The Bastard King by Dan Chernenko

Even though the writing style seemed overly simplistic, The Bastard King was exactly what I haven't been getting enough of lately: good old unpretentious fantasy. The kind where things are not described in detail. Almost everything was left up to my imagination, from the way people looked to the way the castles and countryside looked. Important traits were mentioned but nothing was overdone.
In fact it seemed a little underdone in some places, and all I really mean by that is the sentence structure was a bit annoying- there were lots of very short, simple, dry sentences. Sometimes I cared, but a lot of times I didn't because I had become so submerged into the story.
It's not a very complicated plot either, and there's just enough intrigue to make it interesting. The way things were introduced slowly made it work for me. Lanius is our main protagonist, the son of the king by his seventh illegitimate wife (big scandal there, don't worry about it). He becomes king in time, but eventually is thrown to the side by our other main protagonist, Grus. The two of them rule pseudo-jointly.
This is book one, of how many, I'm not sure, but the series is called the Scepter of Mercy. Basically at some point down the road, Lanius and Grus are going to reclaim this Scepter of Mercy, which was stolen four hundred years ago, for their kingdom. That eventual event is only hinted at, so I'm not entirely sure where this whole saga is going.
I do know that I want book two.

Foundation by Isaac Asimov

Another classic! I really should read more of these, since it's probably good for my overall perspective.

Asimov is brilliant at challenging whole societies to solve complex external and internal problems with subtle solutions. However, since (at least in this book) there are sections that take place generations apart in time, the characters run together and all seem pretty much identical on a personal level. Okay, so it's the macro view and not the micro that matters. I can dig it.

I loved the beginning of this story. A young man recently graduated from college is invited to a world he's never before visited to be a part of a mysterious and progressive movement whose goal is preserving humanity's culture, essentially. He is immediately relatable: if you had never been in a new-fangled anti-gravity elevator before, you wouldn't know to hook your foot under the bar that keeps you from floating up to the ceiling either, right?

All those small details about future technology add to the charm of Asimov's writing. He can just mention that there is a personal message-capsule, and, helped by the characters' curt and casual dialog, you simply accept it, and just sink down into the alternate universe. Definitely classic.

The Golden Key by Jennifer Roberson, Melanie Rawn, and Kate Elliott

I don't want to spend a lot of time writing about this book since I spent so much reading it.

Well-written? Sure. It's divided up into 3 sections, one for each author, and wordy as hell. The first section was written in a way I found obnoxious and not at all charming. But it was different; this author had her own style. Should I hold it against her?

The symbolism runs rampant, the diction is pretty fabulous in that I think the authors must have deliberately chosen every single word and not left anything at 'good enough.'

But if I were to describe the entire plot out, you would probably wonder why in the hell it's over 800 pages for something so simple.

That first section is indeed a doozy. It must take great talent for writing about nothing to have however many pages it was for writing solely about the painting culture of Tira Virte. I mean, I wondered what these people ate, if they ever listened to music, if they had neighboring countries, etc. All I got was a bit about their religion and history as it applied to the main characters' family. And more painting.

We got into more of that in the next two parts, but not quite enough to justify the length, I felt.

Especially when the characters weren't very relatable or interesting. The main character, our anti-hero Sario, is pretty much a jerk, but the only constant person in the hundreds of years spanned, since he has found a way basically to make himself immortal. So you keep having to find new people to like, to latch on to. Not a huge problem, but like I said I didn't particularly like any of them.

This book is what I would call 'beautifully' written, but I still didn't exactly like it.

Maybe I should learn to be a better reviewer instead of blathering on about my preferences. Are there technical things I should be looking for? I think I'll try to find that out.