Any good fantasy/Sword & Sorcery Series???

bitter · December 28, 2015, 01:34:28 AM

Getting back into reading more in my free time, and want some high/epic fantasy series. There's a lot online with my prime account, but I don't know what's out there and is of quality?

Looking for easily accessible series, not so into the more dense, brick-like novels. Anyone stear me in the right direction?

agent of change · December 29, 2015, 08:11:57 PM

Well, if you enjoy bloated sword & sorcery series, that originally were supposed to be a trilogy but keep expanding, with more characters added each book so you have a hard time keeping track of who is who, you may enjoy...

The Warded Man series by Peter V. Brett. The premise is actually pretty cool, a world where demons come up from the ground at night and slay humans, who have a very basic knowledge of warding sigils which, when drawn properly, protect spaces from the demons. One of the main characters eventually realizes that if he tattoos the wards upon himself, it gives him greater power and he can actually fight the demons.

Lots of cool ideas, mediocre writing. I just finished the fourth book The Skull Throne, which actually got pretty fucking brutal at the end. If you're looking to get lost in a series of epic tomes, check it out. The next book is still being written though, so prepare to not know what the fuck happens next.

Edit: so that was from the "What are you reading?" topic. Another decent series that hasn't been fully written yet is Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. Going back a few decades, I really like the Thomas Covenant series by Stephen R. Donaldson, starting with "Lord Foul's Bane." Good antihero and interesting worlds he created. Two trilogies, and then he came back to do a few more books with some of those characters a few years ago that were decent enough. His "Mirror of her Dreams" two-fer was really good too.

Not quite sure what "high" fantasy is other than lofty words and elves, which none of my recommendations have. Well, Donaldson was an English Lit professor, so my vocabulary certainly expanded - "inchoate" is the first one that comes to mind.

khoomeizhi · December 31, 2015, 04:25:31 PM

tad williams' stuff is somewhat bricklike in scope and page numbering, but i find the stories pretty easy to get into, considering the vast complicated worlds they're in. the 'memory, sorrow, and thorn' series is classic.

agent of change · December 31, 2015, 10:58:01 PM

Quote from: khoomeizhi on December 31, 2015, 04:25:31 PM
the 'memory, sorrow, and thorn' series is classic.

Yeah, good one. Starts with Dragonbone Chair, I believe. Classic kitchen boy becomes hero but pretty epic in scope.

khoomeizhi · January 01, 2016, 10:07:31 AM

his series 'shadowmarch' is along similar veins but way darker. the first half of the first book, it's like, 'wow this is pretty apocalyptic', and then another couple thousand pages happen.

bitter · January 03, 2016, 12:49:10 AM

Interesting. I was reading a couple of books from the dimmingwood series, but they were sort of childish and short. For a couple of bucks it seemed fine until the plot got sloppy at the end of book 2. Also, it lacked in the action dept. and offered little magic. I think I need something a bit more fun/exciting, but more mature.

Adventure and magic is more of what I'm after. Is that what I could expect from the 'memory, sorrow, and thorn' series?

VOLVO))) · January 03, 2016, 10:54:05 AM

Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson. Easy read, and very grabbing.

bitter · January 03, 2016, 09:44:56 PM

Cool. I'd seen that one popping up in all of the top book lists. I'll pick up the 1st series.

agent of change · January 04, 2016, 11:05:22 AM

Quote from: bitter on January 03, 2016, 12:49:10 AM
Adventure and magic is more of what I'm after. Is that what I could expect from the 'memory, sorrow, and thorn' series?

Yep. More adventure than magic. Out of all the recommendations above, the Warded Man series has the most of both. But isn't finished yet.

giantchris · February 11, 2016, 03:06:35 AM

Mark Lawrence's Broken Empire series is interesting and really good. Might be a bit more brick style series then you like but its only 3 or 4 books and its highly entertaining. Its not even close to being done but "The Lies of Locke Lamora" would probably be up your alley fun series about thieves.

The Scott Abercrombie series The First Law or w/e its called would also be good. Very fun and fast read. A really fun different series that reads extremely fast is M R Mathias' Legend of Vanx Malic its about a womanizing half elf and is pretty funny. The author has an interesting backstory because he wrote most of his books while in prison.

TannisRoot · May 03, 2016, 04:29:50 PM

Gonna rez this topic.

Check out Roger Zelazny's Amber series. Each book is a scant 200 pages and it's very accessible because you only know as much as the main character who is recovering from amnesia. In terms of genre it's sword and sorcery on acid.

The basic premise is that the multi-verse has one true world, Amber, which is basically Camelot, and an infinite amount of parallel worlds called shadows, of which earth is one. Gods who will it can walk between shadow and basically create any existence they can imagine. So as you can imagine when they get bored, they go find some place where they can be god-kings and chill out. But this is ultimately boring, and the only real challenge is the actually throne of Amber. Since all the god's are related, you can imagine this gets complicated.

The story starts off with one such god who wakes up in a 1970s earth hospital where is obvious he is not free to leave. This doesn't sit well with him and he soon discovers he isn't human and currently his least favorite brother has usurped the throne in Amber. Being a brazen motherfucker he teams up with a dude who dresses like Jimi Hendrix and mounts an invasion of Amber.

Personality wise, he's basically a Han Solo, though trying to not be as much of an asshole as he used to be. It's a fun romp, nothing to serious, and it's definitely epic.

Dylan Thomas · October 29, 2021, 10:19:24 AM

Zelazny is solid. I haven't read that, and will need to check it out.

I recommend R. Scott Bakker's Prince of Nothing and Aspect-Emperor series.

Dark, strange, deeply philosophic novels that go much deeper than the traditional swords and sorcery tropes generally allow for. I liked the first trilogy better than the second four book series. The second has its moments, though it gets pretty bogged down in slogging, bleak, albeit intentional narrative sections. Let me tell you though - the big payoffs are worth it, even if they do borrow more heavily from traditional swords and sorcery influences, particularly Lord of the Rings.

The first trilogy is much more accessible and enjoyable overall. Probably my favorite modern swords and sorcery series, I'm surprised it hasn't gotten the same attention as Song of Ice and Fire. In my experience, it's vastly superior and far more enjoyable. Same epic scope and large cast of characters, though it's not as focused on soap opera-ish melodramatic dialogue and plot twists; it's much more cerebral. That could be why the general public hasn't gravitated to it in the same way.