2 ms·

Yudkowsky is way too pretentious and overconfident in my opinion. Also, the idea that these Ayn Rand style gotcha fictions are effective at showing anything oth

Yudkowsky is way too pretentious and overconfident in my opinion. Also, the idea that these Ayn Rand style gotcha fictions are effective at showing anything other than his poor creative writing skills is laughable.

_0ffh 3y ago
I'm afraid I'll have to disagree. If anything, fiction is Eliezer's strong suit. I had a blast with HPMOR, it's the best Harry Potter book out there in my opinion. But perhaps he's better at long-form fan fiction than short stories. Maybe it would be best if he stuck to doing that.
- throwaway626 3y ago
  As a work of fiction, HPMOR is little more than an exercise in repackaging genre tropes and pop culture references. It doesn’t have a coherent theme; the execution varies from mediocre to poor. Plot holes abound, characters vanish inexplicably, etc. In many ways, it’s a less successful version of Ready Player One that’s clamped on to HP’s coattails. Of course, that formula can be entertaining, but it has limited impact. Lest you think I have an ax to grind with Yudkowsky, I did enjoy Three Worlds Collide. It shares many problems with HPMOR (the writing is inconsistent and the world-building is incoherent) but it at least tells a tight story with a beginning, middle and end. I’d say it’s about as effective as the median submission to Amazing Stories back in the 60s.
- dmbche 3y ago
  If I may, comparing fanfiction to original work is apples to oranges. When writing harry potter, Rowling had to craft a world with characters and rules, make it coherent enough and tread a compelling story through it. She made the legos and then crafted something with them. This guy came to her crafted world, and moved around a few bits, changed a character here, change a few rules there - but the backbone of the work was made before. It's just not the same ballpark
- Ao7bei3s 3y ago
  If you enjoyed HPMOR, you'll probably enjoy this very detailed, criticial review of HPMOR. https://danluu.com/su3su2u1/hpmor/ https://danluu.com/su3su2u1/hpmor/

_0ffh 3y ago

I'm afraid I'll have to disagree. If anything, fiction is Eliezer's strong suit. I had a blast with HPMOR, it's the best Harry Potter book out there in my opinion. But perhaps he's better at long-form fan fiction than short stories. Maybe it would be best if he stuck to doing that.

throwaway626 3y ago
As a work of fiction, HPMOR is little more than an exercise in repackaging genre tropes and pop culture references. It doesn’t have a coherent theme; the execution varies from mediocre to poor. Plot holes abound, characters vanish inexplicably, etc. In many ways, it’s a less successful version of Ready Player One that’s clamped on to HP’s coattails. Of course, that formula can be entertaining, but it has limited impact. Lest you think I have an ax to grind with Yudkowsky, I did enjoy Three Worlds Collide. It shares many problems with HPMOR (the writing is inconsistent and the world-building is incoherent) but it at least tells a tight story with a beginning, middle and end. I’d say it’s about as effective as the median submission to Amazing Stories back in the 60s.
dmbche 3y ago
If I may, comparing fanfiction to original work is apples to oranges. When writing harry potter, Rowling had to craft a world with characters and rules, make it coherent enough and tread a compelling story through it. She made the legos and then crafted something with them. This guy came to her crafted world, and moved around a few bits, changed a character here, change a few rules there - but the backbone of the work was made before. It's just not the same ballpark
Ao7bei3s 3y ago
If you enjoyed HPMOR, you'll probably enjoy this very detailed, criticial review of HPMOR. https://danluu.com/su3su2u1/hpmor/ https://danluu.com/su3su2u1/hpmor/