Good Fantsy Books

[NeuadvenBonechillerr]

I need some good fantsy books to read. . .Dragonlance-style fantsy, dragons, magic, etc.

and

I just finished reading a few dragonlance books, are there any good books aside from the 3 season books, and the Twin series?


Any suggestions on ethier question would be appreciated, and maybe this could turn into another thread like the one about Sci-Fi. . .

If I had to suggest (I only have limited experiance)

The 12-14 'Core' Dragonlance books.
The Belgariad (David Eddings)
The Mellorean (David Eddings)
Deathgate Cycle (Weis and Hickman)

Edit - If anyone still reads this for good fantsy books the list down on post 10 is extremely good, the only thing I don't like is SoIAF. . I don't know what it is about it, I got 45 pages into it and got bored. . . he's too long winded, but thats personal preferance. I prefer simple and easy.

[Hateyou]

The Shannara series by Terry Brooks might be good for you, they are easy reads like Dragonlance.

If you want a bit more in depth, go with the Wheel of Time series, by Robert Jordan.

If you want to go even more 'hardcore', go with A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin, and The Malazan Book of the Fallen series, by Steven Erikson.

[faithdies]

Hmm, the series about the Twins 5-year trip is really good. What are they called....? Damnit. Brothers in Arms was the second one. Can't remember the first. Those are really good. The story about the creation of Qualinost is good.
Some of the villain books are good. The best being the one about Verminaard.

Also, I'm a huge fan of the Wheel of Time series.

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Good DL books...

"Soulforge" and "Brothers in Arms" are the Twins Prequels, very good as far as DL goes.

Also the Kingpriest Trilogy (first book is "Chosen of the Gods") and the War of Souls Trilogy (Dragons of a Fallen Sun) are the other biggies, though I didn't much care for the War of Souls.

Also sounds like you would like the Belgariad by David Eddings...its very old school fantasy.

[Grimmlokk]

Try the R.A. Salvatore books. Forgotten Realms ones, with Drizzt Do'urden and pals. Better written than the Dragonlance ones for the most part, but similar setting and also related to D&D I think.

That's really all I can think of for that type of high fantasy writing. If you want to try a heavier stuff with better writing go for the Martin's Ice and Fire or Erickson's Malazan like suggested earlier. Or Edding's trilogies(elenium/tamuli/belgariad). All good reads, Edding's stuff a little lighter and closer to the DL type stuff. The Saga of Recluce by L.E. Modesitt might interest you. Similar level of writing, but a totally different setting. Lot of books though(12 or 13 I think) so that's good. Easy to get in to, but very well written characters and if you stick with it the world is very well crafted. But no dragons/knights really. Can really pick up almost any one and start reading(think 2 or 3 are direct sequals of earlier ones), not written in order, almost all have different characters.

[Throag]

Krondor chronicles by Raymond E. Feist (Riftwar Saga, Empire Trilogy etc.)

Robin Hobb -> Farseer Trilogy, Liveship Traders and Tawny Man are all very good in my opinion.

[sachemsiouxx]

Martin s song of fire and ice helped me realize that fantasy was not a genre doomed to mediocracy.
Now, I cant stand those overly stereotyped books where the young hero realizes after two chapters that he s orphan because he s the new super hero of doom thats gonna 1shot the endboss (tm) once he has Fkd the princess and regained his "ubr-artfact-of-never-seen-before-magic-powers".
I would really advise you to check this out, just dont let the start scare you with its million characters.

[Aulirophile]

Lois McMaster Bujold's most recent books are all good Fantasy. Curse of Chalion, Paladin of Souls, The Hallowed Hunt, and Enchanted Knife Part 1: The Beguilement (Part 2 in July '07, can't wait). Just overall really well written. It is very strange because the Vorkosigan books, while very decent, didn't have anywhere near the same level of quality. It is like a different writer.

Discworld series by Terry Pratchett. Fun stuff. I think all the major series worth reading got mentioned already so I'll leave it at that.

[Vorph]

Originally Posted by Hateyou

The Shannara series by Terry Brooks might be good for you, they are easy reads like Dragonlance.

If you want a bit more in depth, go with the Wheel of Time series, by Robert Jordan.

If you want to go even more 'hardcore', go with A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin, and The Malazan Book of the Fallen series, by Steven Erikson.

I may be biased because I started reading Brooks a year or two after Sword of Shannara was first published--which is 30 years ago this month--and I've read everything of his since then except the Word series which I'm just starting now... but I still enjoy his fantasy books far more than anyone else's. With the subtle addition of technology to the last two Shannara series, plus the way he is tying together the Word and Shannara stuff in the current one (Genesis of Shannara) I'd disagree strongly that his world has less depth than Jordan's.

[Arbuste]

Extremely good:
- George R.R. Martin: A Song of Ice and Fire (4books)
- Glen Cook: The Black Company (10 books)
- Jack Vance: Everything, but first: The Cycle of Lyonesse (3 books)
- Terry Pratchett: Discworld (a million books)

Good:
- JRR Tolkien: Lord of the Ring and The Hobbit (4 books)
- Robin Hobb: The Royal Assassin, the Tawny Man and the Liveship Traders (3x3 books). Almost good enough to be with ASoIaF and the others.
- Katherine Kurtz: The Derynis (12~ books) Original. "Realistic" fantasy.
- David Eddings: The Belgariad and The Mallorean (5 and 5 books iirc.) Simple, but fun. Prequels are more of the same. All the other books by Eddings were disappointing.
- Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman: Everything they wrote is pretty good. Dragonlance (only read the first books), the Death Gate Cycle (I really liked this one), The Black Sword (so-so.)
- Mickael Moorcock: It ranges from awesome to extremely bad. The serie on Corum (6 books iirc) is the best. Elric and Hawkmoon are ok (if you forget the last couple books.)
- Stephen King: The Dark Tower (7 books.) Western-flavored fantasy. Very good (although overrated, in my opinion.)
- Orson Scott Card: The Tales of Alvin Maker. Very good, and better if it gets to the end some day.
- C.J. Cherryh: Fortress in the Eye of Time (and sequels, 4 books.) Good !


If you are out of good stuff:
- Robert Jordan: The Wheel of time (too many goddamn books.) Long serie with very high ups and very deep downs.
- Raymond E. Feist: Krondor stuff. Overrated.
- Elizabeth Haydon: Rhapsody / Prophecy / Destiny and the sequels (5 books so far.) Decent but a bit too girly.
- Tad Williams: Memory, Sorrow and Thorns (4 books.) Way too long. It really gets boring. The War of the Flowers, on the other hand, was very good. But it's not classical fantasy.
- Fritz Leiber: Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories. Fantasy from the 1940's.
- Robert Howard and al.: Conan stories. Entertaining.
- R.A. Salvatore: The basic stuff about Drizzt and his buddies is decent.

Not worth reading:
- Stephen Donaldson: Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever (6 books or more) Meh.
- Roger Zelazny: The Princes of Amber (10 books.) Yawnfest.
- Terry Brooks: The Books of Landover (5 books.) Very, very bad.
- Terry Goodkind: The Sword of Truth. It's like a lame Wheel of Time. Don't give that man any money. If you've gotta read it, steal it.

If you want something close to Dragonlance, I would say:
1) More Weis&Hickman stuff: The Death Gate cycle.
2) David Eddings: Same kind of stuff, except maybe better. Simple and fun.
3) Raymond E. Feist and R.A. Salvatore. Not as good as the above.

[Hateyou]

Originally Posted by Vorph

I may be biased because I started reading Brooks a year or two after Sword of Shannara was first published--which is 30 years ago this month--and I've read everything of his since then except the Word series which I'm just starting now... but I still enjoy his fantasy books far more than anyone else's. With the subtle addition of technology to the last two Shannara series, plus the way he is tying together the Word and Shannara stuff in the current one (Genesis of Shannara) I'd disagree strongly that his world has less depth than Jordan's.

Well, I should have said that I have only read the original trilogy, the 4 Heritage books, and the prequel, First King. Compared to those 8 books, Wheel of Time does have much more depth. I can't speak for anything after that, my bad.

Speaking of technology, I love the Shannara world. Does he ever write about the "modern civilization" that killed itself off? It was totally pimp reading about 'fantasy' characters wandering around destroyed skyscrapers wondering what they were.

[Vorph]

Originally Posted by Hateyou

Speaking of technology, I love the Shannara world. Does he ever write about the "modern civilization" that killed itself off? It was totally pimp reading about 'fantasy' characters wandering around destroyed skyscrapers wondering what they were.

Yea, the Word/Void series --

Running with the Demon (1997)
A Knight of the Word (1998)
Angel Fire East (1999)

-- is all about the world as it was long before all the Shannara stuff, and how it fell apart. I'm really liking it so far (still on the first one).

Then there's the new series, Genesis of Shannara, which picks up at the end of Word/Void and is going to eventually explain how our world evolved into Shannara (or at least that's how I understood the blurb). I started reading Armageddon's Children before realizing that I had never actually read the stuff before it, and had to run back to the library to swap. The second part is due out in September.

One thing I really, really like about Brooks is the man is a goddamn machine when it comes to writing. He has been putting out one book a year for as long as I can remember, so there's never any painfully long waiting for the next installment and the stories don't seem to suffer for it or feel rushed at all.

[Arbuste]

About Shanara... Terry Brooks wrote a few novels based in Landover, a magical world. They are, in my opinion, very bad books. Very, very bad.
How do those Shanara novels compare to the Landover novels?

Edit: Or Shannnnara.

[Vorph]

Nothing alike really. The Shannara books are a lot more serious, while Landover is sort of tongue-in-cheek and geared towards younger readers. Or at least that's how it seemed to me when I read the first three Landover books in high school.

[Grimmlokk]

Hmmm I read the Word and the Void and liked it. Had no idea it was related to Shannara in any way. Only read first Shannara book and hated it. A lot. Except for the evil little gnome fuckers at least. Was just so trite and basic. Like fantasy by numbers or something.

But then, I keep reading the Recluce/WoT/SoT series, so what kind of judge am I? =P