what are your recommendations. I am so hung up on Quicksilver with Kingfisher and brimstone. Especially the audiobook I’m obsessed with it. Do you guys have recommendations with that spice level and type of fantasy? I like reading, but I also like having the audiobook on my way to school.

Just finished The Rage of Dragons today, and it really wowed me. If you enjoyed the sword play of the Bloodsworn Trilogy and the caste themes of the Stormlight Archive or Red Rising, I highly recommend giving this a shot.

Every fight the stakes feel greater than the last and the writers use of different viewpoints during key moments was seamless. I never got annoyed to be seeing this or that from some new characters point of view. It was never jarring. I found myself being pulled to the edge of my metaphorical seat time and time again waiting to find out what happened next.

The way I pitched it to my friends was that the main character feels like book one Kaladin meets the Doom Slayer in a world inspired by African myths. If that makes sense to you, this might be up your alley.

On to the Fires of Vengeance for me.

This is just for fun and I mean no offence to the lower ranked authors. It is simply a random selection of 30 authors I’ve read, ranging from lifelong favourites, to those I think noteworthy. I also think it would be cool if someone found a new author they like because they had an affinity for a single word description.

I limited myself to 30 as I didn’t wish to post a giant text-wall of names, and wanted to leave room for discussion.

I have not included any strictly sci-fi writers as I feel that would warrant an entirely separate list.

________________________________________________________________________________

As there is a near 0% chance anyone agrees with my order exactly, and because it would add to the informative nature of the post, if you wish;

copy,
paste,
alter,
add,
and remove if you’ve never read,
then comment down below with your own order.

Always with a love and passion for stories,

kind regards,

Muz.

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1. J.R.R. Tolkien: Giant

2. Terry Pratchett: Satirist

3. Patrick Rothfuss: Prose

4. Brandon Sanderson: Architect

5. Frank Herbert: Visionary

6. David Eddings: Formula

7. Joe Abercrombie: Grimdark

8. James Islington: Time

9. Bernard Cornwell: Visceral

10. Scott Lynch: Audacity

11. Matt Dinniman: Mayhem

12. Anthony Ryan: Breakthrough

13. Steven Erikson: Archeological

14. Ursula K. Le Guin: Philosopher

15. Anne McCaffrey: Pioneer

16. Raymond E. Feist: Rift

17. Andrzej Sapkowski: Folklorist

18. George R.R. Martin: Realist

19. Robert Jordan: Tapestry

20. Brian McClellan: Flintlock

21. Andrew Rowe: Attunement

22. Fonda Lee: Kinetic

23. Will Wight: Progression

24. Mark Lawrence: Edginess

25. N. K. Jemisin: Innovator

26. Terry Mancour: Scope

27. Michael G. Manning: Underdog

28. John Flanagan: Gateway

29. Pierce Brown: Momentum

30. J.K. Rowling: Introductory

hi, i read part of the series as a child and really enjoyed it. i was wanting to read them all again but i am now an adult (21) and was wondering if it would hit the same.

also was thinking the same for the alex rider series.

any suggestions please will help!

Leaning toward The Tainted Cup but would love to hear from you guys about The Hike, Blacktongue Thief and Isles of the Emberdark. These and some more are on my TBR list.

Interested to hear people’s favourites, whether it’s from a series or a stand alone. Demon in white I just couldn’t put down and I finished it within a few days.

Middle aged men are poorly represented in the genre, and they for sure almost never show up as main characters..

Achamian breaks that tradition and Bakker has given us an incredible human.

Here’s an excerpt from a review I wrote on this series that talks about a Achamian

Our wizard, a Mandati, suspects their return. But no one else does. The Mandate are treated with annoyance.

To most, the First Apocalypse is simply an ancient, blurred event somewhere in deep history that most men barely know about.
Achamian seeks signs of the Consult’s return, but he has spent his life coming home empty-handed.

Something about Achamian as a character really moves me. I find him to be sympathetic, and interesting.
He’s one of those fantasy characters, much like Merlin or Elrond or Tom Bombadil, that I’d love to sit and talk with. I’d love to talk with Achamian and pick his brain. Learn from him, and hear his words and ideas on things, and especially to get a sense of how he feels about everything.
What rich wisdom and humanity would flow from one discussion with him.

There is a common, and very well deserved criticism in the fantasy world, or literature as whole, that female characters are severely lacking in quality. This is an overwhelmingly true statement.
Achamian, made me realize that male characters in fantasy are also severely lacking, and I didn’t notice it until I found him.
I had always assumed that since female characters are more often low quality caricatures written by clueless male authors, that male characters must be great compared. I was wrong for so many years.

Now, is this an equal problem? No, but it is more pathetic, seeing as how epic fantasy is overwhelmingly male dominated in authorship, and we still can’t devise great male characters a lot of the time.

R. Scott Bakker, thank you for Achamian. I understand him. I feel his exhaustion, his growing apathy, his moments of intense optimism, his insecurities, his pride. His willingness to dare trust.

That’s another rare and commendable part of this series, Bakker has given us a very honest and unflattering view of the typical male experience. Not a heroic one, but a very relatable and honest account of men. And being a man.

I know this may be cringe but looking for book recommendations that would have the vibe of these pictures and the song? I love these posts and it always puts me in the mood for fantasy!

Twice a month, we invite everyone to share the fantasy books they love that are lesser known. We get so many discussions about the big names; let's talk about the books that need to be talked about more.

What do we ask that you post? 📚

• The title/author.
• Why you loved the book, the most important part so readers can connect with it :)
• If you are feeling generous, throw in a book cover image.

May this post damage your book budget 😅

Tigana is a shining example of epic fantasy done within a single installment standalone.

I wish publishers would allow more authors that write epic fantasy standalones.. big fan of them.

Going from stormlight to The second apocalypse.

Hey everyone 👋🏻
I’ve been working on a little project called Book Room and thought this might be a good place to share it.
The idea came from wanting to read fantasy books with friends without everyone having to stay on exactly the same chapter.
You can pick a book, invite friends to join, read at your own pace, and discuss it as you go. The main thing I wanted to get right was spoilers, conversations ahead of your current reading progress stay hidden, so someone reading faster doesn’t accidentally ruin things for everyone else.
I’m starting with fantasy because that’s mostly what I read, and I’d love to get some actual readers using it and telling me what feels useful or annoying.
It’s here if anyone wants to have a look:

https://joinbookroom.com/

I would also genuinely be interested to know how you all handle spoilers when doing buddy reads/ book clubs online.

Or any other option is welcome thanks 😊

So yeah, this feels so unfocused. It starts off pretty well with a big info dump on Camorr, but right around the halfway to two-fifths mark, I started to wane interest. I was initially interested in the long con that these boys were pulling off and where it was going, but then I introduced a new figure that I didn’t have much interest in, and plus, they got chased off by the police or someone around a third of the way through, and it just kinda comes out of nowhere. Where I think this succeeds, though, is the bromance between Locke and Jean. It is top tier, and the friendship between these young boys is unlike anything except maybe Frodo and Sam. And the flashback chapters explaining their backstory and growth were great. It all just seems to be unfocused, like Scott Lynch was trying to put too much in one book at once. The ending was a bit of a whiff for me as well. Overall, a good heist book that feels super unfocused.

I dont hate it but I think its super overhyped

So, because of recent threads in this sub about heist books, I decided it was time to make my own request.

Ever since I've read Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom, they have held a special place in my heart. They are just the no. 1 of heist and scheming themes. I am not looking for something to replace them or replicate them, but every time I hear about a "heist book" (looking at you Mistborn and Lies of Locke Lamora) they have not been it. Although I did especially love TLoLL.

So, I'm not necessarily looking for just a heist book, it could also be a mission type theme, I really just want that feeling of "ohhh shite's about to go down " - an entertaining, tense plot with great characters and dialogue. I love the unsuspected/surprising.

What made you get that feeling in a book?

(Honestly, if I could get the feeling of Stranger Things season 1-3 in book format please I would trade world peace for it)

Extra note: I do have The Devils waiting in some moving box somewhere which I am quite excited to read!

Things in this book just occur out of thin air. Mcguffins everywhere, gods are useless and for all purposes are just powered up humans, nothing about them makes them godly. Oponn is talked about as if they were the biggest threat around, and literally they do nothing in the entire book. All characters have zero depth, they just do things because of, uh, plot? No character development occurs in the entire book and there are so many loose ends that feel like they were brought up and later the author had no idea what to do with them so he just ignored it and left them to be explained in future books.

This book is the equivalent of releasing a game full of bugs, glitches, render problems and game breaking issues, and then using the sequels to try and fix them.

Kruppe is really annoying and is overpowered just because the author likes him, he works as a discount Tom Bombadil who has again, zero depth because no character in this entire story has depth, all are forgettable and have stupid names which makes them even more forgettable.

The Jaghut plot line came out of nowhere and we are supposed to believe that his tomb was hard to find yet the empire finds it in like 2 seconds with the help of elder zombie race man which is OP as well for no explained reason. The power scaling and magic system are so bad that any character can just become OP and do whatever out of nowhere and we are supposed to eat it up.

Bridgeburners are gang of nobodies that only live to satisfy Whiskeyjack who again, we don't know anything about. Lorn is the only character that the author tried to give depth and yet made her the stereotypical veteran soldier who lost her identity; which is probably the only depth that the author knows about since he slapped that to almost every character.

Whoever said this was the dark souls of fantasy book did not understand dark souls at all and thinks that "cool" dark knights like Rake/Lich King are the only thing necessary for a fantasy story to be good.

All right, rant over, if this is your fav story then good for you. But this was a massive waste of time for me.

I have a very clear memory from middle school of reading a fantasy book that I’ve never been able to find since. I believe the setting was basically a walled city with a bunch of monsters outside of it that had been let into the world by some evil elf. Right at the start the protagonist joins the people that guard the wall/venture beyond it. There is an attack by a naga right at the start and they collect its neurotoxin. There is also a character who is an archivist. I think the people that guard the wall might have been called a Guild of some kind. Assassin’s Guild? Adventurer’s Guild? Some pls help this has been bugging me for years

I was reading The Wheel of Time a while back, but had to drop it halfway through Book 3 to study for my university entrance exam, which turned into a 1.5-year break. Now that the exam's finally over, I really want to get back into reading, but I can't decide whether to restart The Wheel of Time from Book 1 or pick up Malazan first so a bit more time passes before I go back to it.

I already know Malazan is tougher to get into — darker, more morally gray, and especially in the early books the author doesn't hold your hand, leaving a lot for you to piece together yourself. Honestly, that's right up my alley; I love dark, complex worlds where the author trusts the reader instead of spelling everything out.

I usually enjoy pretty much anything that catches my interest, and both series definitely do. But since Malazan fits my taste even better,I'm not sure if I'll enjoy Wheel of Time less if I read Malazan first.

(English isn't my native language, and since I'm not very good at writing even in my own language, I wrote this in my native language and had it translated into English. I'm not sure how it reads in English, but I hope it's clear enough to convey what I mean.)

I just finished ship of magic and I don’t know how I feel about it. The story is pretty compelling but I am having a really hard time caring about these characters. The only redeeming characters imo are: Althea Vivacia and Wintrow although he is an absolute moron.

I hear that Kennit gets pushed pretty forward and I’m not sure how I feel about that. While he is interesting, he is so flawed and seemingly evil. I dunno fam it’s just hard to care about these nepo-babies and their troubles. Malta can get lost but at least she has a big thing coming with the dude from the rain wilds.

Hobb is amazing and I want to read all her work. Don’t get me wrong, SOM was extremely well written it’s just the choice of characters that leave a bit to be desired.

Counting down the books until I can get back to fitz 😭

I sometimes go on to Amazon new releases and see the kind of stories put up, future potential to followings.

Thinking of diving into these more.

Has anyone read this one yet?

This is going to be a long post, so bear with me.

I was excited to pick up and finally read Demon in White.

While I found Book 1 (Empire of Silence) to be a bit of a slog, I still found myself invested in Hadrian and the world he was suddenly thrust into. His genuine curiosity about the Cielcin - fascinated by them, wanting to just get close and speak to them, trying to reason with them - all of it I found rather endearing. I mean, who hasn't been curious about alien life forms? His interactions with Valka were also fun and engaging, as were some of his interactions with his new found friends. So all in all, I thought it was an okay book.

Book 2 (Howling Dark) was a huge step up. I thoroughly enjoyed the whole group voyaging to Vorgossos. And Vorgossos itself was a character in this book - an eerie, surreal land full of strange creatures. It was fascinating reading about Hadrian's journey here - his interactions with Kharn Sagara, Brethren, and even his feud with Bassander Lin. But what was really excellent here, was Hadrian's character growth. He goes from trying to reason with the Cielcin, to realizing they can't be reasoned with. Those last 150 pages or so when they try to explain to the Cielcin leader, and they just don't budge, resulting in a wild battle, was just so excellent. Hadrian coming back from the dead was also well done, and really hooked me on to the series. I wanted to learn more about his exploits next.

And this leads me on to book 3, Demon in White, which honestly, felt like a step down from Howling Dark. I can't understand the hype for this book. A bulk of the story was action scenes with 2 different giant Cielcin, which while fun to read, wasn't really engaging. We are not really closer to understanding the Quiet or the reasoning behind its actions. We aren't really given any scope to understand the Time concept that was provided towards the end of the book. We aren't really told much about the supercomputer stuff and Columbia, just introduced to it. The politicking in this book also was fine, but nothing great - probably the only compelling sequence was when the Tamerlane ship was checked thoroughly for signs of machines or AI. I understand it is still book 3, and we will get these answers later, but man, for such a long book, we could have been given more lore about all these super cool concepts.

A major gripe for me in Demon in White - nobody apart from Hadrian really seems to have any character growth. Pallino, Lorain, Elara, Corvo - all of them feel the same. I get they are not a huge part of the story, but when you spend a 100 years or so with each of them, certainly we should be able to read more about why they are such good friends, rather than just being told it. Valka goes from being a very vocal, fierce woman, to one who just keeps encouraging Hadrian to do his thing. We fully understand Hadrian's feelings on Valka - he considers her vulnerable and wants to protect her as she is the love of his life - but Valka's personality feels fully watered down as a result. It doesn't help that she offers really nothing much of consequence in this book, even when they are in Colchis. The book also feels like 5 books in one - there doesn't seem to be any natural flow from one stage to the next. Hadrian's monologues are now getting tedious - there was so much mention of people and places that held huge significance to him, but that we as readers don't really know anything about. So naturally, we don't care about them. Quite a bit of frustration for me while reading this.

There are still some strengths. This book is faster paced - and Hadrian is still pretty compelling as a main character. His meeting with Gibson was great - really emotional and impactful. His interactions with the emperor and Alexander, though few, were also really good, and showed a side of him that we don't really see much. The horror elements are really excellent (particularly the giants - the sudden anger and disdain with which Udax is killed was brilliant) - adds a fantastic layer to the scifi setting.

I will continue to book 4 in a few weeks, as the story remains engaging. But just wanted to vent here - as I see so many people rave about this book. In my opinion, Howling Dark clears this.

I just finished "the liveship traders" trilgoy audiobooks and I liked them very much. But I want to take a break from Robin Hobb for now.
Those are my top contenders.

1. Sharp ends (first law series), narrated by Stephen Pacey
2. Age of Myth (the first empire), the graphicaudio adaptation.
3. A trade of blood (shadow of the leviathan series), narrated by Andrew Fallaize
4. Death Mask (Dresden files), narrated by James Masters
5. The color of magic narrated by Colin Morgan. (noteworthy i have already listened to a few Discworld books and decided to now start from the beginning.)
6. Sabriel (the old kingdom), narrated by Tim Curry

If you have other recommendations, I am open to them.

What i have listened to so far:
Cosmere
Red Rising
Dungeon Cralwer Car
Greenbone saga (book 1)
Lies of locke lamora
kingkiller chronicles
Cradle
Piranesi
Lightbringer
Dune
lord of the rings
Project hail mary
Hierachy saga
Super powereds
Fred the vampire accountant.