It's disappointing to me that this needs to be said. I read the first Song of Ice and Fire book in the middle of 2013, and I finished the fifth book this past March. That's several thousand pages of fiction in less than a year. Clearly, I like the books.
But I can wait for the sixth book. I did fine in 2012 without ASOIAF, and I'll do fine in 2015 and 2016 and even 2017 if it comes to that.
Last year I discovered I prefer novels and assorted nonfiction to reading random articles on the Internet. I prefer to chew on one idea for a long time than a thousand little ideas at once.
So what I'd really like is a way to find other books to read that I enjoy as much a Martin's work. I've signed up for GoodReads, but nothing has come of it just yet.
Does anyone have any suggestions other than browsing Amazon or strolling through a Barnes and Noble?
Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen is a monstrous 10 book (finished) series with a huge, ancient, complex universe, a great mythos and some epic plotting. Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber is pretty dark and very well written. That's all I've got for darkdark fantasy. I can recommend everything Gaiman has written though you'd be better off starting with the Sandman, his best work.
Personally, like your suggestion for Gaiman, I highly recommend anything written by Roger Zelazny.
If you enjoy the Chronicles of Amber, you might also enjoy Jose Farmer's World of Tiers series. Along a similar vein but dissimilar enough that it's worth the read.
+1 for Amber. Much of the rest of Zelazny is good, too. I actually like Lord Of Light better, though it's a bit less approachable (in the specific sense that I picked it up and put it down a few times before getting into it).
Lord of Light is brilliant. It is also very strong stuff - dense, metaphorical, and poetic. It should probably not be the first Zelazny of anyone who's just branching out from GRRM.
To be honest, I had read so much hype about the book before reading it, that, paradoxically, I ended up not liking Lord of Light that much (it does have a very interesting premise).
On the other hand, I basically stumbled on the Chronicles of Amber - I bought the huge omnibus book because it was good words-per-dollar value, back when e-books didn't exist and I needed my books to last me my whole holidays!!
I didn't like LoL much the first time I read it. Admittedly I was also a teenager at the time. When I came back to it much later, I was more willing to engage with Zelazny's desire to play with language. I suspect I'd also had various life experiences the book speaks to; in some respects it was very much one of those 'you'll understand this when you're older' things for me.
I enjoyed the hell out of the Amber books the first time around, though!
+1 for Malazan Book of the Fallen. Totally fantastic. Audiobooks are quite good, too, if you're into that. I like it on kindle since the books are so huge.
I would suggest Glen Cook's Black company series[1] It is written from the perspective of mercenary grunts, so they are no "heroes" in the usual sense since they are not always hired by the good guys (and it is hard to real divide the world between good and bad, it is more a greyish blur). It also has the kind of gritty feeling of ASOFAI, at least in the first books. I won't spoil anything by saying that most characters are pretty expendables, the body count is rather high.
It is fantasy but without the usual dwarves, elves or dragons, but there are much more magic than in Georges R.R. Martin and it is sometimes used as deus ex machina, and is a bit over top for my taste. (However in an interesting twist the black company has only a handful of not very powerful wizards, and since they can't overpower the enemy though sheer power, their magic use is basically used as form of advanced misdirection or psyops)
I would say that the writing is a bit simpler and the characters are a bit less fleshed out than in ASOFAI, but the pace is pretty riveting as well. From my recollection, it reads more like a mystery novel, most events do not make immediately sense, and you are trying to find out who is really pulling the strings behind the scene. On the plus side, even if it is long, I think the story is more focused and go less astray than ASOFAI. (I enjoyed GRR Martin books, but sometimes it feels like he can't help adding new characters or subplots for no particular good reason)
IIRC it is/was pretty popular amongst soldiers stationed overseas.
PS : If I was a television exec, I would try to secure the rights for a TV adaptation ASAP. I am not sure it would work as well as GoT, but it could be a very palatable successor.
Great series, I highly recommend it. And if the parent poster likes a bit of humor, I recommend Cook's Garrett P.I series. A lot of humor and easy reads.
Dune - all the political intrigue and war between houses that makes ASOIAF so great, plus really interesting ecological and technology ideas (desert world where water is very expensive), minus all the horrific violence.
Give Pratchett's Discworld a try. Earlier books are funnier, later books are meatier where it counts (to the point of sometimes being a bit sombre), but they're all very good reads.
I really like the Discworld series (I believe I've read every single book), but I believe they're a different category than the GRRM books.
The later ones start addressing some social issues, and it's great to see Pratchet tackle them (and using fictional species removes some of the ethical issues, one thing where sci-fi and fantasy help with thought experiments)
Is this constrained to Fantasy? I have a lot of Science Fiction recommendations too, but here's a small list:
Riftwar Cycle (several series) by Raymond E. Feist. - high magic, great overarching themes, enjoyable all around. Most of the characters are exceedingly interesting and many are extremely high powered.
Merchant Princes series by Charles Stross - More of the multiworld thing, but a great twist, also what would you do if you could introduce technology into a medieval world.
Deverry Cycle by Katherine Kerr - Rebirth cycles, immortal main character watches and guides several characters through multiple lifetimes.
Dark Tower series by Stephen King - Great story, ties into almost all of SK's books at some point.
Earthsea by Ursula le Guin - A classic story, epic for sure.
Scavenger Trilogy by K.J Parker - Dark and mysterious. Main character might be good, might be bad, but doesn't remember anything.
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A couple good series I ran across on Kindle Unlimited are:
Wayward Pines Series by Blake Crouch. - Like a post-apocolyptic Twin peaks, at least at first. A bit dark, the story bothered me near the end, but still worth the read.
Belial Series by R.D Brady - didn't know what to make of this one at first, "alternate history" (aliens and pyramids type), but it turns out pretty good. involves "Angels" though maybe not in the conventional sense.
Magic 2.0 by Scott Meyer - two books, both very good, highly recommend.
Travelers Gate series by Will Wight (surprisingly good)
Silo Saga by Hugh Howey - currently reading, but great writing, IMO.
There are even more Science Fiction books/series I'd highly recommend, but if you aren't into it, I won't bother you with em.
I've read about 2/3 of the Silo Saga and I can't second this recommendation enough. It was originally just a novelette, but it was so popular on Amazon that he was compelled to write more and so far, it's all excellent.
Joe Abercrombie's books (the First Law trilogy and three semi-sequels) hit some of the same notes. If anything, even grimmer in outlook, and with a substantial dose of dark "British humour". Richard Morgan's The Steel Remains is alright, dude tries a little too hard though.
In general - you didn't do too bad just by asking on here... Find places where relevant people (in this case, let's be honest, nerds) congregate and pipe up. People love to talk about their favourite books, bands, etc. You can normally skim some pages on Amazon to see if the prose style's going to be gratingly irritating to you or something.
I'll do the obligatory chime in to say that final books of WoT make the series worth it. Not the most perfectly executed series, but a good read, nonetheless. Mostly, its quite a bit of fun. books 7-10 are tough, but if you are a fast reader, it'll go by quick enough. Note: Don't do 7-10/11 on audio, thats a sure way to get tired of it.
Use of Weapons, Iain M. Banks. One of many books he's written in the galaxy-spanning setting of "The Culture", an anarchist techno-utopia. Everyone who likes the Culture has an opinion about the best one to start reading with; this is mine. He's also written many SF books outside that setting, and many non-SF books as 'Iain Banks'. Sadly he died recently so there will never be any more.
The Quantum Thief, Hannu Rajaniemi. An ultra-dense draught of future shock; a thief pulls off a complicated caper in a Solar System transformed into something alien and strange by Moore's Law.
The Laundry Files, Charlie Stross. A series about a computer programmer who works for a secret arm of England's intelligence agency dedicated to fighting off magical menaces. Each book stands alone but the end of the world is looming on the horizon. Stross has written a LOT more stuff, pretty much all worth reading IMHO.
The Lies of Locke Lamora, Scott Lynch. A very witty romp about a thief in a fantasy land. There's three books about Locke now; while there's continuity between them, they mostly stand alone - right now I'm reading the latest, where he has to rig an election for a council of wizards, while an old flame does the same for the other side.
Bridge of Birds, Barry Hughart. The first of three gorgeous fantasy detective novels set in magical medieval China. Find them, read them, possibly love them.
The Iron Dragon's Daughter, Michael Swanwick. A changeling's journey through a mad steampunk version of UK fairy myth. Utterly gorgeous and beautiful, also profoundly alien and nihilistic. Not my absolute favorite of his works - that honor goes to Stations of the Tide - but this one's a very close runner-up.
Also seconding the recommendation elsewhere in this thread for Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun series. Huge and dense and slow and beautiful and absolutely in love with language. I couldn't get into the two subsequent Books of the Long/Short Suns, but the New Sun is amazing.
Oh and of course George R. R. Martin has been writing for years; have you tried any of his other work?
Recently read the first volume — wasn't sure about the series so only got the one, it was a great read and the next volumes are on the list for my next book ordering.
I'd recommend Hyperion Cantos. I recently discovered this gem and I'm blown away by how good it is. Has all of the elements of a good sci-fi world: AI, interconnected worlds via a farcaster network, and a mythical creature called the Shrike.
I second it, if you enjoyed it, I warmly recommend Illium/Olympos from the same author which is a bit in the same vein. And generally I really like Dan Simmons. What I found fascinating is that he does not write always the same book (as a lot of author), and he can write in different genre and stay very credible. Carrion Comfort, Children of the Night, The Terror in the horror genre are really great. (Try to read the last one in the heart of a very cold winter)
> I read the first Song of Ice and Fire book in the middle of 2013, and I finished the fifth book this past March.
I started reading ASoIaF after episode 2 aired, finished book 4 (the latest at that point) around episode 4. I didn't get much sleep^^
> Does anyone have any suggestions
goodreads.com and Reddit's /r/Fantasy as well as /r/sciencefiction are my primary sources of new books. goodreads has an okay suggestion algorithm and the reviews are very helpful if you can read between the lines.
The subreddits are both well moderated (especially r/fantasy) and have many authors doing AMA's and popping in to answer random questions. Probably one of the best sources to discover new authors.
For specific novels, I second Malazan (said a bit about it here [1]), anything Gaiman and for a newer slightly dark (and finished) series Mark Lawrence's debut, Broken Empire (Prince/King/Emperor of Thorns)
>But I can wait for the sixth book. I did fine in 2012 without ASOIAF, and I'll do fine in 2015 and 2016 and even 2017 if it comes to that.
I felt similarly after I devoured Robert Jordan's first eleven books in his Wheel of Time series. Quite sadly, Robert Jordan passed away before finishing the series. By the time Brandon Sanderson finished writing the series (another three books), my poor memory lost enough context that I had to go back and re-read the entire series before I could continue where I had left off.
That was a substantial time investment for me [0]. I think from now on I will wait to begin any massive fiction series only after said series has been finished.
[0] 300-some hours to read the first eleven, plus another 400-some hours to "re-read" on audiobook (now the most convenient way for me to consume fiction).
Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy. It's sci-fi, not fantasy, but what sci-fi it is! A hard sci-fi account of the colonization and terraforming of Mars with tremendous verisimilitude and a boatload of Big Ideas.
Robinson explores space travel, the problem of living on low-atmosphere worlds, architecture on other planets, eco-economics, post-capitalist economies, tele-robotics, self-assembling factories, world governments, underground resistance in an always-on surveillance state, corporations with the power of nation states, and the development of a new religion.
The Origin Mystery by A.G Riddle (alternate history, aliens, seeded origins, etc)
Brilliance Saga by Marcus Sakey - Kind of a superhero thing, 1% of humans since the 80s have been born with superhuman abilities. Not bad, probably a 3/5, but entertaining.
Almost anything by Douglas E. Richards - his Mind's Eye book was a great action/mystery, Same with his Wired and Amped books (series). I'm looking into his Prometheus Project series, and might read it next.
Awakened Series by Jason Tesar - Multiple worlds type of deal. Prophecy, fighting evil beings, high powered hero and enemies, and more. Probably not the "greatest" writing or editing going on (I spotted a few spelling errors), but it's a great plot and his character development is pretty good.
Not Kindle Unlimited:
The Long Earth series by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter - Multiple worlds, epic storyline, and getting better with each new book. Can't wait for the next one (The Long Mars).
The Taken Trilogy by Allen Dean Foster - Human abducted by aliens, escapes, has great adventures with his talking dog. Humorous and engaging. Highly recommend.
The Tide Lords by Jeniffer Fallon - Powerful, immortal, nearly gods when the "tide" is up, merely un-killable when it's not. Great read (Fantasy).
Personally, I'm not a "strolling through a Barnes and Noble" reader, but a "been hearing about it for years" reader. Think about the books you've heard people talk about, mention, or quote and then read those. They're usually talked about so much for a reason. You've heard of Hitchhikers Guide, you've heard of Sherlock Holmes, you've heard of Lord of the Rings. Have you read all of them?
Well depends what you're looking for in suggestions.
If you're looking for something somewhat reminiscent of ASOIAF (huge worldbuilding, multiple complex storylines, etc…) I suggest Malazan Book of the Fallen (though it's by no means an ASOIAF copy). I enjoyed it (though I found it could have done with tighter edition and IIRC book 8 was a bit long in the tooth).
I've done pretty well with GoodReads as a source for finding new reading - I basically don't watch TV and read instead when I'm not at the computer.
Most books I've read don't stand up to George R. R. Martin's work, but I enjoy light fantasy too :) (including young adult fantasy which is not what you're looking for, I guess).
I endorse most recommendations in this thread, but, trying to find some epic world-plotting, I'd go for:
- The Kingkiller Chronicles (Patrick Rothfuss), best new books I've read
- Anything by Brandon Sanderson, I enjoyed the Mistborn Trilogy and am currently awaiting the next book in his Way of King Series (which promises to be a big epic)
The Malazan series grew on me, I understood very little about the series' world by the time I read the first book, I think it's by design. Not as enjoyable as the other suggestions but lots of reading and a big, interesting world:
Given that this is attached to a post about fans of Game of thrones being annoyed that the last book is taking forever, it's worth noting that the Kingkiller Chronicles is aggressively unfinished at the moment; it's planned to be three books, two are written, and Rothfuss quite up front about the fact that the final volume is taking a while to make happen, and that he's working on a lot of other stuff in the interim.
They're both beautiful books and I will be happy with them even if Rothfuss never gets around to finishing the series. But if you need your fantasy to end before you're willing to read it then stay away.
The urth books (Shadow of the Torturer and following) take a lot of time to really get into. It's only by the time you get to the last book that you start to understand much of what happened in the first.
I, as you might be able to tell from my nick, am a big fan ;)
> Does anyone have any suggestions other than browsing Amazon or strolling through a Barnes and Noble?
As far as approaches: talk to people you know, understand their reading tastes, and get recommendations from them?
As far as specific reading suggestions for someone who I know nothing about other than that they like ASOIAF, maybe (though its very different) S.M. Stirling's novels of the Change (Dies the Fire and sequels.)
I liked Island in the Sea of Time, which is supposedly set on the other side of the same "Emberverse." But I got really tired of the other novels in that universe after a while (both the Nantucket and the Dies the Fire branches). Which is frankly my general take on the vast majority of science fiction and fantasy series. I get why they're appealing to both many authors and many readers but I often wonder if the genre wouldn't be better if it had more standalone novels or at least shorter series.
Here's a web-serial that is complete; parts of it could definitely use some editing, but it's enjoyable, and at 3.7M words will take a while to get through:
But I can wait for the sixth book. I did fine in 2012 without ASOIAF, and I'll do fine in 2015 and 2016 and even 2017 if it comes to that.
Last year I discovered I prefer novels and assorted nonfiction to reading random articles on the Internet. I prefer to chew on one idea for a long time than a thousand little ideas at once.
So what I'd really like is a way to find other books to read that I enjoy as much a Martin's work. I've signed up for GoodReads, but nothing has come of it just yet.
Does anyone have any suggestions other than browsing Amazon or strolling through a Barnes and Noble?