Fantasy novels: where to start?
The other day I was at the bookshop, and saw the newly published (at least here in Sweden) "Complete Conan Chronicles", a humongous and intimidating black tome. I didn't buy it, fearing that it would feel painfully old-fashioned, but it stirred my interest in fantasy readings.
More or less 10-15 years ago I read some stuff (couple of Eddings novels from different sagas, the first Shannara by Terry Brooks, a Gygax trilogy about Gord the thief or somesuch, and The Hobbit) and bought the Lord of the Rings. I remember Shannara quite clearly, and I quite liked it (though having now seen the LotR films I can see where Brooks got his inspiration... a friend of mine defined it as a compressed LotR), and thought The Hobbit was delightful, but the rest is almost totally blank now, as it was so long ago (more 15 than 10 years ago actually...).
As I looked at the shelves the other day I saw a lot of names that I kind of recognised (Howard, Feist, Pratchett, Gaiman -liked his comics-, Goodkind, Salvatore, Barker -not quite fantasy maybe- plus the above mentioned), but had no clue what would be a good place to (re)start.
Any good recommendations? Possibly something that isn't 5000 pages, at least for now...
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OK, from my point of view, since you have done the required reading (LoTR), I suggest Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. I do believe you won't be disappointed. If you do like his comics, the books are a no-brainer. After Neverwhere, try all the rest, they are short, satisfying, deeply imaginative works. After that I really cannot say, I guess that after Gaiman you will find most of the fantasy literature lacking. But you can take a route of comics, if you have read Sandman, then give a shot to Alan Moore - Watchmen, From Hell (fitting especially well after Neverwhere, since both take place in London) or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Also, Stephen King's The Dark Tower has this nice, epic, fantasy feel with good backstory, but it's huge (seven tomes, if I remember correctly).
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George R.R. Martin. It hasn't quite reached the 5000 page mark, but it's easily the best high fantasy being produced right now. And with the first one at $4.50. You can't go wrong.
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I like Feist, but I lost interest after "The King's Buccaneer". I would say don't read Jordan, because they're not very good, they're long, and will probably never be finished now. Plus, you'll become one of those "Jordanites".
Calling Shannara a compressed LOTR is funny, I think those books outnumber LOTR pagewise by a significant amount, and it's still feels like just another retelling. I couldn't finish "Return of the King", so I couldn't get very far in Shannara because I had already read about these same exact characters before.
Pratchett is hilarious, but if I had to choose, it would be placed firmly in humor instead of fantasy. Read "Night Watch", that's my favorite Discworld novel.
Glen Cook wrote a series of books called "The Black Company". I got into it because they're loosely the basis for the story in the Bungie game "Myth: The Fallen Lords". It's got a different take on magic, and the first book follows the annals of a mercenary company, "The Black Company", who are working for the bad guys, which was a nice change. There's about seven books, and they're normal sized, so that's maybe... 2500-3000 pages total? Not bad.
Neverwhere is more like a modern Alice in Wonderland, which again I'd call fantasy, but isn't what I think of immediately when I say fantasy. Stardust is definitely more up that genre's alley.
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On the other hand, I hated Neverwhere; IMHO, Good Omens and American Gods were better written and had more interesting plots/characters. Granted, I'm not really a big fantasy fan, so take my opinion for what it is.
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My standard answer to this question is the original Dragonlance trilogy.
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My biggest turn off when it comes to books is a title something like Fuzzi Wuzzles of Pendaronandon (Book 1 of 10).
Personally I blame the lord of the rings as every following fantasy author feels the need to have epic world changing stories where a tight plot and interesting ideas are infinitely better.
So in that line. I second the neil gaiman books (though it's more modern fantasy, I highly recommend American Gods). Clive Barker has some interesting stuff (Imajica and Weaveworld) though they're both pretty hefty books. And if you can find her, Ursula le Guin (wizard of earthsea is excellent and she has a number of short stories).
Also, take a look here for some good classic individual books
It really depends on what kind of fantasy. Are you partial to the sword or a space marine? If its the marine, I might humbly suggest Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan. Either way, I'm gonna go with Unn and give a big thumbs up to Night Watch.
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I'd avoid Salvatore and Goodkind, personally: the former because he's a cliched hack (not bad, necessarily, just vanilla and uninteresting), and the latter because he's an unimaginative, preachy hack (pretty bad, unless you like the same book over and over again - you did say you read some Eddings, right?
- and getting sermonized at).
George RR Martin is impressive, but pretty light on most High Fantasy elements (if that's what you're looking for). Absolutely worth reading, but possibly not as a re-intro to fantasy.
Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time is really good -- ignore the haters -- unless you like plots that finish. The first 5 or 6 books are really good, and then he got bogged down. 7 through 9 are long and a bit of slog. (Ok, a lot of a slog.) Still well-written, but the plot advances about 200 pages in those 3 1000+ page books. 10 and 11 pick back up and are much more interesting; we'll see what happens with 12 (which is the last one, and should still be released).
For traditional fantasy, I'd recommend Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles (The Black Cauldron is the first one, IIRC). Light, but highly entertaining. Also easy reads, with storylines that get more interesting as the characters mature.
EDIT: re: Martin - the other reason not to start with him is that he'll totally spoil you on everything else. Read other stuff first so that you can still stand to read books after the Song of Ice and Fire. Otherwise, everthing you read will be "decent, but not as good as Martin."
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I really enjoyed Robin Hobb's Farseer trilogy when I read it, although it's been a while since. Other than that I couldn't recommend much fantasy besides George R.R. Martin and Prattchet unless you're really fond of the genre. At least not of the stuff that's in a quasi medieval setting with Lords and Ladies and all that. Most of it is rubbish. Gaiman's more into mixing the real world with the fantastical, and he's alright, but his books have never been as good as his Sandman comics.
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Gaiman is awesome, though not what I'd call fantasy per sé. Well worth reading though. I've gone the same route as you - went from the Hobbit and LOTR to Eddings. Quite liked the Belgariad, even enjoyed the Mallorean series. After that all his characters apparently are recycled, and the stories rehashed. One writer I've not seen so far is Steven Erikson. Now, granted, his books are huge (and so far there is 7 out of 10 in the Malazan Book of the Fallen series) and they're anything but light. On the other hand, they are (to me) some of the most rewarding books I've ever read. Huge stories that for a change are not Tolkien derived, very interesting characters that are more grey than black or white (though there are some real bastards there too) and a world that seems oddly realistic.
Ok, so I'm a fanboy. Bite me.
Pratchett is also great. As mentioned, Night Watch is awesome, as are all the books based on those characters. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that he's gotten better, far better, since The Colour of Magic.
On Glen Cook: I've not read him yet, but his Black Company sounds really cool. One of these days I actually will remember that when I enter a bookstore.
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Great recommendation; her Liveship series is worth checking out too. Raymond Fiest's books (make sure you start with Magician, the book that starts everything) are a good bet, and also open up some of the works co-authored by Janny Wurts, who has some excellent titles of her own.
If you can cope with multiple plotlines spread across multiple parallel timelines, all set amidst a background of re-incarnation and Celtic environs, take a peek at the Deverry books by Katherine Kerr (beginning with Daggerspell).
Another author I'd recommend for something a little different would be Sherri Tepper. A lot of her work drifts between sci-fi and fantasy, some folks hate some of the feminist undertones, but good starting points would be 'The True Game', 'The Revenants' or 'Grass'.
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Some of the books suggested in this thread aren't fantasy very much...
I've mentioned it before in book threads around here, but the best fantasy book I've read in the last year was The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch. It's a single book (for now) and definitely worth the price.
Besides what has already been mentioned I'll throw out two recommendations - David Weber and his "War God" trilogy. It's a fun, quick fantasy read. He also has some good space-based novels.
Second suggestion is William King and his "Gotrek & Felix" series. It is based on the Warhammer universe but you don't really need to know anything about Warhammer. It is an enjoyable series which stands on it's on. I've read the first trilogy and plan to pick up the second.
I don't know - nor do I care - where "fantasy" ends and "speculative" or "alt-history" or "sci-fi" or "post-modern" begins, but I'd like to add the names Gene Wolfe, China Mieville, Naomi Novik and Guy Gavriel Kay to the list of suggestions.
Also, as a general point, if you want to get reacquinted with fantastic literature, you could do a lot worse than to buy a few short story collections (I'd recommend Wolfe's Strangers Aboard, Gaiman's Fragile Things or Mieville's Looking for Jake). Also, it can be a good idea to check for the athor names mentioned here on YouTube. Many of the better ones have readings posted on there; it's a relatively easy way of sampling their work.
Oh, and if you want to check out Martin, leave the Song of Ice and Fire for later, and start with Fevre Dream. It's a vampire story from before the genre got popular and better than flat out any other I read before or after.
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I got away from Fantasy for many years as well, but recently I went back and re-read Steven R. Donaldson's Chronicles of Thomas Covenant The Unbeliever (both of them). Forgot how good they were.
The Sunset Warrior series by Eric Van Lustbader.
I'm also a HUGE fan of Steven Brust and all his books. The Dragaeran books are very fun to read, but even his other books (Freedom & Necessity /w Emma Bull, Agyar) are a treat.
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I have to second Martin.
I read everything in the song of ice and fire series (even the short stories) they are amazing. I simply cannot recommend them enough. Other stuff seems bland now.
The only gripe I can think of about George R R Martin is that he is pretty light on some of the fantastic elements. Not a lot of magic or crazy creatures.
Personally I like it better that way, when they are used it has more meaning because of it. He is also not afraid to kill a character so you feel nervous when a character you like gets in a fight or does something dangerous.
I also want to second Fevre Dream, I just finished it and its great.
Another vote for George RR Martin.
[i]I really enjoyed the WOT series myself. I see it as a more epic LOTR with a lot more mature content.
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Just to counter-point the Martin love in this thread, I found it blah. I did not finish the second book of Fire and Ice. Everyone always says it's like the best fantasy ever. I don't get it. It was long and drawn out with a ton of "political intrigue" and practically every character he made you care about he killed off. I feel like I'm missing something or there is something wrong with me.
Exactly. I see this as a major plus. It's less fantastic than other fantasy books, but only because everyone else puts a ludicrous amount of magic in their books. The magic here has that same otherworldly and sinister edge that the Lord of the Rings books have.
To me the books are a lot more like Dune than what you would typically expect out of a VLFN (Very Long Fantasy Novel). The story is about the people, cultures, and politics more than anything else.
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Hmm... I'd say one of my favorite Fantasy novels would be the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy by Tad Williams. They start off a little bit slow, mainly to set up the world, but if you make it through the 100 - 150 pages that are slow you can't put it down. It's an incredibly satisfying series.
I don't know how much this counts but you can't go wrong with The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. The Dresden Files are a little more funny then most fantasy. I highly recommend them.
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Huge George R.R. Martin fan here. The "A Song of Ice and Fire" series will spoil you.
Fevre Dream is very well done, but my personal favorite stand alone Martin story is Tuff Voyaging. Tuff Voyaging is for the space fantasy fans, plenty of sci-fi/fantasy involved.
The Wheel of Time series is a good place to get started, it's where I got started. The first book in the series can be read as a stand alone book so it's not overwhelming.
I'm going to stick my neck out here and suggest, Harry Potter, book 4. It's where I started the series and it's right when the series gets good. It's an easy read but it's fun.
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Good choice. The Black Company novels are an entertaining read, and pretty quick to get through. Though, I believe the quality does decline towards the end of the series.
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I am personally a big fan of Feist. The reading is not heavyweight, the stories are good, the characters are easy to get into, and the books aren't intimidatingly large. Start out with the Magician books first (Apprentice and Master).
Also, if you want some fantasy with a different taste, I highly recommend the three Myst novels: The Book of Atrus, The Book of Ti'ana and the Book of D'ni. All fun reads.
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Seconded, with a bullet! Kay may not be the best fantasist, but I find him to be the best writer of those who do Fantasy. For high fantasy his trilogy (Summer Tree, Wandering Fire, Darkest Road).
His later stuff is more "alternate history" or history re-imaged in a slightly fantastical alternate world, but it is universally good. (Although his latest Ysabel is a stab at another genre and I woudn't read it first.)
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George R.R. Martin - A Song of Ice & Fire, the downside being that he's not done...
Robin Hobb - Farseer trilogy
Terry Pratchett - Guards! Guards!, Small Gods, Hogfather... The Discworld books are more of a collection than a series, so they don't cause much trouble as far as which order to read them.
Mercedes Lackey & James Mallory - The Obsidian Trilogy (The Outstretched Shadow, To Light a Candle & When Darkness Falls)
Philip Pullman - His Dark Materials (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife & The Amber Spyglass)
More techie, but still good:
John Steakley - Armor
Orson Scott Card - Ender's Game
Neil Gaimon - American Gods, Good Omens & Anansi Boys
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Funkenpants wrote:
An advisory here:
As she noted, he's not done with this series, and I'd actually call this a pretty jarring re-introduction to the Fantasy universe of works out there, particularly because the fantastical elements are pretty insubstantial at first (and by "at first," I mean essentially the first two novels). If you like medieval politics and war, however, this is a great way to go.
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I have to respond again with some love for Feist. His is a little more bubble gum than Martin, its an action movie to Martins epic drama but a damn fun read regardless.
Props to nsmike for mentioning it. Read the books he suggested.
Nthing the Farseer trilogy. *points to earring in icon*
Why am I the first person to mention Roger Zelazny? Go pick up his Chronicles of Amber, now available in one massive volume, or hit the library to pick up the books individually. Wisecracking protagonists were never written as well as when he did them.
I'll throw in a few names: J.V. Jones - especially the Barbed Coil for an interesting one off, Sara Douglas - an Australian Author with an interesting Alt history trilogy and David Gemmell, most of his books come in under 300 pages and are easy to read.
Also Stephen Donaldson is penning the Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the first of which was okay, I was a big fan of his Gap series, but that's more SciFi.
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