Fantasy Recommendations - for the unenlightened

[Brys]

Erikson's your best choice there. There is an evil god, but I don't think you even find out about it's existence until the 3rd book, and conflict between "good" and "evil" is pretty much non-existent, because there aren't any good characters. You should enjoy it - I'd only read Feist and Eddings before. Also, if you're finding Jordan to be slow paced and waffling a lot already, it's probably a good time to give up, because those books seem concise and fast paced compared to the later books.

 

[Rosemary]

i have missed this place and all of you greatly. I've sorta had my hands full. I highly recommend Melanie Rawn's Dragon Prince trilogy. I was absolutely captivated.
did I say HOW glad I was to be here again?

Oh I really enjoyed all of Melanie Rawn's books, even if it was a few years ago now. I did think at one stage though that the later books seemed to take of into the SciFi direction!

By the way - WELCOME BACK DON SKY

 

[kyektulu]

Margaret Wies and Tracy Hickman.
Mercedes Lacky
Maggie furey
David Gemmal
David Eddings
Raymond E Fiest
Chris Bunch (although he stuff is a bit tedious and takes some slogging to get through)
Richard Knack
Edo Van Belkom
Melenie Rawn
Don Perrin
Mark Anthony
Tanith Lee
Robin Hobb
Terry Goodkind

Will try 2 remember more it is late and im tired!

 

[finvarre]

There's so much already on this thread that I don't want to repeat those same names once again. But as for the authors/books not mentioned here, I'd add:
- some books by Guy Gavriel Kay (Gollum has mentioned only his Fionavar series, and Kay has written 6 more books, 4 of them standalones: Tigana, A Song for Arbonne, Lions of Al-Rassan and The Last Light of the Sun, and the Sarantine Mosaic duology). I'd recommend every one of them, but maybe I'm not being very objective here as Kay is one of my favourite authors (hence my username). I'll say only that these books, unlike the Fionavar Tapestry, are based on European countries' culture like ie. medieval France in Arbonne or Bysanthium in Sarantium. But then, there's a little magic in there as well, and I especially enjoyed Kay's characters.
- some science fantasy books (thanks, Kelpie, for the word ) i.e. C. S Friedman's The Coldfire Trilogy. I'd recommend as well other novels by this author (they're SF, so I'm not mentioning them here)
- CJ Cherryh novels: the Morgaine Saga (a science fantasy) and The Ynefel/Fortress novels: there are already 4 of them, with the fifth volume to come in 2006: both of these cycles are superb, though completely different;
- and now I'd have to add Steph Swainston as well: 2 novels as for now, The Year of Our War and No Present Like Time, hopefully with more to come, as the story is unfinished.

 

[aftermath]

I second finvarre in that everyone should read all of kay's books. Well, I haven't rad The Last Light of the Sun so I can't reccomend that one, but all the rest.

This is all I can remember... my library is in my apartment and I'm 4 hours away from it...

Richard Lee Byers (War of the Spider Queen)
Thomas M. Reid(War of the Spider Queen)
David Eddings
Robert Jordan
Terry Brooks
Terry Goodkind
Ann Rice (Vampires related)
Mad Arab-Necronomicon (thats all they call him in the book and since there is no author stated...I would say this is a must read)
Peirs Anthony
Margaret Wies
Martin

 

[bendoran]

gemmels rigante series is fantastic, as is most of his drenai tales. light hearted and easy reading fantasy.

kearney is also very good, from his monarchies of god series to a different kingdom.

erikson is top notch fantasy, complex and violent

a mention should go to stephin kings dark tower series, which is somewhat fantasy like. possibly the best series of books i ever read.

 

[GOLLUM]

YES Kearney and Erikson are both top notch but don't forget R Scott Bakker, Kate Elliott, George RR Martin, China Mieville, Stephen Donaldson, Janny Wurts and Gene Wolfe to name a few more....

 

[bendoran]

i have read a lot of martin, and melville. Martin is good but i think erikson beats him, martin is much more a typical fantasy and falls down mostly in the length of time between his books. for output and quality it would be hard to find an author producing as many quality novels as erikson in such a short period of time.

not a big fan of donaldson, he has some good ideas but didnt capture my attention as well as some. Janny wurst did a great collaboration with eddings in servant of the empire books, but her stand alone stuff was kinda boring.

never read gene wolfe or kate elliot, though have seen them about the bookshops.

whats elliot like? not too fond of most female writers, i always find they try to hard to reverse the male stereoptypes in fantasy and go against the grain to much. kushiels dart anyone???

 

[GOLLUM]

As far as Elliott goes I'm referring to the current Crown Of Stars series. At times I feel the books sag a little in terms of pacing but the overall story is quite good and cetainly EPIC in nature and I enjoyed the prose. Not sure if the books try to bend the male stereotpye too much though. There's an Authors section here on the forums that has a whole section on Kate Elliott.

Gene Wolfe is in IMO and probably fair to say a number of members here a very fine writer. The Book Of The New Sun is a bit of a classic and something I particularly enjoyed. Sorry to hear about your thoughts on Jany, I like her books especially the Wars Of light and Shadow series but you're right it can be a bit heavy going and the plot doesn't always move at lightning speed but I do like the style and wit of her prose, a little different to the standard fare I think.

I do like Donaldson's T Covenant series in particular. For me it's one of the significant works in the fanatsy genre in the past 30 years. Especially the way it deals with aspects of the psychology of the human condition against a fantasy backdrop. Another who has a gig on the Authors forum. He's one writer a lot of people either love or hate actually.

Erikson well what can I say... He's my no. 1 fav fantasy series author of all time and I've been reading this stuff for close to 30 years now including older fantasy classics.

So what about R Scott Bakker? Along with Kearney he's in Erikson's top Fantasy authors list.

Also have you read Glenn Cook's Black Company series, militray fanatsy along the lines of Erikson and one of the biggest influences on Erikson.

One series I happily recommend is by author J V Jones. Her previuos series were so so BUT the latest Sword Of Shadows trilogy is a very good dark and "gritty" fantasy along the lines of Erikson and to a lesser extent Martin.

Melville is right up there with Erikson and Wolfe for me. A very fine writer.

OH one author I meant to mention is Ricardo Pinto. His current Dance Of The Chameleon trilogy is very richly detailed in terms of an imagined society. It can be a little slow moving in parts but I felt it's a very well written and considered series indeed. Book 3 is taking some time to come out as this project has become something of a labour of love for this guy, another author I don't hear too many mention around here....

All for now...

 

[bendoran]

read the first book of words novel by jv jones and just plain didnt like it. was very slow and clumsy, while being terribly cliched.

read prince of nothing, which was hard to get into but finished well. will get warrior prophet when i get the chance.

like melville, even if he is a bit of a plonk in real life.

 

[GOLLUM]

read the first book of words novel by jv jones and just plain didnt like it. was very slow and clumsy, while being terribly cliched.

YES as I said bendoran don''t go near those early works but when you check out the first book in the Sword Of Shadows trilogy if you're like me you'll swear it's not the same author, the contrast in quality is truly that great IMO.

So ever tried Pinto or Cook?

 

[Brys]

BTW, Melville was the author who wrote Moby Dick - I don't think he qualifies a fantasy author. I think who you actually mean is Mieville. A big difference there, and we don't want to confuse people.

 

[GOLLUM]

Yes you'ld be right Brys that's who we meant to say not that I didn't mind reading Moby Dick when I was younger...

 

[bendoran]

plus was talkign bout china melville, but there you go. and i think a story about a giant white whale is quite fantastic, dont you?

never read pinto, though his books look interesting. been trying to get hold of cook for some time now, recommended as he is by erikson.

 

[GOLLUM]

Pinto's books are definitely interesting and Cook's unfortunately not that easy to get hold off with several books in the series currently out of print, which is a real shame really.

 

[aspi8dos]

I cannot believe no one has mentioned Harry Turtledove. Anything by him is worth reading from the colonization/worldwar series (more sfi) to the darkness series and the (What if) historical fantasys. David Drake has also written some good fantasy beside his military sf. Philip Jose Farmer, Rick Cook, Eric Flint, Linda Evans and Jack Vance are all well worth a look. To finish I would also recommend The War Gods Own, Oath Of Swords and Wind Rider's Oath by David Weber. To check out some writers you may not have read before go to baen.com and check out the free library lots of books by loads of Authors in every format except pdf. It dosent cost anything and you can always buy the book(s) if you like them

 

[Brys]

You may want to mention Turtledove in the Science Fiction recommendation thread rather than this one, as it seems like he writes mainly sci-fi.

 

[Jason_Taverner]

ok it's sci-fi I gues but if u want ur head messed with read philip k dick any of his stuff will get in ur head and it does want to leave, as for Erikson great stuff but can be on the harsh side I find but Iam a romantic at heart. If u want to tune in n chill out get urself a bit gemmel there is a clear line between good n bad and it will only take u a day or two to finish one of his books. As for Robin Hobb I love Farseer trilogy I didn't think i would but it was so fresh I saving the twany man until I've read all the books waiting for me on my bedroom floor that I've collected and haven't got around to read so I've got nothing to distract me. The wheel of time is good, book ten wasn't so good but I re-reading them all as the new book is out soon and i can't wait

 

[Pyan]

The wheel of time is good, book ten wasn't so good but I re-reading them all as the new book is out soon and i can't wait

You managed to get to Book Ten? Full marks for persistence, but don't you get tired of waiting for the plot to move on just a tiny bit? I'm afraid I gave up about half-way through Book Seven, after yet another discussion about hem-lines.

 

[Brys]

I got to book 10 as well, but I got very tired of waiting for the plot. Unfortunately, book 10 was just too much, and the last WoT novel I'll be reading. If you thought 7 was slow, just be glad you didn't try Crossroads of Twilight, which had practically no plot.