with just enough new material being translated to keep a few books in the pipeline.