10 Fantasy Novels

Rvman directed me to the fantasy list and poll on the same site as the SF one I talked about yesterday. I agree with him that this list is pretty broad; I suppose any book with a fantastical element to it (including magical realism, etc.) was eligible for inclusion.

Here’s my list of 10 favorites:

Watership Down – Richard Adams
I loved this book even before I became obsessed with all things bunny, but now, man. Funny, wise, and very beautiful. The end of this book makes me cry every single time I read it… or think about it, if I'm honest. And I don't cry reading books.

The Last Unicorn – Peter S. Beagle
A childhood favorite that I still enjoy re-reading every several years. So many details from this story are stuck in my head forever; I feel like I know what a butterfly sings like, what a harpy looks like the moment before it takes its revenge, and how a down-on-his-luck magician of little talent might find himself changed forever by a wild-haired and wilder-spirited woman and a being of true beauty.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll [and Through the Looking Glass]
Great hilarious fun with an intellectual bent; you’ve got to love the humorous treatment of logic, linguistics, politics, and social mores. The Annotated Alice with commentary by Martin Gardner added greatly to my pleasure in reading and re-reading the Alice stories.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell – Susanna Clarke
I’m not sure how this choice will stand the test of time, but I really liked this comedy of manners set in a 19th century England with magicians. The footnotes were priceless.

Thomas Covenant – Stephen Donaldson
High fantasy from a writer who isn’t afraid to create anti-heroes of questionable-at-best moral standing or let really bad things happen to the characters you find yourself liking. Wordier than it needs to be, but admit it: so was The Lord of the Rings; Donaldson dwells at length on an individual’s emotional state while Tolkein could go on for a week describing a group of trees in a not particularly interesting way. A controversial choice, perhaps.

Perdido Street Station – China Mieville
This book became an immediate favorite of mine. Huge and filled to bursting, the book is as much about the city where the story takes place (cf. Titus Groan) as it is the highly unusual characters in it. An outcast scientist, his bug-humanoid artist girlfriend, a mysterious and dangerous grub, and most interesting of all, an alien but emotionally compelling bird-like creature, stripped of his wings. Also recommended: The Scar.

Watchmen – Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
A dark, intelligent treatment of the superhero comic.

Titus Groan – Mervyn Peake
It’s all about the wonderful slow, complex, thorough descriptions of the peculiar places, characters, and events in the gothic, claustrophobic world of the castle Gormenghast.

The Golden Compass – Philip Pullman [and the rest of the series]
Completely kicks Harry Potter’s ass in the “contemporary youth fantasy novels read by adults” category. Famous for inspiring the name of the blog Alethiography.

The Once & Future King – T H White
Hugely entertaining. I am particularly fond of the section in which Wart is turned into a hawk for a night, listening to the serious discussions of the other raptors in the mews.

First Alternate:
The Hobbit – J R R Tolkein: On another day, when it’s been longer since I’ve read Jonathan Strange, this could easily have been on my top 10. A nostalgic favorite.

Honorable Mentions:
Charlie & the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl (kind of representing all of his books)
Outlander – Diana Gabaldon (which I include less as a fantasy novel and more because it’s the best romance novel I’ve read by several orders of magnitude)
Neverwhere – Neil Gaiman (also representing all of his books)
Bridge of Birds – Barry Hughart
The Metamorphosis – Franz Kafka (the fantasy book my father most commonly read to me, translating from the German in real-time, as a child)
The Prestige – Christopher Priest
Lord of the Rings – J R R Tolkein

I was surprised by how few of the highly ranked books I have even read. In the top 20, there were quite a few books I have not even heard of, which wasn’t the case on the SF list.

The most obvious of the top 20 books that I have not read are A Song of Ice & Fire and that increasingly huge series, which I know from many sources (including Rvman) is supposed to be good for those who like a strong dash of throne-room intrigue in their epic fantasy stories (seeing George R R Martin’s name in close proximity to J R R Tolkein – who my dad calls J R R R R R R Tolkein – makes me wonder about the whole “extra R”/fantasy-blockbuster connection) and The Sword of Shannara, which I cannot imagine that I will ever want to read. Ever. I don't do that kind of fantasy.

Looking at the thumbnail descriptions of the books, though, I have discovered several that sound very promising. If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino seems bizarre and fascinating, for instance.

Most egregious omission of a beloved fantasy novel from the list: Waking the Moon by Elizabeth Hand. It has several elements that tend to push my buttons anyway – a college setting, a secret society, religious power struggles, witchcraft, natural history museums, sex, feminism – which came together in a very enjoyable story that I have read several times and think of with surprising frequency. Recommended for those who like their “strong female characters” very, very strong indeed.