I'm looking for fantasy books that feature a cast of lithe, angry, cool, feminite characters and a relatively cruel and dark fantasy world. I must admit that I'm a complete newbie to fantasy books. In fact, I've read about 5 fantasy books in my whole life. Don't worry, I won't start chewing on the book cover. [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Basically, when I was reading the Potter series and got to the 3rd book and read how a legendary criminal fell on the floor after being kicked by a 13 year old girl, I decided that the series isn't meant for me. [img]tongue.gif[/img]


Examples on what I want:

Cool fantasy world.

Cool characters.

That's anime, but you get the point. [img]tongue.gif[/img]


Thanks in advance.

Not sure if it's exactly what you're looking for, but the George R.R. Martin "A Song of Ice and Fire" books are very dark.

Try Dragonlance. May seem sappy, but trust me, the later ones don't always end with good winning. BTW, I agree completely with the prior poster, George RR Martin kicks ass.

[ 10-26-2005, 08:58 PM: Message edited by: Sir Degrader ]

Try the Darksword trilogy too. Authors of DL did it but the world-setting is way darker. The storyline is subtley sattirical and ultimately, tragic.

Yes, George RR Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" series is a very good series. You'll see plenty of "dark" things happen and it will also piss you off a couple of times.

George R.R. Martin!
George R.R. Martin!
George R.R. Martin!

Ahem.. and if you've read 'A Song of Ice and Fire', you might want to try the Drow 'War of the Spiderqueen' books. They're pretty dark, featuring betrayel, torture, and more of those typical Drow trademarks. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Terry Brooks is decent (Shannara series, not Magic Kingdom). And I'd like to put in a plug for Steven Brust; but he's only dark in spots. There's plenty of death, though, as the "hero" of the Taltos series is an assassin.

Robin Hobb is fairly dark.

There's a Ravenloft novel, I forget which one it is, but the heroine is a dancer who learns a dance that can kill and reanimate the dead as her slaves, a very good story, and it fits within the AD&D game framework if you enjoy novels of that vein. I think it's called Dance of the Dead... anywho it sounds like just what you're asking for.

I'd try out some David Gemmell and perhaps even some Stephen Donaldson, particularly the Thomas Covenant series. Not sure if they'll meet your pre-requisites, but there's definitely dark elements in their writing.