[Closed] /geek/ recommend me some high fantasy books? /geek/

Just discovered Joe Abercrombie, brilliant
JV Jones
Katherine Kerr

Try:

Raymond E Feist (all good, Magician is a good starting point)
David Eddings (Belgariad, Mallorean etc)
Guy Gavriel Kay (The Fionavar Tapestry)

Loads of good stuff out there, but those three leapt to mind straight away.

<geek>recommend me some high fantasy books?</ geek> surely?

(runs away)

This thread may tempt the lurking Mrs Grips to register and post. There's not much she doesn't know about fantasy books 🙂

Patrick Rothfuss, The name of the wind. ive been waiting for part 2 of the trilogy for years now tho.

And for something a bit unusual either Captain bluebear, or Rumo by Walter Moers.

Also recommend Joe Abercrombie and the Blade Itself stuff. I'm all about the Trudi Canavan, Brent Weeks fluff so I'm afraid that's about as helpful as I can be without getting burnt my dragon flame ;O)

Captain Bluebear is brilliant. Very very handy if you get attacked for reading a book about a bright blue bear too, my copy is the size of a breezeblock

Thanks everyone, plenty to look out for there. I might head down to Oxfam this afternoon and see what they've got.

Patrick Rothfuss, The name of the wind. ive been waiting for part 2 of the trilogy for years now tho.

I'll avoid that then, i've been waiting far too long for George RR Martin's next one!

This thread may tempt the lurking Mrs Grips to register and post. There's not much she doesn't know about fantasy books

Ace, get her on here.

+1 for Katherine Kerr, Trudi Canavan, Raymond Feist, David Eddings.

Terry Goodkind - Wizards First Rule, Sword of Truth series - starts off well but the series drags out a bit
Chronicles of Amber - discovered recently after another STW topic and love it
Kristen Britain - Green Rider and First Riders Call
Robert Jordan - The Wheel of Time series, same problem as SoT series to a degree and he died before finishing the last book 🙁
Anne MaCaffery - if you like dragons....
Tad Williams - Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy. A bit too Tolkien like.
Fiona McIntosh - Myrren's Gift

As said feist, but I'll read the first two books first, then the trilogy from the other side and then back to krondor material.
Sarah doulass
Brent week
Karen miller
trudy cadavan
stan nicholls
peter brett
Weis and hickman are always very good choice
Can you read french?
If yes I have very good books for you.

To be honest even if the second and third never come out, i'd still read it.

China Mieville

"Peridido Street Station" is the start I think.. does'nt matter too much

Oh and Karen Miller - Kingmaker, Kingbreaker series and Godspeaker series

No mention of Michael Moorcock??? Shame on you all.

Robert Jordan's dead? You mean that everlasting series has no final conclusion! I'm not happy about that, not happy at all!

Can you read french?
If yes I have very good books for you.

Er... non. There's probably enough here for a decade or so already though. I remember reading a review of Perdido Street Station saying it was really unpleasantly horrid - no? Just looked at Amazon and i'm definitely going to give Brent Weeks a go.

sweepy - Member

Patrick Rothfuss, The name of the wind. ive been waiting for part 2 of the trilogy for years now tho.

Ditto, picked the book up in Atlanta airport on a layover last year and was half way through it before we got to Heathrow! The Wise Man' Fear is to be published april next year, according to Mr Rothfuss

mttm - Member

Robert Jordan's dead? You mean that everlasting series has no final conclusion! I'm not happy about that, not happy at all!

Yes, he passed away last year. Thankfully he chose another writer to carry on the series and explained his vision for the rest of the series in detail. the first "posthumous" book has already been published, not got round to reading it myself though

Feist's early stuff is great, gets a bit boring as it goes on though. Jany wurts with whom he co-wrote the "empire" trology is fantastic though, the empire books and the the wars of light and shadow are brilliant.

Eddings was good for a while, but again the later books turned into repackaged versions of the odler stuff

Can't believe I forgot Stephen R Donaldson - the Thomas Covenant chronicles are great, and his "Gap" SF series is equally as good

Steven Erikson, Malazan book of the FAllen series.

I'm gutted that the last one in the series is coming out soon.

the wheel of time is being finished by an author called brian sanderson? anyway the last book has been split into 3 the first of which came out last year and its actually a lot better paced than jordans writing, tho still a bit sloooooow

chine mieville is very good

and yeah im desperately awaiting the next george rr martin, allegedly september, but we will see

also if anyone knows where i can get a copy of teh tales of dunk and egg (not theh graphic novels) would be nice as they only appear in anthologies

Thankfully he chose another writer to carry on the series and explained his vision for the rest of the series in detail. the first "posthumous" book has already been published

thanks for the update on that. Selfish I know - the poor chap's dead and all - but I really wanted to get to the end of this one.

Eddings was good for a while, but again the later books turned into repackaged versions of the odler stuff

Yes, I'd agree with that. His last series was extremely formulaic.

Oh, try some Maggie Furey as well, she writes a good book.

"mttm - Member

Try:

Raymond E Feist (all good, Magician is a good starting point)"

True up to the point, but recently he's gone down the tubes. But the old stuff really is very good for what it is.

Someone mentioned Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber, the first 5 in particular are as good as it gets, the second 5 are less good but still great. You can get all 10 books in one mighty collection (or the first 5 in a fantasy masterworks edition).

Richard Morgan's The Steel Remains was interesting, not particularily well done though I thought but still worth the read for all that.

Mark Chadbourn - Age of Misrule series and then the other 6 after it

bl00dy excellent

Just looked up that Mark Cadbourn one - think I might have to get that.... 🙂

Not strictly "high" fantasy but I really liked Sergei Lukyanenko - Night Watch Trilogy, also adapted into quite a dark Russian language film.

Has anyone read any Adrian Tchaikovsky? Amazon keeps recommending it to me...

Age of Misrule is indeed excellent, as is the 2nd charbourn series, final one starts well, but felt it was a little tied up in a hurry...but good nontheless

Try Robert Holdstock's Mythago cycle and then maybe Celtika series as well. And I have just been saddened to learn he died last year too:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/dec/02/robert-holdstock-obituary
http://robertholdstock.com/

Been reading his stuff since the mid-90s and has formed quite a big part of my reading life/pleasure.

Oh and the guy that wrote his obit - John Courteny Grimwood writes some good shizzle

Wheel of Time - started out well, but very formulaic (Tolkein/Eddings influences too apparent)

all the usual suspects mentioned (Eddings etc), but what about the late great David Gemmel - very readable....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gemmell

[i]the Thomas Covenant chronicles are great[/i]
Totally disagree, thought they were w*nk, really rubbish, but hey ho read them while I was quite young and may not have appreciated them, has been putting me off the 'Gap' series for years and I really quite fancy them

Enjoyed the Edding books, haven't really bothered with is latest though.

Anne MaCaffery - dragons of Pern series were good fun

[i]Steven Erikson, Malazan book of the Fallen series[/i]
Unbeleveable great start to this series, but have totally faultered in his last one, I'm about half way through and am not inclinded to even bother finishing it

Really struggling to find anything I 'want' to read @ the moment.
(enjoy [mainly older 60's] sci-fi and fantasy).

The book of the new sun set by Gene Wolfe is my fave.
Starts with The shadow of the torturer.

Robin Hobb was mentioned above, but she started out as Megan Linholm, and she wrote a brilliant though little known book called [i]Wizard Of The Pigeons[/i], set in Seattle, about a homeless Vet fighting a strange power. It's dark Urban Magic, and it made quite an impression, it was years before I could bring myself to read it again. R A MacAvoy wrote two lovely books, which I was thrilled to find available through the Kindle app on my phone, called [i]Tea With The Black Dragon[/i] and [i]Twisting The Rope[/i], which involve computer crime, Irish music and a Black Dragon in human form. Lovely books. Kate Griffin has written two urban magic books, set in her home city of London, called [i]A Madness Of Angels[/i], and [i]The Midnight Mayor[/i], with a third, [i]The Neon Court[/i] coming next March. She's a fantastic writer, she describes London in amazing detail and her characters are well crafted and 'real'. The magic uses everyday official writing like ASBO's and use of underground tickets as spells, and power resides in everyday objects. I love these books to bits, and I can't recommend them highly enough; I bought them as paperbacks, then got the hardbacks from the States, and I've got the ebooks as well. Kate also writes under her own name as Catherine Webb, and has written a bunch of books for teenagers, but which are as good as a great many adult books, and better than more than a few I've read. [i]Mirror Dreams[/i] was published when Catherine was fourteen, with [i]Mirror Wakes[/i] shortly after. There are real comparisons with Roger Zelazney's [i]Amber[/i] books here, then she published [i]Waywalkers[/i] and [i]Timekeepers[/i], also with a touch of Zelazney, and has a nice series set in Victorian London about a young scientist/detective called Horatio Lyle, a sort of Steampunk Sherlock Holmes. So far there are four, [i]The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle, the Obsidian Dagger, The Doomsday Machine[/i], and [i]The Dream Thief[/i], which came out last week and which I'm reading at the moment.

Not really into classical fantasy any more as I realised I was reading the same story over and over again. But here are my highlights:

David Eddings - Belgariad and Malorean.

Scott Lynch - Funny, dark, cynical fantasy. One of my favourite writers.

Nial Gaiman - Neverwhere good, others less so I thought.

Neal Stephenson - Baroque cycle, good if you like semi-historical scientific geekery. Very wry. My other favourite writer.

Robin Hobb - Royal Assasin trilogy and Liveship traders good.

Trudi Canavan - Magicians apprentice trilogy good, Voice of the Gods trilogy is very much the same. So read one or the other, not both!

Susanna Clarke - Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, good if you can overcome the prose style.

Mark Chadbourne is OK but found some stuff overly slow and really important stuff got rushed so stopped reading after Age of misrule.

master of the 5 magics, excellent forgotten classic series of books...

maleus darkblade, dan abnett is pretty good.

robin hobb should be shot, dithering women who can't write male characters. Put me off female authors full stop.

conn iggulden has taken ceaser and ghenhis khan histories and made them great.

Try Robert Holdstock's Mythago cycle and then maybe Celtika series as well. And I have just been saddened to learn he died last year too:

That's reall sad. His books are great and rooted in a really interesting set of ideas.

Robert Holdstock , 'The Mythago Wood' and it's associated spin offs always caught my imagination with their hopping from this world to that.

Edit: oops teach me to leave a thread open while I go read bedtime stories.

agree with:

Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time (rereading again, much better when they can be read back to back)
Stephen Donaldson's Thomas Covenant Chronicles
Tad Williams Memory, Thorn and Sorrow

Enough reading there for a a wee while.

Oh, I forgot about Raymond E Feist - agreed again he did womble off ever so after a while but the early stuff is good. And Fiona McIntosh too.
Neil Stephenson - Snowcrash is one of the finest examples of 'cyberpunk' ever and somewhat overshadowed by William Gibsons efforts in the mists of time but it's brilliant. I still want one of the cool surfboardy things.

Not sure if this qualifies, but both World War Z and the Zombie Survival Guide are well worth look.

Failing that, wait for Gordon Brown's forthcoming memoirs, it's sure to be a masterpiece of high fantasy.

Also, to echo a comment above, Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion series (the Elric stories were always my favourites) were great fun.

+1 Steven Erikson and his Malazan series - pretty unconventional fantasy that you can get lost in, but full of invention and mayhem.

Joe Abercrombie's trilogy is good too - does slow down at times but the characters are interesting

I've just thought of another pair of books by Barbara Hambly, [i]The Silent Tower[/i] and [i]The Silicon Mage[/i], high magic mixed with computer technology by a power hungry Mage attempting to gain access to our world from a parallel world of magic, with a mad wizard and a female programmer the only ones who know what's going on and with the skills to prevent disaster. Excellent books, Barbara writes characters with flaws who you come to care very deeply about. Sadly not as prolific a writer as I'd like, she's been threatening a follow up for around twenty years!
[edit] I'd forgotten a third title, [i]Dog Wizard[/i], in 1993, plus two associated titles, [i]Darkmage[/i], and [i]Sorcerer's Ward[/i], which is really is a really gripping story. These can all be found online through places like Abe Books, who are a brilliant resource, I found a pristine leather bound signed ltd edition of [i]Tea With The Black Dragon[/i] there this week, which I was delighted about. [/edit]

If youi like them real pulp (ie David Eddings / Raymond E Feist) David Gemmell is very pulp. The 'Druss' character is all you'll ever need.

oh and if you like vampires and hate twighlight then http://www.thestraintrilogy.com/ (not really fantasy, but has the makings of a good series I hope)

Oh, and [i]Little, Big[/i] by John Crowley is a great book.

Haven't read any new fantasy for a long time, so may be well out of touch, but would be having a look at Michael Moorcock, and if you like the historical stuff, Katherine Kurtz's earlier two Deryni trilogies. I loved a really old book called Lud-in-the-Mist by hope Mirrlees. H.G. Wells and contemporaries have a lot to offer too if you've not delved there.