Not Black Library, or Dune but is it…?

[Rowland]

I love Sci-Fi.  I’ve read a lot of BL lately so fancied a break.  So, searching for recommendations I came across Empire of Silence (Sun eater series) by Christopher Ruocchio.  I love a lengthy space opera and I only downloaded a sample but I’m really struggling to not link it to BL stuff: all the talk of an Alien Race destroying the galaxy i.e. Tyrannids, Emperors, powerful families and Dune with shield belts and swords.

Has anyone read it and can recommend it, particularly if it’s a departure from 40k and Dune?

It seems so close to both books that I may as well read more BL.

I favour Iain M Banks and will probably give Peter Hamiltons Reality Dysfunction a go (which I may have read already).

Edited 2 hours ago by Rowland

[wecanhaveallthree]

a) The Necromancy thread died for this.

 

b) Hamilton is a hack fraud which does not in any way inhibit me enjoying his stupid books, particularly the Commonwealth Saga, because it's like our stupid brainwaves aligned into one single stupid consciousness.

 

c) Disregard Empire of SIlence. Read Locked Tomb, spend half your reading time having to pick up the damn book after you throw it across the room yelling COME ON THIS IS JUST 40K WITH THE SERIALS FILED OFF. 

[Rowland]

Spoiler

 

Sorry wchat that went a little over my head…

a).  What’s that?

b). You like him?

c). Are you confirming the Sun eater series isn’t worth it?  Is Locked Tomb lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space?

[Sothalor]

The Sun Eater series is one of my favorites in recent memory, or maybe just generally in all honesty.

 

The prose is a particular standout - the author studied rhetoric and speechwriting in school, and it shows. The positioning of Hadrian as a byronic, potentially unreliable narrator with a fondness for melodrama and a classical education really lets Ruocchio go to town with wordsmithing.

 

It pays many homages to Dune and the author was very open about that as well; the series may be read as a thematic antithesis to Dune's ideas and Ruocchio himself encourages people to read Dune for that kind of metacontextual comparison. Sun Eater is quite self-aware when it comes to the science fantasy tropes and trappings it integrates.

 

That said, it's all just that: trappings. You might as well say that Star Wars and 40k are so similar because they have spaceships, wizards, scifi guns, and fancy tech swords. It's what stories, themes, and human ideas are underlying them that provides substantive differences.

[Roomsky]

6 minutes ago, Rowland said:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Is Locked Tomb lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space?

Can't comment on Sun Eaters, but I feel there is a point where this particular brand of grimdarkness is inevitably going to fall back into being 40k, which in turn falls back into being Herbert/Moorcock/Wolfe etc. etc. etc. I try to just embrace the fun of spotting the similarities.

The Locked Tomb is, as a good friend once described it, "40k for lesbians." That said, despite Muir's prose stumbling a bit in the first book, The Locked Tomb is ultimately a lot deeper than any 40k fiction from the past 20 years, and goes places GW is too cowardly to let their novels explore. Highly recommended.

[Rowland]

Spoiler

 

Ah, that’s a great recommendation.  I shall give it more time.  It’s an easy read and not un enjoyable.  If it’s as good as you say it should be rewarding.

I get that stories can be based on the hero quest or whatever its called but I like Sci-fi for its departure from that, or at least some abstract thinking on the way.

 

@Roomsky yeah I get your last comment but I’d rather read good 40k as a newcomer because in some ways it feels like homework LOL.  But at the moment I’m a bit over40k’d.    For example the Culture stuff, Expnse, Hyperion, and even Red Rising depart from the grimdark gothic sci-fi vibe.

[wecanhaveallthree]

I don't just love Hamilton, I am completely convinced that I am an amnesiac Hamilton slowly rediscovering my true identity through clues hidden in my stupid stories.

 

Empire is good, but I think if you're looking for something more approaching the 40K aesthetic, Locked Tomb will get you there and with a bit more 'bite' (not that Empire is bad, I stress again, but rather that Tomb is really, really good). 

 

I know nothing about any Necromancy thread. I did not say this. I am not here.