Help Me Find Dark Fantasy Novels! Please!

[The Serge]

I have read much of Lovecraft and all of Caitlin Kiernan's books, as well as King's The Dark Tower cycle (which I consider dark fantasy rather than "horror"), but I don't know where else to go for creepy, well written, dark fantasy. These can be short stories or whole novel series.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated!

 

[EricNoah]

I'm only partway through Black God's Kiss by C.L. Moore but it has a very Cthuluesque fantasy vibe. http://paizo.com/store/fiction/planetStories/v5748btpy7x8d

 

[Pozatronic]

"The Etched City" by K. J. Bishop has been compared to S.K.'s Dark Tower by more than one critic. It's nothing like Lovecraft, however. And the "darkness" part of it is more about the morality of one of the main characters. I liked it a lot.

Have you tried anything by Jeff Vandermeer?. Check out "City Of Saints And Madmen". It's pretty dark in several places, and disturbing all over the place.


Check out this short story he wrote for Clarkesworld online magazine.

 

[Sugarmouse]

For Dark Fantasy with a comic twist, try 'Grunts' by Mary Gentle, or 'Villains by Necessity' from Eve Forward. Good stuff.

The books upon which the game 'The Witcher' is based seem to be quite dark - so that maybe something to check out... if the books are available in English.


Probably not helpful, but what the hey.

 

[Jubilee]

You might try The Keep by F Paul Wilson.. ? I read it a very long time ago, but I remember that I thought it was creepy.

 

[useridunavailable]

You might want to check out The Great and Secret Show, Everville, and Imajica by Clive Barker. Lots of clandestine magic secrets and horrific, writhing creatures from parallel dimensions. The movie Lord of Illusions seems to have been (very) loosely based on some of the concepts from The Great and Secret Show, although I found the book to be vastly superior. IMO, Barker's a surprisingly good author, and extremely creative as well.

Edit: Also, if you liked the Dark Tower series, I highly recommend The Talisman and Black House, also by Stephen King. Both have very significant tie-ins to the Dark Tower. (Of course, there are some references to Dark Tower elements in almost all of his books, but these are more prevalent than most.)

 

[WayneLigon]

Possibly the greatest Dark Fantasy book ever written is Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury. Bradbury has a very dark turn to his work at times.

Chaosium has a wide range of Cthulhu related fiction: http://catalog.chaosium.com/index.php?cPath=66

 

[useridunavailable]

Possibly the greatest Dark Fantasy book ever written is Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury. Bradbury has a very dark turn to his work at times.

I love Bradbury, and I almost recommended this one, too.

 

[trancejeremy]

You might try James Blaylock and Tim Powers. Maybe both are more "quirky" than "dark", but sorta close.

Although calling them "dark" would be stretching things a bit, two of my favorite novels are modern day fantasies by Richard Knaak (semi-famous for doing some Dragonlance minotaur novel) - "King of the Grey" and "FrostWing". Also "The Janus Mask", though that's in a fantasy setting, not Earth. Darker, though.

(I think he got a book deal after the success of the Dragonlance novel, but his non-DL books didn't sell, so now he's back working on licensed fiction. But 3 out of the 4 books from that series - they all have similar covers, anyway - are great, IMHO).

And of course, if you are looking for sword & sorcery style dark fantasy, the best of that is the "Kane" series from the late Karl Edward Wagner. The books can be hard to find, but basically it's like if HPL and REH ever collaborated on writing fantasy novels. I mean, technically I guess Conan was in the backstory of the Cthulhu mythos, but never really tied in, other than a few names and common things. But the Kane stories have more overt Lovecraftian elements in them. Very dark, though. Kane is not a nice person. He's not the sort of evil that kills for fun (other than in battle), but he's completely ruthless. ( I think he's pretty much the definition of Lawful Evil, heck, maybe even the inspiration for it)

 

[Corwyn]

You could try China Mieville's "Perdido Street station" "The Scar" "Iron Council"

Lots of intrigue, politics, darkness in a steampunk kind of world.