Lately I have come to the realization that I do not like stories where someone starts on a long journey and pages go by describing their long journey, then something happens, they deal with it, and continue on the long journey...
I have also come accross stories where the setting is sci/fi fantasy and you follow through a characters life, but nothing interesting really ever happens...
Am I the only one disappointed by these stories?
2 examples come to mind:
Dragonflight through the White Dragon were amazing.. tons of things going on, politics, tons of intelligent characters.
Then I go to read Mccaffrey's other stories: The Rowan and The Crystal singer were complete bores where it simply followed some uninteresting character through a monotonous life... Even the harper trilogy was fairly tame, where nothing special happened.. even with the great source material of the original amazing trilogy.
I loved Left Hand of Darkness(intelligent characters, an overall story arc, different players, etc), so I read :
The Lathe of Heaven-cute idea but it never really went anywhere... half the book was about a weak character being used... not for me.
So I figured, maybe I should read more of the Hainish saga of which Left Hand was a part of... so I read Rocannon's world-a typical journey story where a guy struggles through the wilderness for the entire book to attack the enemy in the last 3 pages...
Alright, so maybe the next book will be better.. Planet of Exile was again, another very standard story where nothing much happens until the end where they protect a town and the enemy just gives up eventually... End.
Let's try the third.. City of Illusions.. I got about halfway through before I gave up. Yet another typical journey story... days of resting, hunting, starting fires.. coming accross an obstacle, stumbling through it, and on and on...
Other books with journey stories that I didn't care much for: Neverwhere, The Hobbit.
The main question is twofold- Am I the only one to dislike books where nothing much ever happens?
Also, is it just me or are many authors almost like one hit wonders, yet get recognition for everything else they wrote after, just because of their one(or 3) great books?
I get frustrated when I find a great book or trilogy, and go on to read more and find the rest is very very average...
I am becoming fearful of Richard Adam's Shardik after I read and loved Watership down...
FYI, my favorite books:
A game of thrones
A Darkness that came before
Vorkosigan series
I have also come accross stories where the setting is sci/fi fantasy and you follow through a characters life, but nothing interesting really ever happens...
Am I the only one disappointed by these stories?
2 examples come to mind:
Dragonflight through the White Dragon were amazing.. tons of things going on, politics, tons of intelligent characters.
Then I go to read Mccaffrey's other stories: The Rowan and The Crystal singer were complete bores where it simply followed some uninteresting character through a monotonous life... Even the harper trilogy was fairly tame, where nothing special happened.. even with the great source material of the original amazing trilogy.
I loved Left Hand of Darkness(intelligent characters, an overall story arc, different players, etc), so I read :
The Lathe of Heaven-cute idea but it never really went anywhere... half the book was about a weak character being used... not for me.
So I figured, maybe I should read more of the Hainish saga of which Left Hand was a part of... so I read Rocannon's world-a typical journey story where a guy struggles through the wilderness for the entire book to attack the enemy in the last 3 pages...
Alright, so maybe the next book will be better.. Planet of Exile was again, another very standard story where nothing much happens until the end where they protect a town and the enemy just gives up eventually... End.
Let's try the third.. City of Illusions.. I got about halfway through before I gave up. Yet another typical journey story... days of resting, hunting, starting fires.. coming accross an obstacle, stumbling through it, and on and on...
Other books with journey stories that I didn't care much for: Neverwhere, The Hobbit.
The main question is twofold- Am I the only one to dislike books where nothing much ever happens?
Also, is it just me or are many authors almost like one hit wonders, yet get recognition for everything else they wrote after, just because of their one(or 3) great books?
I get frustrated when I find a great book or trilogy, and go on to read more and find the rest is very very average...
I am becoming fearful of Richard Adam's Shardik after I read and loved Watership down...
FYI, my favorite books:
A game of thrones
A Darkness that came before
Vorkosigan series