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Best Fantasy Books

pigdogpigdog
edited November 2010 in Chit chat
Any suggestions?

I loved the Belgariad and Mallorean as a kid, but not read anything since. Oh actually that's a lie, Feists Magician et al was great too.

It seems the popular vote goes to George RR Martins books.

Got a few long haul flights coming up.

cheers

P
Post edited by pigdog on

Comments

  • hypostomushypostomus
    edited November 2010
    Most recently I've enjoyed Joe Abercrombie, Alan Campbell and Toby Foster. For some older works, if you haven't read them how about Terry Brooks, Anne McCaffrey (especially the earlier Pern books), Mary Gentle, James P. Blaylock, and Piers Anthony's Xanth books. That should give you something to go on anyway.
    Chris
  • dm_boozefreekdm_boozefreek
    edited November 2010
    Alan Dean Fosters Spellsinger is quite good, never did get to read the last book :(

    I do recall trying to read the Conan novels years ago, It started off well but after Conan the Cimarian they were kind of shit. Watch the 2 Arnie movies instead :lol:
    Every night is curry night!
  • mel the bellmel the bell
    edited November 2010
    michael moorcock?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Moorcock
    Professional Mel-the-Bell Simulator................"So realistic, I found myself reaching for the Kleenex King-Size!" - Richard Darling
  • dm_boozefreekdm_boozefreek
    edited November 2010
    mel the bell wrote: »
    michael moorcock?

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

    Yup got the graphic novel of The Jewel in the Skull, had it since about 1984 but my little cousin took it upon himself to colour it in one time though the little twat :evil:

    I have the written novels back in England at my ma's house as well.
    Every night is curry night!
  • mel the bellmel the bell
    edited November 2010
    dm_boozefreek wrote: »
    Yup got the graphic novel of The Jewel in the Skull, had it since about 1984 but my little cousin took it upon himself to colour it in one time though the little twat :evil:

    I have the written novels back in England at my ma's house as well.

    i have ONE michael moorcock book lol, a big heavy hardback thing.
    i knew of him from hawkwind, chronicle of the black sword and all that, elric

    can i add the obvious too?...............terry pratchett
    Professional Mel-the-Bell Simulator................"So realistic, I found myself reaching for the Kleenex King-Size!" - Richard Darling
  • dm_boozefreekdm_boozefreek
    edited November 2010
    I was gonna say Pratchett and Tolkien, but I guessed they were a given?
    Every night is curry night!
  • DarenDaren
    edited November 2010
    ____________
  • pigdogpigdog
    edited November 2010
    interesting suggestions. ta.

    what do people think of George RR Martins books?
  • Matt_BMatt_B
    edited November 2010
    Ricardo Pinto is worth a mention. He might be more familiar to people here for his work on Gyron, Carrier Command, Hive and the Spectrum version of Elite, but he's since written an excellent series of fantasy novels called The Stone Dance of the Chameleon.
  • sirclive1sirclive1
    edited November 2010
    i instantly thought of Deathtrap dungeon and Rebel Planet !
  • zeropolis79zeropolis79
    edited November 2010
    Try His Dark Materials Trilogy by Phillip Pullman (Northern Lights, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass). Excellent stuff
  • ArjunArjun
    edited November 2010
    I would suggest a dekko at Jonathan Stroud's excellent Amulet of Samarkand Triology. It's clever, witty and inventive writing.
    Zero - A modern Spectrum emulator for Windows.
    Bytes:Chuntey - Spectrum tech blog.
  • jammajupjammajup
    edited November 2010
    I remember back in the day reading the `Dragonlance Chronicles` (Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman),such as `Dragons Of Autumn Twilight`,Tolkien and of course i played the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks , later i discovered Pratchett.
    I am mostly sci-fi now
  • VampyreVampyre
    edited November 2010
    pigdog wrote: »
    Any suggestions?
    I loved the Belgariad and Mallorean as a kid

    Have you tried Eddings' prequels, Belgarath the Sorceror and Polgara the Sorceress? BTS is one of my all-time favourite fantasy books.
    pigdog wrote: »
    Feists Magician
    Oh yes! All of the Riftwar Saga books were excellent.

    I got into Tad Williams a few years ago. Not up to the Tolkien/Eddings/Pratchett level, but still quite good. I've only read a couple of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time books, but they were (especially the first), brilliant.

    I've not read these since I was about 12, but Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea books I seem to remember were pretty good.
    ZXSR - Speccy Mags Reviews
  • beanzbeanz
    edited November 2010
    Dragonlance Chronicles (first 3 books of the dragonlance series) and Dragonlance Legends (the next 3 continuing books).
  • pigdogpigdog
    edited November 2010
    yep, i've read the belgariad prequels!

    so if Geprge RR Martins books are "the best" how come no one here as read them or been impressed by them?

    http://www.bestfantasybooks.com/top25-fantasy-books.php

    P
  • Matt_BMatt_B
    edited November 2010
    pigdog wrote: »
    yep, i've read the belgariad prequels!

    so if Geprge RR Martins books are "the best" how come no one here as read them or been impressed by them?

    http://www.bestfantasybooks.com/top25-fantasy-books.php

    P

    Um... I've read Sandkings and that was pretty good, but that's really science fiction; I've never read any of his fantasy stories.
  • mermanmerman
    edited November 2010
    If you want epic length stuff, go for Stephen Donaldson's six novels (I have them in two volumes of three) about Thomas Covenant. Also enjoyed the first few from Terry Goodkind, but couldn't keep up with the new ones being published.
  • MetalbrainMetalbrain
    edited November 2010
    I've just read the first two Vlad Taltos books from Steven Brust, and they're quite nice.

    http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/b/steven-brust/
  • mel the bellmel the bell
    edited November 2010
    sirclive1 wrote: »
    i instantly thought of Deathtrap dungeon and Rebel Planet !

    i have deathtrap dungeon for the playstation 1
    Professional Mel-the-Bell Simulator................"So realistic, I found myself reaching for the Kleenex King-Size!" - Richard Darling
  • SlackerSlacker
    edited November 2010
    Obviously, Pratchett.
    To me, his later stuff just keeps getting better although I haven't read his new one yet.

    Stepehen Donaldson's Gap series (yeah, I know it's sci-fi not fantasy but they're a bit lighter reading than his fantasy stuff). Like his short stories too.

    Brent Weeks also. Good writer who doesn't keep his stories light and fluffy.

    And did anyone else who read David Eddings' Belgariad series want to crack Garion over the head with a stick for not realising who he is?
  • VampyreVampyre
    edited November 2010
    Slacker wrote: »
    Stepehen Donaldson's Gap series (yeah, I know it's sci-fi not fantasy but they're a bit lighter reading than his fantasy stuff). Like his short stories too.
    Yeah, I much preferred the Gap series to Covenant. I really struggled to get into the TC novels, in fact I haven't even read the last 3 (or is it 4 now?).
    Slacker wrote: »
    And did anyone else who read David Eddings' Belgariad series want to crack Garion over the head with a stick for not realising who he is?

    Nah, more one of Aunt Pol's saucepans ;-)

    I always enjoyed Eddings' writing but it annoyed me that the good guys *always* had something at their disposal something vastly more powerful than the bad guys had and/or some way of finding out exactly what the bad guys were up to.
    ZXSR - Speccy Mags Reviews
  • Matt_BMatt_B
    edited November 2010
    I found the easiest Donaldson books to get into were the Mordant's Need ones. The story is much straighter, and the characters far more initially likeable than with Thomas Covenant. Alas, there's only two of them and you'll be done with the series pretty quickly.

    Not that the TC books are at all bad; once you get over the Tolkien pastiche setting and realize that TC is far more complex than just being an utter bastard they become a decent read. They're still a bit slow and, for the most part, very downbeat though.

    The Gap series strikes me as fantasy but in an SF setting. The science is awful, at least for the first three books although he does buck his ideas up a bit for the latter two. However, the characterization and plotting are excellent and more than make up for it.
  • SlackerSlacker
    edited November 2010
    Vampyre wrote: »
    Yeah, I much preferred the Gap series to Covenant. I really struggled to get into the TC novels, in fact I haven't even read the last 3 (or is it 4 now?).

    I've got the first two books from his latest TC series but I don't wanna start reading 'em until I've got the last one.

    Haven't read the Mordant's Need series since they first came out (my god, I'm old). The only thing I really remember about it is vaguely similar feel to TC... you know, dragged through some magic portal to a parallel world.
    I remember something about a wardrobe and some old fur coats too but maybe I'm getting things mixed up.

    Oh, as a side note... the first fantasy book I ever read, the one that got me into the genre was The Hobbit which I got free with the speccy game. I remember it was around bonfire night and Me and our kid kept sneaking in to play it a little :)
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