I don't agree with it in its entirety, but it is a pretty good list (with some noticeable omissions): http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2016/02/the-30-best-fantasy-book-series-of-all-time.html
What a horrible list. As much as love Brent Weeks as an author and some of his books, the Night Angel trilogy is... horrible towards the end. Where is the Dragonlance series? That is iconic! I'm amazed they have Redwall there, though. Amazing series but somehow I can't believe it belongs to the list compared to some of the things there and lacking therein.
All perspective in some ways. We can go by a lot of things really. I mean I LOOOOOOOOOOOOVE The Dresden Files and I'm reading The Black Company collection (first three books) atm and its awesome! (@Steerpike thanks btw!) But I'm not big on Dragon Lance or WoT but their popularity can't be denied. Most of all The Wheel of Time and the Brandon Sanderson books which are like natural inheritors to that kinda fantasy. Its really hard to make a list of the best, I suppose.
I plan to read the Gentleman Bastard and First Law series. They're morally complex and gritty approaches is exactly what fantasy needs to escape your typical D&D cliche stuff. Harry Potter shouldn't be there and it is so not adult. The plot has way too many holes and simplistic characters for the good stuff to make up for it.(Snape is a good character) It's good for it's genre. Adolescent fiction. It's like a Disney fairy tale. You want to know an adolescent appealing series that does better with mature stuff? The Monster Blood Tattoo Trilogy. The main character has a little bit of what I call Main Character Syndrome, but it has brilliant world-building and some killer artwork. And Europe is extremely cool.
Fairly sure it's not meant to be an adults only list. It's hard to claim Narnia, Earthsea and Chronicles of Prydain are adult books. Like it or not, the popularity of Potter is such they couldn't really get away with omitting it.
But that's my point. It's a popularity influenced list, it's significantly unfair towards the things people wanted to be there. It's therefore bringing more questionable stuff.
Hmm I'm not sure what you're saying at all now. Is there a difference between popularity and 'the things people wanted to be there'? I'm suspect if Harry Potter was missed off that list they'd be people in the comments section of that article saying, 'how did you miss Harry Potter?' Or are they not the people you had in mind?
That's what I mean. Unfair positively towards that. It's going with placation as opposed to genuine quality. Sure, Harry Potter is pretty good, but there's a lot that is better.
No we aren't. Says "best," which could include iconic series or not. It's just whatever these people think after the best.
Yes, not limited to adult books. Without getting into the head of the judges it's hard to say what influenced them individually. I know people (mainly those who grew up with Potter) for whom Potter really is their favorite fantasy series of all time. It's not mine. If I were doing the list alone it likely wouldn't be on there, nor would Drizz't or any gaming tie-in fiction I can think of.
'Genuine quality' is fairly subjective for this kind of thing, though. J K Rowling might not be gritty, and might not write the most beautiful prose, but she can deliver page-turners like an absolute bastard. And that's what a lot of people want from their fantasy.
Hmm, I've read a third of these series (at least the first books). Maybe I do know a thing or two about that genre I profess to hate?????
I think there are a lot of good works on the list, so it's pretty good in that sense. Some of the omissions are striking. My guess is that it is a combination of popularity and some of the judges not having a great deal of knowledge of the genre.
But that's par for the course in such lists, be it books, film, TV, whatever. There's a perfunctory nod to some classics but then everything else pretends that the universe began 10 years ago.
Also, many who grew up with Potter are now in their mid-20s. As with many of us, I suspect their first entre into the genre as young people is always going to hold a certain sentimental attachment for them. If the Potter books were your childhood love and your exposure to the genre, you're likely to always consider that one of the best works. I was glad to see both The Black Company series and Malazan on the list, which are two I quite like.
This is true. I was never a Fantasy Boy, but instead a Science Fiction Boy. I hold DUNE to my bosom as though it were a religious text, which I am sure Muad'dib would find ironic.
A great novel, so I can't say I blame you I could do a similar list for science fiction novels. So many great ones over the years. Then there are all of the potential crossover novels. Where do you put something like the Wraeththu books, for example? Science fiction or fantasy? The Pern books are on the fantasy list linked above, but don't they also crossover?
Both would seem like crossover to me. Wraeththu does a triple cross-over in that I would also shelve it under erotica. I'm surprised that the Darkover novels are not on that list. That's a sad miss on their part. But... jinkies... the Thomas Covenant novels are there and you know my relationship with those books. If nothing else, the list does at least support my claims in conversations concerning those books as to their lofty position in the world of Fantasy when they came out. Regardless, they were unpalatable to me.
@Wreybies Yes, Darkover is another notable omission, though I suppose given the setting and origins of the people in those stories, one could argue they're also SF or at least crossovers. They're based on planetary colonization. I suppose the same is true of Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun, which is also crossover and one of the more egregious omissions if you include it as fantasy. Good point about Wraeththu. Also, I don't think those books are widely known. I liked the Thomas Convenant books well enough, though I read them in high school and still hated the main character. Have you read Donaldson's SF Gap series? He knows how to stick a knife into the reader and twist the blade.
So are the Pern books, once Anne actually gets around to explaining to us how this lovely world of musicians, dragon tamers, and deadly christmas tinsel came to be. She eventually gives a description of a Pernian finding the buried remains of a colony ship, which, I might add, in true Fantasy fashion, somehow still has power all these centuries later. The Darkover novels are more up-front, though, true, as to how humans came to be on this world. Anne's work leaned more to the Fantasy. ETA: In The Dragonlover's Guide to Pern, there is a more fully realized backstory regarding the colonization of Pern. This may also exist in the many subsequent Pern novels that came out later. My experience with these books is limited to the Harper Hall Trilogy and the first three of the Dragonriders of Pern series (The White Dragon being the last that I read). Also, I'm a sucker for these kinds of "encyclopedias". Spoiler: The Dragonlover's Guide to Pern
"Iconic" would make an interesting list. If you went with iconic, it seems to me that Conan would have to be on it.
That list gave me a few additions to my TBR pile, thanks for sharing. I see Mistborn is on it... I'm some 300+ pages in but still not impressed, tbh. The protagonist is just a bit too whiny for my taste and the world isn't all that riveting either. I know teenagers can be whiny, but it's gotten quite annoying by now. >_>
