I am very interested to read about mercenary companies (preferably low-fantasy) that end up becoming rulers of a conquered territory. Something like the IRL Catalan Company and the Duchy of Athens.

If you have a suggestion that doesn't include the conquering, but still does the mercenary part well, I would also like the suggestion!

No spoilers for the series. I just finished book 7.

Very unique magic system but terrible writing.

The power scaling makes less than no sense. It makes negative sense. Jason Asano can’t both be someone who’s experienced combat like no one else (fighting for days without end numerous times as described as each time worse than historical monster surges) and also be a scrub compared other silver and gold rankers. Either what hes done everyone else has done or he’s unique. You can’t have it both ways.

Fights are told not shown and it gets worse in later books. We’re told how the fights go. That Jason fought smart or stealthy or whatever but not shown how.

The dialog is so cringe and too over analyzed. People don’t talk like therapists.

I’m disappointed. 2.5 stars out of 5.

Continued with my journey to read all the Hugo award winners by reading Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein, winner in 1961.

My thoughts:

Wtf did I just read. I had a very hard time getting through this - nearly gave up about halfway through. While the premise at the beginning was intriguing, it felt like the book quickly became a very long, convoluted screed against religion... or politics... or sex?... or morality?... or... something.

I also found the writing style quite tedious. Felt like every character was trying to be clever. Reminded me of the style of banter that The West Wing is known for, but much less effective.

By the end of it, I felt thoroughly "yuck" about the whole book.

Am I totally missing something?

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Sharing again the spreadsheet I made to track all the nominees and winners (now updated with 2026). In case others want to use it, here's a Google Sheet you can copy

A song of ice and fire by GRR Martin remains in my opinion the best series of books I ever read, I am a fan of books who are true to the nature of the world. I believe the world is full of people who try and fail miserably but even in their failures their impacts remain astonishing.

ASOIAF is such a series, it's not a story about a fated chosen one who regardless of all their flaws succeed. Instead it's filled with people who commit mistakes, in such a way that even though they have lived their lives perfectly still succumb to premature demise.

And this is the nature of the world, we all are bearers of our own fate, we all want what's best for us and in wanting so we clash with people who want the same thing. Such clashes become increasingly unpredictable and often times the ones who are winning aren't always the most gifted ones.

I believe I have given my points, that said if anybody have any more suggestions for such stories please do tell.

Significant spoilers for all realm of the elderlings books throughout. Read at your own peril.

I have realized one of the things that makes Realm of the Elderlings both an amazing series, and incredibly difficult to read.

I’m nearing the end of Fool’s Assassin, and whilst the majority of this book has felt like repeated kick to the loins, it’s also allowed me to finally put a finger on something Robin Hobb does that makes her tragedies so tragic.

When Withywoods is raided, it was a total gut punch. Obviously the actual event is impactful, but it’s the way that it occurs in the context. Prior to the raid, Fitz was making plans. The manor was being refurbished, he had hired on new hands, and was planning on taking over Bee’s education personally. He had told Fitz Vigilant that he would be training him in the Axe and Sword, and made preparations for the future. In addition, Bee bought presents for people, Riddle confronted Fitz about his fatherhood failures, and so on.

It’s not like the story tiptoed up to this tragic culminating event, rather it ran full speed in to it. Nearly half of what occurred earlier in the story, all of the remodeling and planning and other life tidbits that the characters experience are now immediately irrelevant. Dozens or hundreds of pages of writing, just to set the stage for this raid to unfold and rip it all away.

I realized in this moment that Robin Hobb does this several times throughout the series. It truly seems to ground her work in realism. There’s a lack of predictability to her world that makes it raw and the emotions have real impact. She allows her characters to live real lives, and prepare for the future, only to rip it all away so that she can once again inflict pain on to her loyal readers.

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS!

Two households, both alike in dignity,

In fair Verona Lacanthium where we lay our scene,

From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,

Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.

A Trade of Blood opens with a Romeo and Juliet inspired murder. Two young persons from powerful rivalling families conduct a secret love affair, until the girls gets killed while the boy is the only other person present. Everything points to the boy being guilty, and it’s up to Ana and Din to try to keep the peace while finding out what really happened.

Worldbuilding is undoubtedly the star of the show.

Both families make their money in augmented cattle trade. One family breeds enormous cows, while the other uses green brainwashed cats with fingers to pick the cotton for them, figuratively speaking. Both of their operations need land and land is a finite resource, making the political atmosphere delicate as both strive for economic dominance in the Lacanthium region.

The most interesting part of the murder is also the murder weapon. It’s revealed pretty early on that the girl was killed the same way aforementioned green cats are forced to pick cotton, with a fungus infection that creates a web in their brain, forcing them to act in a certain way to specific stimuli.

While I loved the fantasy elements, I don't think it’s a successful murder mystery.

There are, broadly speaking, two ways to do a murder mystery: the closed circle murder mystery and the procedural murder mystery.

In closed circle mystery, the reader is introduced to a number of suspects and gets to play along by trying to figure out who the culprit is. The culprit is always a character the reader is familiar with. Most Agatha Christie novels fall under this category.

In procedural types, the author doesn’t try to introduce the reader to all possible suspects. The reader follows the investigator(s) as they discover clues, talk to suspects and eventually solve the crime. The culprit can be a familiar character, but doesn’t have to be. The emphasis is on the twists and turns of the investigation. The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo is a famous example of this kind of story.

I would say The Tainted Cup was the procedural type, while A Drop of Corruption leaned more toward closed circle mystery. A Trade of Blood is also a closed circle mystery, but the problem is that there aren’t enough suspects in the story to make it compelling. The investigation in on itself is also not interesting enough to carry it into the procedural mystery fold.

In a story where two factions are pitted against each other, it only makes sense for the killer to be from one of the families, and neither family has that many family members.

• The female victim is Zansay Burav, daughter of the head of the Burav family, Burilis Burav. That’s the family with green cats.

• Her lover and main suspect is Castus Armenta, last remaining child of the head of the Armenta family, Velona Armenta. That’s the family with huge cows.

The Burav family has only two members we get an introduction to: Burilis Burav and his 18-year-old son Jalin Burav.

The Armenta family seems to have four members left: Castus the suspect, her mother Velona Armenta, Velona’s brother Trikao and Trikao’s son Ippeas.

So let’s examine the suspects as they appear to us exactly halfway through the story (that’s when I wrote this):

• Burilis Burav - Immediately the prime suspect due to his expertise with the murder weapon. The only question mark is whether he’s really willing to kill his own daughter in order to achieve financial dominance over the region.

• Jalin Burav - Good suspect. He could reasonably be expected to have the knowledge to pull it off due to family trade and the motive is there, he could want to blow up the whole augmented cattle trade from the inside out in order to escape it.

• Castus Armenta – Not a serious suspect because it’s clear he loved Zansay and is wrecked by guilt over her death. Also the small problem of getting himself hanged along the way.

• Velona Armenta - Not a serious suspect because her only living child Castus is guaranteed to be hanged for this murder, leaving her with no heirs.

• Trikao Armenta - The most promising suspect from this family. He has the motive over inheritance issues, and he’s been around augmentated cattle long enough to learn how to construct the murderweb.

• Ippeas Armenta - We can also cross off Ippeas from the list of suspects, because it turns out that Din’s estranged sister Fotia is betrothed to Ippeas and this is not the kind of book where good characters fall in love with killers. Ippeas was wasted potential in my opinion. There are no shades of gray to him, nothing to make you think he might be the guilty party. There is very little reason for him to exists in this story at all beyond making the investigation a little more convenient for Din.

Additionally, there are four characters who are not part of either family:

• Fotia - Din’s sister and obviously not the murderer because she’s Din’s sister lol.

• Princeps Seriv the town officer - He helps Ana and Din with their investigation. Lacks the motive and the know-how to be a serious suspect.

• Velona’s feritility doctor - A minor character who is extremely sus, but seems to lack the knowledge on how to develop the murder weapon.

• Commander Tauri - leader of the nature-loving empirial hippie group Orbiis. He definitely has the knowledge of the murder weapon and he also has the motive of righteousness, kind of like when animal rights activists who take it too far to prove a point, but unfortunately it’s immediately clear that he’s one of the good guys with zero hidden depths. Also doesn't help that he seems to be Din's love interest.

Right after 50% mark, there is a fire in the Burav household, killing off all the Burav family members except one: Jalin Burav, who is present at the house but escapes. While the fire is a nice dramatic event for the plot, it’s not a very good decision for the murder mystery, because with half the book still left, we got a story where only two characters are still on the suspect list: Trikao Armenta and Jalin Burav. Maybe the fertility doctor as well as an accomplice. That’s literally it. Like where are the suspects???

There are some clumsy attemps in the second half to make us suspect Commander Tauri by Ana spelling it out for Din, but these are so heavy-handed that no serious reader would fall for them.

So when the final reveal finally happens it’s like duh, WHO ELSE COULD IT HAVE BEEN?

No small part of the book is taken up by a side quest into the mysterious ancestors called the Daljen, who were a tribe of the Khanum and who used to live in that place a few hundred years ago. Honestly, this side plot didn’t do much for me and I had trouble following why it was important. Only in the last two chapters will we get an answer to that and the twist was good, not gonna lie.

Overall, I wish the character work had been more nuanced. Everybody in this book is transparently either a good guy or a bad guy (except for the killer I guess), and it clashes with the bleak and strange world they live in. Nobody has conflicting morals, hypocrisies, or hidden motives. It feels juvenile. Maybe it was true of the first two installments of this series as well, but I honestly can’t remember noticing it that much before. I rolled my eyes at the end, when Ippeas Armenta comes to embody #NotAllRichPeople and chooses to sell his newfound fortune. I can’t say I see any supposed anti-aristocratic themes. I think A Trade of Blood has far more to say on animal rights than it does on class. One of the most unsettling scenes for me was when Ana and Din visted Velona and we see Velona ordering someone to play a tune for her pet field cat, making the cat dance against its will. So when the final reveal comes in the forbidden forest, that the Daljen were the bad guys who conditioned ordinary people into mindless slavery with the use of the fungus web, it seemed to me more like a commentary on humans as animals than commentary on class.

I love mythology/folklore-oriented fantasy however American folklore fantasy seems so rare to come by! I love Old Nathan by David Drake which explores fascinating Applachian lore (magic comes from the mountains and ballads), Dark Tower by King with all of the Wild West legends and American pop culture references, and Charles De Lint’s urban fantasy that hinges a ton on Native American lore and Canadian culture and vibrant descriptions of North American landscapes.

I guess Oz counts but it’s children’s lit

I have read a lot of mysteries but not many fantasy series other than game of thrones, lord of the rings, and the discworld series. Any recommendations?

Review - Legendary Frybread Drive-In: Intertribal Stories ed. by Cynthia Leitich Smith

Sandy June’s Legendary Frybread Drive-In is a drive-in restaurant that serves frybread and other Indigenous food, as well as typical drive-in staples like burgers and fries. It exists somewhat outside of space-time and appears to Native people in different spots, serving as a gathering place for Native Americans around the country. This YA anthology is a collection of stories by different Native authors following different kids and their experiences with Sandy June’s. 

I’ve never read a Young Adult anthology before, and frankly never stopped to think they might exist lol. Most of the stories are pretty fantasy-lite, focusing more on the kids’ lived experiences and their relationship with their identities, which is very much the point of the anthology. The main fantasy element is the Drive-In itself, which features in all the stories. As it is YA, some of the stories felt a little juvenile for my taste, but I won’t deny the importance of kids seeing themselves in what they read, so of course the stories will tackle things that are important to high schoolers (e.g. there were so many stories about crushes).

I’m an Okie who moved out of the state as soon as I could, but damn, this collection made me really miss frybread tacos. So I decided to learn how to make some. And with it being Indigenous Peoples’ Day here in the U.S., what better time?

What is frybread?

It’s fried bread, of course. Lots of cultures around the world have a similar dish, but it has a specific history as a survival food for the United States Indian Tribes. As the government forcibly displaced peoples from their traditional lands, many were unable to hunt, forage, or grow familiar crops like they used to. Dependence on government-supplied rations led people to create the most calorie-dense staples they could. It’s become a rather complicated symbol of both oppression and perseverance, and its ubiquity has also been linked to health problems on reservations today. 

In the past I’ve mainly eaten savory kinds, used for Indian tacos, but there are also sweet kinds with honey or cinnamon or powdered sugar, a bit like a funnel cake.

The recipe

I followed YouTube tutorials from here and here. 

The ingredients are simple: all-purpose flour, baking powder, salt, water, and oil. I’ve been told that fresh baking powder makes a difference in how fluffy the bread turns out. Whisk together the dry ingredients (2 cups flour to 1 tbsp baking powder), then add enough water so the dough is just slightly sticky (for me that was about 1 cup) and knead the dough for a few minutes. Let it rest, covered, for about 30 minutes. Then you can portion out the dough and roll it out to the desired thickness, I made 6 with the amount of dough I had. Fry it in oil for a few minutes on each side, then let drain and cool.

For tacos, you can add whatever taco ingredients you have on hand. Meat is optional. I had one with just refried beans and cheese the day I made this, and even just that was delicious!

Season 1 Wrap-Up

Previous recipes in season 2: Quij’s Plate, Lúthien’s Asparagus Pie, Tavern Noodles, Kara-Tur Noodles

Further reading: Smithsonian ; Cherokees of Northern Central Valley

Hello, all!

I'm just getting out of the Cosmere again and looking for new fantasy series with a heavy inspiration taken from Iceland as a setting and/or its folklore. A true fantasy story (sci-fi okay, but not preferred) would be ideal over historical fiction, and points are scored for interesting magic systems and/or worldbuilding elements.

If you have and favorites that fit the bill, I'd love to hear them!

Welcome to the daily recommendation requests and simple questions thread, now 1025.83% more adorable than ever before!

Stickied/highlight slots are limited, so please remember to like and subscribe upvote this thread for visibility on the subreddit <3

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This thread is to be used for recommendation requests or simple questions that are small/general enough that they won’t spark a full thread of discussion.

Check out r/Fantasy's 2026 Book Bingo Card here!

As usual, first have a look at the sidebar in case what you're after is there. The r/Fantasy wiki contains links to many community resources, including "best of" lists, flowcharts, the LGTBQ+ database, and more. If you need some help figuring out what you want, think about including some of the information below:

• Books you’ve liked or disliked
• Traits like prose, characters, or settings you most enjoy
• Series vs. standalone preference
• Tone preference (lighthearted, grimdark, etc)
• Complexity/depth level

Be sure to check out responses to other users' requests in the thread, as you may find plenty of ideas there as well. Happy reading, and may your TBR grow ever higher!

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^{tiny image link to make the preview show up correctly}

art credit: special thanks to our artist, Himmis commissions, who we commissioned to create this gorgeous piece of art for us with practically no direction other than "cozy, magical, bookish, and maybe a gryphon???" We absolutely love it, and we hope you do too.

I want to read a single book with no series.

I want something shonen with a lot of stakes and stuff.

Edit: If possible the book should be in KU.

Welcome to the December nomination thread for the Beyond Binaries Bookclub! Our theme for the month of December is:

Queernorm Cozy SFF 

• Cozy fantasy or sci fi often contains queer friendly world building. This theme is meant to explore some of those worlds.
• A lot of the recommendations should work well with the vacation spot square for bingo. 
• I acknowledge that “queernorm” and “cozy” can be hard to predict without reading the book already, and that people often do debate the meanings of these terms. Do your best to find something within the spirit of these, but don’t worry too hard if a book will count or not. The intention is not to debate the definitions of these words, and cozy-adjacent books are also welcome.

Nominations

* Make sure that the book has not previously been read by any book club or that BB has not read the author before. You can check [this Goodreads Shelf](https://www.goodreads.com/group/bookshelf/107259-r-fantasy-discussion-group). You can take an author that was read by a different book club, however.

* Leave one book suggestion per top comment. Please include title, author, and a short summary or description. (You can nominate more than 1 if you like, just put them in separate comments.)

* Please include bingo squares if possible. 

* Keep in mind that this book club focuses on LGBTQIA+ characters. Your main character (and as many side characters as possible) should fall under the queer umbrella. 

I will leave this thread open for 2 days, and compile top results into a google poll to be posted on Wednesday October 14th. Have fun!

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This month we’re be reading The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden. The midway discussion is on October 15th, and the final discussion is on October 28th. 

What is the BB Bookclub? You can read about it in our intro thread here.

From what I understand most of the liked and well respected fantasy out there focuses more on background lore and world building than anything else, and I'm usually more interested in the characters that the story is actually about in the present tense, which is why despite fantasy being my favorite genre, I have such a hard time finding fantasy that interests me.

If you feel the same way, let's talk. What are some of your faves?

Here's some of my recent faves:

Savage Legion is about a slave rebellion, and the main character is especially compelling. It's also the best paced novel I've read that's over 350 pages. Super underappreciated, and I wish that more people would talk about it!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/45872179-savage-legion

Amina Al-Sirafi is Middle eastern pirate fantasy about an older pirate captain, and how she gets swept up in JUST ONE MORE ADVENTURE. God this was fun and compelling! The author also wrote a series about gender-bent Aladdin, but I didn't care for it.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61294937-the-adventures-of-amina-al-sirafi

The Sword Defiant is a love letter to LOTR that's more character and combat focused. Instead of a ring, there's an unbreakable, wicked talking sword that the MC is forced to keep around.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/62315620-the-sword-defiant

Hey all! Wondering if any of you guys can recommend me some book series that are super imaginative and unconventional insane and grand world building and has a lot genre blending, so it feels like super unique and fresh. Basically sprawling epic book series that’s completely unlike traditional fantasy or sci-fi. Something that’s incredibly unique, ambitious, unpredictable and very creative like concepts or plots that aren’t really seen much. I’m a huge fan of one piece and the whole world and how crazy the world building is and how everything feels so unique and different so definitely something like that. Let me know if you guys have anything that I’d like that would be amazing🙏🙏🙏 Edit: I also really like Stephen kings work like The Dark Tower series, The Stand, etc.

Welcome to the book club New Voices! In this book club we want to highlight books by debut authors and open the stage for under-represented and under-appreciated writers from all walks of life. New voices refers to the authors as well as the protagonists, and the goal is to include viewpoints away from the standard and most common. For more information and a short description of how we plan to run this club and how you can participate, please have a look at the announcement post.

This month, we are reading Our Cut of Salt by Deena Helm

In this lyrical debut, three generations of Palestinian women must put the haunting of their ancestral home to rest, before the secrets of the past drown them all. Our Cut of Salt is a powerful and intimate look at what it means to make a home, to lose it, and to return, only to find it irrevocably changed.

There is something haunting Nuhad’s childhood home in Haifa. Cats avoid its perimeter, strange noises come from within, and residents have mysteriously vanished without a trace. Although Nuhad has not returned to her home since the Nakba in 1948, she always held a place for the house in her heart.

And, in return, the house did the same for her.

After Nuhad passes away, her granddaughter, Marina, is determined to visit her grandmother’s home after a lifetime of being kept in the dark about her culture and family history. Marina's mother, Haifa - named for the city that was lost to their family - reluctantly agrees to her trip, though she knows firsthand that some secrets are better left buried.

But the house is no longer a home. It is a painful, festering wound that infects everything it touches. The more Marina digs into her family’s past, the sicker she becomes. Despite Nuhad’s ghostly warnings, Haifa rushes to help her daughter.

As the three women converge in their ancestral home, they must put the haunting to rest before the secrets of the past drown them all.

Bingo Squares: Published in 2026 HM, Author of Colour, The Afterlife

Today's discussion encompasses up to the end of chapter 7. I'll get things started with a few discussion questions in the comments, but feel free to add your own.

Examples could be Kvothe from Kingkiller Chronicles and Locke Lamore from Lies Of Locke Lamore, what I really like is the main characters using their quick wits and practical intelligence, anyway, what would be your pick?

I've been a fan of the author especially since The Book of Ancestors and Red Queen trilogy. I just finished the first book of this trilogy and I have some thoughts/questions.

While I am absolutely intrigued with the premise and lore surrounding the series, the execution in my humble opinion is debatable. There are certain things in the book that nagged me until the very end. (SPOILERS BELOW)

Two things (among so many) have left me with more questions than answers.

First of which is Yolanda. I mean, are we just go gloss over that the first time she was mentioned was in passing after a time skip event? Not once was it expounded upon after that. More importantly though, nobody questioned how two seemingly immortal beings was able to bear child?

Second of all, Mayland. For like 90% of the story, he was presumed to be dead. He suddenly appeared to snap the neck of Yamala without proper explanation then poof, we end the novel?

All in all, this book, despite the intriguing lore, admittedly confused the hell out of me. My question then is, does it get any better? Do the succeeding 2 books actually build all this up in a meaningful way?

tl;dr: "The Book Eaters" by Sunyi Dean is solidly in the "Would that be fucked up or what" category of fantasy, where a secret society of people who eat books practice ever more fucked up forms of patriarchy. Soft recommend. (Content warning: Spousal rape and physical abuse)

Once upon a time, there was a Princess named Devon. She was the only Princess in her castle, even though she had several brothers. And Princess Devon, like all her siblings and aunts and uncles, ate books the way you or I eat bread and meat. Fairy tales are sweets, dictionaries are dry crackers, adventure stories like a good steak, pop science like a mouthful of pop rocks.

Once upon a time, Devon suffered the fate of all Princesses, shipped off to an arranged marriage with another Family.

Once upon a time, Devon would do anything, anything at all, for her children, even if they were monsters.

This is a hard book to give a summary of! It's a bit like an ogre, it's got layers; bouncing between Devon's present and a forward advancing march up her past. There's also definitely a certain amount of Bellisario's Maxim ("Don't examine this too closely") with regards to, not merely the fantasy, but the intersection of the fantasy and reality.

I'll say, one thing that I was... kind of expecting, was that eating books would eventually be recognizable as some kind of... metaphor or allusion or thing tying to the real world. Like, maybe they'd be a commentary on people who only read books not being able to write (since book eaters can't write, it's a whole thing). Or maybe they'd get compared to LLMs, able to consume and regurgitate information without much assimilation or synthesis or imagination- and these ideas are sort of raised, but not in a way that touches the themes of the story.

"Where'd they come from? How does any of this work? What does it mean?" "Fucking aliens, I guess. Does it matter?" Very much in the vein of speculative fiction about examining a fucked up situation with a fucked up premise; kind of in the New Weird way, but in a considerably more comprehensible vein than a lot of stories of that variety. (I'm open to being wrong on the "Would that be fucked up or what" nature of the book eaters not having a deeper meaning but primarily existing to serve the plot, but that's my impression at the moment)

Now, that situation is, by the by, absolutely fucked. By nature, book eaters apparently both don't have many daughters AND those daughters aren't able to bear many children; the number of book eaters has been dwindling away over the years. As a consequence, the Families raise their girls on diets of fairy tales and sweet nothings, preparing them for forced temporary marriages with different Families in order to try and prevent inbreeding from causing things to get even worse. You'll be shocked to learn that this has led the Families towards being even more stifled and patriarchal.

And that's not even getting into the knights and the dragons, or the mind eaters. Don't worry, you'll read about them soon enough.

Lemee re-iterate my content warning; there is frank depiction of spousal rape and spousal abuse, and some brief scenes of physical child abuse (although thankfully, not even implied to be sexual). To my mind, it's not gratuitous, it's very much in service of both the plot and the themes of escaping patriarchy by imagining a way to win, but Go Thou Warned.

One thing I kind of liked- in most of these "Weird secret Families that stand apart from human society" type stories, the Families are secretly in control of the world. The Book Eater families very much aren't; they've got a fair amount of generational wealth stored away, but mostly survive via isolation or engaging in at best quasi-criminal enterprises. This isn't a conspiracy that puppets the UN; they don't even puppet the bits of the UK they live in.

This is not a book for a casual afternoon read. It's chewy. It takes its time building up. There's plenty of action, and some cloak and dagger.

Really, if I have a complaint, it's that it almost all felt like setup. Devon is very much constantly being forced to make choices between bad and worse, choices that are no choice at all, while trying to imagine a better world, and gets much more pulled along by events than driving them, for much of the story.

All that said- for folks who want something a little off the beaten path, I think you'll find the Book Eaters quite satisfying, but you'll probably want a palette cleanser afterwards.

I like specific genres that tend to overlap. Dark animal fantasy, absurdist realism, classics, satirical fiction, silly philosophical fiction- that type of thing. I'm also open to YA fiction. The last time I read a book was like six months ago, and every time I try to start one recently it just doesn't catch my attention.

Some of my favorite books are Watership Down, The Book of Dun Cow, The Alchemist, Siddhartha, Ishmael, My Stupid Intentions, Candide, Picture of Dorian Grey, Flowers for Algernon, The Metamorphosis, and Man's Search for Meaning. Some of my favorite authors are Haruki Murakami, Ottessa Moshfegh, Dickens, and Kurt Vonnegut.

Some of my favorites as a child/teenage are Redwall, White Fang/Call of the Wild, the Gregor the Overlander series, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, Warrior Cats, and the Mistmantle Chronicles.

I want to start reading something fun again, does anyone have any recommendations?

I was just thinking of my favorite scene from Labyrinth, where the protagonist Sarah outwits two Jim Henson puppets, one of whom is a "knight", who always tells the truth, and the other is a "knave", who always lies. Something about this blend of pure fantasy and hard logic is irresistible to me. I can already think of existing examples, and please forgive me for not formatting this better because my computer is on the fritz and I had to use my phone:

Obviously, the late, great Raymond Smullyan, who wrote puzzles in such fantastic areas as the work of Lewis Carroll, with Alice in Puzzle-Land. Here's him looking like Gandalf on The Johnny Carson Show. It would be really great if we had late-night shows like this these days.

Another good one is The Man Who Counted, written by Brazilian author Júlio César de Mello e Souza (aka "Malba Tahan"), whose aforementioned novel has as its protagonist a Persian genius who illustrates the real value of math and logic unto themselves and solves his problems with this knowledge. When I read it I was amazed it was actually from the 1930s. Seemed like it was written just yesterday.

Lastly I have in mind the classic CRPG Darklands, from 1992. Despite or, rather, perhaps because of the stereotypical nature of the Dwarves in this game, it became one of my favorites, and I wrote detailed breakdowns of most of the Dwarf puzzles, barring the few general knowledge bowl ones, starting here. It is funny to imagine these checkpoints inhabited by Dwarves who assess the players as having become fully men or women based on a test of knowledge.

All of these are good examples. What I'm hoping from the readers is MOAR.

I feel like google has let me down in my search!

Here’s what I’m looking for:

- fantasy-first and potential romance (but not a full romantasy where the relationship is the focus)

- character who is a high-born/monarch/royal

- another character who is some kind of knight/champion/savior of the realm/highly regarded servant of the royal family

- (Think Link/Zelda, especially in the BOTW series)

- I prefer more “classic” high/adventure style fantasy over paranormal

- bonus points if the second character is exceptionally magically gifted

- I’m NOT looking for YA right now, which has been much of what google is handing me :/

I’ve enjoyed A Darker Shade of Magic (which doesn’t quite fit, but does feature a familial like relationship fitting the trope I’m hoping for) and tbh that’s all I could find in my reading history that sort of fits the bill…. Any recs would be great thank you!!!!