So I'm taking a plane trip, and wondering what I should bring to read on the flight. I've got a crate or two of inherited Shadowrun sourcebooks with a dozen or so novels in it... Given that I only have room for one or two, which ones are your favorites? Somebody here has to have an opinion.

I was just thinking of this this morning!

Changeling by Chris Kubrik.

It breaks RAW but it is old school Shadowrun and very true to the genre and core themes.

- J.

I like "Fade to Black" by Nyx Smith and "Technobabel" by Stephen Kenson.... I've got more to read but those are the 2 I've really really liked so far.

Technobabel was good

Wolf and Raven will always be my favorite though.

I've read Kellan Colt's Trilogy, and i liked it.

right now im reading dead air and enjoying it quite a bit. i also liked terminus experiment.

Mel Odom's 2 Jack Skater Novels are two of my favorites, because they always just felt like they were just deeply rooted in the concept of the game, a basic team of Shadowrunners tyring to do their job. Nothing too funky, no crazy metaplot, just some good, solid Shadowrunning.

Bull

Robert N. Charrette's "Never Deal with a Dragon" was the first Shadowrun novel I read. I enjoyed it mightily and despised whoever thought it would be a good idea to insert a five year old's line drawings at various places in the book. I still remember it vividly and still despise those line drawings. I also enjoyed 2XS but didn't really read many of the others. Maybe I should go back and read some now.

K.

As Bull said. Additional I like 2XS, Nights Pawn and Tails you loose.

Burning Bright is a very good one! Can't remeber who wrote it but it's KE vs the Bugs in Chicago

Shelley is a fun read ^^
And Ash has so much athmosphere in it. I thought i could hear the music from time to time . .

Are Shelley and Ash not German only?

Yep. Those are the only 2 german novels i would want anyone to read. And i hope they get translated into english at least some time.

Pesadillas and Shelley are my two favorite german SR novels.

I read Ash while hanging around on the '01 Wacken-Open-Air... first reading some chapters about a rocker/runner, then going to listen to Nevermore or Flames made the novel really awesome...

...

Other favs:
- Into the Shadows
- 2XS (Nigel Findley)
- Shadowplay (Nigel Findley)
- Lone Wolf (guess who... oh... Nigel Findley)
- Burning Bright (no... this time Tom Dowd)

Thanks, Nyx.

I forgot about Lone Wolf. Shame on me.

You're welcome...

Is it ok to jsut say Nigel Findley? [hate]Stay the hell away from Nyx Smith though.[/hate]

Oh yeah, and that other guy, Hardy. Honestly, I loved that book. And I'm still waiting for more subtle Drop Bear references in the fiction. *Foot tapping impatiently*

Only have Shadowplay and Changeling. They published a couple more books, but I didn't saw them with my own eyes.

Oh, but there is so many to choose...

Terminus Experiment
The Black Madonna (there is three books all together, but the names eludes me)
Wolf and Raven (Must read!)
And plenty more I've forgotten.
Nigel Findley though is good readin', so is Mel Odom.

Streets of Blood, Black Madonna and Nosferatu.

That guy was awesome. Wish he had not left us so early. Most of my favorite SR stuff came from him


As a side note: Don't forget Into the Shadows, the early anthology. Besides two great short stories by Micheal Stackpole, I thought it did a great job of showing just how connected shadow events can be.

That one was Tom Dowd, former SR Line Developer (at least I think he was). The book is pretty close to the rules, at least as they were back then.

2XS and Night's Pawn.

As a teenager in middle school I stumbled upon an old Shadowrun advertisement in a D&D based magazine. A week later I was in my local library and stumbled upon "Shadowplay" by Nigel D. Findely. I read that book from cover to cover over the weekend and absolutely fell in love with Shadowrun.

Over the years, at suggestions from friends I began to read Mel Odom, Jak Koke, and Michael A. Stackpoles Shadowrun novels which I enjoyed very much.

Hey!

Where are the William Gibson novels on this list?

The Sprawl Trilogy:
Neuromancer
Count Zero Override
Mona Lisa Overdrive

The Bridge Trilogy:
Virtual Light
Idoru
All Tomorrow's Parties

Yes, those are cyberpunk, but not SR. And, William Gibson HATES Shadowrun with a passion.
Personally, my favorites are Lone Wolf and 2XS.

I read most of the novels with exception to most of the newer ones.

Anything by Nigel D. Findley (I was traumatised when he died! He inspired me so much).
Nosferatu, 2XS, Burning Bright, Tails You Lose, Lone Wolf, Secrets of Power trilogy all get honorable mentions.

FWIW, Never Deal With A Dragon + the SR1 rulebook are what got me hooked on the game. That novel + Changeling are probably equal for first place in retrospect.

- J.

Nowhere on it it is both an SR list and he is one of the more over-hyped authors ever in my mind. His hatred of SR doesn't do him any endearments in my mind. Cyberpunk was a concept cribed from a lot of sources, he basically claims that we stole his car and put magic on it when nearly every other piece of said car when aquired from another source.

It is, I guess...

IMHO, almost all of the first two dozen SR novels were quite fine, but Findley... well, he was just awesome and I almost feel sorry for other fine authors, that they are always mentioned way behind Findley.

I really like his writing-style. And his "lone wolf" novels with cynical protagonists trying to beat the odds.

Are the new novels any good? i've not had the chance too read any of them yet.

The only one I cared for was Drops of Corruption. The series with Kellen Colt read like a table top game written into a novel IMO, which shouldn't be.

Well they were not horrible, but not that great either. imho

"Wolf and Raven" is extraordinary good. I would recommend it to anyone - not just those interested in Shadowrun. Its one of the reasons I got interested in Shadowrun and started reading the other Shadowrun books.

"Run Hard, Die Fast" was good too.

Although unfortunately I feel other Shadowrun novels are disgustingly bad. I am usually compelled to finish a book once I start reading it and some Shadowrun books I have thrown across the room when I reached the last page.

I liked the Secrets of Power trilogy, 2XS and Changeling because they gave me a window into the world of Shadowrun.
Lone Wolf, Headhunters and Wolf and Raven just for the sake of reading them.

Grexul

My screenname is missinf an 'x'.

Anyone who can get a hold of Night's Pawn should do so. It's some of the cleanest shadowrun writing in the whole line. Aside from Lonewolf it's one of the novels that feels most like shadowrun to me it's nearly Gibsonesque.

And for that "Feels like Shadowrun" quality I'd give props to Never Trust an Elf. It's the best "life in the Barrens" book written so far. I'm surprised no one mentioned it yet.

I really don't understand people who put Wolf and Raven on a pedestal. It's got really serious RAW breaks. (not the author's fault so I've heard) But worse then that the whole quality of the book is something like taking an X-men comic series and creating a novel adaptation. After you've stripped out the art all you're left with is a fairly thin plot full of characters that are really just the masturbatory exercises of the author.

As to Masturbatory Exercisers; Same with Jak Koke who made Nadia Daviar's nipples famous in the Dragonheart Saga. And Stephen Kenson; who wrote Technobable--which was pretty good for a game novel--then went on to write the Tommy Tallon; "Look how much of an issue it isn't that I'm gay. My snappy ally spirit turns into a Motorcycle! He's such a card LOL". Then he completely hit bottom with the Kellan Kolt series which really is just "Young Adult" reading for kids in middle school.

Of the "new" novels I'd read Kenson's Kellan Kolt serries again before I'd pick up Aftershock or A Fist Full of Data
Aftershock is based loosely enough on Robin-hood to gain nothing from either the robin-hood legends or shadowrun universe. The book attempts grand cinematic action in shadowrun style; picture an elf physad hood surfing on top of a speeding van cutting down lamp posts with a mono-whip to slow the progress of perusing motorcycles. It also has, "Hood", a Troll archer, (Yes with all the twink goodness that troll archer's have in SR), who is a pacifist plant lover. In my opinion this book is just an attempt to concentrate all of the authors many beloved memes in one place. Ultimately the book is flat uninteresting, fairly simplistic, with plot twists that left me more board then I was before the revelation. I give it half a Blaa.

A Fist Full of Data. This is one SR novel that mad me say "Wow!"
But not in a good way because that "Wow" was immediately followed by a "What...The...Fuck? Seriously?!" With a tittle like that I believe I had every right to believe that someone had invented the ultimate shadowrun novel scooping my two favorite flavors; Shadowrun and Spaghetti Westerns, into one awesome chocolate dipped waffle cone. In fact reading this book is almost, but not quite, as fun as digging into your favorite two scoop combo and finding a used Tampax hidden under the ice-cream.
A Fist Full of Data is a mashup of, I shit you not, Shadowrun, The Magnificent Seven, and ALICE IN (FUCKING) WONDERLAND! It doesn't matter how you feel about any one of those components the author has taken the worst parts of each and combined them in the worst possible way to create this abomination of SR fiction. I hate this book MORE than I hated the novel The Forever Drug.

Well now that I've vented about that again this year, I can highly recommend the works of Findly Charette and Dowd.

OneTrikPony - Wow...don't hold back like that please. Tell us how you really feel

Seriously though, the newer ones i read i did not care for a ton either. The first of the Colt books was alright, but it went downhill for the second and I didn't bother with the third.

Sorry man I'm trying to come out of my shell here but I can't just do it all at once. I don't mean to be so shy. Should I go back and put in the parts where i physicaly threaten the testicles of anyone who allows novels like that to be published? I don't know. I'm scared someone will think that by behing honest I'm being rude.

Speaking personally, I want you to review all the books I might read beforehand.

I'll second that, good reviews, think i'll give them a miss.

I've said this several times, but one thing the original book series had going for it was the idea that throughout the story there was a gradual unveiling of some of the "true reality" of the universe, along with a story arc around the coming of the Enemy (and another one about the incest spirits). Once that was resolved (in the unsatisfying dragon heart series), the writing went downhill. It was just mostly gaming scenarios and runs written up as novels. While they might have appealed to some, they would most not appeal to non-players I think.

Some of my favorites.

The original "Secrets of Power" trilogy
2XS
Night's Pawn
Lone Wolf
Burning Bright
Preying for Keeps
Headhunters

Black Madonna was a better Davinci Code than the Davinci Code

That's not too hard i'd say . . But at least with Black Madonna, the setting was right and actually promoted magic and high technology and big conspiracies . .

If I had to pick just one it would be 2XS by the late Nigel Findley

Many great books published before about 1998. My favorites

1. Burning Bright
2. Changeling

Many other great books, especially early on.

BlueMax

Honestly, the book I have read the most and will always enjoy reading, is the original first print of "Into the Shadows" before they cut the title-carrying short story out to become the intro to "Never Deal With a Dragon." The first SR novel, and my favorite because of the varying writing styles and flavors it delivers.

Thirding the secrets of power trillogy, especially Never Trust A Dragon <3

I guess I'm not alone when I add the 2XS was my favorite. I actually read this book right before I ran "Universal Brotherhood" for the team I was GMing at the time. It really inspired me and turned the UB into one of the best 1E bad guys, imho.

I am disheartened at the lack of Psychotrope on this list. Great read.

Also, as Bull suggested (albeit without titles) Headhunters and Preying for Keeps.

Worlds Without End - Caroline Spector
and
House of the Rising Sun - the late great Nigel Findley (the scenes between Dirk and Harley Quinn are some of my favorites)

Shadowrun on Facebook said it needed 800 words to describe the awesomeness of Shadowrun. This post proves one level, something for everyone.

The first of the two books above I despise with every ounce of my heart. I am however very happy that someone else enjoys that book. The breadth of Shadowrun is one of the things that makes it so fragging awesome.

BlueMax