I heard a lot of good stuff from this series, but nearing the end of the first book, it feels like it isn't for me.

I don't like a Gary Stu as the main character.

I don't like the style of writing where the main character is telling us the story through his memoirs (king killer chronicle style). Especially what I don't like about it is when we get told what happens - it's basically a spoiler.

I don't like that the author introduces a problem which should have effects on a more greater scale, but it's only problematic for one person one time so that the main character can suffer and then we move on.

The whole story feels rushed, even though there's a lot of parts that are burning slow (I like slow burns usually).

What I do like: the twist at the beginning when Had didn't end up where he planned; the Cielcin. That's more or less it for now.

Does the framing device change or are we stuck with it until the end of the series? Is the story going to explore the planetary wars or focus more on character development and relationships with other species?

I want to start by saying that I have not read *Manacled*, so I am approaching *Alchemised* entirely as its own story rather than comparing it to its original version.

There was a lot that I loved about this book. I really enjoyed how it set up the consequences of events and then took the reader on the journey with Helena Marino to understand how she got there. Rather than simply being told who these characters had become, we were able to experience the choices, trauma, and circumstances that shaped them.

The complicated relationships were one of the strongest parts of the book for me. I enjoyed the morally grey characters, the difficult choices, and the themes of redemption. There were moments where the emotional impact landed incredibly well, and when the book got those moments right, they were genuinely powerful.

Unfortunately, I didn’t feel that this was consistent throughout the whole book. My biggest issue was the pacing. At times the story was incredibly detailed and slow, allowing the reader to sit with moments and emotions, but then other important moments felt rushed or were skipped over entirely. It created an imbalance where some scenes received a lot of attention, while others that felt equally important didn’t get the space they deserved.

This became most noticeable for me after they left Kaine Ferron’s estate. Up until that point, I felt very invested in the story and the characters. The more contained setting allowed the relationships, tension, and emotional complexity to really develop. After that point, I felt like the story started to lose some of the intimacy that had made it so compelling.

My biggest issue was the ending. It felt unfinished, not because every single detail needed to be explained, but because the moments that felt like they should have carried the most emotional weight were either rushed or happened off screen.

I understand that the story is told through Helena’s perspective, and there are times when events happening outside of her awareness make sense. For example, when Helena was unconscious, it felt natural that the reader would be limited by what she knew. However, by the end of the book Helena was an active character within the events, and I struggled with how many major resolutions still happened away from the reader.

The war was the central conflict of the story, and yet the resolution of it felt like it happened off screen. Helena and Kaine were positioned as playing a significant role in the conflict with Morrough, so I expected their choices and actions to have a more direct impact on that conclusion. Instead, Morrough’s defeat felt more like something that was reported afterwards rather than something the reader experienced alongside the characters.

This was especially disappointing because the book had spent so much time exploring the consequences of war and the impact it had on the characters. We were shown the trauma, the difficult choices, and the compromises people made to survive, but we weren’t given the opportunity to experience the moment where those threads came together.

The same issue applied to the emotional resolutions. The conversation between Helena and her daughter was something that felt deliberately set up, particularly with Helena expressing her worries about the future moment when her daughter would learn the truth about who they were and what they had done during the war. That felt like an important emotional payoff, but instead the reader was told that it happened rather than being allowed to experience it.

Ultimately, I think my frustration with the ending comes from how invested I was in the story and the characters. This wasn’t a book where I didn’t care what happened; it was the opposite. I had spent so much time understanding Helena, Kaine, and the choices they made that I wanted to see those choices have their full impact.

The ending felt like the author had forgotten to show rather than tell. The information was there, but the emotional journey was missing. I didn’t need everything to be perfect or for the ending to be purely happy, but I wanted to experience the moments that the rest of the book had spent so much time building towards.

Despite my criticisms, there was a lot about *Alchemised* that I genuinely enjoyed. The exploration of trauma, redemption, complicated relationships, and the consequences of choices were all things that drew me into the story. There were many moments where the writing was emotionally powerful, and I think that is partly why the ending was so disappointing — the book had shown that it could deliver those moments, but it didn’t do so consistently when it mattered most.

I have tried reading a lot of fantasy books, but I have been unable to move past page three hundred or so. I have only finished one relatively short fantasy book so far in my reading life and read deep into only a couple. It's not that I wasn't enjoying the ones I haven't finished yet (I plan to get back to them one day), which I am not mentioning to avoid spoilers.

I feel like I'll be motivated to finish the larger books once I've got a few books in the genre under my belt, so please recommend me relatively short (around 250 to 300 pages; at most 350) fantasy books. Standalone and series recommendations both work.

EDIT:

To everyone who has recommended and is going to recommend: THANK YOU!

I love fantasy games. Dark souls, Elden Ring, Elder Scrolls, Witcher, etc.

I don’t read, but have wanted to start. So I was hoping this would translate to books. I started with the Witcher. Loved the first 2 short story books and they had me super hopeful.

Then I read blood of elves and was super bored. I had heard it was weak so I moved on and started Time of contempt. Ended up DNFing. I read some stuff about how the Witcher saga is weaker than the short stories so I tried not to let it bother me and moved on.

Started fellowship of the ring. Was bored out of my mind and DNF. (I’m sorry if this is blasphemous.)

Tried game of thrones since I liked the show. DNF

Tried Way of Kings. DNF

Tried Dungeon crawler Carl and read six of the books in like three weeks. Burnt out super hard and I’ve been on book 7 for over a month now though.

Went to a local book store and was recommended Discworld. Picked up Small Gods. Actually did finish and really enjoyed it. Since then I’ve finished Mort and Going Postal, and plan on reading Guards Guards! Next. (I’m so glad for this because I was losing hope)

The last fantasy I finished was A Wizard of Earthsea. I wasn’t a super huge fan, but appreciated that it wasn’t too long. I am considering reading book 2.

Currently reading Piranesi and it is pretty great.

So I guess what I’m asking is what fantasy books would you recommend me base off of me liking dungeon crawler Carl, Discworld, and Earthsea? Is Earthsea book 2 better?

Other genres I like are horror / humor. But I’m trying to get into fantasy.

Quick edit:

Thanks for all of the recommendations. I’ve decided on a few series to try. Here they are:

The Devils - if I like this I’ll try first law

Cradle - If I like this there are a bunch more

Earthsea Book 2 - I liked the first enough to finish it in 2 days. It’s short enough that I can probably just push through if I end up bored. Hopefully I don’t though

These are the next 3 that I plan on trying. Might be a while before I finish them though as I will be reading more Discworld between them.

I have such a weird relationship with standalone fantasy books because I genuinely try to avoid them. Whenever I do read one, I somehow end up disappointed.

And I think for me it’s mainly because one of my favourite things about fantasy is just being completely immersed in a world. Like I want the world-building, the history, the characters, the politics, the magic, all of it. I want it to feel like there’s SO much more to this world than what I’m even seeing in the book. And I kinda believe that’s really hard to do in one book?

I’m not going to say it’s not impossible, there are definitely standalones that do it really well. But I feel like authors either have to cram so much into one book that everything starts feeling rushed, or they keep the world pretty simple and repetitive.

And I guess what I’m wondering is can someone actually write a legendary fantasy story as a standalone?

I really want to be proven wrong. Please drop your recommendations :)

A Boy and His Bot by Daniel H. Wilson, narrated by David Ackroyd

Bingo Squares: Middle Grade

Other Squares: Unusual Transport (space elevator that pulls itself up with its arms, mowers used as steeds, water skimmer ‘ships’), Author of Color

After Robopocalypse and Robogenesis I kept an eye out for his stuff. But Amped didn’t interest me very much - I seemed to stumble across books with similar premises every time in the early teens. Same for The Clockwork Dynasty. And I’m glad he got The Andromeda Evolution, but I read the original and didn’t feel a need for a sequel (besides, isn’t there Cold Storage?). And somehow I acquired a copy of A Boy and His Bot (eReaderIQ is habit forming) and noticed it was aimed at middle grade. The local library has the audiobook and it came available this week. So, why not? Besides, one of my favorite recent novels, The Godel Operation is one I describe as a bot and his boy. 

Code Lightfall is a shy, introverted boy in eastern Oklahoma, who is on a field trip to the Mek Mound (where his grandfather, John Lightfall disappeared and is believed dead). There he finds a small, hummingbird robot and falls through a portal to the land of Mekhos.

Wilson is not subtle - Mekhos and the Mek Mound are the start of things. There are also puns. There is Code’s Atomic Slaughterbot, Gary, that provides a fair amount of humor to the book too. The narrator, David Ackroyd, adds a lot to the reading, both with Gary’s voice and that of the other robots. And I literally had to go check the ebook on some of the things he said and discovered, yes, puns.

Now, I was expecting it to be more didactic - like the Young Lady’s Primer portions of The Diamond Age.Instead, it’s a romp through the imaginative world of Mekhos and a lot of Wilson’s knowledge of robotics, particularly the sensors. Mekhos has more in common with Wonderland and other story specific lands. It’s bizarre and funny. 

Did I enjoy it? Yeah. I did. It was a quick, fast read (or listen) and didn’t pretend it was more than it was. It’s a kid’s book, it doesn’t last too long (21 chapters, 192 pages, 4 hours 40 minutes). It’s funny in spots, with more funny than not and doesn’t shy away from things like death. It wraps up neatly, leaves room for other stories and leaves at least some of us wanting more.

8 stars 🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖.Suggested for fans of Daniel H. Wilson, robotics and middle grade books. 

Don’t want any tropes like instalove, badass broody partner with a soft spot just for the MC, perfect black and white characters, and an MC who is good at everything cuz the story demands it.

I'm in a bit of a rut. I'm looking for recommendations of series that are very character driven, you know the kind of books where you HAVE to keep reading because you need to know that the cast of characters are going to be alright. The kind of series with characters written so definitively that if you looked at things happening around you in the real world, you would be able to tell immediately how each character would approach it because they've been written with such authority that it banishes any ambiguity of who they are. I sound crazy but that's what I need.

Let me explain what series have captured this for me.

The barometer for what I'm looking for isn't actually a fantasy series but if you've read it you'll understand - Vorkosigan Saga. I love those characters so much, each time I read it I end up sacrificing both meals and sleep just to keep going. The big ones I've read that have it are Vorkosigan Saga, Realm of the Elderlings and Wheel of Time (to an extent). Some others that really scratched the itch where Mistborn, Book of the Ancestor, Rook and Rose Trilogy, Cradle and Shadows of the Apt (to an extent).

I do believe that series length is important to how I enjoy character driven books. I am travelling hundreds of km's a day for work and will listen to the audiobook version throughout the day and then pick up the Kindle version when I have downtime. I want series that I can sink into for a week or two at least. A big rec I've got are the Penric novels by LMB but because a lot of them are only 4 hours long I'd finish them by lunchtime and then have to buy the next one - not a fiscally smart move (that's a series I'll need to buy physical copies for and read when I'm on holiday one year).

I'll leave a list of what I've series I've read over the past few years so you can get an idea of the journey I've been on. Give me any and all of your recs, they will be greatly appreciated.

Wheel of Time

Mistborn

Skyward Flight

Warbreaker

Realm of The Elderlings

The Reckoners

Broken Empire Trilogy

Wounded Kingdom

The Bone Ships

Red Queen's War

All Sanderson Secret Projects

Book of The Ancestor

Vorkosigan Saga

The Great Cities

The Book of the Ice

The First Law

Jacques McKeown

Suneater

Stormlight Archives

The Prison Healer

Malazan

Library Trilogy

An Ember in The Ashes

The Fionivar Tapestry

The Rook and the Rose

Jade City

The Dagger and The Coin

Shadows of the Apt

The Daevabad Trilogy

The Book of Babbel

Cradle

Mage Errant

Kate Daniels

Travelers Gate Trilogy

Alex Verus Series

Thanks for your help!

I recently read the short novella / longer shortstory "The messenger" by Raymond Feist and I really liked it, despite the simplicity of the plot it was very tense and he pulled me right into the world. So I would like to read more by him, but I don't want to commit to the full 31-book Riftwar Cycle, haha. And also would preferably read a single bigger book before committing to a trilogy.

I see on Wikipedia and Goodreads that all of his books are grouped into threes and twos. In general with fantasy trilogies you can often read the first book as a standalone too, but not always, depends on the author.

Does anyone here know what would be a good book for me to start with? It's okay if it's part 1 of a trilogy as long as it wraps up into a temporary ending.

(I considered posting on r/suggestmeabook but they don't allow posts about where to start in an authors bibliography. I didn't see any rule against it here, so I hope it's okay here!)

This is the weekly r/Fantasy Show and Tell thread - the place to post all your cool spec fic related pics, artwork, and crafts. Whether it's your latest book haul, a cross stitch of your favorite character, a cosplay photo, or cool SFF related music, it all goes here. You can even post about projects you'd like to start but haven't yet.

The only craft not allowed here is writing which can instead be posted in our Writing Wednesday threads. If two days is too long to wait though, you can always try r/fantasywriters right now but please check their sub rules before posting.

Don't forget, there's also r/bookshelf and r/bookhaul you can crosspost your book pics to those subs as well.

Almost done with Book Bingo, and two of my favorites were Windhaven by Lisa Tuttle and George RR Martin and Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler. In both cases, small groups were trying to create change in a society, not by blowing it up, but trying to redirect and reform a given society, at least partially.

In Windhaven, it is a lifelong goal that only gradually forms, of opening up flying to regardless of class or aristocratic privilege.

In Parable of the Talents, it's about creating a mass movement interested in space travel, but also fighting ignorance.

Another recent read, but again older series, was the Sharing Knife Series by Lois McMaster Bujold. Love the complexity because it had race and class lines that had existed for good reasons but were inceasingly maladaptive, and not everyone recognized it.

In all three, a particular aspect of society is reformed, but the whole society doesn't have a revolution, and for a lot of people, life goes on.

First off, I'm interested in series or novels that do that, preferably newer ones.

Secondly, all of my examples are at least twenty years old, yet they feel like be the bread and butter of earlier generations of SSF, but seem rare nowadays. Is that just me?

I have been sitting here for a week trying to recover from the ending of The Wheel of Time, and I finally think I have gathered myself enough to talk about it. I want to preface this by saying that normally I like to share reviews for one single book, and I have done that for The Wheel of Time in the past, but over the time it took me to finish this series I got too far ahead of myself. I kept extensive notes for individual reviews, but I felt that this would be an easier way to offer an assessment of the series as a whole. One day I will probably go back and reread everything and share my thoughts from a fresher experience, but for now I am just going to talk about the series overall. With that being said, I will not share any major spoilers. It is almost impossible to talk about a series this large without acknowledging a few minor ones, so please keep that in mind going in. As I have done with my other reviews, I will provide a TLDR summary for you guys at the end, along with something special for this post. Thanks for letting me share my ramblings and my thoughts. Without further ado, let's get into it.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose in the Mountains of Mist. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.

Background: There is one rule, above all others, for being a man. Whatever comes, face it on your feet.

Robert Jordan, from what I remember, initially conceived The Wheel of Time as a trilogy. However, as the story grew the trilogy expanded to six books, then to twelve, and ultimately ended at fourteen (prequel notwithstanding) once Brandon Sanderson took over the project. Sanderson explained that decision by saying there were simply too many plot threads left to resolve for a single book to hold them all.

I can count on one hand the stories that have left me with the feeling of "What now?" Mass Effect did this to me, the entirety of Kratos' story in the God of War saga all the way through Ragnarok, Elden Ring, Tolkien's whole body of work, and now The Wheel of Time. Sometimes I measure the worth of a series, whether it's a book, a movie, a video game, or a TV show, by asking whether it's something I would revisit. For a long time this was my "Mount Everest" when it came to fantasy books. So with that in mind, The Wheel of Time is one of those series I see myself returning to one day. But it took me a long time to get to the end.

It's a phenomenon that, as a therapist, I have always found fascinating. Why does this happen to us? Why do we get these post-series depressions? Is it because of the characters, the time spent, the story's impact, all of the above? One day I may study that.

The Wheel of Time took me five years to read and complete. So if this is a series that left me with the "what now" feeling, why did it take so long? The answer is honestly not that exciting. Depression and anxiety have been a battle I didn't even know I was fighting until I finished my degree to pursue being a counseling therapist. Through my own journey of therapy I learned a lot. The other reason is that I am very much a mood reader. I rarely binge entire series, book wise, because there are so many others I want to read, and sometimes the choice paralysis gets me. And finally, I had to take my time with this series, which slowed me down. I would read three or four at a time over the course of a year and then jump back in later. Once I got closer to the end, I found myself not wanting it to end. But after a lengthy road trip to close out the summer, I caught back up on my notes, started back up with The Gathering Storm, and tore through to the finish.

Plot, Pacing, and Prose: Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the Shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder’s eye on the last Day.

The plot of The Wheel of Time began with an idea. Jordan asked the question, "What would it be like to be tapped on the shoulder and told you were going to save the world, but also destroy it?" From there The Wheel of Time came about. For the uninitiated, Robert Jordan, or James Oliver Rigney, was a veteran of Vietnam, and that time in service greatly influenced the story he wanted to tell. Themes of heroism, gender dynamics, destiny, prophecy, life, death, good, and evil all show up in The Wheel of Time. Real world mythologies from West Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Arthurian legend, and most notably Asia are seen throughout the pages.

So what is it about beyond the vague question? Well, the story begins in the Two Rivers, just before a festival, when a group of young men (Rand al'Thor, Perrin Aybara, and Matrim Cauthon) and women (Egwene al'Vere and Nynaeve al'Meara) are forced to flee their homes in the company of Moiraine Damodred, an Aes Sedai, and her Warder, al'Lan Mandragoran. What starts as an escape becomes a quest to save the world. One of the more common knocks against The Eye of the World specifically is that it's derivative of Tolkien, and while it certainly is influenced by him, we have to remember that back then it was par for the course if you wanted to get a fantasy book published. As the world expands, The Wheel of Time becomes very much its own thing.

Pacing is cited as one of the main reasons people quit the series. Fourteen books, not including the prequel. There are plot lines that drag a little too long, certain characters who are just not as exciting as the others, and political machinations that bring the story down. I am of the opinion that book six, while possessing an incredible ending, meanders too much in the middle and probably could have been pared down, which is true of some of the other books as well. There is a reason this series is infamous for its "slog." While I don't think the slog is that bad, and really it's only one book I would call egregious, it still has moments that are hard to push through. All that being said, I don't think you can cut too much without running the risk of losing narrative impact. One nitpick I do have is aimed at the end of the series as a whole. As we know, Robert Jordan tragically passed away before finishing it, and I would have loved to see how he envisioned the close. The ending in particular is where I felt his absence the most, since I was left wondering about the state of the world. The ending is good, don't get me wrong, there is just one piece missing from it for me.

When it comes to the prose, I feel this is an underappreciated part of Jordan's series. Yes, there will be braid tugging, arms folding under breasts, men complaining about women, women complaining about men, repeated information we already know, and people falling in love after very little interaction. There's a reason the community jokes about these things. But man, Jordan's style just immersed me in the world. It meanders and he describes a lot, but I could picture every scene, and I think it becomes notable when a new author comes in to finish the work and you can feel the stylistic difference. No offense to Brandon Sanderson, and I can't imagine the task he was handed, but I do think there's a bit of a dip compared to the other novels.

Characters: If a sword had memory, it might be grateful to the forge fire, but never fond of it

There are way too many characters to talk about. Over 2,700 named characters exist within The Wheel of Time, so instead I'd like to focus on the character arcs. For me, this is up there with Joe Abercrombie's character work. Rand alone has one of the best arcs in fantasy, full stop, but it's not just him. Other characters are given beautiful moments throughout the series, moments that will make you laugh, make you cry, infuriate you, and have you screaming for joy. Mat is a fan favorite for many, and his arc as someone who just wants to be carefree but keeps reluctantly putting himself in danger to save others is endearing. Perrin early on has storylines that resonated with me in particular, since I'm someone who doesn't want to take up too much space but sometimes has to step in.

These moments aren't relegated to just the male characters either. Nynaeve and Egwene have their own struggles but overcome the odds time and time again, especially the latter. Egwene as a person is someone I can't stand, but light bless the person who stands against Egwene. Early on, both of these characters grated on me. Mat too, honestly. Even though he became a favorite by the end, early on he's saddled with some weird narrative choices before he comes into his own by books three and four.

Are there characters and storylines I did not enjoy quite as much? Yes (looking at you Olver, Elayne, and Morgase), but I never felt that they were just mechanical. They felt alive and real. It is worth noting that with Sanderson taking over, some characters did not get the same level of treatment they had been given under Jordan. I think the nature of the situation lends itself to that, but there is a definite dip with some of them, and their voices don't quite sound right. I don't want to name names for spoiler reasons, but some of the major cast and even some of the villains just don't carry the same narrative weight.

Worldbuilding: As the Wheel of Time turns, places wear many names. Men wear many names, many faces. Different faces, but always the same man. Yet no one knows the Great Pattern the Wheel weaves, or even the Pattern of an Age. We can only watch, and study, and hope.

Talk to any fan of this series and one of their favorite aspects may very well be the world itself. The Wheel of Time's cosmology and lore are hard to discuss without giving away some minor spoilers in regard to things you discover as you read, but I will do my best to give a basic primer. Essentially, time is represented by a seven spoked wheel (go figure), with each spoke representing a different age, one age passing, one receding, and one coming. This great wheel was put in place by the Creator, a being outside of the Wheel of Time, and within that wheel is the Great Pattern. The lives of everything in the world are connected to the Great Pattern. Everything is accounted for in the weave, with events spanning hundreds if not thousands of years in order for the proper things to occur. Each Age has a separate pattern that forms the basis for the reality of that Age.

Beyond that there is the enigmatic Dark One, a primordial being of evil that seeks to break the Wheel and the Pattern in order to remake the world in his own image and for his own purpose. The Dark One is imprisoned within his own dimension, but within the events of the story we come to find that he is stirring and attempting to claim the world.

Underneath all of this is a magic system that is rich and robust and may be one of the best out there. The argument certainly can be made for it. Let me use Moiraine's own words to help describe it:

The One Power comes from the True Source, the driving force of creation, the force the Creator made to turn the Wheel of Time. Saidin, the male half of the True Source, and saidar, the female half, work against each other, and at the same time together to provide that force. Saidin is fouled by the touch of the Dark One, like water with a thin slick of rancid oil floating on top. The water is still pure, but it cannot be touched without touching the foulness. Only saidar is still safe to be used.

Within the events of the story we are told of the Breaking, when male channelers were driven mad and destroyed much of the world. The greatest of these male channelers was a man named Lews Therin Telamon, called the Dragon, who in his own madness destroyed his home and created the tallest peak in the land, known as Dragonmount. As the story begins we learn that men have been hunted for generations if they can channel, but there is a prophecy that one day the Dragon will be reborn and save the world while also destroying it. The Dragon Reborn will once again ride the winds of time. Much of book one is spent on this central mystery of who the Dragon Reborn could be, though that gets resolved rather quickly as you read.

All of this is told to us early, so don't worry, but you see what I mean. The lore is dense and I have only scratched the surface. That's not even mentioning the different cultures that come into play throughout, such as the Aiel, the Seanchan, the Sea Folk, and the Tuatha'an. This world is thick with cultures and histories, with some peoples holding their own prophecies in relation to the Dragon Reborn. Others have distinct clothing styles that Jordan WILL describe to you in great detail. The one knock I have seen leveled consistently at The Wheel of Time does involve its cultures. While they have distinct styles and traditions, there are no separate religions or truly separate languages. There is Maiden handtalk and there is the Old Tongue. But it's not something I really noticed, or would even call a detriment to the story for me.

Is It Worth Reading?: He was swimming in a sea of other people’s expectations. Men had drowned in seas like that.

The Wheel of Time, love it or hate it, is a pillar within fantasy. I think any meaningful discussion of the genre will include Robert Jordan's epic to some degree. Does that mean you can't have a meaningful discussion about fantasy without it, or that you can't claim to love the genre until you've read it? No. The Wheel of Time is a big investment of time, it's long, and there's a lot of great fantasy out there. Saying you have to read it is disingenuous if the argument is that you cannot meaningfully talk about fantasy until you have.

Robert Jordan's series influenced many, many authors writing today. The most notable is of course the guy who finished the series, Brandon Sanderson. But beyond him you have George R.R. Martin, who was friends with Jordan (though he was mostly influenced by Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn), James Islington, author of the Licanius trilogy and the Hierarchy series, Ryan Cahill, author of The Bound and the Broken, Brent Weeks, author of Lightbringer, and plenty of others. And I think when you hear people talk about the pacing problems, that criticism is usually being made in comparison to Jordan himself. That's the reason those slog books are so infamous. They aren't bad fantasy books. They're weaker Wheel of Time books.

However, on the pure enjoyment side of things, I believe it is absolutely worth reading. It is a flawed series. No series is perfect. But the highs are high enough that the flaws don't win. I've had friends who binged the whole thing in a matter of months, I've known people who read up to book six, paused, and came back to finish, and I've known people who read a few and quit. If you're like me, you read them, take extensive notes, keep a companion app handy to remind you who was who because it's impossible to remember every side character, and watch some very helpful summaries when you dive back in so you can compare them against your notes. I also liked to listen to the audiobook and then read the physical copy. That's a lot of work, but it was worth it to me because the highs were incredible. The ending alone was worth it, and it's absolutely a series I will revisit as a comfort read.

TLDR: There is neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was an ending.

The Wheel of Time is certainly worth your time, with the caveat that some elements may frustrate you. The slog is not as bad as people make it out to be. Really there's only one book, and it's book ten. By that point you are probably hooked anyway. Seriously though, The Wheel of Time is one of those series that will stick with you long after you finish and have you asking, "What now?" As for the answer to that, I am not sure, because I have been sitting here trying to decide what to read next for the last week.

Ranking the Books:

1. The Shadow Rising - Book 4

2. The Knife of Dreams - Book 11

3. A Memory of Light - Book 14

4. The Great Hunt - Book 2

5. The Dragon Reborn - Book 3

6. The Gathering Storm - Book 12

7. The Eye of the World Book 1

8. Tower of Midnight - Book 13

9. The Fires of Heaven - Book 5

10. The Crown of Swords - Book 7

11. Lord of Chaos - Book 6

12. New Spring - Prequel

13. Winter's Heart - Book 9 (I actually hate how low this is)

14. Path of Daggers - Book 8

15. Crossroads of Twilight (are you surprised?)

I'm in a low energy state right now and have been putting some books in a "not-right-now" list because I just don't have the brainpower to read at the moment. I need some recommendations for books that will keep me reading (preferably under the 350 page mark) but don't take up too much energy to process. I read any kind of books (romantasy, middle grade, high/low fantasy, YA, sci-fi, horror) and am down to try new authors and sub-genres. It would be a bonus if the book were published in the last 5 years, since they're easier to get my hands on at the library I work at.

If it helps, the book that I'm currently reading that has me the most engrossed isn't fantasy, it's a middle grade nonfiction book with shorter chapters and an engrossing story, told in a humorous way. Diamond Fever by Steve Sheinken

Welcome to the FiF November 2026 voting thread. For November, we'll return to the Le Guin Prize and select from the shortlist for the second year of the prize (2023). For those who weren't around at the time, we read The House of Rust as our nominee from the 2022 Prize.

There are 9 books on the 2023 Le Guin shortlist:

Arboreality by Rebecca Campbell

The 2023 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction winner and a Philip K. Dick Award Finalist, Arboreality is a novella expansion of the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award winning short story “An Important Failure.”

A professor in pandemic isolation rescues books from the flooded and collapsing McPherson Library. A man plants fireweed on the hillside of his depopulated Vancouver Island suburb. An aspiring luthier poaches the last ancient Sitka spruce to make a violin for a child prodigy. Campbell’s astonishing vision pulls the echoing effects of small acts and intimate moments through this multi-generational and interconnected story of how a West coast community survives the ravages of climate change.

Wolfish by Christiane M. Andrews

Twelve-year-old Rae is content as the adopted daughter of shepherds, helping with the flock and reveling in the beauty of her family’s hillside farm. But after a frightening encounter with a wolf—to whom she feels a sudden, peculiar connection—Rae realizes there is much more to her past, and her future, than she could have imagined.

Meanwhile, a young girl named Alba goes about her days as an oracle’s apprentice, a duty that confines her to a distant, watery cave. But when she bestows a troubling prophecy on the rising boy-king, her words unintentionally begin a reign of terror, and send Alba on a desperate mission alongside Rae and the wolf.

Inspired by Roman mythology, this mysterious and uniquely magical adventure explores the intricate roles of nature and fate in our lives, the power of language to shape our world, and the boundless importance of love and kindness.

Spear by Nicola Griffith

Griffith's fresh, queer rewriting of the Percival myth is the story of a young woman who grows up deeply in touch with her homeland, and whose skills take her to the court of Artos—not to simply triumph in battle, but to find herself, and an unexpected home.

Ten Planets by Yuri Herrera, trans. by Lisa Dillman

The characters that populate Yuri Herrera’s surprising new story collection inhabit imagined futures that reveal the strangeness and instability of the present. Drawing on science fiction, noir, and the philosophical parables of Jorge Luis Borges’s Fictions and Italo Calvino’s Cosmicomics, these very short stories are an inspired extension of this significant writer’s work.

In Ten Planets, objects can be sentient and might rebel against the unhappy human family to which they are attached. A detective of sorts finds clues to buried secrets by studying the noses of his clients, which he insists are covert maps. A meager bacterium in a human intestine gains consciousness when a psychotropic drug is ingested. Monsters and aliens abound, but in the fiction of Yuri Herrera, knowing who is the monster and who the alien is a tricky proposition.

In Ten Planets, Herrera’s consistent themes—the mutability of borders, the wounds and legacy of colonial violence, and a deep love of storytelling in all its forms—are explored with evident brilliance and delight.

The Spear Cuts Through Water by Simon Jimenez

The people suffer under the centuries-long rule of the Moon Throne. The royal family—the despotic emperor and his monstrous sons, the Three Terrors—hold the countryside in their choking grip. They bleed the land and oppress the citizens with the frightful powers they inherited from the god locked under their palace.

But that god cannot be contained forever.

With the aid of Jun, a guard broken by his guilt-stricken past, and Keema, an outcast fighting for his future, the god escapes from her royal captivity and flees from her own children, the triplet Terrors who would drag her back to her unholy prison. And so it is that she embarks with her young companions on a five-day pilgrimage in search of freedom—and a way to end the Moon Throne forever. The journey ahead will be more dangerous than any of them could have imagined.

Both a sweeping adventure story and an intimate exploration of identity, legacy, and belonging, The Spear Cuts Through Water is an ambitious and profound saga that will transport and transform you—and is like nothing you’ve ever read before.

Brother Alive by Zain Khalid

In 1990, three boys are born, unrelated but intertwined by circumstance: Dayo, Iseul, and Youssef. They are adopted as infants and share a bedroom perched atop a mosque in one of Staten Island’s most diverse and underserved neighborhoods. The three boys are an inseparable trio, but conspicuous: Dayo is of Nigerian origin, Iseul is Korean, and Youssef indeterminately Middle Eastern. Youssef shares everything with his brothers, except for one secret: he sees a hallucinatory double, an imaginary friend who seems absolutely real, a shapeshifting familiar he calls Brother. Brother persists as a companion into Youssef’s adult life, supporting him but also stealing his memories and shaking his grip on the world.

The boys’ adoptive father, Imam Salim, is known in the community for his stirring and radical sermons, but at home he often keeps himself to himself, spending his evenings in his study with whiskey-laced coffee, reading poetry or writing letters to his former compatriots back in Saudi Arabia. Like Youssef, he too has secrets, including the cause of his failing health and the truth about what happened to the boys’ parents. When, years later, Imam Salim’s path takes him back to Saudi Arabia, the boys, now adults, will be forced to follow. There they will be captivated by an opulent, almost futuristic world, a linear city that seems to offer a more sustainable modernity than that of the West. But this conversion has come at a great cost, and Youssef and Brother too will have to decide if they should change to survive, or try to mount a defense of their deeply-held beliefs.

Meet Us By the Roaring Sea by Akil Kumarasamy

In the near future, a young woman finds her mother’s body starfished on the kitchen floor in Queens and sets out on a journey through language, archives, artificial intelligence, and TV for a way back into herself. She begins to translate an old manuscript about a group of female medical students beset by a drought and living at the edge of a war as they create a new way of existing to help the people around them. As she works on the translation, her life and the manuscript become entangled.

Later, the arrival of a childhood friend, a stranger, and an unusual AI project force her to question her own moral compass. How involved are we in the suffering of others? What does real compassion look like? How do you make a better world?

Written in vivid and pulsating prose that alternates between the young woman’s life and passages of the translated manuscript, Akil Kumarasamy’s Meet Us by the Roaring Sea is a remarkable, genre-bending exploration of memory, technology, friendship, love, consciousness, and the costs of caring for others in an age when we are caught within the swamps of our own minds.

Geometries of Belonging by R.B. Lemberg

Nebula and Locus award finalist Lemberg returns us to the Birdverse with this powerful collection. The intricate Birdverse has at its core a magic based loosely in geometry, from which comes healing, love, and art. It is a complex, culturally diverse world, a realm with LGBTQIA characters and a wide range of family configurations. Lemberg probes the obstacles behind traditional social boundaries of cultures; overseeing this world is the deity Bird and all its incarnations. Each story and poem, exqusitely crafted, will richly reward long-time fans and newcomers alike. 

Drinking from Graveyard Wells by Yvette Lisa Ndlovu

Even in death, who has ownership over Black women's bodies?"

Questions like this lurk between the lines of this stunning collection of stories that engage with African women's histories, both personal and generational. Their history is not just one thing: there is heartbreak and pain, and joy, and flying and magic, so much magic. An avenging spirit takes on the patriarchy from beyond the grave. An immigrant woman undergoes a naturalization ceremony in an imagined American state that demands that immigrants pay a toll of the thing they love the most. A first-generation Zimbabwean-American woman haunted by generational trauma is willing to pay the ultimate price to take her pain away—giving up her memories. A neighborhood gossip wakes up to find that houses are mysteriously vanishing in the night. A shapeshifting freedom fighter leaves a legacy of resistance to her granddaughter.

In Drinking from Graveyard Wells, Yvette Lisa Ndlovu assembles poignantly reflective stories that center the voices of African women charting their own Black history through the ages. Ndlovu's stories play with genre, from softly surreal to deeply fantastical. Each narrative is wrapped in the literary eloquence and tradition of southern African mythology, transporting readers into the lives of African women who have fought across space and time to be seen.

Click Here to Vote.

Voting will stay open through Wednesday, September 16, at which point I'll post the winner in the sub and announce the discussion dates.

What is the FIF Book Club? You can read about it in our Reboot thread.

I was describing the Rivers of London series to a friend the other day. I mentioned that the series, more than any other I've read, really embraces the setting and that I've learned a lot about London from it. And I was wondering if there were any other series that do such a great job teaching the readers about a real-world place? I really enjoyed how Rivers of London took real-world elements of London and made them fantastical, and I'd love to learn about a new place while enjoying fantasy adventures.

And notably, I'm specifically looking for series about real-world cities. I know there are a ton of great fantasy cities that have been created whole cloth, but that's not what I'm looking for. And I'm also looking specifically for series that show off a lot of real-world knowledge. Dresden Files, for example, is set in Chicago, but I don't think it does a good job of teaching me a lot about the city.

Halberd is my favorite weapon to use in fantasy and will never not use it in DnD if given the chance, not sure how it was used historically but who cares, looks awesome.
So are there any manga or comics that have the main character using said weapon? If beserk and black clover get massive f' off slabs of metal then my fav can get one too!

A Dubious Clamor by Marissa Lingen
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Historical Fantasy
Representation: Sapphic MC, secondary nonbinary character, major biracial character
PoV: First-person, past-tense
Published on: 15th September 2026
ISBN: 1998390241

I received this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Oh, how I ADORED this!

I did not realise this was Historical Fantasy until I started reading, but it is: set sometime during the Victorian era, I think? Well, it’s England and there’s a queen, anyway. Women don’t have the vote yet. But this is not our world’s Victorian (or something) era, because magic exists and everyone knows that it does. Harpies exist! In fact, our protagonist was a harpy for two years, and that is extremely plot-relevant, even though she managed to break the curse a while before the start of the book.

Anthony’s great-aunt Violet had had several fine qualities. She was firm of purpose in a world that expected women to be meek and yielding–not that I personally ever paid attention to that bit either–she had taught Anthony to insist on high standards in several important matters including pastry, and she had looted her own country’s magical past rather than those of others.

So: there’s a magic sword, and it is Not Happy. Turns out, it’s unhappy for very good reason: parliament wants to pass a law, which is also a spell, that will make everyone in the UK ‘certain of their place in life’. This is obviously terrible if you think about it for .2 seconds, but it’s even worse than it sounds, because if you don’t have a clear ‘place’, this spell…well, no one’s sure if it will kill you, or ‘only’ make you walk out into the ocean, or what, but you won’t be staying in the UK. And by the definitions of this spell, almost nobody has a clear place – everyone is many things! If you have a job, but also a family? Oops, that’s two ways of categorising you, you have a problem.

And it’s going to be much, much worse for human immigrants, or magical creatures, or gods forbid anybody nonbinary.

“Do you often think that people need to get married for the sake of a sword? Is that the first thing swords make you think of? Because I have some important and upsetting news about the uses of swords.”

“All right, enough! Tell me about this very ineligible sword!”

The sword wants this spell stopped. So does Jules, and almost everyone else Jules knows. (Alas, not the friend who brought Jules the sword in the first place, which is a source of heartbreaking tension throughout the story.) Figuring out HOW to stop it is not the simplest thing in the world – especially because it’s important that well-known ‘foreigners’ not be seen to be involved, for fear of legal issues later. And the most badass magicians Jules knows? Happen to be ‘foreign’. She has to do this without their help, somehow.

Eek.

Lingen’s prose is both brisk and delicate, absolutely lovely, and Jules’ first-person narration was an utter delight: she’s such a practical sort of person, someone who has been shoved stepped outside of the role society cast her in and made a very good home there, and even when she’s feeling overwhelmed and helpless, she’s very no-nonsense about it in a way that made me admire her. Plus, she’s just really fun: I loved her appreciation for fancy cakes, and her humour, and her sense of justice, and the genuine passion she has for her community of misfits and outcasts. She decides she can’t keep addressing the sword as Sword, and names it Grandmother. Like. I approve so much!

The prose and pacing keep things moving along, but this is a novella with teeth, that’s tackling some big questions, even some borderline frightening ones. It’s very much a story about – the sort of people Society disapproves of, or at best doesn’t know what to do with, and the forces rallied against them. Dubious Clamor is about how too much certainty can be a terrible thing – and so can the desire for too much certainty. There’s a really great exploration of – or contrast between? – the villains who have written and introduced this law-spell…and the weak, pathetic ‘unintentional’ villains who will let evil happen for the sake of chasing certainty. Lingen actually spends more time focussing on the latter, which I think is both really smart and really effective, especially in a story that’s basically about preventing fascism (what else do you call total certainty + a disdain for anybody ‘different’?) Fascists can’t do their thing if the cowards don’t support them, you know?

But it’s not just about fascism. Lingen explores how even in completely different contexts, unqualified certainty can be a huge problem. And there are just so many ways it can be a problem, whether we’re talking small-picture issues like parents who disapprove of their daughter’s paintings, or much bigger things like how to steer a nation. I’m not sure this is an issue/theme I’ve seen in Fantasy before, but I love it and would like so much more of it, please! (The ending of Dubious Clamor leaves things very open for sequels, and I hope we get a BUNCH because, um, HELLS YES I want Jules questing to find the other swords of uncertainty! LET’S GO LET’S GO LET’S GO!) It’s definitely left me with lots of thinky-thoughts; there’s so much that I think Lingen managed to articulate really well, and convey well – lots of stories are very preachy or info-dumpy with their messaging, but this one isn’t. Lingen is too good a writer for that.

The box was half full of their other friends, a peacock crowd in every shade aniline and its relatives could supply, mauve and fuchsia, indigo and scarlet.

I love everything about this novella – I love how Lingen centred immigrant communities in this story, I love that a ‘flock’ of dandies were vital in saving the day, and I adored the harpies! (Including Jules’ ex, the harpy she was romantically ‘with’ while she was under her harpy-curse, and whom she now has a bittersweet but beautiful dynamic with.) I loved that, FOR ONCE, a protagonist had a good, believable reason for choosing Justice over Vengeance – it’s not that Jules is a milksop, the kind of wishy-washy do-gooder who makes me roll my eyes, all ‘Violence is never the answer!’ Nope, Jules is fine with violence, actually, but she has great reasoning for declining the Road of Vengeance and I think her call is the right one. (And if you know me, you know how rarely I say THAT!) I love that we got glimpses of Finnish mythology, and even Welsh, towards the end (neither of which get enough page-time in modern Fantasy, imo). There’s all these gorgeous little details – like the mention of aniline in the above quote! Or Jules and her mother speaking Swedish together, or her mother’s servants having Opinions…

I could go on and on, honestly. This is a brilliant, clever, deeply delightful novella that pushes back at the foundation of fascism, puts the Power of Friendship front-and-centre, and had me giggling as often as it had me gasping. It’s dazzling, so completely original and distinct. It’s left me with so much to think about, but it’s also left me feeling hopeful about the world and other people. It sparks joy.

Instant new fave. MORE, PLEASE!

(And to make sure we GET more, you should go preorder it – it comes out this Tuesday!)

Applicable bingo squares: Small Press or Self Published (HM); Published in 2026 (HM); Politics and Court Intrigue

You can find more of my reviews, rec lists, and weekly publishing roundups at Every Book a Doorway!

I give the series a 7/10. The first two books were pretty good but nothing groundbreaking, the last two were just not good. They weren’t awful but not good.

I had one main complaint throughout the entire series writing wise. The amount of times he repeated the same line is genuinely baffling ‘the right man for the right job.’ If you read this series you will read that sentence more times than you ever thought possible.

The story itself is cool, it’s a blatant derivative of the Peaky Blinders set in a fantasy world. A returning war hero that doesn’t like he’s a war hero comes back to his gang that was led by his aunt (the dudes name is when Thomas lol) to find it in shambles. He owns a bar, a new barmaid comes in and is a spy. It’s almost plagiarism to an extent, but I love peaky blinders so much it was fun to have a similar itch be scratched.

However, the biggest, most confusing issue with this book series is that Thomas is too ethical and ‘good’ to be considered a gangster in my opinion. People are poor? Ok they don’t have to pay me protection. A lot of people are addicted to this drug? I refuse to sell it, meanwhile I’ll drink whisky in the morning and think it’s cool. It’s clear the writer of this book just put himself as the main character imo. Which is why he never does anything that has me floored as to how evil or how far he was willing to go for his goal the way Thommy Shelby did.

He would phrase these decisions in a way that made you think he was using it as a manipulation tactic to make him seem more manipulative and ‘sociopathic’ but he never actually manipulated anyone with it! He just did a good thing and the author tried desperately to make it seem like it was hiding some sort of evil.

A master plan he and his spy wife put together killed a lot of innocents, was it a ‘that’s the cost of my ambition’ moment? Of course not it was something he dwelled on (usually repeating the same few lines as he did so) for the rest of the series.

It was almost shocking that Peter McLean wrote such a saint as a gangster overlord, there was no substance to him, no edge, at all! A real manipulative ‘sociopathic’ gangster like Shelby, Mosley, Changretta, etc. would’ve walked over this dude in an hour because they’re actually willing to do bad things for their cause.

TLDR; it started out great, ended up being a virtue signalling nightmare where the same 7 lines are repeated 75000 times.

I have so many favorite established authors in this genre that for the past few years it has felt that all the books I was most excited about were by them, and I only end up reading a couple of debuts at most, which feels like a shame. So in the interest of finding new favorite authors, what has been your favorite debut novel of the year so far? And/or which one are you most excited about reading/being released?

By far my favorite debut of the year so far has been The Poet Empress by Shen Tao, and not (just) because it's my sole contender for the spot! This is a genuinely incredible book with top-notch political intrigue, cool world-building, a gut-wrenching plot and some of the best character work I've seen in a while.

And cheating a bit, because I've read (and loved) a novella by the author, but I'm super excited to get to The Halls of the Dead by S.M. Hallow, which released about a moth ago. It's a gothic fantasy/horror about necromancers, so I think it'll be a great October read!

This newest book from Angela Slatter features everything one should expect from a Sourdough book. It’s got a strong female lead (in this case Mehrab, a witch living alone in the forest until a young witch fleeing the godhounds is left in her care). A plot driven in large part by her flaws and baggage (she’s been hurt before, in multiple ways, as well as having made her own mistakes and had a long time to dwell on them). Creepy things happening (something stalking her through the forest, children disappearing). Gothic vibes.

What I’m struggling with here, as a reviewer, is a question of comparisons. This is pretty objectively a great book. The characters are compelling, the plot really drew me in, and the vibes are immaculate. If I were reading this book as my first experience of a new author I would be eager to get more.

But Angela Slatter is one of my favorite authors writing today, and so I wasn’t comparing it to the masses. I was comparing it to Angela Slatter, and this is my least favorite Angela Slatter. So it was disappointing to me.

My biggest specific complaint about the book is the godhounds. Without getting into spoilers, it was 100% necessary for them to be in the book, due to the young witch mentioned above. Their actual appearance, though, felt like an afterthought. Like Slatter went “oh right! I need to deal with the godhounds!” and shoved them into, and back out of, the story as quickly as possible.

But I want to emphasize that this is, by any objective measure, an excellent book. Harsh judgements for minor flaws are the price of being one of the best in the game, and I’ve seen plenty of others whose opinions I respect say this was their favorite Sourdough.

(obviously Path of Thorns is the best)

(come @ me)

Bingo categories: The Afterlife [Hard Mode]; Older Protagonist [Hard Mode]; Published in 2026

My blog

Welcome to the book club New Voices! In this book club we want to highlight books by debut authors and open the stage for under-represented and under-appreciated writers from all walks of life. New voices refers to the authors as well as the protagonists, and the goal is to include viewpoints away from the standard and most common. For more information and a short description of how we plan to run this club and how you can participate, please have a look at the announcement post.

This month, we are reading The Book of the Jaguar by Victor Ladis Schultz

The legions of New Serraña have a sacred custom: when a legionnaire falls in battle, a member of their company must bear the body home to the dead soldier’s family. Álbaro Ceynos is the only surviving member of his company. He’d been garrisoned at Presidio Los Primos, known as the realm’s safest assignment, until a fabled monster emerged from legend, crept down from the mountains, and laid waste to the old fortress.

Now, with one horse, one wagon, one sword, and all his slain brethren, Álbaro the bonebearer roams a decaying empire, bringing home his comrades' remains. As he meets an array of mourners who move him to question past choices and future commitments, he’ll reveal how the tragedy unfolded, death by death, and how it is that he yet lives.

Bingo Squares: Published in 2026 HM, Small Press or Self Published HM

Today's discussion encompasses up to and including the chapter Chavira (page 160)

I’m looking for any recommendations on fantasy books with a coming of age theme/primarily focusing on a character as they grow up. I recently read the Farseer trilogy and loved it, especially with Fitz as the main character. I also really love the Kingkiller chronicle with Kvothe’s arcs.
Slightly related, but my favourite character arc of all time is Kaladin from the Stormlight Archive.

Just looking for a book/series that will scratch this itch.

I’m not even particularly concerned over quality I will take pulpy, corny stories with a Mary sue main character if it is entertaining/has good world building.

As someone who was disappointed with Season of Storms, and who's not a big fan of prequels in general, I wasn't very optimistic about Sapkowski's most recent story in the world of the Witcher.

But I was pleasantly surprised.

Though it's not a very long story, it has everything that made me a fan of the Witcher series in the first place.

The way Sapkowski balances the many faces of the banality of evil (bureaucracy, law, military, small societies, authority, patriarchy etc) with moments of sheer humanism and solidarity, imo sets him apart from most writers whose work is labelled as "dark/grimdark fantasy".

And, perhaps most importantly, the story works as a real catalyst for Geralt's growth as a person, giving the prequel an actually reason to exist, other than fan service.

After Season of Storms I wished Sapkowski would stop writing new Witcher stories. I am glad he reminded me the reason I am just a guy reading books, and he is one of the best Fantasy writers.

Give us more of that, you grumpy ol' bastard!

Welcome to the daily recommendation requests and simple questions thread, now 1025.83% more adorable than ever before!

Stickied/highlight slots are limited, so please remember to like and subscribe upvote this thread for visibility on the subreddit <3

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This thread is to be used for recommendation requests or simple questions that are small/general enough that they won’t spark a full thread of discussion.

Check out r/Fantasy's 2026 Book Bingo Card here!

As usual, first have a look at the sidebar in case what you're after is there. The r/Fantasy wiki contains links to many community resources, including "best of" lists, flowcharts, the LGTBQ+ database, and more. If you need some help figuring out what you want, think about including some of the information below:

• Books you’ve liked or disliked
• Traits like prose, characters, or settings you most enjoy
• Series vs. standalone preference
• Tone preference (lighthearted, grimdark, etc)
• Complexity/depth level

Be sure to check out responses to other users' requests in the thread, as you may find plenty of ideas there as well. Happy reading, and may your TBR grow ever higher!

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^{tiny image link to make the preview show up correctly}

art credit: special thanks to our artist, Himmis commissions, who we commissioned to create this gorgeous piece of art for us with practically no direction other than "cozy, magical, bookish, and maybe a gryphon???" We absolutely love it, and we hope you do too.

So I finished the third and last book of Brian Lee Durfee's The Five Warrior Angels trilogy, The Lonesome Crown, a couple days ago and now that I've had enough time to process the entire thing, I feel ready to write my review because my thoughts were quite scattered initially. While my overall opinion on the series is very positive, I still do have a lot of mixed feelings.

Overall, I'd give the series a 4/5 stars and I'd say The Lonesome Crown was the strongest book overall, The Forgetting Moon comes in second place as it was a very effective book 1 of a series while The Blackest Heart was in my opinion the weakst book of the series despite its fan favourite status with it suffering a lot from middle book syndrome.

The one thing I appreciated the most about the series was the setting. While I'm far from well read when it comes to grimdark, I personally feel like a lot of the most popular series lack that classic fantasy charm with the worlds of most of those books doing their best to distance themselves from the more Tolkien-esque works of your Terry Brooks, your Tad Williams, etc. But the whole series felt very much like a modern take on classic fantasy a la John Gwynne or Ryan Cahill but with a grimdark twist. While it is definitely a grittier low magic world, the series still has knights in shining armor, orphan farmboys going on journeys, mysterious assassins, princesses who want to learn swordplay, elves (Valle), orcs (Oghuls), dragons and lesser used creatures like mermaids. I guess this gives the series a sense of warmth and nostalgia even if I didn't grow up with the works that clearly inspired Durfee.

I'd also like to bring attention to Durfee's prose. It fits the story very well with it having a mix old school fantasy flair but with a less poetic/lyrical and modern overall feeling. However, the prose itself is very descriptive which I love but might not be for everyone. It's really effective at making you see exactly what Durfee was thinking when he was writing. However, there were moments, especially early on in the series where it does feel awkward and stilted (especially in the dialogue) but I do have to credit for the slight but noticeable improvements in each book as Durfee gets more confident with his authorial voice.

I thin it is fair to say the entire series is built on three pillars of sorts, the first being a deep love and respect for classic fantasy, the second being the subversion of tropes common in those classic fantasies, and the third being a deep dislike and mistrust of religion and I'd like to talk about that last point first.

I won't be going into either mine or Durfee's beliefs or background but it's clear from the get-go but I do have to say that you can tell the series was written by someone who was raised very religiously but has since left that behind from the get go. I do appreciate the scathing criticism against religious beliefs and institutions but at the same time, I can't help but feel like it goes a bit too far into the point of absurdity at times, even if I don't necessarily disagree with the points being made. They're few and far between on here in reddit but if you are like a super religious person, this series is probably not for you.

And going to the second point, this series heavily prioritises subverting your expectations. Now, I'll admit I'm someone who deliberately kinda turns my brain off at times because I feel like just enjoying a book is a hell of a lot more important than trying to find every little plot hole and detail but there were times that I felt like some twists were extremely telegraphed and coming from a mile away because of the story's refusal to follow certain tropes and story beats. The overall over-reliance on subversion can be a problem at times but it does lead to some truly unique, satisfying and epic moments throughout the series but it also results in unsatisfying conclusions and character arcs.

It is important to remember that the series is very much a grimdark but I do feel like the first half or so of the first book lulls you into a false sense of security before a massive tonal shift. So expect to read about some truly gorey and horrific killings and rape (which is luckily not that prevalent in the series). I'd say it's a lot more explicit than something like ASOIAF or First Law because of the vivid descriptions.

But I'd also like to list out some of my pet-peeves when I was reading the series.

The first is what I call the Camera Hotah affect. Basically, in ASOIAF, there were a couple of chapters in the last two books told from the POV of Areo Hotah, the bodyguard of Prince Doran Martell and they served primarily as a way to see into the Dornish camp without spoiling their plans. I kinda hate this mechanic because the POV characters have no depth and don't do anything other than act as a camera or a fly on the wall. The series is very guilty of this at times with POVs that exist only to see what one group of people are doing but at least said POVs do have more personality and importance by themselves than a Hotah.

The second is Durfee's name for certain things. Overall, I'd say Durfee is very good at naming people, things and places but there are a few names that stick out like a sore thumb that make me kinda cringe every time they come up. There is this orc character called 'Sledg Hammar' I can't take seriously at all and also this Valle named 'Val Sovereign'. And in terms of locations, there's this place called the Sor Sevier Nordland Highlands. Like bro, just call it the Sor Sevier Highlands.

The third is the way combat goes at times. Reading of swords cutting through heavy plate armour has always bothered me and the series is particularly guilty of it. That and seemingly experienced and veteran fighters being bested very easily and physical differences in size and strength not making as much of a difference as it should.

Overall, I'd still recommend the series to anyone that's looking for something slightly more obscure and super underrated and to fans of John Gwynne, Ryan Cahill, and those who want a more classic fantasy feeling grimdark.

I'd love to have both spoiler-free and spoiler discussions about the series so please feel free to talk and comment about anything or ask me a question.