Veeky Forums approved books

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress is pretty neat, if you don't mind that it's kinda libertarian. It's nowhere near atlas shrugged to be fair, I'd say it measures about 0.55 on the Rand scale
Also, Mike is most bro-tier AI in fiction that I've read

Came here to post this.

We really do need to get a pastebin. Or maybe even a general for a Veeky Forums book club. Because I swear this question comes up every single week.

We get enough Veeky Forums specific discussion on fantasy and sci-fi that it's not really the same as Veeky Forums and we get exclusive dominion over "lore" discussions anyway.

Anyways, some good ones to read for the basics, in addition to the recommendations from the guy I linked, in no particular order:
Discworld Books
A Game of Thrones
The Once and Future King
The Lies of Locke Lamorra
The Dark Tower
All of H.P. Lovecraft
American Gods
The Black Company
A Princess of Mars
Mistborn
Elric of Melnibone
The Name of the Wind
Neuromancer
The Dying Earth
Nine Princes in Amber
Foundation
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
The Player of Games
Ready Player One

inb4 Dresden Files

>moon is a harsh mistress
Seconding. Excellent book.

Oh god... If there's one thing I hate it's people casually suggesting someone should read some incredibly long series without knowing anything about what they like to read. Sometimes that kind of book is their jam but some, like the Dresden Files, appeal to a very specific demographic.

I saw a buddy offhandedly recommend The Wheel of Time series to a guy. That's a several month long commitment to just give to someone without knowing anything about why they like fantasy novels.

The Malazan-series (A Tale of Malazan Book of the Dead) by Steven Erikson.

>Nine Princes in Amber
Let's put in the entire Corwin cycle (five books) instead of just the first book. The follow-up (Merlin cycle) I felt wasn't just as good.

Hugh Cook - 1980s author, his series is a mix of pratchett and grr Martin

Yen Olas Impadra has never been surpassed as a character for me.

Veeky Forums hates things that are popular and not 20 years old? Shocker!

The Malazan books. Both Erikson and Esselmont. Started as a homebrew campaign of some stripe, Erikson has a degree in anthropology, and while I will freely admit the first book in the series is almost painful to read, the whole lot is fantastic worldbuilding and character crafting. Seriously, give the series a try. I honestly picked up the third book on a whim, read it, then went back and read the earlier books, then the rest as they came out. Not afraid to throw his characters to the proverbial, and in some cases literal, wolves (Red Wedding? Martin is a rank amateur at killing characters!). The Black Company books by Glenn Cook are pretty solid, and his other works are decent in their way, his urban fantasy detective series being some fun. Despite all of the Mary Sues, Tom Lloyds twilight Reign books are alright, his newer foray, however "stranger of tempest" is a much more matured work, and it has mage guns, so there's a plus.

To be fair the second Name of the Wind was pure trash. Literally That Guy: the Novel

Kvothe a shit

This is why I only ever recommend The Redemption of Althaus for david eddings' work.

The orthogonal trilogy

The Bartimaeus Trilogy are my favourite fiction books not written by Tolkien.

I've always been driven away by the description of it being a series of children's novels even though the subject matter fascinates me.

Is the writing good, even if not complex? When we say children's novels are we talking Lemony Snicket or Phillip Pullman?

>Halo
Contact Harvest, Ghosts of Onyx, and The Cole Protocol range from acceptable to pretty good.

>Ready Player One
I can't recommend a book that boils down to "look at how many 80's pop culture references I can casually throw around...look, there's the Gundam and Voltron fighting!"

My dads friend from the Navy game me the trilogy. Good series. Besides that I like the discworld novels, especially the guards series

Recommending the first book of something is fine. If they don't like the book they shouldn't continue to read it, it's not like someone recommending you a book means you are obligated to read it.

Black company, Malaga book of the fallen, maybe powder mage trilogy, and the heroes come to mind for military fantasy

Not a pastebin but:
1d4chan.org/wiki/Approved_literature

I honestly don't like Ready Player One much myself but it's frequently used as reference for running Matrix adventures in cyberpunk games.

Specificity in cases where there are many works in a series can be helpful, but generally recommending a series tends to imply grab the first and start from there. However, seeing others here posting Malazan without warning about the first book makes me think that a little more detail in recommendations might be called for.

amazon.ca/Once-Samurai-Agent-Vampire-Hunter-Book-ebook/dp/B004NEUHX4

Best goddamn book ever, I tell you. Totally Veeky Forums material, everything about it. It is written by a guy who lives in my city, and it takes place in my city, which makes it awesome. You should buy it and read it. Better than Tolkien and Pratchett.

But seriously, if "The Room" was a book about a reincarnated samurai who is now a vampire hunter, this would be it

The Myth series by Robert Asprin are a lot of fun.
The Xanth series by Piers Anthony is another good series in the same vein.
They're Made Out of Meat by Terry Bisson is a great short story that's available for free on the author's website.
Discworld, but that goes without saying.
Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, the dream team.
Sophocles' three Theban Plays, Antigone in particular is pretty dank.
The Iliad and The Odyssey by Homer
Anabasis by Xenophon
The Dark Lord of Derkholm and Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones.
You're also pretty safe picking up anything by Issac Asimov or Jules Verne.
I remember liking Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series when I was in high school, but I'm not sure how well that would stack up now that I have a degree in history.

Aннa Кapeнинa.

>Recommending Tolstoy
>Recommending a pink snot book about cucking wife and not glorious "War and Peace"
eбин

Malazan Book of the Fallen
A Game of Thrones
H.P. Lovecraft
The Black Company
American Gods
Lord of The Rings
Lolita
Discworld
Prince of Nothing
The Abhorsen Trilogy

The Thieves World books by Robert Asprin and others. Early shared universe work. Very different from most of what would follow.

...

>Malazan Book of the Fallen
>A Game of Thrones

Fuck off

>The Black Company
>Lolita
>Discworld

Ah ok sorry man

No one's mentioned Snow Crash yet. It's dumb, but super fun and I love reading it.

>The Abhorsen Trilogy
My nigga

The most recent 2 (Clariel and Goldenhand) were great for worldbuilding the Old Kingdom, but lacked some of the spirit of the first three. Then again, Sabriel is just far and away better than Lirael and Abhorsen, but at least they have pretty good legs to stand on.

Thinking about it, these books are probably why I never took anyone seriously who.called out fantasy for having no good female protagonists.

> good Omens
How can I recommend American Gods and forget good Omens? That book is just fantastic.

>Completely normal list of recs with Lolita casually thrown into the middle
I love you.

Hmm, I want to disagree with that, but I can't until book 3 comes out.

I'm dead sure that in book 3 all the general douchiness of kvothe will come back to wreck him utterly, but if the author pulls some "but it all worked out" bull the whole setup/payoff will be ruined.

/fk/
/off/
/cnt/

My hopes align with yours, but keep in mind we already know how a lot of It ultimately plays out.

make me

Not him, but Jonathan strouds writing is awesome. Where he really shines is characterization, though. He writes with a maturity way beyond most adult books.

I was thrown off for a second because I remember when /fk/ existed and couldn't figure out how the other two related to that board.

If we're talking only fantasy and science fiction

Blindsight by Peter Watts
Perfido Street Station/Looking for Jake by China Mieville
Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe
Everything Discworld by Terry Pratchett
Good Omens by Pratchett and Gaiman
American Gods by Neil Gaiman
The Night Lords Trilogy by A.D. Bowden
Dawnthief by Barclay
Everything Conan by Howard
The Foundation Cycle by Asimov
Philip K. Dick in general
Neuromancer by Gibson
Snow Crash by Stephenson
The Methods of Rationality by that one guy whose name I can't remember

I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot of them

Kind of tangent to the OP's original intent, but what makes a book a Veeky Forums book? Is it the setting? Is it the magic? The fictional science? Is it the way the story is told? It is it is it the way the world is developed? Is it the characters? Answering these may help to create a profile by which to better identify what kind of books should qualify as Veeky Forums literature.

Obviously the Greeks.

I guess I'll throw some Warhammer books that I liked and get ready for REEEs

Iron Within
Eisenhorn series
The Emperor's Gift

Gotrek & Felix series
Nagash the Sorcerer (didn't read the other 2 from trilogy yet)
Liber Chaotica
Liber Necris

Why hasn't the book of the New Sun been posted yet? It's the greatest work of science fiction ever composed

Gave Six of Crows a read, didn;t know there was a big Trilogy before it though. Either way I got the gist of the world and such, and it was pretty good read. A well done dickass thief for the protagonist.

...

The Wheel of Time series. Had some really neat world-building aspects. I particularly enjoyed the unusual take on the classic "muh honour" nation/people.

SUP HOES

Thank user, have you read it?

That cover is a goddamn work of art.

See that character?

It's the author. In CG.

Things I consider actually good:
Peter F Hamilton 'Commonwealth Saga, Void Trilogy, Chronicle of the Fallers, Night's Dawn trilogy. Loved them all.
Terry Pratchett's anything, discworld in particular of course
Stephen King's Dark Tower heptalogy
Gene Wolf's Latro in the Mist
Nabokov's Lolita

>Things I consider enjoyable but not good per se
Jim Butcher's Dresden Files
Towing Jehovah
The Gospel according to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Yeah, kind of. Three fourths in - it's amazing. On another level, kind of, especially when it reflects on symbols and the like. Linda feel like reading the Soldier in the Mist reading. You read it?

The Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Mistborn is generally seen as a starting authors piece, with the flaws that would inevitably come with it, but it's hardly shit on to any special degree.
You're dead on with Kvoth's shenanigans, however.

Only read the first one, but the Powder mage series looks good.
Just hope it doesn't go to shit

What about recommended comics, films?

>Ready Player One
>Look at me spout pop culture references! I'm so witty!
yeah nah
but most of the rest are good (the ones I've read, at least)

>Hammers Slammers
>Red Army
good man
>Pretty much every tom clancy novel
Eh, I'd argue that the best are the first few, and it goes downhill from there. RSR and Red October are the best by far.

Team Yankee (how the fuck has nobody brought it up)
Horatio Hornblower books
Flashman

Walter Moers stuff never gets talked about but The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear and Rumo are solid action oriented adventure stories while The Alchemaster's Apprentice, The City of Dreaming Books, and its sequel are all a bit more centralized and based around riddle and problem solving and other fun stuff

The Temeraire series is pretty good. I wish Novak would give up on how to make dragons scientifically plausible, but it's an interesting alt-history series that's described by "what if the Napoleonic Wars had dragons?" There's often some "what makes a man" stuff when Temeraire gets and spreads the idea that dragons should be treated as more than trainable war-beasts, some discussion of how far one ought to take "I do my duty for King and country," and also plenty of humor of... several types.
The most memorable part I've read so far was when Temeraire sort of casually admits to pleasuring himself in the river the humans were drawing cooking water from; it's memorable mostly because I honestly didn't expect *anything* physically published to go near there, especially in a story that wasn't specifically for dragons being lewd.
All in all, though, a pretty good read, does dragon characters downright excellently.

Seconding this. I picked up A Study In Scarlet expecting it to be the same fare as other "I read this book to be an *intellectual*" stuff, but I legitimately enjoyed it, and the others I read after. Holmes isn't TOO far away from an everyman; it's easy to think that someone could get close to him in terms of observational skills, and from time to time he explains his deductions thoroughly.
Plus, something that people often don't mention when discussing the books, he's FLAWED. He's an opium addict, he's far from the most charismatic person, and he is very upfront that he does not care in the slightest about and will promptly forget things he doesn't think will be useful to him (Watson tells him the Earth revolves around the Sun, Holmes pretty much says "useless, deleting from brain"). It made the books a lot more enjoyable once I saw that it wasn't "Oh, ever-brilliant and perfect Sherlock Holmes, please look at the scene of the crime and magically tell us who the killer is!"

>The name of the Wind
>puking loli.jpg

The belgariad, the mallorean and other series by David eddings I found very enjoyable

Whether the contrary assholes we are in this board can agree that a book is good.

Lolita fits none of the criteria you listed, but the consensus is that it's tg approved, so far.

-Not tg btw, It was recommended to me as a "fantasy classic" and still i'm amazed that i lasted for whole 50 or So pages. Whats up with this "baby first fantasy series nostalgia hardon books"? I can understand that it can be a favorite of some fanfiction obsesed poser tg girl but common, its just cringy and awful.

I always see it as either something that directly has a Veeky Forums related game attached, something that is a major inspiration for the various games out there (like Tolkien or Howard's works), or something that can be used to inspire settings and games.
Alternately, a how not to do it would be acceptable, like Eragon or Sword of truth

I've heard literally all the female characters in that series are insufferable snarky cunts. How true is it?

If this is a lit thread, can someone tell me the pros of Dune? I was recommended it by an ex and it's a little bit of a slog so far.

You'd be amazed at the shit that gets recommended in fantasy.

I got free the darkness (I know, but I thought the name wasn't going to be indicative) because it was apparently some amazing breakout work, and it turned it to be the worst thing I've ever read, including Eragon.
It boggled my mind, but then I remembered that Eragon also got good reviews, albeit because he managed to convince people he was only 15 when he finished it.

Fantasy has very oddly low standards, which is why it's critical to have recommendation threads here, where you can actually corroborate on if something is good, bad or at least worth a shot.

Um

it's...good?

I guess?

Idk, apparently it gets better as the series goes on.

just curious what's with all the Eragon hate I read that shit as a youngin and only made it to the second book but remember having a pretty ok time

To be fair, everything that Zelesny wrote is fantastic.
Dune was already mentioned, so my pick for Herbert would be Destination Void and The Jesus Incident, which were a direct inspiration for the Alpha Centauri video game.

...

>Eragon
Always curious about this too. Never read the series but people I have very low opinions of never fail to recommend it.

My favorite novel is Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy. Favorite non-novel is Fitzgerald's third edition of the Rubaiyat of Omar Kayyam (it's more lyrical and accuracy is irrelevant).

It's literally (literally) just Star Wars but with elves and dragons.

BOOK THREE WHEN

True that, frankly i don't remember the last time, when I found something good from fantasy genere. I read mostly sci-fi because of this - you can easily find more mature/quality stuff, even with fantasy elements to it. Im no /litfag but fantasy books Are seriously just crap nowadays.

You have objectively bad taste in literature.

No one cares, you cock-sucking faggot.

Go buy this book

since it has not been said yet, Last Call by Tim Powers.

Hey OP asked, angry-friend.

Literature and poetry should be more important to your gaming than beach reads.

I have such mixed feelings about this series. It reads like Veeky Forums guy writing his first book with so many cool ideas he wants to fit into his world and I recognize it for what it is but I still like it even as it is slowly turning into fantasy wizard justice league.

>Comics
Western:
Justice League International/Europe
The Bus by Paul Kirchner
Paul Kirchner's Realms
Conan the Barbarian (Marvel Comics)
Bone
Green Lantern/Green Arrow
Superior Foes of Spiderman
Hitman
All-Star Superman
All-Star Section 8
Whatever happened to the Man of Tomorrow
Alan Moore's Swamp Thing
Alan Moore's Miracleman
Watchmen
Multiversity
Doom Patrol (both the original and Grant Morrison's)
Grant Morrison's Animal Man
Godzilla in Hell
Judge Dredd
Flash: Rebirth
Blue and Gold
It Hurts!!
The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck
Meg, Mogg and Owl
Mouseguard
Maus
The Sandman
Order of the Stick
The Eltingville Club
World's Finest Comics

Manga:
Berserk
Dungeon Meshi
Yotsuba&!
Dr. Slump
Dragon Ball
Vinland Saga
Hinamatsuri
Needless
Everything by Dowman Sayman
Everything by Morita Masanori
Uzumaki
Gyo
Takeru: Supplementary Biography of Japan
SoreMachi
Flying Witch
Sumire 16-sai
One Piece
Otoyomegatari
Helck
Dasei 67%
Hakumei to Mikochi
Grand Blue
Golden Kamui
Quick Start!!!
Stravaganza: Isai no Hime
Bonnouji
Nichibros
Takeo-chan Bukkairoku
Neko Musume Michikusa Nikki
Hunter X Hunter

Can't speak to the others, but Name of the Wind sucks.

>slowly turning into fantasy wizard justice league.
if you don't think that's the tightest shit you can get out of my face

ignore the cover, it's actually a great story about a man torn between friendship and duty

probably the best battletech book

I disagree, there's a lot of great series that took some time to find their footing. I can imagine someone reading The Color of Magic and deciding Discworld isn't for them, meanwhile they would have loved Guards! Guards! or Reaper Man.

The new cover is pretty good