LogFAQs > #963526588

kind9 posted...

Gormenghast, by Mervyn Peake
Gormenghast might be the wrong kind of fantasy, but the first book(Titus Groan) is my favorite fiction book.

Mervyn Peake's writing is slow-paced, but it is just fucking phenomenal, like honey. Unfortunately, Peake passed away in the middle of writing the third book. If I recall correctly, a family member finished it (much like how one of Tolkien's sons finished The Silmarillion, which is why the late parts of that book are distinctly different), and Titus Alone suffers as a result. But the prose in these are excellent, and the books have an incredibly kooky cast of characters- think Harry Potter characterizations, but, you know... they actually stand up to scrutiny. Come to think of it, the first two books also take place in a castle. Ha.

My mother's favorite books are LotR and the first 2 Gormenghast books. Uh, here's a sample, if you want to determine if it's up your alley:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESnTPAtniqE

As for the Great Book of Amber, I actually have this but did not finish it. It's uh... it's fucking huge, lol, and it did not grip me, but it did seem good. I should pick it up again sometime.

Llamachama posted...

The Abhorsen series.

They have a great tone and I think he does a good job of characterizing his moody female leads. Poor Lirael could use some medication, I think, lol.

To name a couple more...

I remember reading the Wyrd Museum books by Robin Jarvis as a teen. Those were interesting but I'm pretty sure some of the rather shocking death scenes in the books traumatized me as a kid, so I have not read them again, lol. They make reference to Norse and Abrahamic religions particularly, and mostly follow a boy and a girl and some rather grim goings-on related to artifacts and people at a museum in London.

I guess you could try some books based off D&D stuff. None of it is particularly outstanding, but RA Salvatore's books have fun fight scenes.

I read some books by... what was her name... Kristen Britain, and the first book was Green Rider. Those were entertaining, though I lost interest after 3 books. The first book is about a girl who is forced to take up the dying mission of an assassinated messenger that serves the crown, only to find herself hunted by that assassin, who is a skilled horseback archer.

There's the obvious His Dark Materials series, and Artemis Fowl. These are hardly books targeted at adults but they're entertaining media, unlike the disaster films that were made out of them. If you aren't familiar, His Dark Materials = cool familiar+Abrahamic stuff, and Artemis Fowl is basically "fantasy characters vs malignant child genius." Both enjoyable. Real shame about the garbage films, though. Artemis Fowl got done particularly dirty.

Oh, if you want something super niche that I'd be surprised if anyone else has read here, a ways back I read a book called Villains by Necessity. You follow a group of "evil" people trying to save the world from the consequences of having too much "goodness" in it. It's deliberately highly referential to other fantasy books and tropes, including LotR. I thought it was a fun read.

Recommending books is always a YMMV thing, especially because the target age ranges vary wildly and a lot of the stuff I've found most enjoyable has been aimed at younger authors, as if those aiming for adult audiences are too fixated on edge to make their writing actually enjoyable. Maybe I've just been unlucky in my picks, lol. It didn't help that I was reading adult books at a very young age which causes my taste to whip all over the place.