From: Scott Promish 
Date: Fri, 19 Dec 1997 20:24:59 -0800
Subject: Books, reviews...

Hallo.  I'm just at your web page and reading the letters other people
have sent you has motivated me to add my two cents (it may end up being
a dollar or so, but hopefully I won't bore too much.)  I'm always
looking for new suggestions or discussions on things I've read so I
search for review sites a lot.  If you are interested, check out my site
at http://www.cris.com/~scottjp/BOOKS.HTM

Donaldson seems to be the most talked about author here.  I have only
read Mordant's Need but I liked it a lot.  I've bought most of The Gap
but haven't started it yet.  No real interest in Covenant, though a
friend of mine really liked it...

I like King, though I read him infrequently.  Most of what I've read is
older stuff.  The most recent was The Green Mile, which I thought was
bad.  It was so repetitive, the characters so uninteresting, that I had
no emotional investment in the series.  And on top of that, the ending
was a letdown. But aside from that and some short works, I pretty much
like all his stuff.  A lot of people recommend Koontz to King fans.
Though I wouldn't strongly do so, if you are interested, The Bad Place
is good, as is The Voice of the Night (which is short, too).  I didn't
like Twilight Eyes very much.  After those first few samplings, I've
pretty much had my fill of his writings.

I also love Joel Rosenberg.  I loved the entire Guardians series, though
The Warrior Lives struck me as a little weaker than the rest.  Maybe I
was just not used to life without Karl.  Joel just posted on r.a.s-f.w
that he has submitted the latest manuscript for publication, so
hopefully it won't be long till the next one.  I'm not one of those
people that likes series to drag on endlessly past their prime, but
there is still a lot that hasn't been explored in this one, like the
whole thing between Myrddhin and Titania, which was only hinted at and I
don't think was even touched on in the last couple books.
I've bought the first book of his new series, but haven't read it yet.

Tad Williams:  I've only read Tailchaser's Song, which is sort of a
"Watership Down for cats."  That's oversimplifying, as the story is
original, but I think it's appropriate enough.  I loved it, and I wasn't
even a cat lover at the time I read it.

Piers Anthony:  I liked the first Incarnations a lot, and the second
wasn't too bad.  I hated the third.  For some reason I started the
fourth (I had bought it before I read the third), got a chapter in,
asked myself "Do I really want to read the same story again?" and quit.
Now, I almost never quit a book in the middle, but I decided in this
case I wouldn't be missing anything.  Then a friend of mine gave me the
sixth (? - the one about Satan), and I figured, "Well, he's done the
standard incarnations, maybe this'll be a little different."  Well, it
wasn't as bad as the Fate book, but I didn't think it was very good,
either.  And by then I'd grown to hate his writing style.  That was it
for me.

Some suggestions I don't think I saw in your library:

Mary Gentle:
-Golden Witchbreed, an alien contact novel.  This is one of my all time
favourite SF books.  I read it years ago so it's not real fresh in my
mind, but I do recommend it.  The sequel, Ancient Light, isn't as good,
and it's very depressing.
-Rats & Gargoyles, which appears to be an alternate history that takes
place in medieval times, merging magic and technology (such as it is).
It's really large of scope, at times confusing, but it's fabulous,
believable, and has a lot of likeable characters.  There is a lighter
(and shorter) sequel called The Architecture of Desire, which is also
good, but definitely read R&G.

Tanith Lee:
A lot of her recent work has been in the horror vein (are you interested
at all in that?  I didn't see much mention on your page other than
King.  I can recommend some great stuff if you want.)  The Blood Opera
(Dark Dance, Personal Darkness, and Darkness, I) is excellent.  The
covers make them out to be vampire novels but they aren't at all.  As
for fantasy, I loved her three Unicorn novels (Black, Gold and Red
Unicorn).  They are YA books, I think, but I'm 27 and I enjoyed them
immensely.  They are more or less self-contained (the unicorns in each
book have no relation to each other; they merely tie the adventures
together thematically.)
Overall, I am just in love with Lee's writing style.  It's beautiful.

Charles de Lint:
Wonderful magical realism.  Start with Dreams Underfoot, which as near
as I can tell is the start of his Newford chronicles (Newford is the
fictional town in which a majority of his stories take place.)  de Lint
really makes you believe that seeing the realm of faerie is just a
matter of knowing where to look, and having the right attitude.  It's
uplifting in a way.

Well, I could go on forever but I'll stop now...hope this is helpful and
write back if you want to discuss anything!