# Fantasy help needed **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 10, 2001, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362 "2001-01-10T17:35:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2001, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362/61 "2001-01-13T08:10:11Z")
_Finally_ someone mentions McKillip? I love her stuff. In fact, whenever I wander into the F&SF section of a bookstore, I immediately go look to see whether Patricia A. McKillip, Robin McKinley, and R.A. MacAvoy have anything new out. McKillip has somber works and whimsical works. McKinley generally uses themes from fairy tales. (Not simple retellings, but mature stories based on the original concepts.) In MacAvoy, Tolkien’s _Faerie_ generally impinges on the mundane world (sometimes in 20th century USA, but also in Renaissance Italy, 19th century Ireland, future worlds of space exploration, and created-from-whole-cloth worlds of fantasy). If you have not already read him, you _must_ read Fritz Leiber (especially the many tales of Fahfrd and the Gray Mouser in Lankhmar, but also his tales of evil invading San Francisco and many others). And for heaven’s sake, how did this thread get so long without anyone mentioning Peter S. Beagle? **The Last Unicorn** , **A Fine and Private Place** , **Come Lady Death** , **The Folk of the Air** , **The Innkeeper’s Song**? (He has a couple new ones that I haven’t been able to “review” yet.) ---
**Author:** ![magdalene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df788c/32.png) [@magdalene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magdalene)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2001, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362/62 "2001-01-13T23:42:37Z")
tomndebb, I LOVE Robin McKinley - I’ll look up the others you mentioned as well. ---
**Author:** ![Reno\_Nevada](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Reno\_Nevada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reno_Nevada)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2001, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362/63 "2001-01-13T23:50:22Z")
Well, Alessan, you have gotten some good replies (and I wrote some down for myself), and some not-so-good replies. Personally, I think many of the posters overlooked something in the OP: > [@](#): > > I keep on buying new books by celebrated authors such as Terry Goodkind an Tad Williams, and they keep on disappointing me with bland, juvenile storylines, standard issue “naive farmboy with great destiny” heroes, and cookie cutter Evil Wizards. My feeling is that you have grown tired of fantasy novels written for adolescents, and are ready to try some written for adults. If that is the case, I have a few suggestions (depending on your definition of _new_, of course.) **James Branch Cabell** Anything, really, but _Jurgen_ is the easiest to find (because it was banned in Boston. Nothing better for an author’s career!) **E R Eddison** _The Worm Ouroboros_ This book cannot be compared to any other. It can be difficult, but it is well worth the effort. Ignore the initial character, Lessingham, and the setting, Mercury. The author does. \*\* Ludovico Ariosto\*\* _Orlando Furioso_ The crowning acheivment of Western Literature, it would be labeled Epic Fantasy if published today. Sex and violence and securing Europe for Christianity! I recommend a prose translation; the poetry feels leaden in English. **Lord Dunsany**. I have only read a couple of the most popular, but I feel safe in recommending any of his books sight unseen. By the way, these books are definitely for adults only. If you are still enjoying the characterization in Eddings latest, or think that Leiber is no better than Goodkind, don’t bother, you probably won’t enjoy them. If you have begun to wonder if there is anything better than Extruded Fantasy Book Product available, maybe it is time to look into these. ---
**Author:** ![Spiritus\_Mundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c68b51/32.png) [@Spiritus\_Mundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiritus_Mundi)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2001, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362/64 "2001-01-14T07:18:02Z")
I enthusiastically second Reno’s suggestions with one exception: while _Ouruborous_ is indeed one of the seminal an influential works of fantasy, I am afraid I do not think it has well stood the test of time. Also, let me add **John Crowley** to the list. His older works may be hard to find, but they are well worth the hunt. I am not a big fan of his recent _Aegypt_ series, but his older work in both SF and fantasy is superb. _Engine Summer_, in particular, is a gem. It is science fiction, but the structure and feel are closer to fantasy. The same might be said for _Beasts_, though it is solidly SF. _The Deep_ is pure fantasy in a stark, allegorical setting. _Little Big_ is a novel you will either love dearly or despise. I have seen it descirbed as “Faulkner does faeries” and “the book in which not a damn thing happens”. Oh, and one more author: \*_Gene Wolfe_. He writes more SF than fantasy, but his _Book of the New Sun_ series is much more of a fantasy tetralogy. I do not recommend the follow up series, but the orignal four (Shadow of the Torturer, et al) are excellent. If you have any interest at all in ancient Greece, then _Soldier of the Mist_ and _Soldier of Arete_ are must-haves. Even if you don’t, they are fine books. _Devil in teh Forest_ is a stand alone novel which is either historical or fantasy depending upon your interpretation of a couple events. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fantasy-help-needed/49362.md?page=3)