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what a great site!
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dustydigger
Posted 2012-05-27 3:45 PM (#3237)
Subject: what a great site!



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Location: UK		I just joined a science fiction group on the Shelfari site,and decided to compile a list of great SF books both read and to read,and surfing around found this excellent website.Instead of having to root around for the NPR list,or the Hugos,Nebulas etc,here they all are on one site.Very impressed,have had a great afternoon listing books,checking out reviews etc.Of particular interest was the listing of so many blogsites discussing the books.Just what one wants,seeing what other fans have said! .So glad to find this useful site.
I am going to have fun deciding what Grandmasters and books to choose!
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Administrator
Posted 2012-05-27 5:38 PM (#3238 - in reply to #3237)
Subject: RE: what a great site!



Admin

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Location: Dallas, Texas

dustydigger - 2012-05-27 3:45 PM So glad to find this useful site. I am going to have fun deciding what Grandmasters and books to choose!

Hello dustydigger and welcome to WWEnd!  I'm glad you found us and that you're finding us useful.  We've got a great community building here with fans from all over the world so you're in good company.

I see you've already read 3 Grand Masters this year!  Perfect to get you going on the challenge.  I hope we'll see some reviews from you in future.  There are prizes you know

Also, be sure to tell you friends to come check us out.  The more the merrier!

Dave

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dustydigger
Posted 2012-05-28 1:34 AM (#3240 - in reply to #3237)
Subject: Re: what a great site!



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Location: UK		Thanks.I As a teenaged girl back in the 60's I got a lot of funny looks for reading SF.Oh but the heady days of youth when reading was still high adventure.We lived in perilous times(I still remember lying sweating in fear during the Cuba Crisis,wondering if we would all still be alive tomorrow),and we turned to science fiction to address our anxieties-but also to relieve them with swashbuckling adventure in galaxies far far away.Odd to think many of these Grandmasters were everyday fare on the library shelf then.I can close my eyes now and see the Bradbury's on the top shelf beside the dear old John Carter of Mars tales of romance under Barsoomian skies,,and at the other end,Theodore Sturgeon and Roger Zelazny.Great days! And of course who could forget the ubiquitous searing yellowbacks of the Gollancz series.
Unfortunately,I moved abroad to Africa for 10 years,no libraries or book shops there,and I had to read and reread the few books I took with me.Fortunately,I had a few greats there-Lord of the Rings,Princess of Mars,plus Gods and Warlords,Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress,,but science fiction went out of my life.
On returning to UK a decade later I found the whole landscape had changed.,I didnt know any of the authors,super hard SF seemed to rule among the few SF books on the library shelf,and I do mean few.Fantasy had moved in and taken over,and for the most part I just couldnt get into them.Sword of Shannara had infected the world.There were five massive fantasy tomes for every neat slim SF volume lol.So SF fell out of my life entirely.Now,in my 60s,I joined Shelfari,and read a few old favourites,and enjoyed them so much I went looking for more info,and to refresh my memory-and I found you! YAY!! So I am hoping to get back into SF,but I intend mainly to stick to the lighter vein,avoid some of the heavy and dystopian stuff! No Camp Concentration,Death of Grass,Case of Conscience,but lots of dear old Heinlein,Simak,Clarke and Asimov.Once I have reread the golden oldies,I will move forward through the 70'and 80,.Dont know if I will live long enough to get to the end of the century,but it will be fun trying! lol
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Administrator
Posted 2012-06-06 12:35 AM (#3319 - in reply to #3240)
Subject: Re: what a great site!



Admin

Posts: 3943
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Location: Dallas, Texas		WWEnd is built to help you narrow your search so you'll never have to read a bad book again.  You've come to the right place!
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chickentrain
Posted 2013-05-12 1:12 PM (#5038 - in reply to #3237)
Subject: Re: what a great site!



0
I would like to piggyback on this thread and comment that I also find this to be an excellent site. My favorite parts of the site so far are the lists section (https://worldswithoutend.com/lists.asp) and the series lists section (https://worldswithoutend.com/lists_series.asp). I just got back into reading for enjoyment in 2012, and I have been mostly reading non-fiction books with a few graphic novels thrown in at the start. I've realized that I haven't read a fiction novel since maybe 2005-2006, and it was likely for a school assignment not for enjoyment. So, I recently ordered two massive books: the 1100+ page Gormenghast Novels by Mervyn Peake and the 1200+ page Great Book of Amber by Roger Zelazny. I have never read anything by these authors, and I honestly hadn't even heard of their series until a few days ago. I can't wait until they arrive!

Anyway, keep up the great site. I love it! I look forward to finding many more books here.

(For those of you interested in the books mentioned above, the Gormenghast Novels comprises the Gormenghast trilogy which includes Titus Groan, Gormenghast, and Titus Alone. It also includes the fragment of the fourth novel entitled Titus Awakes. Titus Awakes also exists as a completed novel by Peake's widow based on Peake's fragment. The other book, Great Book of Amber, contains all ten books of the Chronicles of Amber series. Both series are fantasy with the Gormenghast trilogy being more of a gothic fantasy.)
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Administrator
Posted 2013-05-12 10:46 PM (#5040 - in reply to #5038)
Subject: Re: what a great site!



Admin

Posts: 3943
2000
Location: Dallas, Texas

chickentrain - 2013-05-12 1:12 PM I would like to piggyback on this thread and comment that I also find this to be an excellent site...

Thanks, chickentrain, and welcome to WWEnd! So glad you're finding the site to be of use.  The series list is one of my favorites too.  It's great just for browsing when you don't have a particular book in mind or if you just want to start a new series.  There are lots of surprises in there too like when Pohl came back to The Heechee Saga 17 years later with The Boy Who Would Live Forever (and here I thought I'd finished that series long ago) or Piers Anthony wrote how many Xanth novels (I stopped at 12 but he wrote a whopping 36)?!

I read The Chronicles of Amber many years ago and really loved it so I hope you get as much enjoyment out of them as I once did.  I've been curious about Gormenghast for many a year but I've always held back for some reason.  Perhaps you'll share your thoughts with us when you're done?

Great to have you aboard - you'll find some wonderful people amidst our ranks and you'll get plenty of help finding good books to read!

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chickentrain
Posted 2013-05-13 9:14 AM (#5047 - in reply to #5040)
Subject: Re: what a great site!



0
Thanks for the warm welcome. I should have mentioned "thanks" for providing the site in the previous post, so consider this a belated thanks for that.

As for the series list portion of the site, it is too cool that I can scroll through pictures of the books rather than plain text. It's a lot easier to picture a series when there are, well, pictures. Like you brought up, I have come across some very late sequels, too, the past couple days like A Canticle for Leibowitz received a sequel almost 40 years later, and Titus Awakes came out about 50 years after Mervyn stopped the trilogy. Strange stuff! I also came across the Xanth novels you mentioned when I went through David Brin's recommended reading list.

I'm very glad to hear you enjoyed the Chronicles of Amber series. Along with Chronicles of Amber, Gormenghast seems like a series that might fade away in a few years, so I was happy to buy both series now while they're still available. I'll let you know what I think of the Gormenghast trilogy, but it might take me awhile to get through them because I don't always have time to read.

There are so many books I've found on this site that I really want to read, but they'll just have to wait. I'm glad to be here.
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