Favourite Sci-Fi / Fantasy Books of all time... What's yours?

There are a lot of discussions on various subjects, but I don't see one on favourite books!

So I'll kick off:

My favourite books of all time are:

- Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time
- Orson Scott Card's Enders Game
- Patrick Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicles
- L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth and Final Blackout
- Anything with Druss in it from David Gemmell

Honorable mentions to the Elenium and Tamuli which I really enjoyed as a kid, but have re-read recently and they're not that great. Also the Shannara series but they are SERIOUSLY dark.

I may add some once I've had a bit more of a think about it.

But, for now...

DISCUSS! What are your favourite books?

(P.S. I will freely admit that i'm also looking for some good reading material so this thread has an alterior motive... )

 

well i don't know about favorite but if you are looking for a good read then Jane Lindskolds "through wolf's eyes" and the sequel books are great

 

I have read ar least 12 of the books, I liked them really much. I dig fantasy world books.
I do not particulairy recall it being extreemly dark, it had some grim parts but overall a good story.

Sadly I don't have a lot of Time lately to read.
At the 'moment' I am reading a novel about the burning of Rome for over a year

I will dig into the titels I read to make some list sometime soon

Grrr, Imrahil

 

I LOVED the first AF book. I read the second and third and then fell out of it.

You mean the guy who wrote Percy Jackson? Maybe I'll take another look at that stuff.

 

That's a bunch of titels I have to check out, when i have the time

I watched Percy Jackson and I liked the mythology aspect of it the story-line wasn't great, but I'll give the books a try.

Grrr, Imrahil

 

I heard about the movie and was thrilled as I grew up reading Greek Myths and Gods and for some reason this really appealed to me, so when the movie seemed to be a homage to them I was very excited.

Movie was a bit of a let-down. Shame really as the main character actor did a great job in The Maze Runner and Alexandra Dadario is a pretty good actress too, so must have been the directing...

Either way, I should have realized that the books would be worth a look, so will check those out as a next read. Thanks @Scalenex

Oh, to add to my list of favourite books (I am a bit of a book worm), I would also put on there Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Saga which I am eagerly awaiting Book 4 of.

 

Some great books there.

I loved Heinlein's Starship Troopers which for anyone who saw the movie it is NOTHING LIKE IT AT ALL! (Sheesh, what a butchered manuscript).

I'll be sure to put those others on my list of books to check out

 

Wow, I’m surprised someone only thought of this now, indeed I’m surprised I didn’t think of it being an avid book reader. Thanks @Lizards of Renown mate!

Favourite fantasy series:

• The Edge Chronicles series (Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell) - a very unique series that is beautifully illustrated by the latter, this series is set on a peninsula that sticks out over a cliff, and the floating spherical rock chained to it. It’s a universe where rocks fly, ships that use them as power have battles in the sky and all manner of weird versions of known fantasy creatures exist.
• Harry Potter series (seeing as I’m of that generation )
• Redwall series (Brian Jacques) - a real fantasy classic, I was first introduced to this by the animated film and the series it was made from, which is faithful to the first book, but the others I’ve read (Martin the Warrior and The Pearls of Lutra) are great too. I don’t think I’ve read all the ones I have yet, must read some more of them at some point
• The Five Realms series (Kieran Larwood) - a 21st Century Redwall, this series is nevertheless great in its own right. This is the first series I’ve ever read that has a heavy basis in Celtic civilisation, with the rabbit protagonists living in burrow kingdoms with tribal chieftains and bards, with all of these rabbit-tribes under threat from the Gorm, pretty much rabbit Chaos Warriors.
• Middle Earth series
• Goblins series (Phillip Reeve) - a novel take on fantasy that portrays Goblins as neutral good or Chaotic good guys rather than bad guys, alongside humans of varying alignments, Dwarves (who are curiously portrayed as being less benign than the Goblins) a prince who is genuinely hopeless in a fight and a princess who is about fifty-odd from waiting to be rescued for so long. A fun and well-written series.
• How to Train your Dragon series (Cressida Cowell) - this series shot to fame through the films, but like the Percy Jackson films these are really toned-down and simplified versions of the books. The How to Train Your Dragon series is a beautiful example of how characters can be interlinked between each other through fate, and turns from being quite light-hearted to pretty grimdark about midway through.
• Mortal Gods series (Francesca Simon) - this author is more famous for her books for young children, but this little-known series she has written really makes me smile sometimes as a Pagan. It is set in an alternative England where Christianity died out about 1500 years ago and the population continued to practice Teutonic Paganism. Familiar landmarks are still there, like the British Museum, and familiar scenarios still occur (Henry VIII creating the Fane of England to divorce his first wife) but the culture of the land is more heavily-rooted in the culture of the Saxons and Vikings even in the 21st Century. In some ways it parallels Percy Jackson, but in other ways it’s different as Freya, the protagonist, is just an ordinary person rather than a demigod or wizard, yet she has to cope with similar trials to those that Percy Jackson faces, from enchanted Lewis Chessmen to Giants on the rampage and the Norse Gods trying to get into celeb culture.
• Percy Jackson series - I liked the Percy Jackson series a lot, and I’ve read the first two Heroes of Olympus novels and have the first Kane Chronicles novel, The Red Pyramid but haven’t got round to reading that one or any of the others, because Riordan just keeps on writing and writing and I’m having trouble keeping up. I haven’t even bothered reading Magnus Chase because that seems to be a Norse version of Percy Jackson and I prefer the Mortal Gods series for Norse myth, or Trials of Apollo.

I haven’t read so much sci-if as fantasy yet, but I still have loads of books I haven’t read yet. Probably my fave sci-fi works at the moment are The War of the Worlds and the sequel approved by the H.G. Wells estate, The Massacre of Mankind. I love the original novel and the Jeff Wayne version, and Stephen Baxter’s sequel ties both in beautifully while also giving the Martians the ability to adapt their tactics and launch an invasion MK II that once again knocks humanity for six (and this time they’re immune to the bacteria that killed them in the first one ). The 1953 film was OK in places but in the wrong time and place, the 2005 film was just plain hideous and the recent BBC series was the right time and place but not long enough and messed with the story because the BBC have become a left-wing mouthpiece (and I imagine the BBC rushed it in order to get onto making that stupid His Dark Materials series that was shown about the same time period )

 

Glad you like the idea!

I like the sound of the Edge series, must remember to check that out.

Harry Potter almost made it onto my list. I really liked all the books.

I read Redwall years ago. Still love the idea of a Battle Badger

And another with praise for Percy Jackson... I better get started on the series!

 

Oooh this thread piqued my interest. I really enjoy the book series Dragonlance, it's an older fantasy series but it's amazing. I also love Lord of the Rings (of course). I've read some forgotten realms, also loved a series by Raymond E Feist called the Riftwar saga, about a young magician it's really good.

 

Anything by Neal Asher

 

The following books are part of my list. In no particulair order:

- The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. I started in The Silmarillion but lacked the will to stumble through the first couple of chapters so gave up on that.
- the series 'De Roodburcht', 'Het Zuidland' and 'Het Moswoud' I read as a child, probebly my first fantasy books. I only recently found out that these are the Dutch translations of the Redwall series
- during my study I read about two-third of the Shannara series. Still very fond of the Stories, maybe I'll re-read them sometime(what I rearely do with books)
- my little brother was into The Ranger's Apprentice when the Dutch versions came out, so after him I read all of those. The last 2 of the serie where harder to get through but overall a nice serie set in fictional medieval scene.

That is it for now. I'll think about all other books I read and which fit the theme

Grrr, Imrahil

 

- +1 for Hobbit/Lord of the Rings
- Gotrek & Felix series by William King - I guess most people here will know it, but still worth mentioning imho
- the same goes for Eisenhorn & Ravenor trilogies and the Gaunts Ghosts series by Dan Abnett, pretty much the best 40k there is, especially the two trilogies, people not into military sci-fi might not get full mileage out of the Gaunts Ghosts series
- the old Star Wars stuff is pretty good, Thrawn trilogy by Timothy Zahn, X-Wing series by Michael Stackpole
- classic Battletech novels are always a good choice, same goes for Shadowrun

Regarding something newer, THE EXPANSE series by James S.A. Corey gets my absolute top vote. Near-future, hard sci-fi is a nice change of pace to what I normally read (lots of 40k in the last few years). The TV series (started on SyFy, now on Amazon) is brilliant as well, and criminally underrated. The best sci-fi series since Babylon 5 and Deep Space Nine, with the best VFX of any space series ever. Rise up, Beltalowda!

 

I loved all of the Gotrek and Felix books. Good reading.

Mental note to self: check out The Expanse.

 

the books not the show it's not as good

 

Righto.

 

That's heresy of the highest order, my man

On topic, what I forgot to mention was Andrzej Sapkowski - Witcher series. Most people have probably heard of the Witcher 3 computer game, but the novels are really good too. The first book is a collection of short stories (which I am normally not a fan of), but it gives great insight into the character and the world. The rest form a pretty epic story arc. Also worth mentioning the new TV series with Henry Cavill as Geralt, on Netflix. The TV series is probably the weakest of the three entries across those three mediums, but still good entertainment. The game is required material for everybody with access to a gaming PC or console, though. One of the best games of this generation, period.