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Lady Winter Rose

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Sooooooo.....

I'm horribly out of loup. I mostly read my country fiction (Croatian fantasy, small EU country), but I'm not impressed anymore... there's some good stuff there, but I think I need to shift focus on American fiction/EU/UK

Last English thing I read is Naomi Novik Uprooted and I found it very, very good. Other things I read in past years is Terry Pratchets older work, Bear and the Nightingale (Winter Night novel, liked that one) and The Witcher. I really like Elric of Melnibonea short works, Memory Sorrow Thorn, Song of Ice and Fire series

I wish to read:

  • fantasy, not urban fantasy one and not SF, not dystopian and not alternative
  • something tasteful, and not too cringy, something that's not pretentious, so, basically this mean is something between cringworthy and pretentious (based on my reading bookshelf, it's astonishing how EU can be so ridiculously pretentious and irrelevant, and go on two sides of this spectrum)
  • something that passed publishers quality selection (I know, I know...)
  • something I can easily find in printed form and find a way to ship it to EU, or digital, but digital is last resort option, I got non working kindle
  • not overly manly fiction (i.e. first pages of the book I deemed manly: man in his prime is fighting for its life, and it succeed to live to to sheer effort and skill, but not before readers are informed with every move he took, then author shifted focus to elderly rich and corrupted banker man)
  • not young adult, or not romance young adult at least
  • I'm open to new titles, but I'm open to reading old stuff only if you recommend new stuff also, by new slightly new can also pass
  • you're welcome to break any rule, but I'm horribly picky and hard to please

 

Some of my lifestyle in past years:

I read mostly my own country novels and try hard to like them, some of them are OK, good for reals, but some of them I try to forget I actually wish to read... In my spare time I only videogame, have no actual friends (I'm complicated, kind of ill in wrong way and live in small closed minded town). I was fan of Song of Ice and Fire before the series...

Currently reading Red Orm - historical fiction and I'm really digging it.

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1 hour ago, Lady Winter Rose said:

Sooooooo.....

I'm horribly out of loup. I mostly read my country fiction (Croatian fantasy, small EU country), but I'm not impressed anymore... there's some good stuff there, but I think I need to shift focus on American fiction/EU/UK

Last English thing I read is Naomi Novik Uprooted and I found it very, very good.

 

Novik's Spinning Silver is also quite good.

Besides dittoing Robin Hobb, here's some names I'd recommend:

Madeline Miller's Song of Achilles and Circe (retellings of the Iliad and part of The Odyssey)

Judith Tarr's The Hound and the Falcon and Avaryan Rising (unfortunately these are only easily available as digital)

Guy Gavriel Kay (though possibly you will consider him pretentious). I'd suggest The Lions of Al-Rassan as a start, and if you like that, read the rest. You may find Children of Earth and Sky especially interesting, as it is inspired in part by the history of the Uskoks and their struggles against the Turks.

Robin McKinley's The Blue Sword and The Hero and the Crown are YA before YA existed.

Jacqueline Carey's Banewreaker and Godslayer (her take on Tolkien), and if you don't mind rather sex-heavy literature her Kushiel's Dart series (with sequel series).

Katherine Kerr's Deverry series, very long, but fairly unique in a lot of ways.

Most anything by Patricia McKillip or Jane Yolen. 

Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series.

Lynn Flewelling's The Bone Doll's Twin trilogy. 

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Lois McMaster Bujold's The Curse of Chalion

Daniel Abraham's The Long Price Quartet

Max Gladstone's Craft Cycle (starting with Three Parts Dead

Josiah Bancroft's The Books of Babel (starting with Senlin Ascends)

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Few replies:

12 hours ago, Ran said:

Novik's Spinning Silver is also quite good.

 

Translated into my own language... can't say I find it interesting, seems to focus on "girl power" too much, but adding to the list

12 hours ago, Ran said:

Madeline Miller's Song of Achilles and Circe (retellings of the Iliad and part of The Odyssey)

 

Own translation of Circe, will read it after Red Orm

12 hours ago, Ran said:

Guy Gavriel Kay (though possibly you will consider him pretentious). I'd suggest The Lions of Al-Rassan as a start, and if you like that, read the rest. You may find Children of Earth and Sky especially interesting, as it is inspired in part by the history of the Uskoks and their struggles against the Turks.

 

Have some of his books. Including CoEaS

3 hours ago, Filippa Eilhart said:

I know we're not supposed to like Card anymore, but if you liked Uprooted then you'll like "Enchantment".

 

Who? I still have good memories of Mists of Avalon, but I can't force myself to reread... too much associations now.

12 hours ago, Ran said:

Katherine Kerr's Deverry series, very long, but fairly unique in a lot of ways.

 

Interesting. Will check it out

12 hours ago, Ran said:

Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series.

 

Maybe...

 

BTW: new info about book I read currently in main post.

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11 hours ago, williamjm said:

Josiah Bancroft's The Books of Babel (starting with Senlin Ascends)

In all seriousness, this is what I was going to suggest.

Also, Long Price Quartet as well as Dagger and Coin could both fit the bill as well.

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27 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Also, Long Price Quartet as well as Dagger and Coin could both fit the bill as well.

Adding here, as it's relevant: I picked up (in English) the first book in The Dagger and Coin series, The Dragon's Path, in Varna (Bulgaria) of all places. 

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I mean Wheel of Time has a good balance of cringe and pretentiousness which is basically the same thing as being in the middle, right?

Note: I actually really like WoT and consider this a serious recommendation, especially given that in your earlier thread you were looking for something that people are currently reading and discussing. It's not really happening on this board because everyone here who was ever going to read it has done so by now, but I'm seeing an uptick in the number of posts on Reddit and the WoT hashtags on Twitter with people starting the series for the first time, largely as a result of the forthcoming tv show. 

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1 minute ago, Poobah said:

I'm seeing an uptick in the number of posts on Reddit and the WoT hashtags on Twitter with people starting the series for the first time, largely as a result of the forthcoming tv show. 

Really? Does it strike you as a sizable uptick, or just a small increase? (I'm totally curious now!)

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17 hours ago, Ran said:

Lynn Flewelling's The Bone Doll's Twin trilogy. 

That’s an excellent trilogy, I really enjoyed it when I read it, which must have been around the time it came out. It has familiar fantasy tropes but does a lot of interesting things besides, including gender switching the main protagonist.

I must read Fewelling’s Nightrunner series sometime as well.

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On 6/15/2020 at 6:41 AM, Lady Winter Rose said:

Sooooooo.....

It's not quite fantasy, but has fantasy elements in it - The Baroque Cycle by Neal Stephenson. Ditto Fall, or Dodge in Hell.

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Michelle West - all of it

Samantha Shannon - Priory of the Orange Tree has pacing issues but was still a great read

Robin Hobb - all of it

Tasha Suri - particularly if the Chakraborty stuff looks good

Anne Leckie - has a current fantasy going but it's Leckie so read anything with her name on it

NK Jemisin - all of it

Ellen Kushner - specifically the Riverside books

Robert Jackson Bennett - Divine Cities seems closest to the request but all his books are good

JV Jones - all her books are good and they get better as you go.  Sword of Shadows is some of the best fantasy I have read...and I have faith it will be completed when JV is ready.

Anthony Ryan - Draconis Memoria is steampunky but I loved it, his other work might be too manly but it's still good

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If you read Red Orm, you could try Abercrombie's other world "Half a king" (or whatever the first one is) that is clearly viking-inspired and not quite as exaggerated "hardboiled" as "First Law". And if you haven't read it and despite you not wanting alternative history, you could try Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell.

I also second what was mentioned by McKilip, LeGuin and McMaster Bujold, not because they are female authors but because they are overall more "poetic" and reflective than a lot of other more "action oriented" recent fantasy. Also Vance's Lyonesse, old but great. Some older YA that might not quite feel like more recent YA which I liked as a kid in the 1980s and I don't know how well known they are today, is Ende's Neverending story and Dragt's "Letter for the king".

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Anne McCaffrey - Dragonflight

It's the first book of Chronicles of Pern and that series has its ups and downs but Dragonflight is one of the best fantasy books I've read. It's THE book I go for when I have nothing new to read. I've read it couple of times in English and lost count how many times I've read it in Serbian.

Not only does it have a great set of characters (including a lead female character), it also has telepathic dragons, impending doom and everything you can hope for in a fantasy book. It just gripped me from the first chapter.

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On 6/15/2020 at 1:19 PM, IlyaP said:

Really? Does it strike you as a sizable uptick, or just a small increase? (I'm totally curious now!)

Couldn't say for sure, just that it's been noticeable.

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