What are your favorite fantasy series?

[AwkwardlySet]

My fellow fantasy nerds, what are your favorite fantasy books/series? There are quite a few that I've enjoyed and liked through all the years of my fantasy reading, but I'll try to choose a few only.

1. The Lord of the Rings together with The Silmarillion By J. R. R. Tolkien

The sheer importance of these books is enough to put them on a pedestal, yet I feel they are still holding decently well against any other fantasy series, even if we forget about their importance. While modern fantasy is probably ahead in some things, these books have aged well regardless.

2. The Wheel of Time By Robert Jordan

The insanely good worldbuilding and a fantastic story, despite some flaws make this series a must for any fantasy reader. I've put it on second spot, but the series is probably a tie for the first spot in my mind.

3. Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson

The only one that is still unfinished and can change its spot in my personal ranking. A series with incredible worldbuilding and colorful characters that speaks about an incredibly imaginative mind.

As you can see, I've chosen series that excel in worldbuilding and lore, but have some great characters too. I generally like High Fantasy, but I have enjoyed reading some Low Fantasy series as well, such as A Song of Ice and Fire, Gentleman Bastards and such.

 

[creative1772]

i jumped on the asoiaf bandwagon after dance already came out.
the wait for winds has been brutal.
i love the level of detail in the world. there are so many little nuances that are picked up on re read that make it worth revisiting
... which is good since it's been a brutal wait, lol

 

[ofbuttons]

Robin Hobb!

Primarily, the first three trilogies of the Realm of the Elderlings series: the Farseer trilogy, Liveship Traders, and the Tawny Man trilogy. Big doorstopper books, combining character driven storytelling with high fantasy stakes. Her later stuff is fine, doesn't have the raw 90s fantasy grit -- I suspect she was emulating/inspired by a lot of the fantasy being produced at the time and she was able to take it and enhance it with her own style and interests, and it was a great combination.

 

[ElectricBlue]

My favourite has always been Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy. It walks all over LOTR in my mind.

The Worm Ouroborus (E.R.Eddison) is fun, and I read David Lindsay's Voyage to Arcturus every decade or so, for its weirdness.

Not your latter day fantasy stuff, but the books that came before.

 

[onehitwanda]

What's the difference?

Low Fantasy is written by dwarves.

my favourites:

1. LoTR for obvious reasons.
2. The Assassin, Liveship and Tawny Man trilogies by Robin Hobb. If you haven't, you should.
3. The Earthsea Chronicles by Ursula le Guin.
4. The Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss. I wish he'd finish the third book so I could get some closure.

 

[RejectReality]

Toss-up between Feist's Riftwar and Eddings' Belgariad/Mallorean.

 

[onehitwanda]

Robin Hobb!

Primarily, the first three trilogies of the Realm of the Elderlings series: the Farseer trilogy, Liveship Traders, and the Tawny Man trilogy. Big doorstopper books, combining character driven storytelling with high fantasy stakes. Her later stuff is fine, doesn't have the raw 90s fantasy grit -- I suspect she was emulating/inspired by a lot of the fantasy being produced at the time and she was able to take it and enhance it with her own style and interests, and it was a great combination.

Oh thank God, I sometimes feel like a lone voice in the wilderness.
I picked up Assassin's Apprentice on a whim based on the cover art, opened it at random, read a line... then a paragraph, and then before I knew it I was two chapters in. If I were forced to choose an author whose style I'd most love to emulate, it would be her. She's the only fantasy author who has ever made me ugly cry. Nighteyes, I will never forget.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

What's the difference?

Simply put, the difference is the amount of fantasy elements. For example, George Martin's books are considered Low Fantasy, as the fantastic element isn't really that strong. You got dragons, you got red priests with mystical dead-raising powers and you got the Others, and that's about it.

 

[ofbuttons]

Oh thank God, I sometimes feel like a lone voice in the wilderness.
I picked up Assassin's Apprentice on a whim based on the cover art, opened it at random, read a line... then a paragraph, and then before I knew it I was two chapters in. If I were forced to choose an author whose style I'd most love to emulate, it would be her. She's the only fantasy author who has ever made me ugly cry. Nighteyes, I will never forget.

Dude, I cry every reread. It's just so heart breaking -- people should read Hobb if they want it to hurt. It's wild she isn't more widely recognised by even big time fantasy buffs.

 

[onehitwanda]

Dude, I cry every reread. It's just so heart breaking -- people should read Hobb if they want it to hurt. It's wild she isn't more widely recognised by even big time fantasy buffs.

I nearly threw the book the first time. I was so angry and felt so betrayed. She hurt me with that. I didn't see it coming.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Oh thank God, I sometimes feel like a lone voice in the wilderness.
I picked up Assassin's Apprentice on a whim based on the cover art, opened it at random, read a line... then a paragraph, and then before I knew it I was two chapters in. If I were forced to choose an author whose style I'd most love to emulate, it would be her. She's the only fantasy author who has ever made me ugly cry. Nighteyes, I will never forget.

For the reasons I already mentioned in the first post, I didn't enjoy her books that much. While her books are incredibly emotional and touching, I couldn't get over the lack of good and meaningful worldbuilding. The very first book sets up such a great story, and while she does deliver with characters and emotions, the lack of lore and the scarce use of Skill and Wit, but also the lack of some deeper lore when it comes to antagonists kinda spoiled the series for me to an extent. Still, those books are classics, and should be a must read for fantasy fans.

 

[onehitwanda]

For the reasons I already mentioned in the first post, I didn't enjoy her books that much. While her books are incredibly emotional and touching, I couldn't get over the lack of good and meaningful worldbuilding. The very first book sets up such a great story, and while she does deliver with characters and emotions, the lack of lore and the scarce use of Skill and Wit, but also the lack of some deeper lore when it comes to antagonists kinda spoiled the series for me to an extent. Still, those books are classics, and should be a must read for fantasy fans.

whereas I found the infuriating hints and the lack of clarity captivating - I liked that nobody knew how things worked; it made the story more real and the people more broken for me. But that's the beauty of books - the images they paint for us. Not everyone sees the same painting.

 

[Blind_Justice]

The Runestaff saga and most of the Eternal Hero-adjacent Michael Moorcock stuff. Elric, of course.

Everything Discworld by Terry Pratchett. "Good Omens" ranks in the top three of my all-time favorite books (even if it's not directly Discworld... but close enough)

The early Dark Elf books by R.A. Salvatore up to the Hunter's Blades trilogy. That's where he really began to brute-force obviously stupid character decisions so the rest of the plot can happen. While on the topic of D&D fiction, I've read most of the books released during 2nd and 3rd edition. Good old times. The early Elminster books. The "Spellfire" series. "Daughter of the Drow" and "Tangled Webs". Comfort food in book form. Read and enjoyed the first nine Dragonlance books but got tired of Raistlin eventually.

Never been a huge Tolkien fan. I've read LOTR but found it exhaustingly long-winded. I did enjoy much of Lustbader's Sunset Warrior cycle, especially the first one dealing with the Freehold and it's descent into anarchy and desolation. It did drag on in parts but at least the world and mythology kept me interested.

I've read a couple of Shannara books but found them very... meh.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Seanan McGuire's "Home For Wayward Children" series: beautiful take on portal fantasy. What happens to all those kids who travel through mirrors and wardrobes when they come home to a world that doesn't believe such things exist? Her "Indexing" books are also excellent but there are only two of them, so barely a series. One of these days I'll check out her other series.

Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. I started with the first few in the series, got some laughs out of them but wasn't tremendously impressed, told myself I'd outgrown them. Years later, friends finally got me to dip back into the series, and I discovered how much he'd improved after those first few books. The later ones are still fantasy comedy, but with teeth.

 

[Dunes_et_Soleil]

For me three writers come to mind, Robert Holdstock 'Mythago wood', Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and lastly the Bondage Fairies by Condom. Mythago wood I read in my teens and years later found it tucked away somewhere, read it again and enjoyed it as much as I had remembered. Really well done, don't believe I found another one written by Holdstock that was this good.
The Bondage Fairies will always be my in my list of favourites, the impossible balance of love, sex, humour and bondage, all presented as a cartoon.

 

[PennameWombat]

My fellow fantasy nerds, what are your favorite fantasy books/series? There are quite a few that I've enjoyed and liked through all the years of my fantasy reading, but I'll try to choose a few only.

1. The Lord of the Rings together with The Silmarillion By J. R. R. Tolkien

2. The Wheel of Time By Robert Jordan

3. Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson

I fully agree on your 1.

A good friend of mine was a big fan of your 2, but my original reluctance was that it was then-unfinished. Once Jordan died, I was satisfied about my reluctance. The tie to Sanderson, and The Wheel of Time, is that anything I’ve poked at by Sanderson has never grabbed me. So him finishing the series isn’t any sort of recommendation.

I tried to read The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant and… well, decided that there was no way I was going to waste further time. Fortunately I’d only bought (back when it was an investment for me) the first book. Sold it on for a buck. Also at the time the Shannara books by Brooks were the Hot Thing… and… all I could think of was he’d more or less done a find-and-replace from Tolkien.

But beyond that… I think the above experiences turned me somewhat away from fantasy and more on the science fiction ‘side’ of things. But there’s very little science in S. M. Stirling’s Emberverse series (first book Dies the Fire) and that one I carried on, although I‘ve not made it to the last three (of fifteen) novels, but whether it’s enough fantasy or simply alternate history, up to others to decide.

Most other series I’ve read and enjoyed (Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels, The Expanse, Foundation, Brin’s Uplift Saga, and others) are all more clearly science fiction.

 

[DarkSollat]

Mine are the Witcher original books.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Pratchett, and Le Guin except Earthsea, which I found depressing. Her stories might be more SF but not totally.

Some Iain Banks is fantastical, like Walking on Glass.

I don't generally like pure fantasy ('Yet Another Noun of Shanarra', LoTR etc), especially when it makes a weak story into trilogies of fat books. Tolkien gets a pass for being the first to do it. I do love Narnia, though, even though the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the worst because of the unoriginal plot.

Some Young Adult ones but still very good: Nevermoor, Philip Reeve's Larklight series, and Wed Wabbit.

A random one, very funny: Carolyn Cushman's Witch and Wombat. Roleplayers end up in a real Pratchettesque fantasy world...

 

[PeytonMirabelle]

The Runestaff saga and most of the Eternal Hero-adjacent Michael Moorcock stuff. Elric, of course.

Beat me to it.

Original six books of the Elric saga are my all-time fav.

 

[lovecraft68]

The Belgariad by David Eddings. Those five books were a lot of fun with memorable characters a good take on the standard Fantasy tropes. I like how in the series magic came simply from the will and not spells and other outside things.

I'll add that if anyone wants to check it out, stay with just that. A few years later Eddings revisited the series with the Mallorean, another 5 books that shit all over everything from the first five down to the prophecy suddenly being "no, wait, there was more...."

 

[lovecraft68]

If you like darker fantasy The 1st/2nd Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. This is in the vein of no one is safe and there's a lot of tragedy and the MC not exactly likeable in many ways, but his own self loathing is what drives much of the story where in the second series he's trying to atone for what he did in the past and save a world that saved him.

But like my above example even though the second series wrapped things up beautifully, Donaldson published a third series and I think its more than three books but I stopped partway through book two because again, it just tried to change all the rules from before and was in general a bucket of suck.

 

[SimonDoom]

I haven't read as much fantasy as I'd like, so I'm working from limited knowledge and experience.

I read LOTR as a kid and loved it. Still do. It has some weaknesses but it's so well done in so many ways I gladly overlook them.

I enjoyed Roger Zelazny's Amber series. I read it a few years after reading LOTR, when I was a teen, and I enjoyed the darker, more cynical tone.

Interestingly enough, while I loved LOTR, I wasn't a fan of the Narnia series, which I read much later. Some of the books I found downright boring. I find Lewis's writing style unengaging.

It's not a series, but my all-time favorite fantasy story is Watership Down. Beautifully written, with great characters (rabbits!) and high adventure along with plenty of rabbit lore.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Interestingly enough, while I loved LOTR, I wasn't a fan of the Narnia series, which I read much later. Some of the books I found downright boring. I find Lewis's writing style unengaging.

It's not a series, but my all-time favorite fantasy story is Watership Down. Beautifully written, with great characters (rabbits!) and high adventure along with plenty of rabbit lore.

Narnia is very English, I think, steeped in the culture. Interestingly, although I was brought up agnostic, my father (who was a declared atheist) read them all to me, as a child. I in turn (also an atheist) read them to both my children.

Have you read Richard Adams's The Girl in a Swing? Very different and (I've not read it for a long while), quite disturbing IIRC.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Hmm... I am surprised no one mentioned Malazan series. It seems nobody likes long book series here, even one so critically acclaimed.

 

[SimonDoom]

Narnia is very English, I think, steeped in the culture. Interestingly, although I was brought up agnostic, my father (who was a declared atheist) read them all to me, as a child. I in turn (also an atheist) read them to both my children.

Have you read Richard Adams's The Girl in a Swing? Very different and (I've not read it for a long while), quite disturbing IIRC.

I haven't read that Adams book. Is it worth reading? I can deal with disturbing.

I didn't read Narnia as a kid, but became familiar with the series when I read it to MY kids when they were young. I thought the Christian allegory was at times clumsy and heavy-handed, and there's something about his story-telling style that leaves me flat. I agree it may be a cultural thing, although there are plenty of Americans who have enjoyed the Narnia books. Just not me.