Israel SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

Anyone enjoy reading steampunk? If so, what are some of your favourite books?

And has there ever been a steampunk festival in Israel? I'd love to participate in one.

Haven't tried steampunk yet. What do you recommend?

Same as Jon.

I am embarrassed to say that I don't even know what steampunk is. Anyone care to define it for me?

Steampunk's a lot of fun, especially since it's comes with it's own style of art and fashion.
These are some of the books that I've enjoyed though I think most of them of them are kind of steampunk-light.

Soulless by Gail Carriger
Cold Magic by Kate Elliott
The Doomsday Vault by Steven Harper
The Bookman by Lavie Tidhar

I've also really been enjoying the online comic, Girl Genius.

These are a few other steampunk books that are supposed to be really good and I hope to read sometimes soon:

Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
The Buntline Special by Mike Resnick
Retribution Falls by Chris Wooding

Retribution Falls and Cold Magic are on my list, but I have no plans to read them soon.

I always thought The Parasol Protectorate more like as a paranormal romance, which is quite deterring me, but now I read Stephen's review (I hope you all know that guy, he is my one the best reviewers in GR), and he says that it's much more “Victorian steampunk” than a paranormal romance, and Soulless is a surprising book, so I'll consider that one.
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Nimrod wrote: "Retribution Falls and Cold Magic are in my list, but I have no plans to read them soon.

I always thought The Parasol Protectorate more like as a paranormal romance, which is quite deterring me, bu..."

I actually would consider Soulless a kind of historical romance, though the rest of the books in the series have more steampunk and less romance. But a lot of men still seem to enjoy it. To tell you the truth, most of the steampunk books that I've read seem to be based around a romantic storyline, though those could just be the books that I'm drawn to. You might enjoy Scott Westerfeld' Leviathan.

Leviathan is already on my list.

I read the Boneshaker- it was nice, but not something special

I just got my hands on a novelization of the first girl genius .Not sure if a mainly visual genre like steampunk will work as a book

I really liked the Girl Genius novelization. I've got the second one here (Agatha H and the Clockwork Princess), but it is waiting for me to finish about four other books before I can start it. I swear it is burning a hole in my bookshelf. My kids say it isn't as good as the first one, but I'm sure I'll enjoy just the same.

I had read the book before I knew it was an online comic and it didn't really draw me in. I didn't finish the book but based on reviews that I read of it, it lacks the humour and personality of the comic strip.

Genia, I'll be interested to hear what you think of it.

Eyalg wrote: "I read the Boneshaker- it was nice, but not something special"

Hm, I'm sorry to hear that since all the reviews I've read have raved about it. I'm curious to try it for myself and see.

I just have to write a correction - one of my kids came to tell me I had it wrong, and that Agatha H and the Clockwork Princess was MUCH better than the first one. So, you have it. *grin* Since I read the online comic long before the first novel came out I can't rate it as a stand alone work. I can say that it filled in some small holes from the comic, and made it all more three-dimensional and I liked that.

I have read Boneshaker and Soulless. I liked them both but only Soulless enough to continue the series.
I also have The Windup Girl and Leviathan on my shelf and hope to read them before the end of the year.

Esther wrote: "I have read Boneshaker and Soulless. I liked them both but only Soulless enough to continue the series.
I also have The Windup Girl and Leviathan on my shelf and hope to read them before the end of..."

I had started listening to The Windup Girl but I had a hard time following what was going on. I'll have to try reading the book to see if I have more success that way.

I loved Soulless, it was so much the fun. Though the rest of the series wasn't quite as good a the first book.

What I really want, though, is for steampunk to become popular enough in Israel to have a festival here so that I can get myself an awesome steampunk costume.

Simcha wrote:What I really want, though, is for steampunk to become popular enough in Israel to have a festival here so that I can get myself an awesome steampunk costume.
..."

Unfortunately,you barely can see some sub-genres in Hebrew, steampunk is among that sub-genres (so as for cyberpunk for instance).The israeli book market works very odd, many publishers just start translating first book in a fantasy series and then just abandon it.....

Nimrod wrote: "Simcha wrote:What I really want, though, is for steampunk to become popular enough in Israel to have a festival here so that I can get myself an awesome steampunk costume.
..."
Unfortunately,you ..."

Graff publishing has a couple of steampunk books coming out and I had offered to help them put together a festival, which I thought could be a good promotional event, but they weren't interested. I guess that publishers don't do that kind of stuff around here.

Simcha wrote:
I guess they publishers don't do that kind of stuff around here.
..."

You got it right....

First, I want to see Patrick Rothfuss's The Wise Man's Fear being translated to hebrew, and then we can talk about other things. I don't know if you'd believe it, but the publisher in Israel abandoned the series after translating the first book in the trilogy.

Simcha wrote: "What I really want, though, is for steampunk to become popular enough in Israel to have a festival here so that I can get myself an awesome steampunk costume. ."

We could always go as a group to ICON in Steampunk costumes. The dress I had made for my son's Bar Mitzvah would make a great base for my costume.

Esther wrote: "Simcha wrote: "What I really want, though, is for steampunk to become popular enough in Israel to have a festival here so that I can get myself an awesome steampunk costume. ."

We could always go ..."

I don't know if I want to make the effort for Icon. I went a couple of times and was really bored so I haven't been planning to go again. But maybe if we get enough people into steampunk by then we can make it a little more fun.

My Kindle's battery ran out and I couldn't find the cable to charge it... Pain. So I went to Steimatzky and Tsomet Sfarim to alleviate said pain, but didn't really feel like paying 60 NIS for a small paperback when I could get it for a fifth of the price on Kindle. Anyway, then I spotted a Steampunk book (it was actually called Steampunk) with a pretty cool cover and it turned to be an anthology by some well known authors, so I bought it :)
Unfortunately, I only managed to read one story so far (by Cassandra Clare) because I have since found the cable.

Jon wrote: "My Kindle's battery ran out and I couldn't find the cable to charge it... Pain. So I went to Steimatzky and Tsomet Sfarim to alleviate said pain, but didn't really feel like paying 60 NIS for a sm..."

That's one of my biggest fears, to be stuck somewhere without anything to read. I never travel without making sure that both my iphone and ereader are charged but I've still had some close calls. ;)

Well I do hope you get around to reading the rest of the book. Anthologies can be a great way to try out a new genre and discover new authors. And steampunk is a lot of fun.