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A good fantasy book? you know, wizards, dragons, princesses, that kind of stuff

Well I'm craving something in this genre but I'm a bit overwhelmed and underwhelmed at the same time. So many titles and yet I'm not sure what to read. Maybe you can help?

I'm looking for something in a high fantasy setting. I'm not too keen on heavy politics and war driven plots (though, I can read that ). What really gets me is interesting characters, good action and magical creatures.

I've loved anything Discworld and I've also enjoyed the First Law books by Abercrombie.

I'm finding that Tolkien, Sanderson and George RR Martin appear on every fantasy list I come across, so if you do recommend something I'd appreciate it be something other than that.

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  • A few I've enjoyed that aren't mentioned elsewhere so far:

    • Robin McKinley, The hero and the crown. If you've never read this, please, just go and do so, if you read nothing else on this entire response. The Newbery Medal it got was well deserved. (And it has princesses and dragons and wizards.)

    • Louise Cooper, Indigo (8 short books). Sealed ancient evil, cursed protagonist on heroic journey, talking animal companion. Just lots of fun all around.

    • Lois McMaster Bujold, The curse of Chalion series. Maybe a little more politics than you are looking for, but the divinity/magic system works well and I appreciate that the viewpoint characters are generally kind of old and busted. She is of course better known for the (excellent) Miles Vorkosigan military space opera series.

    • Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear, A companion to wolves et seq. Exactly what it says on the tin; the catch is that the viewpoint character of the first book becomes bonded to a female wolf, which radically changes how his culture sees him.

    • Elizabeth Moon, The deed of Paksenarrion. Basically what you'd get if you wrote down a really good D&D campaign (but mostly for only one viewpoint character). Formulaic in spots but enjoyable and well executed.

    Other replies have mentioned Steven Brust's Vlad Taltos books, which I enjoyed a lot; and David (and Leigh) Eddings, which were my first big-kid fantasy novels (as for many other other American children of the 70s and 80s). Another long series in something of the same vein as Eddings is Raymond E. Feist's Riftwar saga; I haven't read the entries after 2000, but before that it was a lot of fun.

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