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Looking for Fantasy, Science-Fiction Suggetions


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Greetings All, hopefully someone can help me in my search.

 

I'm a HUGE spy fan, however, I want to give that a break and try something new.

I've come up with some criteria, and hopefully your recommendations can meet them.

If You Select Sci-fi or Fantasy, the book must be a series.

Choose one of the categories and then recommend a book.

If you recommend:

Fantasy: I don't want the generic medieval/Tolkien rip-off. No Elves, Dwarves or Castles. I want something original, and more mature orientated. No YA, and no fantasy set in modern day.

Science-fiction: No military SF. I get enough of the bad-ass solider kicking ass from BSG, Stargate/Trek etc. I've tried to read The Lost Fleet but just couldn't bring myself to finish it. It's nothing against the author but the main character type is repetitive . No time travel either. I'm leaning toward space opera, and I know it's hard to find SO that isn't also military.

Thriller: I'm looking for the average person caught in a conspiracy type thriller. Right now, I'm eyeing The Girl on the Train, and seriously considering the purchase. Any other of those types of novels is great.

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Science Fiction: Jack Vance fits neatly into the category of Space Opera, his books are often called "Planetary Romance".

He has written many trilogies and series.

 

My favourites are :

 

The Planet Of Adventure series (4 books)

Cadwal Chronicles series (3 books)

The Alastor Cluster series (3 books) (more of a collection; the stories are not linked but share a central common idea)

The Demon Princes series (5 books)

 

Couple I am not so fond of:

Durdane trilogy

Big Planet series

 

 

He has also written many excellent one-off novels, but you insisted that they must be series, so I must discount those. How much I rate Vance is illustrated by the fact that I came across my first Vance novel as a teen and spent years reading almost everything he wrote (around 100 books). Now I am collecting and reading them all again.

Edited by vodkafan
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For fantasy you could try Game of Thrones.

 

I don't mind reading, but I want to step away from the medievel fantasy for awhile. Since LoTR came out, alot of authors want in on medievel fantasy. It's become generic and predicable. A lot of novels/video games have variations on elves/dwarfs but at the end of the day, all they did was take Toliken elves/dwarfs and twist them slightly.

 

I'm aware of the critical acclaim and postive reviews GoT gets, but I'll read it when the TV show ends and we move from medievel fantasy to another genre. 

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Ermmm.... there aren't any elves and dwarves in GoT......   

 

And it's nothing like Tolkien.  Not sure where you got that impression.

 

I know it's nothing like Tolkien but it is medeval fantasy. What I meant was, to me at least, after the LoTR novels people wanted more fantasy, and so other authors delivered, but, what they delivered was just a rehash of what Tolkien did, just slightly changed. Feel free to counter me, I love a good debate :smile:. For example, The Sword of Shannara series.   

 

HBO decided to produce a show based on A Song of FIre and Ice novels, a more matured adult orientated medvial fantasy drama. As I said, I know it's well written and has positive reviews, but I'll read it when the TV show is done. Again, I feel like I'm missing out on a lot of other fantsay novels because of the popularilty of GoT. I don't want to read a novel just because it's what's popular/what everyone else is reading. I'm looking for the author's who wrote fantasy but decided to be different, maybe one not set in medieval times, perhaps one with no dragons or magic. 

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Ermmm.... there aren't any elves and dwarves in GoT......   

 

And it's nothing like Tolkien.  Not sure where you got that impression.

 

To elabortate futher, I don't want to read another medieval fastasy just yet. Thanks to the popularity of LoTR, I'm seeing alot of medieval fantasy novels pop-up, and while I understand GoT is darker and more adult oriented, and very different, I don't want to dive into medieval fantasy just yet. I want to step away from the genre that is medevial fantasy, and look at other authors.

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How can I delete previous posts? After posting them, I cannot edit or delete them. Is that just the way the forum is structured?

 

Hi Nexusfactor - until you have made 10+ posts we restrict what you are able to do on the forum. If you have 10+ posts and still cannot edit, contact a Mod.

 

If you have a look at Rules, Guidelines and FAQ section, you'll be able to find out more info about the forum and how it works. :)

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SF:

 

Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space series)

Vernor Vinge (Zones of Thought series)

Peter Watts (Firefall duology)

Peter F. Hamilton (Night's Dawn trilogy or Commonwealth Saga)

Neal Asher (Spatterjay series or Agent Cormac series)

Iain M. Banks (Culture series)

Frank Herbert (Dune series)

C. J. Cherryh (Foreigner series, Faded Sun trilogy, Company Wars series)

Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos)

 

 

Fantasy:

 

China Miéville (Bas-Lag series)

Jeff Vandermeer (Ambergris series)

Edited by Karsa Orlong
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Welcome to the forum!

 

I can't really expand on the SF list above but I can highly recommend:

 

Fantasy:

 

Scott Lynch's Gentlemen Bast*ard series starting with The Lies of Locke Lamora.

Brandon Sanderson - Mistborn trilogy

Joe Abercrombie - First Law

 

Thriller:

 

Patrick Lee - The Runner is a fantastic read and fits your criteria quite well I think.

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Welcome to the forum!

 

I can't really expand on the SF list above but I can highly recommend:

 

Fantasy:

 

Scott Lynch's Gentlemen Bast*ard series starting with The Lies of Locke Lamora.

Brandon Sanderson - Mistborn trilogy

Joe Abercrombie - First Law

 

Thriller:

 

Patrick Lee - The Runner is a fantastic read and fits your criteria quite well I think.

 

 

The Runner looks highly interesting thanks for the recommendation.

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SF:

 

Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space series)

Vernor Vinge (Zones of Thought series)

Peter Watts (Firefall duology)

Peter F. Hamilton (Night's Dawn trilogy or Commonwealth Saga)

Neal Asher (Spatterjay series or Agent Cormac series)

Iain M. Banks (Culture series)

Frank Herbert (Dune series)

C. J. Cherryh (Foreigner series, Faded Sun trilogy, Company Wars series)

Dan Simmons (Hyperion Cantos)

 

 

Fantasy:

 

China Miéville (Bas-Lag series)

Jeff Vandermeer (Ambergris series)

 

Thanks for these! Much Appricated.

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Patrick Lee - The Runner is a fantastic read and fits your criteria quite well I think.

 

Damn, how did I forget that?  :o  :doh::D    It's a brilliant, edge-of-seat thriller with science fiction elements, as is his Breach trilogy  :smile:

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Ooh, for fantasy you might also try the Craft sequence by Max Gladstone, which starts with Three Parts Dead. I wasn't totally overwhelmed by it myself, but the world is certainly unique, and I've heard the series gets better and better. :) You might also like Chris Wooding's Ketty Jay series.

 

I've fairly recently discovered The Expanse, a SF series by James S.A. Corey. The first book is called Leviathan Wakes, and it's a lot of fun. :)

 

Also, I can't recommend the authors Patrick Rothfuss and Steven Erikson highly enough. :wub:

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If you want to try space opera without the Star Trek

 

To be fair, most modern space opera is completely unlike Star Trek.  The problem is, the long-running series are all Military SF, which doesn't help the OP with his search.

 

 

ETA: Another one to throw in - Arthur C. Clarke's 'Rama' series.

 

 

ETA2:  And Jack McDevitt's got a couple of series, too.

Edited by Karsa Orlong
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