Alright, first, there's our hijack - http://lusternia.ire-community.com/index.php?showtopic=1144

Then, the failed thread - http://lusternia.ire-community.com/index.php?showtopic=1148


Now, what I'm wanting is a list of fantasy novels, with a tag of 'popular', or 'good', or 'great', or combination (you can say one is a great AND popular novel, etc.)

I'm currently starting The Sword of Shannara, and bought the first three books of David Eddings' Belgariad, George R. R. Martin's "A Game of Thrones", the first Harry Potter book, and a handful of other older books.

Now, first off, I really enjoy reading fantasy (obviously), but my former knowledge of the genre is primarily LotR, DragonLance (having read over 70 novels), and all the Drizzt books to date, with a smattering of other Forgotten Realms novels. Also read the first of the Death Gate Cycle, the first few of Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality, and about half of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.

Please make suggestions! (Note, I'm really considering a future project wherein I analyse the genre specifically, going into plotting, characters, etc. - I'm also trying to do this to help out my own writing).

bleh - move to Real World if you want. Didn't mean to go to General, though I don't care if it stays

Terry Brooks is great. His first one, "Sword of Shannara", is beyond blatent plagerism of "Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit". That aside, his remaining works are quality. He did a triology of Shannara followed by a 4 book Shannara mini-series that takes place long after the first triology. I particularly like that series because, like Lord of the Rings, each book has its own piece of the story but the whole thing remains unresolved until the end. His Landover series is ideal if you want some good comedy but still be serious writing (as opposed to the Hitchhikers sci-fi series, which is just pure silliness). The Landover series is quite funny, but I always find that towards the end I am riveted with suspence to see what happens on the next page. He also has a habit of maintaining that feeling until about the last two pages by not having long drawn out endings after the main climax has been achieved. He Demon series ("Running with the Demon", etc.) is much darker. It reminds me mildly of a Stephen King fantasy and is unique from his other works in that it takes place in modern America. Brooks makes wonderfully evil bad guys, especially in "Running with the Demon".

Piers Anthony is good for sci-fi if you read his early works like "Chthon" and "Macroscope". He goes down hill as he gets older. Though some of his collaberations where he really just acts as an editor are nice. For fantasy, I liked "Through the Ice", "Quest for the Fallen Star", and often times the first book or two in his series. For example, "A Spell for Chameleon" was nice. but after 20 or so sequels it gets stale quickly. Same holds true for the Incarnations series (though I did like book 6 since the main character was Satan, a clever idea) and the Apprentice Adept series. Though personally I'd say Anthony shines more as an early sci-fi writer than fantasy since his fantasy took of in his later (meaning lamer) years.

I also strongly suggest Tolkien for his lesser known works, like "Silmarillion", etc.

Mercedes Lackey is one of the very few authors whose books I can read over and over and over and over and over without getting bored. (Certain fairy tales rewrites excluded)

Like Anne McCaffrey's brainship series too.

Timothy Zahn, David Weber: Nice, but not something I'd read more than once.

Curt Benjamin... only read one book of his so far (The Prince of Shadows), but doesn't feel like it's dragging on despite the length. Unbelievable (not in the sense of fantastically good) plot though, and personally speaking, the character names are rather irritating.

My friend's been raving about Dave Duncan, but haven't got a chance to read his books yet.

Robert Jordan and his Wheel of Time, that is if you can actually stand to wait for it to end Running on book 11 now, but he is by far one of the best fant authors I have read.

He is also the creator of Conan, though the movies never really did the books justice. Also, if you like Sci-Fi try Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game series if you havent. When it comes to writing Sci-Fi, I think only Asimov or Clark could do better, and not by much.

Read Ender's Game bought it the day after Christmas, finished it a couple days later (And I love Heinlein). Oh, and Robert E. Howard invented Conan

Should read the three Robin Hobb trilogies. I didn't like the first one (The Assassin one) very much, and found it rather boring, however it is very very very very worth reading it to be able to understand the other two properly. It is possible to read the second one (The Liveship Traders) first, and understand it fine, however it does link back to the first one a few times (Even if it's not obvious how at first) and you definitely need to have read both to read the third (The Tawny Man) trilogy. The author improves with every one, although I think how much you like them really depends on how attached you get to the characters. The very last book of all of them, Fool's Fate, is the only book ever to have me close to tears.

If you liked Ender's Game you should read the other books in the series (The next one is called Speaker for the Dead). They have quite a different tone to the first one though, it's more like a separate series that just happens to follow on storyline-wise from Ender's Game. Should also read Orson Scott Card's other stuff. My favourite is Pastwatch, and if you've ever played Civilisation you'll see why . He also has four (I think) collections of short stories, although unless you have nerves and a stomach of steel you'll want to read them in broad daylight and not while eating.

To summarize how you wanted it:

Robin Hobb's Assassin trilogy: Popular
Robin Hobb's Liveship trilogy: Popular, good
Robin Hobb's Tawny Man trilogy: Popular, GREAT
Orson Scott Card's books (Any of them really): Great, some popular

I know. Robert E. Howard, and Robert Jordan are one and the same. He uses a different pen name for almost every series.

I absolutely HATED speaker for the dead... I actually know OSC personally (used to live near me, and I dated his neice)... beware of anyone who answers his phone in character of who he is writing about.

By the way, my spelling seems to be going down with the time, sorry.

That's wrong

As far as I know, Robert Jordan is still alive. Robert E. Howard shot a bullet into his own brain on June 11, 1936.

There's an Australian author by the name of Garth Nix. His Old Kingdom Trilogy, Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen, are fantastic. They are highly recommended.

Mutter. All these series have the books stolen out of the library. Especially those last 3 Rhysus said, I REALLY wanted to read those (I think Ingrid recommended them) but nooo, someone nicks them out of Lincolnshire altogether.

IM ALWAYS RIGHT -cough-

I researched and, yeah, Robert Jordan just wrote the Destroyer, and a few others, he diddnt come up with the origional story.... my mistake.

Clive Barker takes the fantasy genre and adds a bit of a sci-fi twist in "Imajica". Not sure if it would be your cup of tea, but I liked it.

I read about a book a week and it's not often a book 'sticks' in my memory. But here are some memorable reads off the top of my head:

The Black Company Trilogy by Glen Cook - Read this ages ago but still stands out. Only the first three books are worthy, I think.

The Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop - Really original fantasy novels. I haven't read anything else by this author that was really standout however.

The Kushiel Trilogy by Jacqueline Carey - Amazing writer. Warning, though, of very disturbing sex and violence.

Perdido Street Station by China Mieville - The master of the 'steampunk' fantasy genre (melding of high fantasy and low technology). This is my favorite of his novels but all of them are extremely well written. His latest book is, ironically, called the Iron Council (though bearing no resemblance to Magnagora's Iron Council), though its my least favorite book.

The Troy Game Trilogy by Sara Douglass - A new series by an excellent author (wrote the Wayfarer Redemption series). Unfortunately, only the first two books are out. I bring this up because of the really great rendition of Stag of Briton and his relationship with the Goddess.

Definitely Mercedes Lackey has already been mentioned, but specifically her Last Herald-Mage series with Vanyel is awesome. (Popular/Great)

A newer author, Sarah Ash, would probably be the one I'd recommend over anything. A Russian background combined with Eastern European folklore works in a nice blend. Her series is called the Tears of Artamon and the first book is Lord of Snow and Shadows. (Superb)

Also, just as an aside because I just re-read it, On Fire's Wings by Christie Golden starts off what should prove to be an interesting set. Think saviours of the world mixed with elemental dragons, mixed with questing. (Good)

and have to agree with Estarra on Kushiel's series.

Fantasy sucks, with a couple of exceptions.

Okay, one exception. A Song of Ice and Fire, George R. R. Martin. Ignore the double r's, it is as far from Tolkien (Thank god) as yer gonna get.

*thinks* Ok, some of these may have already been mentioned but...

Books by...
- Tolkien
- Feist (especially the Empire series with Janny Wurts)
- Eddings (especially the Tamuli IMO)
- Martin
- Melanie Rawn (underrated)
- Salvatore (Where's the "I'm a Drizzt fanboy" t-shirt?)
- Rowling
- Duncan (if you can find his books)
- Wurts herself
- L. E. Modesitt Jr (for something that's not good vs evil),
-Hickman and Weis
- Hobb
- McCaffrey's Pern
- Isobelle Carmody (Obernewtyn and Darkfall series)
- Lewis Carroll
- Katherine Kerr (amazing)
- Katherine Kurtz
- Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger series (the first three or four at least)
- Pratchett
- Maggie Furey (the Artifacts of Power)
- Barbara Hambly
- J. V. Jones
- Lackey
- Le Guin (first three of Earthsea at any rate)
- C. S. Lewis
- Greg Bear (Songs of Earth and Power)
- Andre Norton
- Robert Rankin (bizarre and definitely not to everyone's tastes)
- Mickey Zucker Reichart
- Lawrence Watt-Evens (twists on cliches)
- Zelazny
- Tad Williams

Oooh, more Mercedes Lackey fans

For "single" books, Born to Run (is part of a series of sorts, but you don't have to read the entire series) is really nice. Same goes for Fire Rose. The two pretty new books: Joust and Alta are great too. Joust greater though . Anyone else feels that the first books are better, and the following books are... less great? *hides from lynch mob*

Anne Rice for a bit of gothic/real world fantasy