Well, 24 hours is all it took to garner enough feedback to recognize the incomplete nature of my previous list. First, the top of the list was overly redundant due to the presence of multiple books from a few series. Second, due to my haste to post, there were a few mistakes (although The Anubis Gates really was good enough to be listed twice!) After taking far too much time to analyze my list and my other reading experiences, I've reformulated the list to consist of my favorite 50 series of all time. This doesn't include stand-alone novels, which I will cover in a separate post soon - and before you get outraged, I consider Lord of the Rings to be a single book.....so its not on this list at all. This post was exceedingly difficult to compile, given the incomplete nature of so many series; and how I felt about a few series with only one or two books released so far. I've included some of them in my list despite the fact that I have only a small sampling - based solely on how I feel the series is likely to continue. Given that, there are a few newer series I've listed at the bottom, that may turn out to be great series as well - but its simply too soon for me to tell. Without further ado, the new and improved list (as always, feel free to tell me why I'm wrong):
Top Fifty Fantasy/Sci-Fi Series
1 A Song of Ice and Fire – George RR Martin
2 Malazan Book of the Fallen – Steven Erikson & Ian Cameron Esslemont
3 The Dark Tower – Stephen King
4 The Kingdom of Thorn and Bone – Greg Keyes
5 Memory, Sorrow and Thorn – Tad Williams
6 The Farseer Trilogy – Robin Hobb
7 Night’s Dawn Trilogy – Peter Hamilton
8 The Hyperion Cantos – Dan Simmons
9 The Monarchies of God – Paul Kearney
10 The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever – Stephen Donaldson
11 The Word and The Void – Terry Brooks
12 The Coldfire Trilogy – CS Freidman
13 Harry Potter – JK Rowling
14 Otherland – Tad Williams
15 Chung Kuo – David Wingrove
16 The Prince of Nothing – R. Scott Bakker
17 Demonwars – RA Salvatore
18 The Chronicles of Amber – Roger Zelazny
19 The Fionavar Tapestry – Guy Gavriel Kay
20 Riddle-Master – Patricia McKillip
21 The Book of the New Sun – Gene Wolfe
22 The Wheel of Time – Robert Jordan
23 The Black Company – Glen Cook
24 His Dark Materials – Phillip Pullman
25 The Swan’s War – Sean Russell
26 The Tawny Man – Robin Hobb
27 Ender Series – Orson Scott Card
28 Shannara – Terry Brooks
29 Cygnet – Patricia McKillip
30 Lyonesse – Jack Vance
31 Ilium/Olympos – Dan Simmons
32 The Deathgate Cycle – Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
33 The Gentleman Bastards – Scott Lynch
34 The Kingkiller Chronicles – Patrick Rothfuss
35 The Sword of Shadows – JV Jones
36 Drenai Saga – David Gemmell
37 Chalion – Lois McMaster Bujold
38 Discworld – Terry Pratchett
39 The First Law – Joe Abercrombie
40 Tyrants & Kings – John Marco
41 The Ruins of Ambrai – Melanie Rawn
42 Deryni – Katherine Kurtz
43 The Riftwar Saga – Raymond Feist
44 The Book of Words – JV Jones
45 The Liveship Traders – Robin Hobb
46 The Stones of Power – David Gemmell
47 The Symphony of Ages – Elizabeth Haydon
48 The Litany of the Long Sun – Gene Wolfe
49 Dune – Frank Herbert (& Brian Herbert & Kevin Anderson)
50 The Earthsea Cycle – Ursula Le Guin
Possible Future Entries on the list:
1 The Long Price Quartet – Daniel Abraham
2 The First Law – Joe Abercrombie
3 Mistborn – Brandon Sanderson
4 Acacia – David Anthony Durham
5 The Godless World – Brian Ruckley
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2 comments:
It's a pretty good list, and, obviously, all such will be controversial.
I would have included Tolkien for sure, and considered Arthur C. Clarke's Rama and 2001 series, Larry Niven's Ringworld series, the Time series by Madeleine L'Engle, and the Space Trilogy and the Narnia books by C. S. Lewis.
Thanks.
Martin,
I'd definitely agree with Tolkien near the very top of any list, but I will be posting a list of my favorite stand-alone novels soon too. In my mind, LOTR was a single novel - and despite all the other works that have been published after it, I still consider it one novel; and didn't include it here. That will likely be my biggest error in this idea, but it will hopefully make sense when I have both lists up here. As for your other suggestions, that is a result of my own shortcomings; I haven't read Clark or Niven, and simply didn't enjoy Narnia as much as most others. Possibly due to the time in my life when I read them - but I'm not sure. Thanks for looking it over and taking the time to reply.
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