fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #5933 ]

[ SECRET POST #5933 ]

⌈ Secret Post #5933 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Will be missing a Friday post this week (traveling!). Just a heads up!

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 12 secrets from Secret Submission Post #850.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Semi-based on secret 3. What book authors do you think are overrated or underrated?

Isaac Asimov is wildly, wildly overrated. The guy had some interesting ideas, he was clever, but he just wasn't much as a writer of fiction. There's only one thing of his I think is worth reading from a literary point of view. And that's not even getting into his personal life. But he's still treated as a god of science fiction.

DA

His science fact books, however, were very well researched and edited. During the eighties, I always enjoyed looking at his small guides to modern science and science fiction movies. They were a real pleasure to read. They spoke to my inner geek.

yeah I think that's the thing...he wasn't writing from a literary point of view. Because of that, he's very easy to get inspired by because his writing is essentially philosophical fiction. I'd say that's where his status comes from. His concepts are extremely good.

Disagree. Sure, his writing isn't literary, but you don't need to be a literary genius to write good genre fiction. His ideas outweigh the writing (which is perfectly servicable for what he was doing)

I’m not into Asimov’s long fiction, but I think he did some clever stuff in bite-size format. Just enough time to set up the plot, not enough time to get bored with the paper-thin characters. Some of my favorites are “Obituary,” “All the Troubles of the World,” and “The Last Question.” That last one got a really good comic: https://www.reddit.com/r/Frisson/comments/41zsz6/comic_isaac_asimovs_the_last_question/

Edited 2023-04-05 02:05 (UTC)

The comic is well worth rereading.

Thanks.

Edward Gorey, of Amphigorey and The Gashlycrumb Tinies fame.

Brilliant cartoonist, horror story aficionado, and polysyllabic wonder. Younger me would always try really hard to check out all of his books out of multiple libraries 'till the librarians were sick of me.

Yes - also he did some covers for John Bellairs' novels, which are very iconic to me. And Bellairs is honestly a very underrated author in his own right (for kids' horror at least).

I looooooooooove Edward Gorey. I have pretty much all his books.

And his Dracula set designs...

LOVE Edward Gorey.

SA

I still have the Fantod Deck!

Great fun trying to Google the living daylights out of those biiiiig long obscure words.

Dan Brown. OMG. Awful stuff.

Who do you think he's overrated by? Like i'd say he's high in the airport book crowd (and I'd ever say that's a fair rating), but generally people don't count that crowd as taste-makers.

There was such a to-do about that 'Da Vinci Code' and 'Angels and Demons' (plus movies); when they were new, you'd have thought he was the next best thing since sliced bread. My sis loaned me the Da Vinci one and it was just...so awful. The couple others I've looked at were the same.

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

meadowphoenix - 2023-04-05 00:36 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

tabaqui - 2023-04-05 00:38 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

meadowphoenix - 2023-04-05 00:58 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

(Anonymous) - 2023-04-05 00:56 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

meadowphoenix - 2023-04-05 01:19 (UTC) - Expand

I'd say he's overrated by all the people who bought so many books it's landed him on the NYT bestsellers list multiple times, and adapted into a blockbuster movie.

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

meadowphoenix - 2023-04-05 05:22 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

(Anonymous) - 2023-04-05 06:25 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

meadowphoenix - 2023-04-06 02:12 (UTC) - Expand

I unmatched with a guy on a dating app last week because he said he was excited for Dan Brown's new book. It was petty and I still feel a little bad about ghosting him, but like... I have one life to live, and I don't want to spend it pretending to be interested in Dan fucking Brown of all authors.

Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaa, omg, dude. I do not blame you one bit. Do not have TIME for that crap.

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

(Anonymous) - 2023-04-05 02:08 (UTC) - Expand

His first book, Digital Fortress, is what happens when you optimize for suspense at the expense of everything else. Characters talk around the point because it wouldn’t be suspenseful to say what they mean. Exposition is rushed or neglected because it would slow the pace and reduce suspense. I think there’s something there a writer can learn from, but I’d never take it to such an extreme.

I haven’t read his later work, so I don’t know if he changed any.

Re: Overrated/underrated authors

tabaqui - 2023-04-05 02:21 (UTC) - Expand

Stephen King. But I just personally hate his writing.

Proust is overrated. Probably going to get yelled at by somebody but I find him very boring.

He's a genius

He is boring, though

Overrated: Voltaire. I disliked Candide so, so much. I wanted to throw it across the room almost the entire time I was reading it, but it was required reading.

Underrated: Ellen Conford (The Alfred G. Graebner Memorial High School Handbook of Rules and Regulations). She has some notoriety and won awards, but I don't think she gets the same recognition that other children's/teen's book authors I would put her on par with do - like Raskin (The Westing Game) and Konigsburg (From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler).

Shadows in the Sun by Chad Oliver. It’s about aliens, but what it’s really about is colonialism, and how the colonized might respond to it. It’s a cult classic, but I think it deserves higher praise.

Gonna check this out!

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