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I love fantasy novels but I'm so picky. I almost have no tolerance for anything less than the best. I'm not into those Forbidden Kingdom or Magic Kingdom or whatever those series are. (Forgotten Realms?)

My favorites are: The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The Chronicles of Narnia
The Chronicles of Amber (not Zelazney's later works)
DragonWorld by Byron Preiss and J. Michael Reaves

I used to enjoy the Belgariad (Elfstones of Shanara, Sword of Shanara, etc.)
but became bored with that stuff. I don't know why. Any suggestions?
Please include a brief synopis, a review, a rating, (such as mature for sexual content or language, etc.) and don't forget the author.

Try Jane Lindskold's "Firekeeper" series, "Wolf Captured,etc.

The synopsis is that on whatever world this is set in, the Wise Animals live alongside their speechless kin on part of one of the continents, and humans live on the other. Firekeeper was a child survivor of a lost expedition into Wise Animal territory and was - like Mowgli - raised as a wolf. Rescued and taken back to civilization and told she is a lost noblewoman, she and her new human friends work together - they accustom her to civilization and she lends them her wolf skills to do what they have to do (many, many adventures & baddies to be overcome.), along with her wolf mentor Blind Seer and a Wise Bird (forgot the name! It's been a while since a new adventure came out.)

Maturity level: adult or smart YA, some rather downplayed sex (part of the tale but not all-important usually), some adventure-story violence, lots of wit and insight. One of Lindskold's first novels, not in this series, was "Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls," about a homeless girl who can only speak in quotations but still manages to communicate. She escaped a lab (where she was treated as a lab rat) and lives with a gang run by a leader who is deeply into The Jungle Books. (Whatever works!) I find this standalone to be well worth looking up!

George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones series is darker, more violent and sexual, more like the depth of the Dark Ages, with overtones of real medieval history, but still fantasy. One of the leading, morally ambiguous characters is a very clever dwarf whose family has totally underestimated him: think the love child of Miles Vorkosigan (Louis McMaster Bujold) and Richard III (William Shakespeare.)

Try the The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb. The first in the trilogy is calledAssassin's Apprentice. And the great thing is if you enjoy the series, there are another two trilogies to follow on from it. Hero is the illegitimate son of a prince, who becomes the court poisoner. Has afinity with a wolf. Compulsive reading.

Also try Luck in the Shadows by Lynn Flewelling, also first in a trilogy. More of a dungeons and dragons scenario, hero becomes apprenticed to a spy/thief character who is an exiled nobleman from a society strongly based in magic. (The spy/thief character is also gay, the hero realises he is by the third book.)

In the Sci-fi section (but only 'cause it is set in space) are the Miles Vorkosigan books by Lois McMaster Bujold. These are beautifully written and wonderfully characterised. don't spoil it by starting in the middle of the series though.

Last edited by CuriousPrimate on 04 Feb 2006, 3:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

this is an older book, but I reccomend The Neverending Story by Michael Ende.

Like many authors, they wrote rather more than they had ideas for. possibly due to contract requirements.

Zelazny's second Amber series, despite moments, was a severe disappointment.
I was never taken by Terry Brooks' Shannara series, but Edding's first Belgariad series was excellent. I liked his Sparhawk books too, despite their similar "feel".

Now given that one person's taste is another's revulsion, I might suggest:

Sheri Tepper. "The True Game" A boy growing up on a world where a good number develop "talents", and these powers and their interplay determine careers and politics and war. Tepper set a variety of books on this world, but I think this is the original and best.

Tepper at her best is superb, but can keep returning to the same ideas, and with the same axes to grind.

Raymond Feist. "Magician" Utterly superb introduction to a world, (again with multiple books to follow) with wars and magic and intrigue. Once again a young boy follows a path far from the norm. Some of the later books feel formulaic, but not so much so as with other series.

David Gemmell: "Legend" An introduction to the world of the Drenai, and a famed but aging warrior facing his final battle. Lots of books to follow in the same world, some excellent, some a little repetitive.
In a different series, with past and future settings interwoven, are his Siptrassi tales, which go from Arthurian Britain to a post-apocalyptic future. "Wolf in Shadow": in a wrecked world, somewhat resembling the American wild west, Jon Shannow wanders, seeking Jerusalem.

Tim Powers: The contemporary fantasy "Last Call" is one of my most amazing reads ever, but it's not a fantasy of swords and dragons. It's about power and the magic of cards, and of the land. And about a man who lost his body and soul in a card game, and the debt about to come due. (more violent and adult than any of the others above)

Tim Powers has written books I didn't think much of, such as "Dinner at Deviant's Palace" but has written other remarkable volumes such as "The Stress of Her Regard", a totally different take on the world of vampires, and "The Anubis Gates" a time travel gothic horror literary mystery romance. In much lighter tone was "The Drawing of the Dark", a take on the Arthurian myth set in the 1500's.


Then amongst the classics not mentioned so far there's Anne McCaffrey's Dragons of Pern, and Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea books...

Is humour allowed? There's Piers Anthony's Xanth books, chock full of puns.
And above all Terry Pratchett's Discworld, with serious ideas and human stories crammed in settings crammed with literary illusions, and references.

The Forgotten Realms trilogy is pretty good.


-SpaceCase

Out of those already mentioned I've read and enjoyed Hobb, Ende, Tepper, Feist, Gemmell, LeGuin and Pratchett.

David Gemmell's Echoes of the Great Song is set in a world where the Avatar once developed great technologies (or magics), but this was thousands of years ago and few have bothered to understand the old knowledge. In this respect it's almost like a fantasy version of the premise of Foundation. It does contain some fairly gory violence, and nudity.

E. Nesbit's books are classics, and The Enchanted Castle is probably her best. It's aimed at a young audience and the style might seem a bit old-fashioned, but it is very well written. Since the copyright's expired you can get it off the Project Gutenburg website.

For Sci-fi, Mary Gentle's Golden Witchbreed is an immensely detailed story about a human envoy on an alien world. The Ortheans once had sophisticated technology, but abandoned it after it brought them too close to destruction. Part of the envoy's job is to encourage trade with earth, which would involve bringing technology back to Orthe. Only about halfway through the book does she begin to understand how different the Ortheans are, despite their superficial similarity to humans. Contains fights and a little nudity.

Frank Herbert's Dune is a Sci-fi classic.

Emmetman wrote:
Zelazny's second Amber series, despite moments, was a severe disappointment.
I was never taken by Terry Brooks' Shannara series, but Edding's first Belgariad series was excellent. I liked his Sparhawk books too, despite their similar "feel".




I couldn't agree with you more on that. I keep hearing these names pop up from friends and aquaintances: Raymond Feist and Piers Anthony.
I think I'll read their works first.

THANKS TO EVERYONE for your suggestions. This is very helpful to me. I hate labouring through a book only to find that I didn't like it: but once I start it, I can't stop, even if I am thoroughly bored or disgusted! I'm just weird that way.

Enders Game! duh all about kids but not made for kids (kinda like Narnia but a bit darker) though it is scifi not fantasy. Seriosuly it took me like a week to finish it and I was also busy reading the stupid school books.

I don't usually read Sci-fi but I'll try it. Sounds good.

Yaaaaaaaaaa I win all of you lose :-p.

My record for reading is the Lord of the Rings Trilogy over a weekend, or the collected works of John Wyndham over a week.

An obvious choice could be the "Harry Potter" series. It's a wonderful fantasy series, and this from someone who's an extremely picky reader. A synopsis of the story wouldn't do it justice at all because of how complex and detailed it gets by Book 6 (Book 7 isn't out yet), suffice to say it involves wizard schools, saving the world, peer pressure, politics, war, love, the media, and racism. Personally I think the series has kinda gone downhill after Book 3, but I still think that the series as a whole is above and beyond the standards of the typical fantasy series. As for rating, this varies, because the books get darker and more mature as they go along. The first one isn perfect for kids, but the later books get rather brutal, with hands getting cut off and people being slashed up, that sort of thing. Nothing super R-rated, though.

I also really recommend Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trillogy, which consists of "The Golden Compass," "The Subtle Knife," and "The Amber Spyglass." I don't even know how to BEGIN summarizing the story, but it's very very cool, and deep. It involves different dimensions, different parts of people being separate but connected beings, theological ideas, particles, and something called Dust. It's rather mature, with a few brief intense and grisley moments, and the harpies in "Spyglass" are topless.

A lot of people like Garth Nix's trillogy, consisting of "Sabriel," "Lirael," and "Abhorsen." Personally I don't like it for stylistic reasons, but I can't deny that he's created a very cool world. Basically, a necromancer uses swords and 7 magical bells to save the world from zombies. It's interesting but the writing style is generic and the dialogue uninteresting. I loved the characters of Mogget and the Disreputable Dog, but found the rest of 'em dull. It's a very cool world, though, and most people like it. I didn't finish Abhorsen, but from what I read, it's pretty kid friendly.

Finally, I'll recommend that you read up on your Neil Gaiman, who is basically the current king of dark fantasy. His 11 "Sandman" graphic novels are frankly amazing, but are VERY mature--quite bloody and with a lot of nudity. They're so interesting though, because of his wonderful execution of the 7 Endless--Dream, Death, Delerium, Desire, Destruction, Destiny, and Despair--the beings who never die because they are the embodyment of ideas. The appeal is that he combines mythology with horror and humor, all wrapped up in a carefully constructed, sweeping, epic storyline. Highly recommended.

"American Gods" is another example of Gaiman's work. I'm only in the first third but I love it. Basically, all the old gods--Odin, Thor, Anansi, etc.--still exist in today's world, but they've been displaced by the new gods. Gods of cell phones, credit cards, and TV are created because people sacrifice their time to warship technology. Odin's just about sick of it so, in true Viking fashion, he's trying to gather up all the old gods for a last stand against the new ones. This is told through the eyes of Shadow, a big dude who's just got out of prison. However, the book's about as adult as books can get. It's extremely profane and even more erotic. To give you an example, one scene has a goddess who's disguised as a hooker make a guy worship her as they have sex, and the guy winds up getting swallowed up into her through her vagina. It's an awesome book though--a well deserved bestseller.

Philip Pullman and Garth Nix are good Even if they are more of a YA genre.

You could try some Isobelle Carmody, perhaps her Obernewyton series (because it's the most finished out of all of them even if it is still missing a book ). It's very hard for me to describe so you're probably best searching for the blurb or a synopsis online, and even then you still need to read the book to know if you like it or not. It is a bit hard to get into when you first start but once you get used to it it's great. I personally prefer her series including the books Darkfall and Darksong but I'm still hanging on the end of the second book awaiting for the third to conclude the series. The Obernewyton series is classed in a YA and fantasy genre so it's a bit of both really.

If you wanted to branch out a bit you could try and get hold of some Kate Forsyth (The Witches of Eileanan) or Juliet Marillier... they both have a bit of mature content in them to add to the story. I know there are some book reviews on their websites (as far as I can remember) so if you search their name you might come up with something interesting. Juliet Marillier's books Wolfskin and Foxmask are the ones I enjoyed the most although she also has The Sevenwaters trilogy and The Bridei Chronicles which she's still writing.

It's hard to say if you'll enjoy a book until you start reading it though, so..

You're not the only one, once I start reading a book I have to finish it as quickly as possible, though, not quite as quickly if it isn't so good.

My reccomendation:

Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood. This one takes place in the future when bio-engineering has gone totally out of control, people began playing god, humanity was destroyed, etc. Takes place both in the post-apocalyptic world and in flashbacks telling the story of what led to the apocalypse. Good book for an aspie, lots of word-play, and even a chapter titled Asperger's U, which takes place in the top science and technology university which is populated almost entirely by aspies. I read this one in one night, couldn't put it down.

A A Attanasio has some good books. The Dominions of Irth series is about a magical realm called Irth, which co-exists with a dark shadowrealm which is actually our own reality. The two worlds don't mingle, until a single person from our reality escapes to Irth, where he takes on a new appearance and loses his memory. The book is about him trying to remember his life, finding love among the upper classes of Irth society whilst he has no social standing, and about the struggle between good and evil that brought him to Irth in order to bring about it's destruction.

If you like Arthurian fantasy, he also has an Arthurian series, but with a twist. Merlyn is actually a demon cast into human form, and lacking his demon powers, has to learn to use his chakras to manipulate energy. The Dragon and the Unicorn actually has very little to do with Arthur, but more with defining Merlyn and the events that lead up to Arthur's birth. Again, very well written.

He also has great science fiction novels, if you prefer those. Centuries is about a future earth society after a devastating third world war, where geniuses are pooled into a singular entity working to preserve humanity. One attempt is at genetic modification which creates people who are really really intelligent. They get rid of old age, colonize the universe, and as they approach the end of time, they plan to collapse the entire universe at the quanta level to their version of paradise. Over these thousands of years, one of the original geniuses and a clone of an original super-intelligent creation, attempt to thwart the event to destroy the universe and the achievement of their dubious paradise.

Though he's already been mentioned, you really have to read David Gemmell. Absolutely awesome. Echoes of a Great Song and Dark Moon are both really good, though they're both standalone books, which is a shame. Dark Moon is my favorite Gemmell book. It's about a world with three races. The original race was powerful with magic, and brought two other species from dying worlds into their own. One of them was human, the other race was an insatiable race who warred and wanted power. In order to protect the planet, the original race secluded the violent race and tried to coexist with humans. Humans, of course, began to distrust the original race and attacked, but this time, humanity was spared and the original species hid themselves away. Eventually, over time, the violent race reappeared and began destroying humanity, who no longer had the protection of the original race. Standing against the tide is the armies of the Ice Queen, and a special warrior with two souls and magical swords. One soul is a great and merciless killer, while the other is gentle. This is a poor synopsis, but it's really really great.
By the same author, Dark Prince and The Lion of Macedon are books about Alexander the Great and the rise of Macedonia. His Drenai novels are good, as are his Waylander novels. The Siptrassi novels aren't as great as his other novels, though. I'd skip them entirely, actually.

The Redemption of Althalus by David and Leigh Eddings is a great standalone novel, too. A thief breaks into the house of a Goddess, who traps him and teaches him from her book of power. It consists of powerful words that utilizes her magic. Kind've like a magical bible. She and her brother, an evil God, are fighting for control of the world. He has his own book, a dark book of power. Their other brother, God, just watches while the lesser two fight it out. As the book progresses, each side develops almost identical and opposite teams of disciples who fight on the behalf of their deities. Rather too convoluted to explain, but really good.