Help me find a fantasy novel like this...

I want mages throwing fireballs and dwarves smashing face with their battle axes. Shape shifting nature loving elves, and holy warriors. Gimme evil wizards summoning elementals and necromancers raising the dead. Orcs, trolls, and ogres. Hidden treasure, magic weapons, mystical ruins. That’s right, I’m asking for every fantasy cliche from WoW, DnD, and other RPGs. Mix Tolkien with Salvatore.

But…

Make it gritty and serious like Game of Thrones.

I’ve heard a bit about the Malazan books. Is that what I’m looking for?

Rad *the Fionavar Tapestry *by Guy Gavriel Kay. And be careful what you wish for.

Joel Rosenberg’s The Guardians of the Flame series is a lot like that. Considering that it’s a series about a group of gamers who are transported and trapped in the game world by their villainous professor/dungeon master, and it involves themes like slavery (a major plot point…destroying the institution of slavery in the game world becomes the entire reason for being of the group of gamers), rape, and death, it sounds like what you’re looking for.

The first book is The Sleeping Dragon. I’ve only read up to The Warrior Lives, so I don’t know what direction the series took after that, though reading the titles, it looks like it got a little silly by the latest ones. The early ones weren’t like that, though.

And (if memory serves; it’s been a long time since I read it), it’s better than this description might lead you to believe. (The concept is played straight, but the books are not without humor.) Not a bad suggestion, jayjay.
I wonder if Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd & Grey Mouser series is close enough to what you’re looking for.

You may enjoy the Codex Alera series by Jim Butcher (of Dresden Files fame). He self-conciously set out to incorporate pretty well every possible fantasy trope together in a quite serious fantasy series, and it is very good. :smiley:

Not in the epic scale of Thrones, but I’m going to recommend The Gentleman Bastards series, starting with The Lies of Locke Lamora. Hard Boiled noir novel about a pack of white collar criminals… in a fantasy setting.

The Paksenarrion saga by Elizabeth Moon comes to mind. The protagonist of the series starts out as a mercenary recruit; plenty of grittiness there. And there’s paladins, elves, orcs, magical ruins, shapeshifting evil clerics, wizards, dwarves, etc. It’s also a very good series.

I was just about to recommend the Deeds of Paksenarion.

Raymond E Feist’s first Midkemia trilogy, starting with Magician also fit the bill.

I’ll look over my bookcase later and see what else springs to mind.

Grunts by Mary Gentle.

Orc Marines!

Kate Elliot’s Crown of Stars series comes to mind.

If you’ve not read it yourself, you’ve probably heard people spit on *The Sword of Truth *series but (the first couple of books, at least) fit your criteria quite well. I liked the series just fine, personally.

If you’re more interested in the gritty-ness than the setting, most urban fantasies (excluding those that are romance novels with a thin veneer of spell casting) have that tone. Mike Carey’s Felix Castor series, Simon Green’s Nightside series, Kadrey’s Sandman Slim, del Franco’s Connor Grey series, etc.

Oh. You’d probably like The Magicians, too.

I can highly recommend The Doomfarers of Coramonde by Brian Daley, as well it’s sequel Starfollowers of Coramonde. Both books are great fun in a fairly pulpy style.

The board is likely to leap through my monitor and strangle me for suggesting it, but what you’re looking for was the goal of Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time books. Unfortunately, they’re also a good example of why it’s a bad idea to sleep with your editor. They start off quite strong, with a few kind-of-annoying but forgivable quirks. Nine books later, we have costume porn that makes Tolkien’s love of landscapes look g-rated, tons of girl-on-girl spanking (and occasional bondage) so badly written it manages to take the fun out of it, what appears to be a reality show to determine which character can Mary the most Sue (Egwaine by a country mile) and multi-book subplots that might have made a decent B-plot for a single book (It didn’t help that everyone but Jordan hated the character being rescued anyway). Worst of all, two entire books where nothing happens.

He got his act together when he realized he was dying, and ascended fanboy Sanderson is doing a very good job tying things back together. He shares Jordan’s weakness for Sue, always has, but no one’s perfect. (There was one ‘spanking as a serious plot point’ incident in his takeover book, but I’ll allow that as homage)

A lot of people dismiss them because of the filler arc, which I think is a mistake. The first few were very good. You can always switch to summaries once they get annoying, and jump back in when they improve.

I’ll second Feist’s Magician series, which is usually described (not without affection) as ‘My Kickass AD&D Game (Prose Version)’ And also there are (sorta) Highlander-esque bad guys, and who doesn’t like that?

Nothing says grim and gritty like a barbarian vaulting a bottomless pit on rocket powered skis . . .

Maybe the Dragonlance series?

Yes, the Malazan books are exactly what you’ve described except for one big difference, there are no standard middle earth races. It is a unique world with unique races, no orcs elves or dwarves. No “just like elves but slightly different” bullshit either. Apart from that it fits what you requested to a T.

Gritty wouldn’t be a word I chose to describe Dragonlance.

These are great books but they don’t really qualify for this particular request in that they aren’t trodden with typical fantasy tropes. Still worth reading though!

Erm, whut?

very little

nope

none of those either

Children of the Light? Meh, not really.

nope and nope

Trollocs and Ogier aren’t exactly what’s being sought here, I think.

In 13 books so far, I recall one hidden treasure, two magic weapons, and one mystical ruins. Density a bit low, I think.

I’m a big fan of WoT, but I can’t recommend it to the OP based on his description of what he’s looking for.

I’m pro-Paksenarrion but you need to reach about half-way through the second book before they start to pull out the orcs and elves and magical bits. There’s a little bit in the first book but, for the most part, the first book is played pretty straight with only very minor “magical” things. When it does get started though, it ramps up to levels that seem almost ridiculous when set against the austere first book – though in reality no worse than your typical high fantasy read.

Well, I’d have to second (or third or whatever) the votes for

[ul]
[li]Feist’s *Magician *(Apprentice, Master, Silverthorn, Darkness at Sethanon). I didn’t continue after that, but my friend did and had mixed reviews.[/li][li]Rosenberg’s *Guardians of the Flame *-- and it’s spin-off trilogy. The main character of the spin-off is critical to the overall premise of the Flame series; the author needs to remember that and finish what he started rather than just leave it all hanging…[/li][/ul]
I read Leiber’s Fafhrd & Grey Mouser set as a staple of the genre, but I must say I wasn’t comfortable with the repeated ‘Here is the lynchpin’ endings of what seemed like a collection of short episodes rather than a series going in a direction.

I was reading Moorcock’s *Elric of Melnibone *series at the same time; liked it a lot more than Leiber’s work. I dunno if that qualifies for the OP’s search.

I’d also put up a vote for some light pieces by the late Roger Zelazny: *Changeling *and *MadWand *though they’re certainly not gritty. Fun reading, though.

I tryed to re-read the first trilogy a few years ago. They do not hold up, aged very badly i felt.