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waterfall_maker  3d ago (text post)   1071 thread views

I am looking for story about nondysfunctional family (or group of friends)

I am looking for story where group of characters (family or friends) form together a group that is NOT dysfunctional.

Them dealing with problematic/oppressive/bureaucratic/evil world is fine, in fact I want to have some conflict. On the other hand I do not want them to win effortlessly or get some insanely OP powers that invalidate any opposition. I do not want tragic/bad ending, I also do not want obvious 100% perfect absurd success thanks to blatant plot armor.

I also want story to not feature blatantly stupid setting or characters that make no sense whatsoever. Initially I phrased it as "no unrealistic stuff" but I am in fact fine with dragon-flying slave traders as antagonists, as long as suspension of disbelief is achievable.

I strongly prefer avoidance of current politics in either direction, I have seen remarkably few cases where it was done well. I also do not want books that would be recommended only due to current politics, quality of that is even worse.

Story may be small scale. I actually prefer to avoid "saving the world" story. I think that within last decade I seen two stories that did it and were done well (House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds, Deepness in the sky by Vernor Vinge). And maybe few more that I read earlier (LOTR, Ursula K. Le Guin)

I was thinking about fiction when I was writing this, but if you have anything that is nonfiction and fits - even better!

I hope that it is fine to ask for book recommendations here? If not, then please delete/downvote this and let me know what went wrong.

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Funny enough if you look at the totality of middle earth stories even if Sauron won it wouldn’t be lights out. Morgoth won at one point and the valar intervened.

I mean, yes, but it was a Pyrrhic victory; Beleriand, where all the elven kingdoms had been, sank into the ocean permanently with the exception of Lindon. Sauron might not have won, but the Free Peoples would have lost.

Also, there's that line from the Downfall of Numenôr: "Men could not a second time be saved by any such embassy".

And the Valar always made claims about not doing something until they did.

That was narrator voice, not the Valar.

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