Book recommendations

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Okay I'm looking for a few good books to read. When I start a book I typically finish it that night if it can hold my attention, so I want a fair amount of books that you think can do that. I'm sure you need a basis so the most current series I've been reading is Kelley Armstrong's Otherworld series. It's like the anti-Anne Rice series. Think fun with werewolves and other supernaturals. I love Tolkien, not just the The Hobbit and LotR. Bernard Cornwell's books on Arthur and such are some of my favorites as well. I also love legal thrillers, but I have plenty of those so unless you can find me a legal thriller with elves and dwarves and such let's stick to the other. However if there is a legal thriller with such characters I have to have it.

[ March 24, 2007, 22:28: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

 

Anything by Steven Erikson.

 

If you like Armstrong definitely check out:
Jacquelyn Carey (Kushiel's Dart) +
Kim Harrison (Dead Witch Walking)
Patricia Briggs (Moon Called)
Laurell K. Hamilton (Guilty Pleasures; Do NOT, under any circumstances, read past book 9. Unless you want pure erotica, in which case more power to you)
Keri Arthur (Full Moon Rising)

Fantasy:
Steven Erikson (Gardens of the Moon) +
George R.R. Martin (Game of Thrones) +
China Mieville (Perdido Street Station) +
R. Scott Bakker (The Darkness That Comes Before)*
Robin Hobb (Assassin's Apprentice)
Jacquelyn Carey (Banewreaker)*
Gene Wolf (The Wizardknight, the Book of the New Sun)*


Scifi:
Richard K. Morgan (Altered Carbon) +
Neal Stephenson (Cryptonomicon)
John Varley (The Golden Globe, Red Thunder)
Robert Heinlein (Starship Troopers)
Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space)

Authors who dabble in genres:
Stephen R. Donaldson (The Real Story, The Man Who Killed His Brother)
Dan Simmons (Hyperion, Illium, Hardcase, Hollow Man)

Thriller/mystery:
Greg Rucka (Keeper, Queen and Country: Operation Broken Ground [starts as a comic series, eventually becomes a novel series])+

* = fairly dense
+ = for the love of god, read these

 

I've been reading up on some of the authors and two authors that look interesting are Steven Erikson for his Malazan books and Karl Edward Wagner for his Kane books. What do you think? good places to start?

 

Kane might be worthwhile, but, well, I've read some unflattering things about Wagner. 'Course, Drake ain't a disinterested party, but...

Erikson, however, is well worth your time and money.

 

If you're willing to go more than a night reading a book I'd add to the Neil Stephenson list his three-book series, Quicksilver, The Confusion, and The System of the World. But they are very thick tomes. As for what genre they are - like Cryptonomicon, they are kind of alternate history (but less alternate than you might think), kind of science fiction, kind of fantasy. Meticulously researched, fascinating plots.

A shorter and quite hilarious Neil Stephenson is his early Snow Crash, a near-future sci-fi satirical novel. The main character is named Hiro Protagonist. Need I say more?

 

I'll way second recommendations for Cryptonomicon, Snow Crash, and The Diamond Age - don't know about his other stuff and don't know how they fit into what you like already, but they're awesome.

 

I just finished reading Erikson's Malazan stuff up til Midnight Tides. You HAVE to read it.

 

Midnight Tides will be released here the middle of next month (about three weeks). It's been a long wait.

 

@Chandos

Why just now? We've had Bonehunters (albeit in the large, pricey, clunky paperback version that I wont buy) now for some months already and Midnight Tides in regular paperback since early last year already (although Erikson's books are in short supply as he hasn't hit "mainstream" market yet like Martin's ASoIaF which is suddenly so popular here). I would've thought that you guys would get the books first in the U.S?

 

It is very odd. Bonehunters has been out in New Zealand for well over a year. Why don't Americans just buy online from an overseas retailer?

 

May I recomand Trudi Canavan's "The Black Magician Trilogy"
1. The Magician's Guild
2. The Novice
3. The High Lord

Highly recomand you read them.

 

Well, Tor seems to have finally caught a clue, as both Midnight Tides and the Bonehunters will be released this year in the US.

'course, Reaper's Gale won't be. So maybe they're not quite with it.

 

I'm a big fan of K. J. Parker's writing. His imaginative and refreshingly mimetic take on fantasy makes a change. He uses an entirely modern diction, although this seems to fit perfectly with his worlds and keeps the text light and easy to read.

He can get a bit heavy handed at times; he loves to go on in-depth about the intricacies of bureaucracy, politics, battle tactics and even smithing techniques. Might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I found that it was interesting and added variation to the narrative.

I'd highly recommend his Scavenger Trilogy and am about to move onto the second volume of the Engineer Trilogy. Haven't read his first three books, but I intend to at some point.

 

I can recommend The Blade Itself and Before They are Hanged (due out in your neck of the woods sometime this month) by Joe Abercrombie - gritty fantasy, with superb charcterisation

and if you like thillers, you might like to try some of the Dresden Files, Jim Butcher's very readable "fantasy gumshoe" series

 

Thanks everyone for the recommended reading. As soon as I finish the Drizzt series(I'm well into "The Silent Blade") I plan to start on some Erikson books since he seems to be the most recommended reading and we'll see from there. Thanks again.

Don't hesitate to add to the list, I read pretty quickly (I think I'm on my 14th book in a month's time)