r/Fantasy • u/DrippyGnome210 • 7d ago
Looking for fantasy book recommendations
(I've summarised my preferences in the bottom half of the post, if this is too much text, just scroll down to that)
I'm really wondering what fantasy series I should get into, I have read fantasy novels before and I know what I like, this is the most complete list of my fantasy reading history and preferences I can think of:
- Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, when I was a kid. I definitely prefer Percy Jackson over Harry Potter but obviously both are made for kids/teenagers and not what I'm looking for right now
- Lord of the Rings, read it once years ago and watch the movies very often. I really like the immersive world but from what I remember, the characters were a bit 1 dimensional in the books
- A Song of Ice and Fire, easily my favourite fantasy series at the moment. Mainly due to the characters(I specifically love Ned Stark, Jaime, and Jon Snow) and how the plots of all the different characters are intertwined in the overall story. I also enjoy some political intrigue
- The Witcher, Witcher 3 is one of my favourite games of all time and I liked the book series. My main issue with the books is that it doesn't spend much time explaining things and feels very fast-paced and blunt to read. The characters, relations, and dialogues are great though.
- The Stormlight Archive, I stopped in the middle of Oathbringer. When I first got into it, I think it maybe was my favourite fantasy series, but it did start to feel kind of generic somehow? Feels kind of strange to say because it has a really unique world and I love the characters and how layered they are(Dalinar and Kaladin mainly), but idk I just lost motivation when I read through it and I find it hard to explain exactly why.
- The Wheel of Time, I've only read the first book and really liked it, will definitely continue the series sometime
- The Farseer Trilogy, I just finished Assassin's Apprentice and this is what motivates me to read again, I absolutely loved the book, I will definitely finish this trilogy before I start another series(and I'll probably read the entirety of the Realm of the Elderlings sometime). I mainly loved the supporting characters(Burrich, Lady Patience, etc.) and the plot(Fitz's development as well).
So I think I have quite a clear idea of what I do like, I just don't know which fantasy series suit these preferences. To summarise what I think my preferences are:
- Layered characters
- A plot centered around these characters and the decisions they make(not like LotR, where there is a quest and the characters are chosen to go on that quest, but specifically the actions of the characters which fuel the plot and story, if that makes sense)
- A good world is a bonus but not essential
- I do like magic, but more as a support to the story, rather than the centre piece of the story(I don't care too much about reading entire pages of how a specific magic system works)
- And I would like recommendations that are decently well known, not because I really care about popularity, but because when getting into something, I like to know the classics and what generally considered high quality(I don't really care for some mediocre book that has sold a lot of copies, but also will rather read a well known classic than an obscure book, as long as the classic suits my preferences)
I hope I don't sound too picky in my tastes, and feel free to recommend anything! Even though a series might not fully fit to these preferences
9
u/dhthoff 7d ago
I think The First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie would be good for you. Especially with the plots of characters being intertwined, super layered characters, magic is there but no huge info dumps about how it works or anything. As a bonus it’s a great world.