What Dying Earth books should I pick up?

[blackshirt5]

I'm headed to the library in a little bit, to drop off and pick up some books. What Vance books should I pick up?(I wanna get a feeling for how Vancian magic is)

 

[Duvall]

Just one

If you can find Tales of the Dying Earth you'll have all 4 books in one volume. Pretty cheap to buy. Something like $12 on Amazon

 

[blackshirt5]

What are the names of the stories?

BTW, did he write short stories, or novels?

 

[Churchill]

Vance wrote fantasy and SF, and he wrote both novels and short stories. And he did all of it amazingly well. Bad Vance is better than many authors good work.

 

[Gospog]

Blackshirt,

The anthology already mentioned is excelent.

Otherwise, pick up the Cugel stories:

Eyes of the Overworld
Cugel's Saga

Ther excellent Dying Earth RPG books also do a great job of capturing the feel of Vance's work.

As does my Dying Earth Story Hour.

(edited for book title)

 

[Gez]

Dying Earth books are excellents.
The two Cugel books are excellents.
You should also read the fantabulously excellent Lyonesse trilogy.

That's about all you need for Vancian magic.

 

[Richards]

That anthology mentioned earlier includes the following:

The Dying Earth (compilation of short stories)
The Eyes of the Overworld (first Cugel novel)
Cugel the Clever (second Cugel novel)
Rhialto the Marvellous (novel about a band of wizards)

Despite them having been written in that order, each is standalone enough that you can read them in any order and not miss out on anything. (I mention that only in case you can only find one of the later books in the library; don't feel you have to read them in order!) Oh, and I've also seen Morreion, which is a novella-sized excerpt from Rhialto the Marvellous, as an illustrated, oversized book as well.

The Lyonesse trilogy consists of the following:

Suldrun's Garden
The Green Pearl
Madouc

These, however, are a trilogy in the sense that they should be read in that order. Lyonesse is a little odd (for Vance) in that it's set in Arthurian times; most of Vance's fantasy works are set in the far future - so far, in fact, that the Sun could sputter out at any moment; hence "The Dying Earth."

They are all excellent reads, I might add, but I might be slightly biased in that Jack Vance is my all-time favorite author, bar none.

Johnathan

 

[Assenpfeffer]

Anyone who's seriously into Vance should do themselves a favor and check out Talislanta. It's dedicated to him, and shows his influence cleraly, in addition to being an amazing work of world and system design in its own right.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Re: Just one

If you can find Tales of the Dying Earth you'll have all 4 books in one volume. Pretty cheap to buy. Something like $12 on Amazon

Heh. I got a used copy of Compleat Dying Earth for $8 ($5 + $3 shipping). It's a pretty good slice of Vance's writing.

I like the book, though 'predictable' doesn't begin to describe it...