[PB74] Can Bing reach the Modern Era?

[BING_XI_LAO]

Is that a Long Sun naming theme? I approve.

I recently read Long Sun and Short Sun. Loved them so much I was staying up to 5am regularly in bed reading them. In the course of the couple of weeks in which they got devoured, I became so fatigued that I was shivering and sweating in 27 degrees celsius with the heating going, from exhaustion. 

I liked them even more than the New Sun series, although maybe this is because New Sun (and Wizard Knight, and Free Live Free) helped prepare me for the style. I am still not good at all at picking up on subtle mysteries - and yet these are still by far the best scifi-fantasy I've ever read. What else could you recommend? I would like to recommend The Night Land (1912) - very underrated

[BING_XI_LAO]

Also... I'm on a small island with two cities in this game. May I go AI?

[BING_XI_LAO]

oh, no need. CIAO!

[DaveV]

What else could you recommend?

Take my recommendations with a grain of salt, since I'd rate New Sun and Wizard Knight above Long Sun and well above Short Sun, which I found somewhat disappointing.

For some more Wolfe books, I just finished Soldier of the Mist and Soldier of Arete and enjoyed them. I think it's hard to appreciate Wolfe on a first read through, so I'm not sure where they'd fall in the above rankings, but they were fun for someone who enjoys Greek mythology.

My son turned me on to Brandon Sanderson, who is kind of the anti George RR Martin, churning out several fat books per year. I've read the Mistborn and Stormlight books and would recommend all of them.

[Tarkeel]

So, what's the relevance of the Ballista Elephant? Is its use case being able to fight knights/cuirs (with some help from catas one would hope) even when the enemy has spears, pikes or even rifle stack defenders?

Speaking from experience, the biggest benefit is being able to hit scout/medic chariots from stacks. They are also pretty decent at killing wounded knights from under pike-cover, but the counter to that is to use unwounded knights as cover.

I liked them even more than the New Sun series, although maybe this is because New Sun (and Wizard Knight, and Free Live Free) helped prepare me for the style. I am still not good at all at picking up on subtle mysteries - and yet these are still by far the best scifi-fantasy I've ever read. What else could you recommend? I would like to recommend The Night Land (1912) - very underrated

The very best sci-fi mystery I've read is Gideon the Ninth which is a variant of the locked room murder mystery.. The second book in the series is *very* heavy though, and I haven't had the time/mindspace to start on the third just yet.

Another less fantastical murder mystery is The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle.

[Qgqqqqq]

Those are both very good recommendations from Tarkeel. Seconded.