Recommend me some Fantasy/SF, if you have a free moment

[Over]

Originally Posted by Demented

Bah some of you wouldn't know quality if I hit you in the head with Toll of the Hounds.

Michelle West - The Sun Sword Saga
Steven Errikson - The Malazan Empire - very lengthy reads
Dan Simmons - Hyperion
Alastair Reynolds - Revelation Space(good call earlier)
Kate Elliot - Crown of Stars
Jordan/Martin as previously mentioned

I don't understand all the hype about Steven Erikson. I've read the first book and I thought it was uninteresting. Add to that how boring it is and I still don't know why I kept reading 'til the end.

The world building is very good, and it loks like what the book is all about. I think the author ismore interested in the worldbuilding and showing it off, than in a compelling story, with really interesting characters.

[montsnmags]

Originally Posted by sassanik

No one mentioned Anne McCaffrey, though she is somewhat more fantasy than Sci-Fi, you might have already read her though.
...

I've only read some of the Pern series, and a couple of others, so I would have said she was more Sci-Fi than fantasy. I'd certainly second the recommendation though.

Cheers,
Marc

[JSWolf]

Anne McCaffrey fantasy? Nah! The Dragonriders of Pern series is science fiction.

Also, I am really surprised nobody has seconded my recommendation for the Discworld series.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Over

I don't understand all the hype about Steven Erikson. I've read the first book and I thought it was uninteresting. Add to that how boring it is and I still don't know why I kept reading 'til the end.

Maybe in hopes that it got better?

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

I'll definitely second Terry Pratchett's Discworld series; and also Susannah Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.

I'd also recommend Iain M Banks' Culture books

[EricWiz]

I dont see it mentioned anywhere but I am a big fan of David Eddings series as well as many of the books mentioned in this thread.

They arent as deep as Wheel of Time but I love the characters in his books.

Eric

[Dave Berk]

I will restrict my recommendation to complete series / standalones which you can get as ebooks. I will also try to stay away from books which had already been recommended.

Sean Russell's The Swan's War Trilogy:
The One Kingdom. The Isle of Battle. The Shadow Roads.
Sadly his other works aren't available as ebooks.

Bernard Cornwell's Lord of the North Series.
Though ongoing, each book can be read as standalone, much like his sharpe series.
Lords of the North. The Last Kingdom. The Pale Horseman. Sword Song.
Pretty much anything by him is a good read. Some more, some less. His best series is probably the Warlord Chronicles.

Lian Hearn's Tales of the Otori series.
Across the Nightingale Floor. Grass for his Pillow. Brilliance of the Moon.
There are two sequels. Haven't read them so I can't vouch for their quality.

Timothy Zahn's The Cobra Trilogy.
Also the Blackcollar duology. Blackcollar. Blackcollar: The Judas Solution. but you can skip the last book. It's not that good (IMHO).

mmm... Thought I had many more to recommend. Funny how very few series are available completely as ebooks. Some of them were missing just one book...

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by MdB

brief synopsis?

Of the Amber stories?

The protagonist awakens in a hospital on Earth, with no memory of who he is or how he got there.

He turns out to be Corwin, a prince of the royal family of Amber. Amber is the real world, and the city of Amber is the one true city. All other places including ours are reflections of Amber in Shadow. Members of the royal family have the ability to travel in Shadow by "hell rides", mentally adding and subtracting elements until they reach a place that matches their conception. (It's a minor philosophical question among them over whether the shadows they travel to already exist, or are created by their attempts to reach them.)

King Oberon of Amber has disappeared, a dynastic war is brewing as various of his kids by several different mothers jockey for position to succeed him, and meanwhile, Amber is under attack by strange beings out of Shadow.

Corwin must discover who he is, who tried to put him out of commission, and who is attacking Amber, then do something about it.

The original Amber series was five books:
* 1970 Nine Princes in Amber
* 1972 The Guns of Avalon
* 1975 Sign of the Unicorn
* 1976 The Hand of Oberon
* 1978 The Courts of Chaos

There was a second series featuring Corwin's son, Merle, a computer expert who creates Ghostwheel, a computer capable of mapping Shadow:
* 1985 Trumps of Doom
* 1986 Blood of Amber
* 1987 Sign of Chaos
* 1989 Knight of Shadows
* 1991 Prince of Chaos

These are fun, but generally considered less successful, and only existing because people clamored for more Amber stories.
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Dave Berk

Timothy Zahn's The Cobra Trilogy.
Also the Blackcollar duology. Blackcollar. Blackcollar: The Judas Solution. but you can skip the last book. It's not that good (IMHO).

I concur. I loved the first two Blackcollar novels, but was disappointed in the third. _The Judas Solution_ felt like a book written in a hurry to fulfill a contractual commitment and tie up loose ends, when the author really wanted to get on and tackle other products. It was a brisk read, but lacking in the depth and resonance it should have had.

The Blackcollar series and the Cobra series explore two different aspects of soldiers at war.

The Blackcollars are commandos created in a losing war against the alien Ryquil.They've been treated with drugs that retard aging and speed up their reflexes to enable them to go one on one against the Ryq who are naturally that fast. The protagonists of the books are stationed on the planet Plinry, still conducting guerrilla warfare, even though Earth has been conquered and occupied by the Ryquil.

The Cobra series features a different take. The Cobra are cyborgs created for a war against the alien Trofts. They have powered skeletal enhancements for greater speed and strength, implanted laser weaponry, and a built-in tactical computer to control it. The focus of the series isn't the war, it's the peace afterward. What do you do with a class of soldiers engineered to be faster, stronger, and more powerful than anyone else, with built-in weapons that can't be removed, when you no longer have a war for them to fight? They're heroes during the war, and objects of fear and distrust afterward.
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

I'll just mention a couple of authors that I usually recommend when people want to "try" fantasy.

Terry Brooks -- start with the Magic Kingdom of Landover series.

Oh, Great Ghu. Eddings does have an original concept, but it's marred by cotton candy writing that made my teeth hurt.

David Eddings -- as someone said, Belgariad is a good starter here.

And a good place to finish. Eddings has a smooth prose style that reads easily, and a gift for dialog. Unfortunately, he has one story to tell, and one set of characters. Subsequent series have the names changed and the serial numbers filed off, but are the same basic story.

I read and enjoyed the Belgariad. I plowed grimly through the sequel, the Malloreon. The authorial strings were too evident, as Eddings carefully maneuvered his characters through every spot on his world. It felt like "paint by numbers" fantasy.

Back when they were being published, I saw commentary online from folks who wished the Belgariad would go on forever. By the time I finished the Malloreon, I felt like it had.

Read the Belgariad. If you really like it, read the rest of Eddings, as you'll be getting more of the exact same thing.
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by sassanik

I recently read Little Fuzzy and Oomphel in the Sky by H Beam Piper and I was very impressed, especially considering the time period that they were written in.

All of the Piper currently in the public doamain is available here on MobileRead, in anthology editions created by HarryT. Good stuff.

No one mentioned Anne McCaffrey, though she is somewhat more fantasy than Sci-Fi, you might have already read her though.

Depends on which books. The Pern series feels like fantasy, with a feudal social system, medieval level of technology, and fire breathing dragons. It isn't, it's SF. If you come in the the middle, you miss the setup that Pern is a lost colony whose human inhabitants arrived by starship, the fire breathing dragons are the result of genetic engineering on the indigenous fire lizards, and the social structure and level of technology is a side effect of the parasitic "Thread", whose periodic fall destroyed the original civilization and whose descendants have forgotten their origins.

I would also recommend Frank Herberts Dune, if you have not read it yet.

As would I, but I'd be more guarded in my recommendation for the rest of the series that followed it.
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Elsi

Lord Foul's Bane, the first book in the series, is the book that taught me it would be OK to just quit reading a book. After finishing it, I vowed I'd never again force myself to finish a book that I wasn't enjoying. I kept reading thinking "it's got to get better". I mean, after all, so many people were raving about the series and how wonderful it was. At this point, all I remember is that Thomas was sad/morose/depressed and he moaned and whined all the time about how miserable he was and how misfortunate his life was. I just wanted to reach over, slap him across the face and shout "SHUT UP! I'm tired of hearing you complain."

I read the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant back when they were first released, and enjoyed them because they weren't Tolkien clones. I didn't find them "bad", but they aren't what you read if you like uplifting stories with happy endings.

But I've felt no desire to re-read them. They are indeed grim. Donaldson seems to be operating from a philosophical position I can't agree with.

(They are also marred somewhat by Donaldson's desire to use obscure words. If you do that, it helps if you get them right. Gene Wolfe can and does do it quite successfully, because he actually knows the words and their meanings. Donaldson is less successful...)
______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I can heartily recommend David Drake's books, both his own and in his collaborations. He's perhaps best known for his Military SF "Hammer's Slammers", but he's written some splendid fantasy novels too.

Some of his books are available in the Baen Free Library (for free, of course).

AFAIK, they are all in the Free Library. Baen's web site lists only part of the full Library. The rest were issued on various CDs bound into selected hardcover releases. All of the CDs are available as big Zip files or ISO archives suitable for burning to CD, and as individually extractable books at The Fifth Imperium

The CDs were all issued stating that you were encouraged to copy and share them, and The Fifth Imperium maintains the archive with Baen's permission.

In particular, the When the Tide Rises CD should pretty much cover the bases on anything Drake had published by Baen.
______
Dennis

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

extractable books at The Fifth Imperium

This link is bad. You forgot to put the "e" in the word "the".

Here is the correct link:

http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/

BOb

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

This link is bad. You forgot to put the "e" in the word "the".

Here is the correct link:
http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/

So I did. Thanks for the catch, and I fixed the original post.
______
Dennis