in the fantasy genre.

Ive read a lot of horror in the past but never really read anything fantasy besides Lord of the Rings as a teenager.

I just picked up an R.J. Salvatore book called The Thousand Orcs. I looked for Elric stuff in the store but they had not one of his tales.

Thought you guys would know who the top writers were. The darker the better :)


Xregg

This may be a given.. but if you haven't yet, read The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Despite seeing the movie, it really is a must read. And if you have, try The Silmarillion. It's a beautiful mythology and story, and a huge insight in to Middle Earth.

if you have not already wasted your life reading Wheel of Time series. Don't. /argue on.

-George R. R. Martin's books have a legion of fans.
-Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber are great fantasy (don't let the modern setting at the story's start fool you).
-Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson. (Warning: starts slow in Lord Foul's Bane, but picks up and is a great read).
-Books of Swords by Saberhagen, good solid, basic fantasy, but don't continue with the Books of Lost Swords.
-Glen Cook's Book of the New Sun series, complex but fascinating, starts with Shadow of the Torturer. His Chronicles of the Black Company are pretty neat, but not as interesting after the first trilogy.

And yeah, what Halo said.

I quit buying paperbacks when they started hitting $8-$9 even for reprints =/. Fucking rediculous...

Anyway...I like the Mythadventures series by Robert Aspirin. Really funny author...good stories.

Raymond E. Feist and his Riftware saga was pretty damn good (been a while since I read it, tho).

Read some David Eddings stuff...I remember liking that quite a bit.

Read a lot of Piers Anthony...good stories, but if you don't like puns avoid this series like the plague =). The Immortals Series is a good/fairly serious semi-fantasy series. The Xanth series is good, but silly.

Mainly I stuck to a lot of the TSR books...those seemed to be pretty safe as far as decent reading (aside from the Pool of Radiance conversions...yuk!)

L.E. Modesitt JR is hands down the best fantasy author I've ever encountered. But don't bother with him if you're looking for "hack and slash", his style is more that of the philosopher - he goes down to the bone of stuff in his books.

Not very dark though. I'm not much for the dark stuff.

Big second on the first two books of the Black Company series. Feist is mostly good too.

The Wheel of Time - after the third book, each volume amounts to eight hundred pages predominantly devoted to the new Aes Sedai smoothing their shawls and other stuff that could only be interesting if you overdose on ADHD medication. Yes, I've read eight books in the series. Oh, how my eyes bled.

Tolkien - The Hobbit kicks ass. In my eyes it's a far better book than the LOTR trilogy combined.

David Eddings has some good series out to read which is why i've reread them about 5 different times.
the thomas covenant books are good also.



Piyn

I highly recommend the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett.

If you haven't read more I would also suggest Salvatore's older works such as the Icewind Dale and Dark Elf trilogies.

'I highly recommend the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett. '

- Oh, oh, yes. How could I forget.
Desite seeming so, they really aren't for kids. Far from it. The humour is very British, very dry and tricky.
Pratchett can write novels with the best of 'em.

The Bazil Broketail books by Chris Rowlery (Sp) kick ass.

The Sword of Truth Series by Terry Goodkind

If you like saberhagen's sword trilogy, the prequel "Empire of the east" is a good read also if you want the background on it.
Dragonlance novels are decent (at least the first ones), The twins trilogy is a good read imo also. If your not into fantasy too much, Harry turtledove's alternate timeline books are good also. Think he also writes a few good fantasies too.

hehe, I've worked in a bookstore for the past 3 years, and sci-fi/fantasy is sort of 'my' section...

- I've also read the Otherworld series (4 books) by Tad Williams. I think you (Xregg) might enjoy that one as it's got some horror aspects involved in it. To me though it was somewhat boring... heh
- Another horroristic / vampire type author I think Xregg might enjoy is Laurell K. Hamilton. Has 2 different series, one dealing with vampires, the other with some fantasy thing. I don't read Hamilton though, I just sell it. :)
- Books published by Whitewolf Publishing (Actually a guildmate of mine has actually contributed some to several of these books, free advertising :) ). Namely the Clanwars series, though there are some other ones dealing with vampires and other more horroristic fantasy aspects.

- Agreed with Thormir, my manager LOVES George R. R. Martin's series (Clash of Kings / Game of Thrones / and two others I can't remember)
- I personally go for more of the alternate history type of books (Harry Turtledove comes to mind), but one very very good blend of fantasy / alternate history is Orson Scott Card's Tales of Alvin Maker series (6 books now, newest one came out 2 weeks ago, The Crystal City). Series comes highly recommended from me, though he's more known for his Ender's Game series.
- I just started reading Terry Pratchett's Discworld series (up to book 4 atm). He's hilarious, if you like the off the wall type of humor he has (if you've ever heard me crack a bad joke in allmustdie, you know the type of humor I'm talking about :) ). If you don't like that type of humor though, his books will easily loose interest for you as they're full of unexpected twists and turns and no logical plot.
- Some other miscellaneous fantasy authors/series I can think of that haven't been mentioned that sell pretty well are:

* Kristain Britain
* Brian Jacques (more geared towards children though imo, but can be enjoyed by adults too.)
* R. A. Salvatore (not his TSR books, his normal fantasy series)
* Elisabeth Hayden (Rhapsody, Enchanter, 2 others; another series my manager loves and tries to get everyone to read)
* Harry Turtledove (mentioned above for alternate history) also writes a fantasy series that sells pretty well.
* David Farland
* David Weber (Honor Harrington series is the main one, more sci-fi'ish though)
* Eric Flint (again, more sci-fi'ish; personally love 1632, 1633, and am eagerly awaiting 1634 in April, his alternate history stuff)
* Anne McCaffery (how did no one mention her yet? lol)

There are others, but that's all I can think of for now...

Necroscope from Brian Lumley is a great read if anyone is looking for some good horror novels.


Xregg

Not fantasy but I just finished Stephen King's: From a Buick 8. Good thought provoking read. On the fantasy side I'd HIGHLY recommend King's Dark Tower series or Eyes of the Dragon. Can you tell im a King fanboi?

Definitely check out the George R.R. Martin books, good stuff.

Might be kind of hard to get here but Mark Chadbourn's fantasy novels are supposed to be really good and pretty dark.

-George R. R. Martin's books have a legion of fans.
-Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber are great fantasy (don't let the modern setting at the story's start fool you).
-Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson. (Warning: starts slow in Lord Foul's Bane, but picks up and is a great read).


Thormir nailed it.

-Glen Cook's Book of the New Sun series, complex but fascinating, starts with Shadow of the Torturer.
Gene Wolfe wrote the four volume Book of the New Sun. Book of the New Sun is science fiction anyhow.

Terry Brooks' Shannara series was awesome when i read it, that was some time ago, though. But excellent reading there, from memory.

George Martin
Steven Erickson's Malazan series
Dark Tower by Stephen King

David Farlands Runelords is kind of cool. Different take on magic.

The new J V Jones series has started out well. Another one I am waiting for the next one lol.

For darker fantasy I always loved Karl Edward Wagner's books. Try Dark Crusade, Bloodstone, Darkness Weaves, Death Angel's Shadow or Night Winds. The last two are collections of short stories but the others are full novels. They may be out of print by now, but you can usually find them in used book stores.

i'd have to say, like so many others have already said, that george r.r. martin is the best out there together with raymond e. feist (magician, silverthorn, etc).. only problem i see with them though is that after reading their books pretty much everything else is just a disappointing waste of time :)

Gor series by John Norman. The wheel of time series rocks.

Well I went to a different bookstore tonight and was shocked to see how large the fantasy section. I forgot my list at home of all the names you guys gave me so I walked out empty handed.

I finished reading Salvatore's The Thousand Orcs. Was a decent read but seemed a little tame. Im looking for something much more darker and evil. Maybe im just too used to Kootnz , Barker, King and Lovecraft.

Tomorrow I go back to try a George R. Martin book. Can any of you tell me which of his works I should get first?


Xregg