Dream a Little Dream: RE's favorite fantasy titles
by staffPart two of our extremely biased and highly enthusiastic list of RE recommendations.
The Deed of Paksenarrion, by Elizabeth Moon. While heavily inspired by Tolkien, Paksenarrion's story is as original as they come. The series follows her from young girl to mercenary soldier, straight on to paladin, all while maintaining her independence from both the patriarchy in the story and patriarchal conventions in fantasy fiction. The graphic reality of her training and the detailed political situations further differentiate The Deed of Paksenarrion from other fantasy novels; but ultimately, it's simply a very tender, human depiction of a woman on the road to becoming a hero.
Wicked, by Gregory Maguire. For a book about a wicked witch, even the cover tugs at your heart: a cut-out circle reveals a cameo of the wicked witch, which, when the page is turned, shows the full picture: a woman cradling a flying monkey, and surrounding her, a wolf and cat. As political as it is fantastic, Wicked is the story of a woman desperately trying to save the world until she's no longer entirely sure it's worth saving - and is as poignant as it is thought-provoking.
Discworld, a series by Terry Pratchett. With all the seriousness of knights, wizards, and castles, fantasy can be a humorless genre. Unless you're Terry Prachett, in which case the world really is flat, the most helpful hero is the one who runs away the fastest, and War has a daughter named Clancy. As the Discworld series grows ever longer, Pratchett can begin to repeat jokes, but for our money his most savvy book is Small Gods, 13th in the series, a funny but philosophical skewering of rigid doctrine and organized religion.
The Earthsea Cycle, a series by Ursula K. LeGuin. Ursula K. LeGuin, why do we love you so much? Is it for your background in anthropology? Your understanding of Jungian psychology? Or is it because you, as a writer, naturally chose to create a universe where words are magic, and the right utterance could even still an earthquake? The Earthsea Cycle demonstrates a masterful understanding of archetype, a willingness to draw from non-European sources, and a magic system that deviates from Christian or Celtic underpinnings. An original work, elegantly written, and accessible to a non-standard audience.
The Dark is Rising, a series by Susan Cooper. Ten years after first reading this young-adult fantasy, members of the staff can still recite the entire opening prophecy. (There's a reason the series won both the Newbery Honor and a Carnegie Medal.) Within a reimagined British mythos, the story makes readers want to be better people, as reflected by the main characters - realistic children who get angry, tired, and afraid, but continue to do what they know is right. More than 30 years after publication, The Dark is Rising still feels fresh - and genuinely creepy.
Hart's Hope, by Orson Scott Card, arose from a map Card doodled, on which two gate towers were crowded too close together. From that mistake, he developed a world in which the price of magic is blood, the gods are terribly weak, and the gate by which you enter a city determines your access. This is a story of sacrifice, limitation, and the nature of evil, with perhaps the most complicated morality in the fantasy genre.
Gormenghast, an unfinished series by Mervyn Peake. The only reason RE's editors don't read this series yearly - or even monthly - is that it's exhausting. It's long, to be sure, but that's par for epic fantasy; instead, the grueling nature of the series is grounded in its gothic, decrepit world, where everything moves at the slowest possible pace, and the few good characters are rarely the charming ones. We find ourselves rooting for the villain, who at least wants to change things - and in doing so, we play right into Peake's hands. After all, the hero is only one year old by the end of the first book. This carefully-written, excruciating series is unparalleled by any work inside or outside the fantasy genre; fans are more likely to love Nineteen Eighty-Four and Dickens' bleaker works than The Sword of Shannara. Peake unfortunately died before completing the final book - and in a way, that's only fitting.
Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neal Gaiman. It's hard not to love Crowley, "an angel who did not so much fall as saunter vaguely downward," and who now irritates commuters with horrible traffic snarls while keeping the most terrified houseplants in London. Good Omens is a rollicking tale of the end of the world, wherein the anti-Christ is a pleasant 11-year-old boy, Famine writes diet books, and nobody is too keen on the idea of Armageddon. Separately, Pratchett and Gaiman are funny men; in combination, their wit may be unparalleled.
His Dark Materials, a trilogy of novels by Philip Pullman, feels like a magical version of Around the World in Eighty Days crossed with A Little Princess. Pullman's pseudo-Golden Age world resurrects fantasies that have fallen out of fashion, but never out of style: cowboys, pilots, gypsies, daemons, and warrior bears. Although the story focuses on a young female protagonist and the differences between childhood and maturity, His Dark Materials feels neither juvenile nor particularly feminine; it's hard for any reader to resist sled-chases across the arctic, harrowing zeppelin attacks, and rooftop knife fights, especially when they're this well-written. Add in strong, memorable characters, and it makes for a book you'll keep coming back to.
Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, a series of novels by Tad Williams. The strength of the main character, the richness of the world (despite its obvious debt to Tolkien), and the sound pacing of the overall story make this a series to remember. The basic plot is a standard fantasy coming-of-age story, complete with magical artifacts, a seemingly unkillable evil villain, and a wise witch-woman, but its deep characterization and careful world building transcend cliché - the reader really gets a sense of how it feels to withstand a long journey, both physically and emotionally.
Dark Tower, a series of novels by Stephen King, successfully maintains a fantasy epic while straying from Tolkien; it's hard to think of another story that blends fantasy and Western influences with as much sobriety and force. It's a sharp reminder that the genres are linked by the same archetypes, and a good excuse for paladin gunslingers, men in black, robot bears, and talking trains. Meanwhile, the grittiness of the Western setting grounds the story in a world that feels truly dangerous, something that is occasionally lost in the glitter and archaism of fantasy. In addition, King has consistently good character psychology, and Dark Tower features his best villainous creation, Randall Flag.
Word and Void, a trilogy by Terry Brooks, is one of the few good examples of dark urban fantasy, and Brooks' most original work. The modern setting is a convincingly flawed Earth where Good and Evil battle over a backdrop of pollution, homeless squatters, and track and field competitions. Although Running with Demons is probably the best of the trilogy, the series as a whole thoroughly explores the consequences of characters' strengths and weaknesses as played out over decades; Brooks' lawyer mind spins dozens of plot threads, and leaves none of them unresolved. Although the series has its weaknesses - including a number of lectures on why pollution is bad and why we should give more money to the homeless - it remains the strongest offering of its sub-genre.
The Chronicles of Conan, a series by Robert E. Howard. Conan is one of the most iconic characters in the fantasy genre (and most certainly in the barbarian fantasy sub-genre he created). To be sure, the fiction was pulp, the character a brute, and the sub-genre decidedly narrow, but it was a single-handed stroke that inspired a legion of imitators. According to legend, Howard had a drunken (and probably mental-illness-inspired) hallucination of a big man with a sword who threatened to kill him if he did not write the Conan story; that intensity stayed with Howard throughout the writing process, and he later wrote that Conan was an amalgam of the ranch hands, cowboys, and other hardened Texas types he grew up with. In that respect, Conan is one of fantasy's most honest creations.
Song of Ice and Fire, a series by George R.R. Martin. As a genre based in myth, fantasy is uniquely dependent on what has come before - so almost all of it is derivative of earlier works. It is almost impossible to find original interpretations of medieval fantasy, and most of those are centered on creating and defining a unique magic system - which detracts from the mystique that makes magic mythic in the first place. Song of Ice and Fire avoids this problem entirely - it's original medieval fantasy in which the magic feels magical and the world has the realism of Tudor England. As for the storyline, it is full of complex, fascinating characters - some of whom are dead before the story begins, and others of whom die during the course of the conflict-filled narrative. Be prepared for heartbreak.
The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle. A unicorn in search of others like her is forced to endure humanity in order to hide, and in the process learn of love; but that's a simple description for the whole. Filled with the kind of delicately balanced prose and characterization that most authors spend a lifetime trying to achieve, The Last Unicorn accomplishes the rare trick of making a new myth feel old. A poetic book that never slides into the sentimental, it's fantasy at its best.
The Wood Wife, by Terri Windling. If the World Fantasy award didn't convince you, perhaps this will: the story was inspired by the paintings of Brian Froud. With characters as wildly fascinating as that art (and the desert in surprising competition as a near-character), it's a beautiful read. While it's in part a mystery of a city woman inheriting a home from a man who drowned in the desert, that's still only one part; and all of it is magical.
The Hero and the Crown, by Robin McKinley. Beginning with the heartbreaking tale of Aerin's mother, who died of despair when she gave birth to a daughter instead of a son, The Hero and the Crown only becomes more intriguing with dragons, royalty galore, and plenty of magic. But this young adult novel (and Newbery Medal winner) is more than a delightful collection of fantasy ingredients; Aerin's struggles feel painfully real, and her royal family is as difficult as any common one. An artful coming-of-age story that transcends the genre.
The Chronicles of Narnia, a series of novels by C. S. Lewis. Yes, it's a Christian allegory - but with few exceptions, the story rather than the allegory is the leading aspect. Each book is a beautiful part of the whole, but also a strong stand alone - and each one is distinct. The allure of talking animals, sea travels, magic, and monsters still hasn't faded, and the arguments over which book is the best are still just as heated, and just as fun, as they were at age ten.
Many thanks to Chad Banks and Ciro Faienza for their help in creating this list.
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