Well I’m craving something in this genre but I’m a bit overwhelmed and underwhelmed at the same time. So many titles and yet I’m not sure what to read. Maybe you can help?
I’m looking for something in a high fantasy setting. I’m not too keen on heavy politics and war driven plots (though, I can read that ). What really gets me is interesting characters, good action and magical creatures.
I’ve loved anything Discworld and I’ve also enjoyed the First Law books by Abercrombie.
I’m finding that Tolkien, Sanderson and George RR Martin appear on every fantasy list I come across, so if you do recommend something I’d appreciate it be something other than that.
Patricia C Wrede. The Enchanted Forest Chronicles. The titles for the series are below:
- Dealing with Dragons
- Searching for Dragons
- Calling on Dragons
- Talking to Dragons
Fantasy stories with each book centered around one protagonist and a meta take of your usual fairy tales. And includes wizards, dragons, princesses too.
Ooooh
Terry Pratchett!!
None of the suggestions above talk about comedy fantasy. Is there anyone close to the master? GNU
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Have you considered Kate Elliott novels? Jaran was amazing if you like sci-fi/fantasy crossover, or King’s Dragon if you like pure fantasy. If you prefer easier reading check out the Dragonriders of Pern series.
Memory, Sorrow, & Thorn series by Tad Williams is my all time favorite. I also noticed that I relate to different characters as I age which makes rereading it a fun experience.
@Aviandelight @Mothra This is a great series. I recently did a re-read and it still holds up.
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The Belgariad and The Malloreon by David Eddings. His books have classic D&D feel, light reading with bits of humor.
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Realm of the Elderlings by Robin Hobb. A massive plotline (all books already written so no need to wait), very dark, superb characters.
assasins trilogy is among my favorite
last trilogy starting with bee is kinda bad
the final book reads too much like pandering to fans
Hobb has great books and books with whiney paralyzed main characters which can be a slog
Fitz and the Fool trilogy spoilers
I like Bee and her story, I don’t like that most of the plot could be ended in no time if only the characters bothered to talk with each other (it looks forced to keep them from contacting in time). The end is a good closure for this saga.
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Michael Moorcock’s Elric books tick all of the boxes in your list. So do his Corum and Hawkmoon books.
My personal favorites are the Assassin series, starting with Assassin Apprentice by Robin Hobb.
Some of the best most heartfelt characters I have read in any modern fantasy, with a brilliantly unique type of magic and adventure. There is some political intrigue, especially within the first trilogy, but it isn’t overly burdened by it.
The whole series has continued to be a heavily character driven emotional roller coaster that I would love to be able to forget just so I could read them again for the first time.
My wife got me to read the first trilogy, they’re pretty good. There’s also some weird writing at times that made me think it was very much “men writing women”. And a weird scene at the end of book 3 where >!Fitz (nephew) and Verity (uncle) do a Freaky Friday body swap so Verity could fuck his wife while in his nephew’s body and impregnate her.!< I didn’t read the other books lol.
To be fair, I’ve read all of Wheel of Time and loved the series, and while it’s not as bad as Discworld, it’s still pretty weird and misogynistic at times.
Robin Hobb is a woman, though
I’m aware, that’s why it’s surprising.
You are the first person I ever know to say Discworld is bad. It’s usually love, ignorance or indifference with Pratchett’s work, may I ask why the hate?
It’s definitely good and entertaining, but I found it almost distracting how he described women. I’ve been told it was actually intentional, like he was making fun of other fantasy tropes, but it sorta turned me off to it. I only read Color of Magic.
There is a massive variety of female characters in Pratchett’s work and they are so different I’m not even sure what you mean by that. Sure, some are bimboes or twats but I can also recall cunning, resourceful, and smart ones, and in particular the older characters such as the witches really stand out. Male characters are subject to the same amount of variety so I’m surprised at your take on gender. He does have a very stylised approach though, cartoonish in many ways and fair enough if that’s not your thing.
I appreciate you being a perfectly reasonable person and understanding that people have different tastes in books lol. Cheers
Colour of Magic is the first Discworld, and one of Pratchett’s first novels. He grew into his voice a lot more over the course of the next fifty-something novels.
Most of the strongest, most unique women I’ve read have been of Pratchett’s creation. And not just heroes that happen to be described as female, but fully fleshed out women ranging from feminists who wish to support their husband to trans females pretending to be males dressing as women in order to fight the patriarchy.
If you’re willing to give the Discworld another go, and I urge you to, there’s a couple of reading order guides online. ‘Guards, Guards!’ is generally recommended as a good starting point, but I’d also suggest Wyrd Sisters, Mort, Going Postal, or if you really want to dive into the gender thing, Equal Rites or Monstrous Regiment.
A few I’ve enjoyed that aren’t mentioned elsewhere so far:
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Robin McKinley, The hero and the crown. If you’ve never read this, please, just go and do so, if you read nothing else on this entire response. The Newbery Medal it got was well deserved. (And it has princesses and dragons and wizards.)
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Louise Cooper, Indigo (8 short books). Sealed ancient evil, cursed protagonist on heroic journey, talking animal companion. Just lots of fun all around.
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Lois McMaster Bujold, The curse of Chalion series. Maybe a little more politics than you are looking for, but the divinity/magic system works well and I appreciate that the viewpoint characters are generally kind of old and busted. She is of course better known for the (excellent) Miles Vorkosigan military space opera series.
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Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear, A companion to wolves et seq. Exactly what it says on the tin; the catch is that the viewpoint character of the first book becomes bonded to a female wolf, which radically changes how his culture sees him.
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Elizabeth Moon, The deed of Paksenarrion. Basically what you’d get if you wrote down a really good D&D campaign (but mostly for only one viewpoint character). Formulaic in spots but enjoyable and well executed.
Other replies have mentioned Steven Brust’s Vlad Taltos books, which I enjoyed a lot; and David (and Leigh) Eddings, which were my first big-kid fantasy novels (as for many other other American children of the 70s and 80s). Another long series in something of the same vein as Eddings is Raymond E. Feist’s Riftwar saga; I haven’t read the entries after 2000, but before that it was a lot of fun.
Thanks for the detailed response! Will keep in mind
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I really liked the Night Angel series, The Way of Shadows is the first book.
I was also going to recommend Night Angel.
OP, it’s a book about a gutter rat that becomes trained as an assassin by the best, then evolves into a bit more fantasy and magic and the endgame of being the world’s best assassin.
I’ve heard the Wheel of Time stuff is pretty good. Piers Anthony’s Xanth novels were popular long ago, but he has sort of disappeared (I just looked him up, and he’s probably just retired). I’ve personally read the Black Cauldron books and enjoyed them quite a bit. Robert Aspirin’s Myth books can be fun. Hopefully there is something new to you in that list!
+1 for Piers Anthony, the xanth stuff gets the most attention but he has some other good stuff, the battle circle trilogy was pretty cool
Have you continued with Abercrombie’s books? He does not miss.
Tad Williams - Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy. On par with Tolkien and Martin IMHO
Came here to recommend this. Favorite fantasy books of all time.
Definitely for people who like verbose fantasy books though.
I’m saving this thread for later because I’m interested in this genre, I am totally new to books, I haven’t even read LOTR, The Hobbit, Game of Thrones or House of the Dragons books, I have only consumed that through the movies and TV Shows, but seems like there are some really neat suggestions here.
NPRs top 100 scifi and fantasy books.
I googled it instead. Loving the first few entries. Specifying only the first Ender book but the entire (Frank Herbert) Dune series is 👌. The fact that the rest of the Dune series is mostly ignored is criminal. The first book is far from the best and the series varies so much in setting and tone that it stays interesting to me after many readings.
I cannot for the life of me get that image to load at a readable resolution. Imgur how far you have fallen…
Should get out of that habit… Hopefully this is better.
https://pixelfed.social/p/thelastknowngod/624885702810365387
Ursula K. Le Guin’s Earthsea series is a good one. Unlike most authors in this genre who tend to be overly descriptive and feel the need to develop the lore of every squirrel in the kingdom, Le Guin writes really tight, well thought stories, where every word is important to the story.
