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Originally Posted by Luffy
Phew! I thought you were going to rip me a new one. I have read Storm Front, didn't find it very readable. Since I've finished my reading challenge, I'm willing to take risks and go out of my way. I'll check out the Kate Daniels and Otherworld recommendations.
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I should point out that those weren't so much recommendations as examples; it's kind of weird for me to love one series by an author and dislike another. All the same, both of those series have a good mix of action, worldbuilding, character development, and romance - but then, I'd say the same (except for the romance) of the Dresden Files, so your mileage may vary.
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Originally Posted by meeera
Not necessarily personal recs but popular/books to consider: Dresden Files, Stross's Laundry Files series, Stephen King's Dark Tower series and Talisman, Hines' Libriomancer series, Jamieson's Death Works books. And Harry Potter.
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I've butchered meeera's list to pare it down to what I've read. I enjoyed them all, with the Dark Tower probably lowest on that short list.
Given that you're explicitly looking for male-protagonist UF, neither the Otherworld nor Kate Daniels series qualify. I will say that the Dresden Files series takes a few books to get going, and while it's well worth the effort IMO, that's not what you're after.
So, let me throw something at you from left field: Simon R. Green.
He's written a lot of stuff, mainly series work, in a few different genres...but ultimately, it all links up. Sometimes it's just a reference here and there, but they all fit together in a bizarre way. His twelve-book Nightside series (#1:
Something from the Nightside) is about a detective with a mysterious heritage and a daunting reputation who works that small part of London where it's always 3am and monsters walk the streets...and sometimes, vice versa. After several books of that, he started the Secret Histories series (#1:
The Man with the Golden Torc), which is very firmly set in the Nightside's world but has more of a James Bond feel, as you might gather from the book titles. As Green was winding the Nightside books down, he started a
third series, the Ghost Finders books (#1:
Ghost of a Chance), which follows a small team whose mission is to find and squash malevolent ghosts. Yes, this means he's currently publishing at least two books a year, one in each of the SH and GF series. (And oh, happy day - I just noticed that GF5 comes out Tuesday, and there's a collection of Nightside short fiction coming in January!)
All three series can be read independently, but I find it works best to read them all in chronological order by publication date, so the references and occasional crossovers line up. Green's got a wicked sense of humor, and I love playing spot-the-reference while reading his stuff. His books tend to be on the short side; the first Nightside book is 230 pages, so it's not much of a time sink...and if it pays off, you've got over 20 more books ahead of you.
His Forest Kingdom and Haven series are more traditional fantasy, but more on the gritty side.
Drinking Midnight Wine and
Shadows Fall are standalones; the former is "hidden magical layer" UF and the latter is...well, it's pretty hard to describe, especially at this time of night. It's about the place where legends go to retire, I guess is a decent way to put it.
Finally, the Deathstalker books are straight-up SF, or so I understand; I haven't read them yet. However, I may have to; one of his postscripts in
Tales of the Hidden World (a short story collection from earlier this year) points out that he "stopped [the third Deathstalker book] dead for two hundred pages just so I could write a version of Heart of Darkness featuring the Muppets. Really. I'm not kidding." That sounds bizarre enough to get just for its own sake...