The current state of fantasy literature

[Ratenef]

Elric - 9 books and counting

Fafryd and the Grey Mouser - 7 books

Conan - dozens of stories by Howard and countless more by others

Good examples of stand alone fantasy

Lieber is the only one who didn't sell out (not that Howard did but his copyright holders did).

The Elric saga was best with the first 6 books and Conan is best done by Howard.

(and if you give me Stephen King's number I'll certainly tell him what a hack he is for novels, he writes excellent short stories tho')

(please note the above is just me being devil's advocate....no flame war here...please)

 

[Essafah]

Actually, I was referring to the scene, ten pages in, of Rek waking up with the innkeepers daughter, having a very modern conversation about their (lack of) relationship, then getting served orange juice with his breakfast -- by her father.

When I tried to think of modern alternatives to Howard, I couldn't think of any -- in fantasy. In historical fiction though, Steven Pressfield's historical fiction might qualify. I highly recommend Gates of Fire, about the battle of Thermopylae.

I read all types of fiction, though I predominately read fantasy and horror, but still I will check out the books you recommended Gates of Fire, especially since I'm fond of Greek history and mythology.

Peace,
Essafah

 

[Essafah]

Elric - 9 books and counting

Fafryd and the Grey Mouser - 7 books

Conan - dozens of stories by Howard and countless more by others

Good examples of stand alone fantasy

Lieber is the only one who didn't sell out (not that Howard did but his copyright holders did).

The Elric saga was best with the first 6 books and Conan is best done by Howard.

(and if you give me Stephen King's number I'll certainly tell him what a hack he is for novels, he writes excellent short stories tho')

(please note the above is just me being devil's advocate....no flame war here...please)

Ratenef:

When you state, as you did in your previous post, that horror lends itself better to the short story format, I am curious as to know if you are included the genre of horror known as the "occult thriller" into that format as well?

For example, I am not a huge fan of Stephen King style horror, though I do feel Stephen King is a genius as what he does, but rather I am a fan of the aforementioned occult thriller genre of horror. This is a genre the frequently features somebody like a cop or say a private investigator, who begins investigated a string of crimes or bizarre occurrences that eventually end up taken on an occult or supernatural twist. The movie with Denzel Washington called Fallen or the X-files would be a good example of what I am talking about. In terms of authors and books the Repairman Jack novels by F. Paul Wilson, which features a private investigator/problem solver who on record doesn't exist (no social security number, no legit driver's license, etc.,) who battles against a demonical preternatural force called the Otherness. I also like the books Beyond Belief by Roy Johanson, Ghosts and Cemetary of Angels by Noel Hynd, all of which are cop thrillers, also the dark fantasy writings of Charles De Lint (writing as Samuel M. Keys) novels Mulengro, Angel of Darkness, and From a Whisper To Scream are all very good horror novels as opposed to short stories, and I think this genre of horror does better in the novel format than standard horror.

Peace,
Essafah

 

[Ratenef]

Gang,

If our concern is that there are no good stand alone fantasy novels, then we need to define stand alone.

To me ANY book that is 1) part of a series, 2) occurs in the same author's world, and/or 3) continues the adventures of the characters regardless of if it was written as a) short stories and then strung together, b) written as a single book and then added to OR c) Jordanized (written with the intent of dying before it was finished), then it is disqualified as a stand alone fantasy novel.

A stand alone fantasy novel that fits this bill (that I can quickly recollect) is Roger Zelazny's Jack of Shadows (good book by the way).

Now is the reason that there are no stand alone books of any quality:

1) demand is such that stand alone's will not sell
2) supply of series is forced upon us
3) the genre is such that a good idea is frequently beaten to death
4) other

I think that is what we need to discuss.

Personally, I think it is because of 1 and 2 (noted above). We the readers, by majority, desire/buy books that are serial in nature (See how David Eddings and Anne McCaffery have beaten their series to death....does anyone care about the doings of Belgaraths cousins/nephews/great uncle or one more go at the Dragon series by Anne!!). And the genre is such that unless you kill the character, or yourself die, you can just keep going and going and going (a al Jordan or Salvatore)

Thanks,

 

[Ratenef]

Essafah,

Let's not turn this thread into a personal conversation, so if you wish to continue this email me at ratenef@hotmail.com

As for your question, I usually stick to short story collections of horror preferably containing Edgar Allen Poe, H.P. Lovecraft and their peers or mentors.

I find that horror is best if you get one really good thrill from the story.

Novels tend to either have too many shocks so as to 'desensitize' you by the end or drag on so the 'big thrill' at the end is effective but anticlimatic. It is rare to find a novel that maintains an atmosphere of eerie throughout without being melodramatic.

I have read F. Paul Wilson's The Tomb and found it entertaining but not of the calibre of The Tell Tale Heart or The Whisperer in the Woods.

Send me a personal email and we can further discuss this out of forum.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Actually, I thought that you were saying that publishers had arbitrarily decided to switch to multibook series for no particuar reason, when it's clearly not the case. Fantasy fans have voted with their dollars. If they wanted more standalone books, they'd buy them.

I'd argue that, actually. I want more standalone fantasy books. I want a lot more good standalone fantasy books. If I could find them, I'd buy them.

But because 90%* of everything I find on the shelf these days is book 12 of 274, I don't buy. I've bought fewer fantasy novels in the past five years then I did during some single years in high school or college, because I refuse to buy a fantasy novel unless it:

A) Stands alone (or at least stands somewhat alone, such as most of Brust's "Taltos" books), or...

B) The series of which it is a part is fully complete and published.

Sometimes, I'm not in the mood for a 2,000 word opus. Sometimes I just want to read a book.

(* This number is an estimate based on my own experience. I don't pretend to have any factual data to back it up.)

 

[Dr. Talos]

An even older fantasy series(though not necessarily "fantasy" at the time they were written) were the works of Alexander Dumas. The Three Musketeers,The Count of Monte Cristo, Twenty Years After, and The Vicomte Bragelonne (AKA The Man in the Iron Mask) were all stories about the continuing adventures of the Musketeers. As these books were written in the mid 1800s, the idea of the serial novels in romantic/fantastic literature is not a new one.

If you want a great fantasy novel that was only recently published, try The Knight by Gene Wolfe. It is not as difficult to read as some of his earlier stuff and manages to turn out an extremely fresh and exciting take on what at first seem to be stanadard fantasy themes.

Another book I recently read that turned out to be pretty good was Shadow by K.J. Parker. Parts of the book make your brain do somersaults and unfortunately the book is the first in a series, but on the whole it turned out to be halfway decent.

As for the crud out there, I have to throw in The Ring of Five Dragons as terrible along with The Fifth Sorceress.

I am learning to never read any book advertised within the pages of Dragon.

 

[Orius]

First of all, there's the insistance on producing series that appear to go on forever, and of making each book extremely long. The business rationale for this is simple; the more text you produce, the more money you get. The problem is also simple; authors who work on carrying out just one story for one volume after another frequently reach a limit to what they can do in the one scenario that they have created, and don't have the chance to exercise their imagination by creating entirely new worlds. Furthermore, they have a tendency to bloat their books with filler material just to make them longer.

Why didn't the writer of this say "Robert Jordan" and be done with it? It's fairly evident who "authors" is reffering to.

Not that I dislike the WoT as a series. But when the last book has 3 chapters of that airhead Elayne taking a bath, while leaving out the details of Rand meeting Logain for the first time, I felt unsatified.

The final worrisome problem is the use of pervasive and graphic sex in fantasy novels. Of course, this is hardly a new development. Almost since the genre's origins, there have been authors who basically used the fantasy label as a thin excuse for writing pornography. Whether this has actually increased in recent years is tough to say. But we certainly see sex used more and more in marketing campaigns, and more and more claims that erotic scenes are necessary to make a fantays novel adult and realistic. In point of fact, most good adult fantasy doesn't contain any sex at all (some of you may have heard of a novel called Lord of the Rings, for instance), and too often the sex scenes in today's fantasy novels seem to be tossed in just to appease a horny teenage audience.

I'd generally agree here. I don't need graphic sex to enjoy a fantasy novel. If I want that I know where to get it. I wouldn't say that it's confined to te fantasy genre, I'd say authors are doing all over the place, and saying it's "art". Unless it's an important part of the story, it's not necessary, and even then, it doesn't have to be graphic.

 

[CCamfield]

I also find the highly moralistic characters in modern fantasy to be somewhat annoying.

Gah. Well, while those sorts of characters aren't always what I want to read about, I thought of a few authors that might interest you. Have you read any of:

- Glen Cook (I'm thinking of the Black Company series; then again, you might enjoy the skirt-chasing fantasy P.I. Garrett although the first bunch of books are out of print)
- Steven Erickson
- George R. R. Martin
- K. J. Parker
- come to think of it, Steven Brust (the Vlad Taltos books)

Chris

 

[Essafah]

Gah. Well, while those sorts of characters aren't always what I want to read about, I thought of a few authors that might interest you. Have you read any of:

- Glen Cook (I'm thinking of the Black Company series; then again, you might enjoy the skirt-chasing fantasy P.I. Garrett although the first bunch of books are out of print)
- Steven Erickson
- George R. R. Martin
- K. J. Parker
- come to think of it, Steven Brust (the Vlad Taltos books)

Chris

I read a Black Company novel a long, long time ago and I remember not liking it all that much. I have been wanting to revisit some of Glen Cook's works now that I am older and seeing what I think of them. Steven Erickson I haven't read nor have a read any of George R. R. Martin, but just from what I have read of his books in the stores I don't remember any of them leaping out at me. K.j. Parker I haven't read nor do I know anything about really so, I will look into this author. The Vlad Talto books I have read several of, and while I found them entertaining and unique I did not enjoy them as much I did David Gemmell's books, but I would definately say Brust's works are some of the best more modern fantasy works available today. Roger Zelazny Amber series I did think was incredible.

Peace,
Essafah