Best Fantasy Fiction
Discover the best fantasy fiction books of all time! Explore epic adventures, magical worlds, and unforgettable characters in our curated list of top fantasy reads.
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The Eye of the World
by Robert Jordan
The Wheel of Times turns and Ages come and go, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth returns again. In the Third Age, and Age of Prophecy, the World and Time themselves hang in the balance. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.
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A Game of Thrones
by George R. R. Martin
NOW THE ACCLAIMED HBO SERIES GAME OF THRONES—THE MASTERPIECE THAT BECAME A CULTURAL PHENOMENON Here is the first book in the landmark series that has redefined imaginative fiction and become a modern masterpiece. A GAME OF THRONES In a land where summers can last decades and winters a lifetime, trouble is brewing. The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes to the North of Winterfell, sinister and supernatural forces are massing beyond the kingdom’s protective Wall. At the center of the conflict lie the Starks of Winterfell, a family as harsh and unyielding as the land they were born to. Sweeping from a land of brutal cold to a distant summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, here is a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. Amid plots and counterplots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, the fate of the Starks, their allies, and their enemies hangs perilously in the balance, as each endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones. A GAME OF THRONES • A CLASH OF KINGS • A STORM OF SWORDS • A FEAST FOR CROWS • A DANCE WITH DRAGONS
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The Great Book of Amber
by Roger Zelazny
Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber have earned their place as all-time classics of imaginative literature. Now here are all ten novels, together in one magnificent omnibus volume. Witness the titanic battle for supremacy waged on Earth, in the Courts of Chaos, and on a magical world of mystery, adventure, and romance.
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Magician: Apprentice
by Raymond E. Feist
A worthy pupil . . . A dangerous quest To the forest on the shore of the Kingdom of the Isles, the orphan Pug came to study with the master magician Kulgan. But though his courage won him a place at court and the heart of a lovely Princess, he was ill at ease with the normal ways of wizardry. Yet Pug's strange sort of magic would one day change forever the fates of two worlds. For dark beings from another world had opened a rift in the fabric of spacetime to being again the age-old battle between the forces of Order and Chaos. Praise for Magician: Apprentice “Totally gripping . . . A fantasy of epic scope, fast-moving action and vivid imagination.”—The Washington Post Book World “Most exciting . . . A very worthy and absorbing addition to the fantasy field.”—Andre Norton “The best new fantasty in years . . . has a chance of putting its aughor firmly on the trone next to Tolkien—and keeping him there.”—The Dragon Magazine
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The Sword of Shannara Trilogy
by Terry Brooks
For the first time in one elegant collector’s edition hardcover, and featuring an introduction by New York Times bestselling author Terry Brooks, here are the first three novels of that classic series: The Sword of Shannara, The Elfstones of Shannara, and The Wishsong of Shannara—the beginning of a phenomenal epic of good and evil. The Sword of Shannara Long ago, the wars of the ancient Evil ruined the world. In peaceful Shady Vale, half-elfin Shea Ohmsford knows little of such troubles. But the supposedly dead Warlock Lord is plotting to destroy everything in his wake. The sole weapon against this Power of Darkness is the Sword of Shannara, which can be used only by a true heir of Shannara. On Shea, last of the bloodline, rests the hope of all the races. The Elfstones of Shannara The magical Ellcrys tree is dying, loosening the spell that bars the Demons from enacting vengeance upon the land. Now Wil Ohmsford must guard the Elven girl Amberle on a perilous quest as she carries one of the Ellcrys’ seeds to a mysterious place where it can be quickened into a powerful new force. But dark on their trail comes the Reaper, most fearsome of all Demons, aiming to crush their mission at any cost. The Wishsong of Shannara An ancient Evil is stirring to new life, sending its ghastly Mord Wraiths to destroy Mankind. To win through the vile growth that protects this dark force, the Druid Allanon needs Brin Ohmsford—for she alone holds the magic power of the wishsong. Reluctantly Brin joins the Druid on his dangerous journey. But a prophecy foretells doom, as Evil nurses its plans to trap the unsuspecting Brin into a fate far more horrible than death. Thus begins Terry Brooks’s thrilling Shannara epic, an unforgettable tale of adventure, magic, and myth.
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Assassin's Apprentice
by Robin Hobb
“Fantasy as it ought to be written . . . Robin Hobb’s books are diamonds in a sea of zircons.”—George R. R. Martin Young Fitz is the bastard son of the noble Prince Chivalry, raised in the shadow of the royal court by his father’s gruff stableman. He is treated as an outcast by all the royalty except the devious King Shrewd, who has him secretly tutored in the arts of the assassin. For in Fitz’s blood runs the magic Skill—and the darker knowledge of a child raised with the stable hounds and rejected by his family. As barbarous raiders ravage the coasts, Fitz is growing to manhood. Soon he will face his first dangerous, soul-shattering mission. And though some regard him as a threat to the throne, he may just be the key to the survival of the kingdom. Praise for Robin Hobb and Assassin’s Apprentice “A gleaming debut in the crowded field of epic fantasies . . . a delightful take on the powers and politics behind the throne.”—Publishers Weekly “This is the kind of book you fall into, and start reading slower as you get to the end, because you don’t want it to be over.”—Steven Brust
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Pawn of Prophecy
by David Eddings
The farm boy, Garion, begins a dangerous quest to recover the magic Orb and prevent the evil Torak from seizing power over the world.
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Lord of the Isles
by David Drake
A couple of teens rescue from the sea an old woman who turns out to be a wizard from another world. The woman is joined by other wizards and they take the teens on an adventure in magic.
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Ender's Game
by Orson Scott Card
From New York Times bestselling author Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game—adapted to film in 2013 starring Asa Butterfield and Harrison Ford—is the classic Hugo and Nebula award-winning science fiction novel of a young boy's recruitment into the midst of an interstellar war. In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race's next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew "Ender" Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn't make the cut—young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training. Ender's skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister. Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender's two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives. Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game is the winner of the 1985 Nebula Award for Best Novel and the 1986 Hugo Award for Best Novel. THE ENDER UNIVERSE Ender series Ender’s Game / Ender in Exile / Speaker for the Dead / Xenocide / Children of the Mind Ender’s Shadow series Ender’s Shadow / Shadow of the Hegemon / Shadow Puppets / Shadow of the Giant / Shadows in Flight Children of the Fleet The First Formic War (with Aaron Johnston) Earth Unaware / Earth Afire / Earth Awakens The Second Formic War (with Aaron Johnston) The Swarm /The Hive Ender novellas A War of Gifts /First Meetings
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Battlefield Earth
by L. Ron Hubbard
Jonnie Goodboy Tyler ventures out of the tiny community of humans barely surviving in the Rocky Mountain refuge and finds himself challenging the Psychlos, the malignant and oppressive alien conquerors of Earth.
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Battle Circle
by Piers Anthony
The brilliant, riveting tale of the savage struggle for empire and dominance in post-cataclysmic America.
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The Paradise War
by Stephen Lawhead
In an ancient cairn in the wilds of Scotland, Oxford student Simon Rawson vanishes, seemingly into thin air. Where has he gone? Unsettling signs -- a mysterious Green Man, a Celtic circle chalked on the sidewalk -- point his roommate, Lewis Gillies, to an impossible answer ... and an incredible destiny on the other side of a doorway between worlds.
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Red Branch
by Morgan Llywelyn
"Powerful . . . A lusty, poetic and legendary world based on Ireland's mythical warrior-hero Cuchulain." The New York Times Book Review In a land ruled by war and love and strange enchantments, Cuchulain -- torn between gentleness and violence, haunted by the croakings of a sinister raven -- fights for his honor and his homeland and discovers too late the trap that the gods have set for him in the fatal beauty of Deirdre and the brutal jealousy of King Conor.
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A Spell for Chameleon
by Piers Anthony
BEST NOVEL OF THE YEAR, BRITISH FANTASY SOCIETY • Discover the magical beginning of Piers Anthony’s enthralling Xanth series Xanth was the enchanted land where magic ruled—where every citizen had a special spell only he could cast. It was a land of centaurs and dragons and basilisks. For Bink of North Village, however, Xanth was no fairy tale. He alone had no magic. And unless he got some—and got some fast!—he would be exiled. Forever. But the Good Magician Humfrey was convinced that Bink did indeed have magic. In fact, both Beauregard the genie and the magic wall chart insisted that Bink had magic. Magic as powerful as any possessed by the King or by Good Magician Humfrey—or even by the Evil Magician Trent. Be that as it may, no one could fathom the nature of Bink’s very special magic. Bink was in despair. This was even worse than having no magic at all . . . and he would still be exiled! Thus begins Piers Anthony’s enthralling Xanth series. . . .
