Fantasy Book Club discussion

Hey everyone..

I've just about finished reading Good Omens by Niel Gaiman / Terry Pratchett (loved it), but now I'm ready for something a bit different.

I'm looking for something well written, with a lot of action / twists and turns, and..very importantly, interesting and enjoyable characters. Something along the lines of George R.R. Martins work/Game of Thrones.

Anyone have a good recommendation? I want something that feels epic and is a real page turner -- if that makes sense.


Thanks!

or . But Wheel of time is kinda long. >.<

Thanks! Yeah..I really want to do the Wheel of Time..but I'm waiting for a better time. Gardens of the moon looks really interesting -- i'm looking into that one right now. Thank you.

I would say The Wheel of Time. Are you waiting because you don't think you have time? Right now is a great time as the final book is being written now. You will have time to theorize a bit before next winter.

Carrie (Care) wrote: "I would say The Wheel of Time. Are you waiting because you don't think you have time? Right now is a great time as the final book is being written now. You will have time to theorize a bit before n..."


Yeahm that's why I'm reading it now. :D I'm up to book 3. Hopefully I finish up to 13 when the last book comes out.

I would say Janny Wurts's Wars of Light and Shadow. Intricate plotting to match Erickson or Martin. Excellent prose to match (or exceed) Erickson. Engaging characters and levels upon levels of understanding.

Glad to hear you loved [Book: Good Omens]. That's one of my all-time favorites. Lessee... Erikson is all over here, and he's probably the closest to Martin. You'd probably also like Anne Bishop's [Book: The Black Jewels Trilogy], and Janny Wurts's Wars of Light and Shadow. Sara Douglass is also good. Hope that helps.

I like The Deed of Paksenarrion, I'm always a little surprised at how many people missed this one. For something more recent Brent Weeks The Night Angel Trilogy might work. These are both closed trilogies that complete (though a sequel to Paksenarrion was released this year. I'm not sure if this will be a second trilogy or not).

I assume you have read The Lord of the Rings. There are some other older books that are epic in proportion but are thought of more as "series". For example Roger Zelazny's Amber series or Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion novels.

Jeff wrote: "I would say Janny Wurts's Wars of Light and Shadow..."


That series was the first to come to my mind, also.

I would have to agree that The Wheel of Time books are great - and I've only made it through the first 5. It's been such a long time, that I feel I should start over with them before I continue so that I don't forget/miss anything!

This is of course my opinion...the Wheel of Time is indeed on of the best written epic series out there...through book 6. Then it takes a precipitous nose dive. I'm sorry to tell you. The (at least supposedly) next to last book in the series has just been published. Many really love the entire series, but from the 6th volume on they drag at the pace of a glacier and get very repetitive. Though to be fair, you may feel differently, just giving a heads up.

Jeff wrote: "I would say Janny Wurts's Wars of Light and Shadow. Intricate plotting to match Erickson or Martin. Excellent prose to match (or exceed) Erickson. Engaging characters and levels upon levels of unde..."

I must also concur with Jeff, but I would add a writing style pretty much unmatched by anyone writing fantasy today as to word crafting and creating a complex, rich world, for Janny Wurts' Wars of Light and Shadow.

While I'm completely familiar with G.R.R.M. (no subsequent commentary regarding his ASoIaF series), I'm not at all familiar with the work of Janny Wurts,although I've been encouraged to read some of her works most recently. Just what might any of you recommend?

Start right off with [Book: The Curse of the Mistwraith], Lady. Excellent stuff. Exceedingly well written, thought-proking and involving. Great series.

The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson (One of his newest books and the first book in a series)

Yes the first of a planned 10 volume series....

I would recommend Assassin's Apprentice, got the same feeling of the battle for the control of the throne, world looks like Alaska if you turn the map a certain way.

I agree, I would defineatly say The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks.

IMO, one of the best epic fantasies is the Riftwar Saga, by Raymond Feist. I especially like the 2nd trilogy, the Empire trilogy done in collaboration with Janny Wurts. Indeed, I consider the Empire trilogy one of the best in Fantasy. The cultural, political and character detail reminds me of the best of CJ Cherryh which is a big compliment coming from me.

I've wondered how 2 authors collaborate in such a series. Who did what, eg.

Dragon Wing

The whole series is great!

Cannot always go wrong with some Dark Elf with The Crystal Shard, also Glenn Cook with Chronicles of The Black Company.

I tried reading the Black Company omnibuses last decade, but was so annoyed with the style of writing, I gave up. They are still on my TBR pile, so maybe someday I will give them another try.

A great series no one has recommended and would do is The Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind (Wizard's First Rule).
It's pure epic fantasy, though not as political as ASOIAF , and you might not last until the final book ;)

I would recommend Wheel of time and Assassin's Apprentice as previously mentioned. I think Wheel of time is better then the Malazan, even though Malazan is epic, you don't really get attached to any of the characters . I have to warn you against reading Sword of truth and the Riftwar saga even though they both start of well, later in these series the story loses it's flavor,if you do start reading these,read only the first couple of books.

Another good series (in my opinion, anyway) is the Obsidian Trilogy by Mercedes Lackey. I've read the first book and am in the middle of the second. The villains are simplistic, but I think that would be my only complaint. I loved the magical system she invented for the series, and it has elves!

The Outstretched Shadow

We must agree to disagree. I loved the Weel of time characters, it felt almost like i knew them. I have only read the first to Malazan books and i was not really impressed. The reason i started reading them was beacause people have compared it to GRRM, but unfortunately i didn't feel like it was even slightly similar. They are not bad, but after reading the second book, i'm not sure if i want to read the third one. Most of the characters from book one, weren't even in book 2, so i am kind of sceptic. But the thing that made me stop continuing the series, was all these gods or halvgods, that act like humans, it wasn't my cup of tea. People die then they come back and have a new name, it was kind of weird actually. But maybe the series gets better further on,i don't know.

Machavelli wrote: "We must agree to disagree. I loved the Weel of time characters, it felt almost like i knew them. I have only read the first to Malazan books and i was not really impressed. The reason i started rea..."

Could not agree with you more.

My disagreement here is only about Wheel of Time (I've stated it before) the series could have been one of the greatest of all time I think, only it almost crashed and burned after the 6th volume... As with everyone else, just my opinion.

Sarah wrote: "@ Kevin: What did you not like about MBotF besides what Machavelli wrote?

I'm curious to see if your opinion falls in the same lines as others who've not liked this series."

As I wrote in anothe thread, the Book, I could not really get into Sarah mostly because I did not like the writing style, at the end making me not understand what was going on.

Mike (the Paladin) wrote: "My disagreement here is only about Wheel of Time (I've stated it before) the series could have been one of the greatest of all time I think, only it almost crashed and burned after the 6th volume....."

A lot of people I know throught the book was going on way too long with no way of wrapping it up. I read one review five or six years ago that said the Jordan wrote too much unneed description, went too deep, someone like Charles Dickens did not do that, he got paied by the number of words that he wrote. I feel that too, sometimes too many description made me confused, not the way that Brandon Sanderson is writing the books.

I loved the books, unrestrainedly, until book 7 where things start to SSTTRREETTCCHH out. After that it only got worse from volume to volume. I bought them trough 10 and then sold the entire series to a used book store. Since then I've taken the news out of the library and skimmed them. Each event told and retold from as many as 6 or more points of view. One 800+ page volume covers 3 days while one actually drops back and covers time already covered in the previous book. The idiotic "battle of the sexes" thing gets dragged out more and more. Jordan seems to have run out of original parts for Perrin's story and Faile is always in peril... Oh and it took Rand forever to get around to cleaning Saidin with Nineve's help of course, something we'd all been waiting for for a few volumes...and then little moves from it...hopefully there's only one volume left...as I said, I hope.

I suppose I'm so down on it because it could have been so great. Instead it became a soap opera.

I could not have agree with you more. It was when he proposed the book to Tom Doherty, the publisher, it was three books, then a few years later six books, it dragged on and on. I heard a interview with Brandon where he said that he needed to know who was in Perrin's army for the last battle, Robert had cds felt with folders of folders of materials, Brandon found a document about Perrin's army, the people that was not written, going to appear with a whole entire background made up for them. Robert was maybe too into his world building.

I always wondered what happened and I suppose we'll never know. When I started it, there were 6 books and it was supposed to be a series of 7. I read them all back to back and as I said, loved it. I waited and picked up the 7th, 8th, and 9th as they came out... I have never figured out why the books were suddenly moving at a glacial pace, I always wondered if somebody advised him to stretch it out because they were all best sellers.

Oh well, we'll never know now. My opinion on them is through book 6 they seemed to be leading into becoming one of best fantasy series of all times, a classic. Then it all changed. I don't get it.

I love all of The Wheel of Time books. It is my favourite series as well as my husbands. I do admit though that books 7-10 are slower and I do not enjoy them as much as the others. Books 11-13 have been some of my favourites though and I am excited for the final book.

I don't mind the slowness personally, but then again, I didn't have to wait at all in between books for new ones to be released. I didn't start the series until the first eleven were already out. By number six I was already hooked, so the slowness was bearable. I can imagine it would have been a lot more annoying had I waited years between each book only to find that nothing really happens in the next one.

I hate when events that goes on for books.

What I'm saying here about The Wheel of Time, is my opinion only....

It's not a slow pace, at least not only. There is simply tons of repetitiveness....warehouses full of fluff and unnecessary pointless details that have little or nothing to do with the actual story. There's fill and strange pointless additions in the middle of things. (I mean will Faile be kidnapped again?) I've said before that the one thing that might save these would be that they get turned over to a good editor. A slow pace is one thing. Telling the same events over, and over, and over, and over, and over isn't a slow pace, it's padding the story. It's taking a novel that might reach 200 pages of good material and turning it into an 800 page tome.

I read these a few years ago (while getting the later ones as they came out from my local library)and was initially one of the series biggest supporters. I know some (apparently a large number of) readers like what has now become the "soap opera" format with each detail repeated ad infinitum from each main character.... I'm glad for them (I suppose) that they enjoy it. But please don't tell me I don't understand it. I understand it...I just find it sad and the ruin of what could have been a classic epic fantasy series. At this point it is what it is and even if Sanderson is, somewhat different, the die is cast and the series will never be more than a huge over bloated saga. At least not unless someone ends up with the rights to it and the willingness to turn the entire series over to an excellent editor.

I'm not seeing where anyone said you don't understand it? I hope you're not taking offense to something I said.. I mean it's all a matter of preference. It was ruined in your opinion, and that really sucks, not ruined in mine, which I'm really glad for...

I just love Tood Lockwood's cover art on Steven Erikson's book, just epic.

I didn't mind the details in Wheel of time at all, it was much easier for me to imagine the characters and the setting that way. I dislike authors that write books and you don't get any information about how everything looks. I didn't have that problem with Robert Jordan.I thought all of the books were great except book 10 and Sanderson has brought the story back on track with the last 2. WOT is not a soap opera Mike, just because the last battle has not happened yet, does not mean that the story is bad. He could have finished with 8 books but then, we fans wouldn't be able to enjoy the rest of story.

Raymond E. Feist's Riftwar saga starts with Magician: Apprentice & has a lot of twists & turns. After reading the first two books, there is the Empire trilogy he wrote with Janny Wurts which shows the other side, then back to the original world with a couple of books followed by several spin-off series. All pretty good, although I liked the Empire trilogy the best.

Everyone has different taste in books, that's because we are different people. I wouldn't appreciate Wheel of Time, in the same way if was cut down to fewer books and i'm glad RJ did it the way he did. But i see why some people get annoyed and i still consider it along with ASOIF to be the best of fantasy.

I also totally understand individual likes and dislikes about books, but for me I simply can't imagine any fantasy series remotely coming close to Jordan's "The Wheel of Time" series. I started reading it when the first volume was released, and have read it several times. I have read most of the other books/series mentioned above, and still find the WoT to be the most rich, satisfying, and intellectually stimulating. I am almost sad to think that it is coming to a close with Brandon Sanderson's impending completion of the final volume, "A Memory of Light." I must say that I have been very impressed with his efforts on "The Gathering Storm" and "Towers of Midnight."

No Dawn I'm not offended, that's why I gave the early disclaimer that it's my take.

I refer to it as a soap opera because it shifted to a format where we are/were given huge amounts of dialogue, detail, and emotion that not only didn't/doesn't move the story forward in some cases it has little or nothing to do with the story. And there are actually fluff additions that seem (to me) only to lengthen the volumes (a lot of the Perrin and Faile story seems to be totally pointless and even repetitive).

Now also please note I said that I realize this very...well, what I would call a "flaw" is what many have come to love about the books. They would not call the hyper detailed and lengthening style a flaw but a strength. I accept that we disagree. My request that I not be told I "misunderstand" or "don't understand" or "don't get it" is because so often that's the reaction I get from true believers. In a way I'm in the same boat they are, but without what they have. I said before and I really believe that The Wheel of Time could have been truly great, but instead went down the road of big sales. That's just my take and I accept that some will disagree. We were discussing our favorite Epic reads and WoT could have been one of mine, I wish it were, but now it's....not.

Jim, I agree about Fiest, I've been thinking of digging out my Rift War books, at least the early ones. I just have so many "to be reads" waiting LOL. I also want to get to the Death Stalker books and Green's Secret History series is also one I want to get to.

I think I mentioned The Deed of Paksenarrion a trilogy I truly love. I have Moon's newest Paksenarrion novel, Oath of Fealty on my shelf and have been meaning to get to it for months... so, favorite epic reads. So many...so little time. LOL

I only have read the first Paksenarrion, thought it was predictable. On a different note, I love Wheel of Times just for Darrel K. Sweet's cover art, my favorite cover artist of all time, master of Del Rey Books in the 1980s. All the science fiction and fantasy published during that time were done by him, including Lord of the Rings.

The lord of the rings.

The Wheel of Times is the number one biggest and bestselling fantasy series out there. Each book since 98 has been #1 bestsellers.

Okay Kevin, I get it, you like WoT. We shall have to agree to disagree.

Kevin wrote: "I only have read the first Paksenarrion, thought it was predictable. On a different note, I love Wheel of Times just for Darrel K. Sweet's cover art, my favorite cover artist of all time, master of..."

Kevin, you are the very first person I have heard say that. Most people (myself included) I have talked to don't care for the covers. I don't mind the first two, but from then out they seem to get progressively worse. I get it, in the 90's fantasy covers all had this look to them, but the characters just looked horrid IMO.

Now the new ebook covers are great. I love them, especially FoH with Moiraine on the cover, .

LOL! Carrie, I sure do agree with you about the covers of the original WoT hard/softcover novels. IMHO, they left a lot to be desired, and the new e-book covers rock! I might even be inclined to buy the paperbacks all over again if they used these new covers! ;-)