Book series

[Bob Ducca]

I didn't want to completely hijack the Harry Potter thread, but it is interesting to me how we all keep drawing parallels among these fiction series.  I have read many (some great, some bad, some meh) and find them really appealing- something about those familiar characters makes me feel comfortable.

Besides HP and the Stephen King DT series, what I have read includes the Earth's Children (Auel- cave people have a lot of sex), the Wideacre trilogy (Gregory- incest and property ownership in 18th century England), the Hannibal Lecter books (Harris- a cannibal eventually finds himself), the Flowers in the Attic and Heaven series (VC Andrews- more incest...what does this say about me?  Yikes.), and that's not even counting some of the young adult series (I like Norma Johnston, anyone remember her?).

If anyone is interested, what series do you enjoy?  Any you can recommend?

[purplebunny]

What series do I read... hmm...

Well, there's a lot of novels by S.M. Stirling that I enjoy (alterna-history/sci-fi).

Kage Baker's books about The Company (time travel/sci-fi).

Star Wars! There are some truly atrocious "official" Star Wars books but they are more than made up for by the good ones, which are very good.

I still read Wheel of Time, though I don't care for it much anymore. But I've read all of them so far, darn it! I just want to get to the end!

Lord of the Rings and associated. My hubby is an über-fan and has a lot of the collected writings of Tolkien as well.

A Song of Ice and Fire, George R.R. Martin. I like these because they're a little more 'realistic' - at least as much as it's possible for fantasy to be realistic. Definitely a rare/low-magic setting, which doesn't crop up as often.

Farseer/Liveship/Tawny Man series by Robin Hobb. Those are some of my faves!

[Clara Bow]

All things Eugenia Price, though I haven't read any of her books in years. I loved the Savannah series, I even got to see where some of the characters are buried. It was a great thing!
I loved the Green Mile books and I loved the first two VC Andrews series, the rest are dreck. I haven't read the Dark Tower yet, but it's on my list....
I also love John Jakes books, the Kent Family Chronicles and the North and South trilogy were great, I reread them from time to time just because I can't get enough. I even have the crappy miniseries of North and South and watch it sometimes, just for the high camp....

[Nekolove]

Hmm.

Well of course the Harry Potter books. Can't wait for #7.

I also have read the Auel books. Clan of the Cave Bear is one of my all time favorite reads.

Every year I re-read the Little House on the Prairie series (I'm in the beginning of this year's read-through right now, actually).

And I've also read the LOTR books. But I didn't read them until after I'd seen the movies. I'm sure that means I can never truly be an uber-geek. *sniff*

ETA: because apparently I'm having some spelling deficiencies today.

[wildtao]

Wow, tough one. I read so many series. *C*Let's see...short list:

Harry Potter.

The Sword of Truth by Terry Goodkind. Good general fantasy type book.

The Dark Tower Series by Steven King

The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan. Started out wonderfully. The last few books...meh.

The Meredith Gentry Series by Laurel K Hamilton. Fantasy/Fae type book. Sex does play a fair part of the plot, since the main character needs to get pregnant to take the throne, but once you get past that it has some great sub-plots and interactions.

Stephanie Plum Series by Janet Evanovich. How many cars can one girl blow up?! *L*

Lord of the Rings (and the Hobbitt) By Tolkien.

Earths Children by Jean Auel. I'm eagerly awaiting the next book. Even though I know it could be years and years considering the gaps between her books already.

Nicholas Seafort series by David Feintuch. Great Sci-Fi series set in the future and surrounding the same character and the struggles he goes through in the Navy of the future.

Enders Game and Speaker for the Dead and...all of it.*G* Love Orson Scott Cards Ender's series.

Incarnations of Immortality by Piers Anthony. Great series revolving around Death, Nature, War, Time and Fate. And God and Satan, as well.

And...I could go on, but those are the ones off the top of my head.

[TZ]

I love Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series.  The time travel is great, plus I study the eighteenth century, so there you go.

[Gwywnnydd]

If anyone is interested, what series do you enjoy?  Any you can recommend?

In addition to many of the series already named, I really like:
Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. 30+ books, still love 'em to death .
Sharan Newman's Catherine LeVendeur series. Historical fiction, set in 12th Century Paris, murder mysteries. Very well researched and written.
David Weber's Honor Harrington series. Science Fiction, HH ROCKS!! I wanna be Honor Harrington when I grow up!
W.E.B. Griffin's _The Corps_ series. Historical military fiction, set in the Pacific theatre of WWII.
David Edding's Belgariad and Mallorean. Fantasy, really fun characterization (somewhat formulaic plots, but well written just the same).
And, that's about 60 books for you to go check out .

[stanthedevil]

Lord of the Rings

Harry Potter

Chronicles of Narina (both in chronological order and the order he wrote them in)

Little House on the Prairie

Discworld - Terry Pratchett

Belgariad & Mallorian - David Eddings

Redwall - Brian Jacques

Wheel of Time

Dragon Quartet - Marjorie Kellogg

[LuckyDucky]

Ummm..  the series i have read and enjoyed are

Redwall by Brian Jacques (makes me feel a bit wierd to be borrowing from the kiddies section.  they all look at me funny, but i gotta read those books)

Discworld by Terry Pratchett ( I got RN addicted to them too- although he prefers the Tiffany Aching sub series - something about the Nac Mac Feegle got him hooked)

The vampire Chronicles - Anne Rice

The Troy Game - Sara Douglass
The Axis Trilogy - Sara Douglass
The Wayfarer Redemption - Sara Douglass
The Crucible - Sara Douglass

Songs of Fire and Ice - George RR Martin

the Stephanie Plum series - Janet Evanovich

And of course Harry Potter

There are probably heaps more but i can't think of them right now

I never really enjoyed LOTR or the Wheel of Time.  i found them to heavy in detail and not in character development.

[VorFemme]

It might almost be shorter to list the authors I didn't like.........but

Heinlein, Clark, Asimov, Zelzany, McCaffrey, Bradley, Norton, Blish, Bujold, Brust, Anthony, and the rest of the "classic" science fiction and fantasy pantheon as well as lots & lots of the newer authors (defined as started writing AFTER 1985 or so).  Howard's Conan books come to mind.

Burroughs, Wells, and Doyle in really classic literature - as well as Clemens/Twain for turn of the 19th and early 20th century.

Auel - although after #3 the book seemed to be more prehistory recipes, description, and sex scenes with foreshadowings of future "plot" details than the original Clan of the Cave Bear promised.  It's not that it is BAD - it just isn't quite the same.........

Then there is Lackey, the one Stephen King book called something like "Eye of the Dragon" that was fantasy and not horror, Hamilton (Merry Gentry - what is taking so long for her to get pregnant - you'd think the reader would be at risk of pregnancy symptoms after reading about all the bedroom activity!), Weber's Honor Harrington, Harris (Charlaine, if anyone doesn't recognize Sooky Stackhouse's author), and a whole new slew of mystery writers that I have discovered since moving to a new town with all new libraries..........

Judith Martin's Miss Manners, of course, Jeanne's Bridezilla books, biographies written with a touch of humor, quilt books, knitting books, embroidery books, sewing books, and anything else sitting around that looks interesting and is in English.  I don't remember my Spanish lessons well enough to read anything that hasn't been translated............

I almost forgot to add The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings & The Hobbit, and even Jonathon Swift's satires - Jack London, Defoe's Robinson Crusoe(sp?), The Swiss Family Robinson, Nancy Drew, Cherry Ames (a nurse around WWII and just after), and half a thousand more whose names I cannot recall at this time.

If I owned one copy of every book that I ever read - I'd need at least one more house to put them all in.  Even if they were all on CDs, the stack would be pretty big.

[stanthedevil]

Then there is Lackey, the one Stephen King book called something like "Eye of the Dragon" that was fantasy and not horror.

I love that Stephen King book.  I don't usually enjoy his horror stories, but that was a great little fantasy piece!

[Moogle]

Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, Robot series, Black Widowers series.

LOTR

David Gemmell's Drenai series, Rigante series.  heck any DG book, I will read!

The first five books of Jordan's Wheel of Time were pretty good, but I got sooo bored and irritated with the later books that I stopped reading.  Same thing with Goodkind's Sword of Truth series.

R.A. Salvatore's Icewind Dale and Dark Elf trilogies were good.  The others?  I think his characters got too powerful in that they seemed like they would never die.  Then he goes and resurrects one of them.

Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles

Neil Gaiman's Sandman

Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series

[Cupcake Fiend]

I've enjoyed a lot of the Dragonlance books by Margaret Weiss and Tracy Hickman

Death's Gate Cycle also by Weiss and Hickman

I like a lot of Raymond Feist's work

Tom Deitz' Davy Sullivan books are wonderful...his later books not so much.

Anne McCaffrey's Acorna series.  Pern, too.

The Glasswright series by Mindy Klasky

Chronicles of Narnia, in the order written

L.M. Montgomery's Anne series (Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea etc.)

I read Laurell Hamilton for a while, but they got to annoy me. Same with Robert Jordan.

I love everything Charles deLint has written.  Love, love, love, love it.  I almost cried this summer when we went to a reading/signing he did and he said that Widdershins is probably going to be his last Newford book.  His characters are just so real to me.

[Cupcake Fiend]

I forgot to add Stephen Lawhead's Song of Albion trilogy.  He's a bit heavy handed with the Christian spin he puts into all his books, but I can ignore that and the stories are good. (I am Christian but I don't need it shoved down my or anyone else's throat).

I also like his Dragon King trilogy.  If we are ever blessed with a Thing 3, and if Thing 3 is female, her name will come from those books.  The name of the queen is Alinea and I am totally in love with that name.

[Rei-chan]

Here's my list, although I am sure I will think of more later.....

Anything Stephen King (with the exception of "The Girl the Loved Tom Gordon") especially the books that intersect somehow with the Dark Tower series, (of which Eye of the Dragon does just a little) although Dark Tower 7 kinda let me down a bit after a six book build up.

The Marion Zimmer Bradley Avalon series (in chronological order, not release date order)

The first two V.C. Andrews series (which were mainly written/outlined before she died....the ghostwriter her family hired recycles the incest thing in the other books, so what's the point in reading them??)

Jean Auel's Earth's Children series (DH calls them my "cave porn"    )

Anne Rice's first 4 Vampire Chronicles (the rest seem redundant to me for some reason)

Hunter S. Thompson's writings, but mainly Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and the second of his collections of letters (if you find crazy rants funny, as I do, this ones for you)

Clive Barker's Imajica ( long, but beautiful and it will make you cry)

The Harry Potter series

Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials series