Favorite Asher Book?

[Hypes]

I just finished Cowl. I think I did the book a disservice by reading it mostly late at night. I fell off a couple of times throughout the book, like wondering where the hell that time-travelling city came from all of a sudden. While I have myself to blame for that, I did find the twist in regards to Cowl's motives at the end a little underdeveloped. It seemed almost put in there as an afterthought, just a couple of lines of dialogue and that's it.

Hearing about Gridlinked though, I like the sound of it and will be picking it up sharpish.

[biodroid]

Originally Posted by Neal Asher

Oh, and since I've noted some confusion about the order of those books, here it is: 1. Gridlinked 2. The Line of Polity 3. Brass Man 4. Polity Agent 5. Line War.

Which books can you read without having to start book 1. Are they all from the same series and are sequels to each other? I recall someone mentioning that Cowl was stand alone. Does that mean I still have to read the others to understand Cowl or can I just dive right in? Which books are stand alone without needing to read Gridlinked etc. Not trying to do shortcuts, it's just that the bookstores I frequent don't have books 1 and 2 but they do have Cowl and Hilldiggers and Line of Polity, basically everything except Gridlinked and The Skinner

[Steve Batten]

Gridlinked et al are good but my favourites are probably his short story collections (Runcible Tales and The Engineer Reconditioned).

Really liked "Walking John and Bird" out of Runcible tales - very interesting twist. Also liked a lot of the stories out of The Engineer.

Its very enjoyable (but rare) to find an author who can do good short stories as well as epic novels / series.

[Steve Batten]

Cowl, Skinner, Hilldiggers are all standalone. Try "The engineer reconditioned" as a good sampling of ideas.

[Rane Longfox]

The Skinner is standalone to an extent - but only to the extent that Gridlinked is - it's the beginning of a story arc which is continued with The Voyage of the Sable Keetch. You can read it as a standalone though, that's true enough.

I think it is quite important to read Gridlinked before the others in that series though, unfortunately

[biodroid]

I eventually would like to get to read Neal Ashers work, a work colleague said he has read him and thoroughly enjoyed him

[Connavar]

Originally Posted by Neal Asher

It's like when you lend an SF book to someone telling them you think it's excellent, and are then disappointed when they seem unimpressed. I've seen so many varying opinions of my books, many of them contradicting each other, that I can't really say. Check out the amazon reviews of them and you'll see what I mean.

Cowl is an excellent wide-screen time-travel story, done in the manner of a space opera ... or it's far too complicated and violent with unlikable characters.

Gridlinked is a space opera/detective/James Bond romp ... or it's boring SF with flat characters.

The Skinner is another romp full of wonderful characters and an superbly detailed ecology ... or it's full of unbelievable creatures, cardboard characters and a pointless plot.

Take your pick.

I thought it would be easy getting one of those books when i decided to try your work. For some reason no library in sweden has any of them. Not even bookmooch has them.


So i went for Cowl and ordered. I gambled on a stand alone who sounded good.

I liked the time travel angle and an artifically forced advance in human evolution when i read about it in fantasticfiction.

[biodroid]

Not much to say because I haven't read any Neal Asher 's books, I am about 40 pages into Gridlinked and it's very good so far. Lots of action!! Keep it coming Mr. Asher...

[biodroid]

Currently reading Gridlinked (which is the first novel I have read of Neal's) and its pretty darn good. I find Neals style interesting and gripping, he does not drag things out too much and looks like he does not mince his words, basically he likes to get straight to the point. I like all the characters and despise the ones I am supposed to. I just have a niggle about Cormac himself, he seems to be a bit detached (for obvious reasons). Does he get over it in the later novels? I find him slightly irritating as he does not connect to his team/people very well or will that be explained later on?

Keep it coming Neal, I think I might have found a new fave author.

P.S. Mr Crane is quite freaky don't you think? I would flat out crap myself if I ever saw him in reality.