Soliciting recommendations for a good fantasy epic . . .

Hi, all. I'm new here, so apologies if there is a thread dedicated to this already.

I love both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, but I'm not satisfied with the read alikes I've found. (I also prefer to just re-read a book I love, rather than search for something that probably won't measure up.)

But . . . I'd like to read a little bit more in modern/contemporary fantasy, and I'd like the content or style to be similar to a Tolkien work, and with:

knights-errant
castles
forests dark and deep
a quest
wit, but not slapstick humor
dragons (esp. friendly dragons)
swordplay
pronounceable names

What I love most about Tolkien is the way he drew on his knowledge of chivalric romances. I'm fond of that genre, and its Renaissance update, The Faerie Queen. So I'm looking for something that references that.

I also like Arthurian romances (esp. The Once and Future King) and epic poems, such as Beowulf.

Hmm, reviewing my above comments, it seems that what I really want is a good, old-fashioned quest epic. I'd prefer a one-off, but a trilogy would be okay, too. YA is fine.

Any thoughts? And, thanks in advance.

PS: Please, no Game of Thrones; I tanked on that one very quickly. ;)

Welcome, DianaNowling! So, you're looking for epic fantasy (you also said you're looking for modern/contemporary fantasy, but contemporary fantasy is a genre, meaning fantasy in a current-day-world, so I guess that's not what you want, right?).

When I read your post, I thought of the Fionavar trilogy by Guy Gavriel Kay (starting with The summer tree). It is definitely epic, and has castles, elves, dragons, gods, forests and Arthur. Whether you'll like the style, I can't predict, but this is my favorite fantasy series.

Can you say what you didn't like about Game of thrones, by the way? I haven't read it, but it might help other people steer you to the right kind of book.

And another welcome, DianaNowling! I'll second what @zjakkelien said in #2, and add:

I think you'll enjoy almost anything Guy Gavriel Kay wrote, not thust the series. Assuming you have access to a good library, try The Lions of al-Rassan -- a standalone, and dragon-free -- before parting with money.

On the same assumption, try Terry Brooks's Shannara series. I must admit I've got my fingers crossed behind my back on this one: my local library thinks they're popular, and so has a more-or-less complete set. I finished Magic Kingdom for sale ... sold (not a Shannara), but got bored with every other one I've had out, and started skimming at about page 100 (how to read a brick in half an hour!).

David Eddings's Malloreon series might fill the bill. I read books 1,2 and 5 to completion, but was disheartened by finding myself able to predict 5 in detail from halfway through 3.

And, possibly leaving the best for last, take a look at the writings of Janny Wurts, who belongs to this group.

>2 zjakkelien:,3 Thank you both. The Kay books do look good, and my library has some Wurts titles. It's nice when a published author is active on LT.

Is the Shannara series comic, like his Discworld books? I ask because I didn't really like any of the Robert Aspirin books I tried (which is sci-fi?) and Discworld seems similar.

>2 zjakkelien: I knew I would make a terminology error! You are correct, I meant I was looking for fantasy written by modern or contemporary authors. But, I'm going to revise my OP and state that any epic fantasy will do.

So, classics are in play now, too. Maybe someone on here will even know of a medieval romance I've not yet read. ;)

Re: Game of Thrones, my quibbles were the silly names of characters/places and the shifting viewpoints (which made it hard to care about the narrative). Plus, it just struck me as messy and not very well-written. But a friend has raved about what an intelligent author is Martin.

Thanks again. More please! . . .

#4. Shannara comic? (yawn ...) No. But discworld isn't Brooks, it's Terry Pratchett. Sir Pterri's humour is muct more cerebral than Asprin's; I must admit I, too, find a little Asprin goes a long way; not so Pratchett.

Pratchett has dragons (in the Vimes stories), but they live in the suburbs of a really insanitary city. The Witches are often errant, but not knights, and Lancre (home of Nanny Ogg, one of the witches) has a castle that's busy falling to pieces.

Come to think of it, if you can stand some truly desperate puns, and you can handle some very adolescent YA fantasy, you could try Piers Anthony's Xanth series. It has dragons, castles, quests ... Pronounceable names: one of the dragons is called Stanley, and he steams his victims, so, Stanley Steamer. Ouch.

Thirding the mention of Fionavar... GGK actually slips Arthur in as well.

You might try looking into Melanie Rawn's Dragon Prince and Dragon Star trilogies. They are massively epic, full of dragons (who become friendlier after humans learn to communicate with them), have deserts wide and burning rather than your sought forests, and may fail on your desire to have pronounceable names. I adored them.

I wonder if Anne McCaffrey's Pern books might fill the bill?

Guy Gavriel Kay is always worth a mention - his may not fit your bill completely, but he is definitely worth a look. Tigana is perhaps my favourite of his (no dragons, I'm afraid)

Or what about some of Robin Hobb's work? There be dragons!

Take a look at C. J. Charry's Fortress in the Eye of Time and sequels, it may well fit the bill for you. The series has heart and intricacy and is dreadfully underappreciated.

Also, check out Stephen R. Donaldsons Mordant's Need series, A Man Rides Through and Miorror of her Dreams/

I was also impressed with Carol Berg's Lighthouse Duet, Flesh and Spirit and Breath and Bone - treat this duology as one story, however, since all of the reveals unfold fully in the second half.

Many of the more modern and contemporary fantasies take some pain to avoid the "knights, quest, pseudo-medieval sort-of-european setting" package, unless they paint over it with a heavy grimdark brush, which may have been what you didn't like in aSoIaF.

If you liked Beowulf maybe you could try Grendel, a retelling from the other side.

I see Curse of the Mistwraith named above, good but not the kind of setting you're describing, and a big series rather than standalone/trilogy.

I wouldn't recommend Shannara (at least Sword, didn't read further), or the Fionavar trilogy, they irritated me to no end for being such slavish imitation of LoTR down to exact scenes and character equivalents. Tigana is great though.

The Chalion trilogy has a setting fairly similar to what you're describing (well, no dragons and little humor), and its good, though for me the real gem is the second book Paladin of Souls.

For old-fashioned quest fantasy on the LotR template that isn't an outright rip-off, I remember the Blackbird trilogy by Freda Warrington.

Thanks, everyone for the input. It's nice to be part of an active, happy group.

Lots of interesting choices here, from a variety of angles. Keep them coming! I'm heading to the library on Thursday, so I'll pick up some and get started.

***One of the reasons I like The Hobbit so well is that it's a good, old-fashioned cheerful adventure that just happens to have trolls and a dragon. Are there any stand-alone novels like that you would recommend, titles with happy adventuring?

Any fantasy classics or books that influenced Tolkien at which I should take a look?

>11 Jarandel: Grendel is indeed a lovely book.

Interesting re: Game of Thrones; you might be right. It did all feel very . . . portentous. I was tired of winter coming about the second time it was mentioned.

5> Ouch indeed.

Thanks for the correction. I might give Discworld a shot. I read the Aspirin dragon book, whatever it was called. By the second book, I was tired of the conceit already. I'm not sure he finished the series before he died.

Another voice of dissent here on the Fionavar Tapestry -- I personally didn't care for the style (and was honestly so traumatized by a scene in The Summer Tree that I couldn't continue the series). If you're looking for anything remotely jolly, this ain't it. It may be your cup of tea in other ways, but humor/cheer is not one of its qualities.

Lud-in-the-Mist by Hope Mirrlees might be worth a look? No dragons and I found it quieter in tone than a lot of more contemporary works, but well worth reading.

Or The Wood Beyond the World or anything else by William Morris if you haven't read his works already.

I nth the recommendation for Guy Gavriel Kay. I prefer his stand-alones to the Fionavar books, but I found them quite different in flavour. If you bounce off the one, you might not necessarily bounce off the other.

And if you do decide to give Discworld a shot, I'd recommend starting with Guards! Guards!. I think that one probably overlaps with your request best? Been a while since I read anything Discworld, so I'm not 100% sure.

Since you're fine with YA, I have to ask if you've read The Dark Lord of Derkholm by Diana Wynne Jones? That might be worth considering too.

If you're looking for cheerful, definitely avoid the Fionavar Tapestry. I, too, found it rather traumatizing. The Belgariad by David Eddings or The Riddlemaster of Hed series by Patricia A. McKillip might work for you. Good, old fashioned farm boy adventures.

I'll 5th GGK. I love Fionavar but all his novels are excellent.
I'll also suggest Tad Williams Memory Sorrow and Thorn trilogy. Like all his books, it's slow to start but if you make it halfway through the first book, you'll be hooked.

Gordon R. Dickson's Dragon Knight series is great. It begins with The Dragon and the George.

If you're ok with slightly silly, then I would recommend Dealing With Dragons. It is the first of a young adult series, but the first one is extremely well-suited for standing alone. This is what comes to mind when I think of "Hobbitlike happy adventuring."

Likewise, for something a bit off-the-wall, have you ever actually READ The Princess Bride? It's very good.

For epic, if you don't mind starting an unfinished series, Patrick Rothfuss is amazing. The Name of the Wind is a doorstopper in the best sense of the word, and Wise Man's Fear is the sequel.

For another YA selection that's funny and a little smidge creepy, perhaps Brandon Sanderson's alternate Americana The Rithmatist would work. If that's a bit too juvenile or not to your taste, I would suggest The Emperor's Soul which is his short story that just won a Hugo award. If you read either or both of those and like him as an author, he's got MANY other epic fantasy works, mostly in singletons or duos or threes.

If you want CLASSIC epic fantasy, I'd go back to Magician: Apprentice and Magician: Master, although I have to admit I like Janny's trilogy of contributions to that universe better than the main series. Her trilogy there starts with Daughter of the Empire and they're awesome.

For cheerful epic fantasy, I immediately think of the Belgariad (already mentioned by someone) and subsequent Malloread by David Eddings. Those are not standalone's, though, each series contains 5 books. For a standalone you could read The redemption of Althalus. I have to admit, this is not my favorite Eddings. That is partly because all the characters seem direct copies of characters in his previous works, though, so you may enjoy it.

Have you read anything by Cornelia Funke? I think the intended age is a bit younger than YA, but I seem to remember cheerful adventuring...

I'm reading Eddings's Belgariad at the moment and enjoying it: it certainly has most of the OP's required ingredients so far (with the exception of dragons). I would describe it as a stand-alone novel in 5 volumes, rather than a series, since the story is completely continuous. Mrs Bookworm says it is his best, to be recommended over the Malloreon.

I'll put in a good word for Tigana too, and warn you off the dreadful Shannara novels. Robert Asprin did write fantasy, but after a quick look at one in a bookshop I put it back on the shelf.

You will miss some of the best that fantasy has to offer by sticking to the knight-and-castle cliches of European romance, though, such as Ursula le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea and Geraldine Harris's Seven Citadels sequence beginning with Prince of the Godborn, for example, and the contemporary fantasies of Alan Garner and Susan Cooper. The tales of David Gemmell would also be worth your time.

Any fantasy classics or books that influenced Tolkien at which I should take a look?

That's a tough one. Most of the cliches you list in the OP are post-Tolkien. More or less contemporary with Tolkien is Poul Anderson's The Broken Sword (1954), which draws on some of the same mythical background (but Norse rather than Anglo-French). For earlier fantasy, I'd recommend the tales of Lord Dunsany, and the delightfully whimsical The Worm Ouroboros by E. R. Eddison. If you're interested in Tolkien's sources of inspiration, you could do worse than read his own Children of Hurin, where some of the main tragic legendary themes that he borrowed from Norse and Finnish myth are worked out in a more digestible way than in The Silmarillion.

I'll second the suggestion of Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow and Thorn trilogy, which starts with The dragonbone chair. It has all the elements of classic fantasy writing - an inexperienced protagonist, a mix of different characters/races who must work together on a quest, a feudal society setting (with travel to other cultures), magic and a looming evil that must be defeated in order to save the world. It's well-written and while dark in places there is always hope and sometimes a little humour.

I also prefer GGK's stand-alones to the Fionavar books, although the Sarantium duology might be my favourite of his works.

I love Patricia McKillip's books, though prefer her more recent books to the Riddlemaster trilogy. They contain some classic fantasy ingredients, but are written in lovely poetic (but not purple) prose. I especially love Alphabet of thorn and Od magic, which stand alone.

Dealing with Dragons was also the first book I thought of when I read "Hobbitlike happy adventuring." I'll second the Chalion trilogy though my favorite was The Curse of Chalion, the first in the series. Also, second The Princess Bride, the Belgariad by Eddings, and Magician: Apprentice by Feist.

Some other "happy fantasy" I'd suggest:

Hurog Duology starting with Dragon Bones by Patricia Briggs (dragons, quest, knights, swords)
Stardust by Neil Gaiman (quest)
Symphony of Ages starting with Rhapsody by Elizabeth Haydon (might be a little dark on occasion) (quest, swords, wit)
Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart (set in Asia, very humorous) (quest, wit)
The Jousters series starting with Joust by Mercedes Lackey (alternative ancient Egypt) (dragons)
The Fairy Godmother by Mercedes Lackey (first in a series but they are all stand alones) (knights, quests, wit, forests)
The Lark and the Wren by Mercedes Lackey (again first in a series but all are stand alones) (quests, wit)
The Harper Hall of Pern by Anne McCaffrey (quests)
The Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia McKillip (dragons, quests, forests)

One happy contemporary fantasy I'd recommend is:

Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

No dragons, no adventures, castles or quests. Just a happy story.

Ooh, Garden Spells and Lackey's Joust series were very nice. Very different, but both lovely. I actually gave my non-fantasy-reading father-in-law the Joust series for his birthday because he likes Egyptology, and he really liked them!

If you try and like Garden Spells, there's a second one by the same author - not a sequel, but very much the same feel - The Sugar Queen.

My husband very much enjoyed the Rhapsody series, but I found them a little on the dark side on occasion.

For another contemporary author and a nice atmospheric stand-alone fantasy (this one more wizards and personal-relational quests) House of Shadows by Rachel Neumeier was very good. I have not read her other books, so can't comment on them.

If you like dragons, I enjoyed Elizabeth Kerner's Song in the Silence and the two sequels The Lesser Kindred and and Redeeming the Lost. Very strongly quest-oriented, fairly standard knights and castles setting, and pretty light-hearted. I did mention it has dragons, right? Lots of dragons.

As an interesting variation on the standard fantasy world, you might try Jim Butcher's Codex Alera. There's 6 of them, so it's a little long for what you asked, and it IS more than a bit dark in places. However, it is questy, has magic and elementals and strange creatures, and lots of witty humor and clever dialogue. The world in question is also very interesting, and a bit of a fun puzzle to sort out as the series progresses.

#23 RowanTribe reminds me of another Rachel Neumeier standalone that I really liked, The Floating Islands. Not questy, but has other qualities you may like.

I enjoyed Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, ably concluded by Brandon Sanderson. It's a long one.

Tamora Pierce's Tortall books? Not exactly epic fantasy, but there are knights, castles, forests, quests, wit, swordplay, pronounceable names, and even (eventually) dragons.

The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley

I love the suggestion of Dealing with Dragons, those are some of my favorite books. I also really like the book The Princess Bride.

Arrr, me hearties. There be some excellent choices here to pillage when I raid the stacks. I'll hoist a signal when I've had a chance to spit and polish my treasure. Lashings of rum for the lot o' you.

>20 MyopicBookworm: You will miss some of the best that fantasy has to offer by sticking to the knight-and-castle cliches of European romance:

I'm not sure I will like fantasy. Several friends who know my tastes have mentioned that I would, if I could find the right conduit book. I found something to sate my Tolkien fix by looking at recommendations for medieval works. Since that connection is so strong for me, that's best for me vis-à-vis LotR.

For this pub's purposes, I think that my OP's list will suit, as will cheerful adventuring, but without the shoehorning of Tolkien. And, of course, recommendations for must-reads across the genre are most welcome. I've been meaning to read LeGuin's book for some time.

>20 MyopicBookworm: Most of the cliches you list in the OP are post-Tolkien.:

Thanks, and very interesting. I'll look for a good overview of the genre, or a chronological list of reads, at the library.

Thanks again, all. I appreciate your suggestions and information.

>22 Morphidae:, 23 I, too, love Egyptology.* I alternated between playing Howard Carter and Tutankhamen** when I was a kid. I even had a sweater I wore on my head as a nemes.

A few years ago, I lived, briefly, in Luxor, and played at adventurer every day. I developed a fascination with the graffiti on the temples and photographed lots of it. My favorite was the Rimbaud sig at Luxor Temple. I also stumbled across a Champoleon graffito at Karnak, but there isn't solid evidence it's authentic.***

*This fascination has not, however, inspired in me a compulsion to read either Christian Jacq's or Wilbur Smith's series, though I did make an unsuccessful stab at Mika Waltari's one-off, The Egyptian.

**Minus the tragic ends, usually.

***This isn't my photo!

If I can add one more suggestion, there is a wonderful YA series by Gerald Morris which fits pretty much all of your requests. The first of the series is The Squire's Tale. I found myself laughing aloud when reading his books.

>29 mamzel: Thanks.

Ha! A questing list: http://www.librarything.com/list/702/all/On-the-Road-Again-Journeys-Travels-and-...