Catching up to 2008

[afuna]

I picked up Ghost by John Ringo today. I'd never heard about it before; it's not a book to walk into unprepared.

You know how you can sometimes run into something so completely ridiculous and over the the top that you think it can't possibly be real, and you turn to Google to find someone who shares your pain? I did that and I have now been introduced to OH JOHN RINGO NO.

Best review I've ever read, about the worst series I've ever run into :D


ETA: I think that review is the only thing that could have induced me to give John Ringo another try. Ghost is a horribly traumatic first run-in with any writer!

Comments

[branchandroot]

O_O Oh my god, I am so sorry. That whole series should come with big, serious warning labels; I was lucky enough to avoid it, because I had read the Weber-Ringo collaborations and then the Aldenata books, and had figured out that he has a really disgusting taste for torturing his female characters on-screen. The Aldenata series is about as Ringo as I'm willing to go; the rest of them are just way too fucked up.

If you do want to give it another shot, I'd quite recommend the Weber-Ringo books (starts with March Upcountry), as Weber interjects a good deal of lighter and more (let's face it) liberal notes into someone who's idea of a good time really is to kill off most of his cast.

[niqaeli]

IAWTC! Weber's definitely far more to my taste than Ringo. He's generally decent on female characters; among other things, he manages a fair ratio of walk-on characters, which is nice because you get the sense that women actually do stuff.

Honor Harrington, probably his most well-known character, her life *is* kind of horrible but it was going to be since she's modeled after Horatio Hornblower and it's about a career in the navy during war. It'd be kind of bizarre and unrealistic if her life didn't involve a lot of awful things, and at least she gets a strong arc out of it.

[afuna]

I have read the Honor Harrington series, and have enjoyed it for the most part :D I'm trying to decide whether to continue though; it started out good, then started going downhill and the last book I read in the series was tedious. It felt like Weber had painted himself in a corner and had to hit a gigantic reset button in order to have some wiggle room to keep the series going. I haven't dared pick up the next book to see whether it gets better again.

I agree re: strong female characters \o/ I like that there are enough female characters around and they're in all sorts of roles, that it doesn't feel like a case of token female on deck and that makes me \o/

[afuna]

Oh thank you! I will give March Upcountry a try (I have the books from the Baen library, or maybe it was the Baen CDs, so I won't lose anything by peeking *g*).

Would you recommend the Aldenata books as well, or should I just give those a pass?

After Ghost, I feel like I only dare pick up series by Ringo that people have actually told me about :x

[branchandroot]

Hmmm. The Aldenata books are a lot more focused on a dystopian scenario. Earth is being overrun by carnivorous aliens and the people who might help are screwing everyone over. It's /extremely/ militaristic; in fact it's kind of "project real-world military getting screwed by government and suppliers onto alien races for heightened effect". He kills off major characters with gay abandon, but the Major Major ones do survive. There are utterly kick-ass women, but, um, they tend to be the ones you see getting tortured or interrogated or such, so I'm almost grateful there are only a few.

I take it in quite small doses, but I do think it's a good adventure series with some really pretty fascinating worldbuilding behind it. I just really wish Ringo would go find a good therapist for his issues with women.

[afuna]

Belatedly, thank you. I feel much better going into the series forewarned about issues *wryly*