#Fantastical gamer patreon series
While she is most celebrated for her genre-defining sci-fi novels, The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed, she also redefined the fantasy genre with her Earthsea quartet.īeginning with A Wizard of Earthsea, this is a series of fantasy books for readers of all ages, set in a world of vast oceans and no great continents.Īs its name suggests, this is a place of islands and archipelagos of differing sizes. Le Guin was a hero of the fantasy and sci-fi genres an incredibly kind and powerful and inspirational woman. If you love your fantasy to feel claustrophobic and dripping with gothic atmosphere, this is a must-read.Īs influential classics of the genre go, the Gormenghast trilogy represents some of the best fantasy books of all time.īuy a copy of Gormenghast here! A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Gormenghast is a piece of intensely surrealist and gothic fantasy fiction. The second book follows the teenage Titus as he fears his predetermined future and years for freedom, especially after learning about his feral foster sister, who lives out in the forest. Since the first book chronicles Titus’ birth, its main focus is on the castle’s other strange inhabitants and the political subterfuge they get up to. The series is set within the earldom of Gormenghast, and follows the life of the castle’s heir, Titus Groan. The titular Gormenghast is a remote castle ruled by the Groan family, who have called the castle home for as long as there has been history at all. While it lacks many of the staples of the genre that were mostly established by Tolkien, Peake’s contemporary, Gormenghast remains hugely unique and influential.
Surrealist and intensely gothic in its tone and setting, Gormenghast helped to pave the way for the grimdark subgenre of fantasy books. Gormenghast is a series beloved by many, including author Neil Gaiman, and it is a trilogy (originally intended as a single massive book) that blends the gothic and fantasy genres. Peake himself was an interesting man, having been born in China, dying before his series could be finished, and being celebrated for his illustrations as well as his writing. Often compared to The Lord of the Rings because they are both fantasy and were written at similar times, Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast is, in truth, an entirely different beast. The Lord of the Rings is the definition of true epic fantasy and worldbuilding, and for that reason they are some of the best fantasy books ever written.īuy the books here! The Gormenghast Trilogy by Mervyn Peake If you love what the fantasy genre has given you - if you love its themes and settings and tropes - you need to read the books that started it all. Races like elves and dwarves settings like mines and mountains multiple language systems wizards royal lineages a “chosen one” narrative armies of light and darkness.Īll of this began with Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings. This is also the series that took aspects of European folklore and mythologies and turned them into staples of the genre. The scope of Tolkien’s Middle Earth is unmatched in fiction.
In fact, in many ways these books are a showcase in building an entire, fully realised fictional landscape. With these books, Tolkien took what he began with The Hobbit and turned it into an entire world - a world with its own deep history, lore, and languages. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy of fantasy novels is the most important and influential work in the genre’s history, and it always will be. The classic fantasy books of the 20th century soon gave way to fantasy books by incredible Black authors, queer authors, and more expanding the scope of this exciting genre.Īnd so, here are some of the best fantasy books ever written, from the legendary epics that started it all to the modern fantasy books that are pushing the genre in bold new directions.
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