shaners

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i am a deep thinker and reader of books of philosophy, theology, religion, and the like... lately ive been wanting to step away from that area and start reading more novels and stories to involve my imagination! authors that can portray moral and life lessons captivate me!

can you help with suggestions of a highly acclaimed fictional series?
im looking for something of fantasy or historical context.
i do not enjoy sci-fi too much, but i am open to those suggestions.
a western based series, or
an antiquity (roman / greek / asia) based context is grasping!

thanks everyone

macho biscuit

steven king's dark tower series is excellent. the first book is a bit off, it was his first and he was young, the second book is much better, by the third, he has it down and it is an excellent story. it's fantasy/western/sci-fi -ish. i think it's worth checking out, but don't judge the whole thing by the first book, the first was the worst of the whole bunch.

ark383

I can highly recommended the following.

David Eddings - The Belgarid series, The Mallorean series, The Eleniam series, The Tamuli series.

Trudi Canavan - The Black Magician Trilogy.

James Barclay - The Ascendants of Estorea Book One and Two (Three isn't out yet)

David Edding and Trudi Canavan are easier books to read, however I fell in love with the characters and re-read them every few years. Pure fantasy books!

The James Barclay series is a little more seriously, touch harder to read but it excellent. What I liked about it is that it has a Roman feel to it.

barthelemykaras

You might like Terry Goodkind's series The Sword of Truth. It takes place in a fantasy world and has some stuff to think about. Here's a bit from Wikipedia's entry on the series:

Draggon

I would also recommend the Sword of truth, but be careful...the first three books are awesome but the story really slows down from there...and he continues to repeat the same information over and over again even within the same book.
Still, I'm through 6 books and am looking forward to starting 7

hillbilly

"The Song of Ice and Fire" by George RR Martin, these books are the best of the best that you can get there if your looking for Fantasy/historical fiction type of story

The first book is called "A Game of Thrones"

prompt

The mention of Objectivism in that comment above made me think of Roger Zelazny. Try Lord Of Light, which is sort of half science fiction, half fantasy. His protagonists model Rand's ideals, I've heard. (I've read Zelazny but not Rand.) It's just one book, not a series. The setting is like ancient India, except it's not.I vote against anything by David Eddings.

Edit: Oh, I missed that you were explicitly requesting a series. Sorry about that.

Echolalia

Even though it is for children, the Narnia books are full of a lot of theological stuff (you said that interested you).

The Ender's Game series is quite good too (more sci-fi, but still very good, although after the first one, Ender's Game, it was a bit downhill for me).

I don't know many series it seems...

Yousai

well, everyones probably going to talk about Steven king but i think hes pretty boring... the best fantasy author i know of is terry pratchett. hes been writing the discworld series for more than 20 years now if i had to guess. Ive heard his work described as lord of the rings meats hitch hikers guide to the galaxy, and id say thats not far off. If you like deep thought, and comedic satire, hes awesome.

Jimi

Depending on how fantasy you want to go, you could check out Piers Anthony. He's got a lot of series, including one of my favorites when I was younger, the Xanth novels.

___________________________________________
"I don't care if they're black, white, purple or green. Awww hold on now. Purple or green? You gotta draw the line somewhere. To hell with purple people. Unless they're suffocating. Then help them."


January 2009, the end of an error.

Bigeme

I would definitely reccommend Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time over Sword of Truth. I read the first I think 4 books in that series and grew tired of it. Not that it's not an engaging story, but the Wheel of Time is so much more in depth and the background and world that he creates is so rich. Reading Sword of Truth was like a slimmed down and more edgy Wheel of Time.

The first book in the series is the Eye of the World. It is a little different in tone than the rest, but a great book even by itself.

My one caveat would be that the later books become a little dense because there are so many characters and so many political and plot elements that need to be resolved. They definitely require back to back reading. I started reading them about 7 years ago and the last book in the series is supposed to come out sometime this year. I still haven't read the one prior because I forgot so many characters and plot elements that it was difficult for me to completely follow the story, so I decided I'd buy a box set in a few years when I am done with school and have forgotten most of the story and read it again.

Dr. Weezil

Pft...

"Dune" by Frank Herbert

vernuf

"The Song of Ice and Fire" already mentioned is good.

There's also the Malazan Books of the Fallen by Steven Erickson which I think are excellent.

farcue

i forget who its by try footfall its modern day scifi