Other Fantasy Authors

[Philomath she/her]

Hey all. I have a friend who is an English teacher at a high school. He is starting a fantasy/sci-fi lit class and is looking for more modern fantasy authors besides Brandon. Any length of work is okay. Anyone have recommendations?

[Guest Coda]

Brian McClellan, Patrick Rothfuss, Robin Hobb, Terry Pratchett(GNU), Neil Gaiman, Naomi Novik, Guy Gavriel Kay, HP Lovecraft, Stephen King, Ursula k. La Guin. Just look up "Fantasy authors" on Google.

[Silverblade5 he/him]

Andrez Sapkowski. He did the Witcher books that the games are based on. 

[The Awakened Salad they/them]

I’ve finally found an excuse to gush about some non-Brandon books and authors that I love!!
 

V.E. Schwab (she also goes by Victoria Schwab for her YA books) is great for more non-traditional fantasy (like, less swords and dragons and more modern day stuff. Her more urban fantasyish books take place in fictional worlds, too, though). Her most popular works are Vicious and A Darker Shade of Magic. Vicious is, in my opinion, the better novel, but I don’t know if it’s too violent for a high school class (there’s also swearing, so I don’t know if that’d be acceptable either. Maybe if it’s an older class? But it’s amazing and you should read it anyway). Her writing, although not necessarily poetic, is captivating and she knows how to keep you hooked. She’s written books ranging from middle grade to adult, and she’s a very recent author. 

Katherine Arden is great — she wrote the Winternight Trilogy, which is set in a fantasy version of Medieval Russia. The story is so atmospheric, and the setting is almost alive, in a sense. The characters are great too, each with strong driving goals and personalities. The first book in the series, The Bear and the Nightingale, is one of my favourites. 
 

Madeline Miller, who’s written Circe and The Song of Achilles. I’ve only read Circe, which is about, well, Circe from Greek Mythology. It’s a slow book, without a central plot, but it’s still an entertaining read and I highly recommend it. 

Mark Lawrence, maybe? I only say maybe because I’ve heard his novels can get pretty graphic. I’ve only read the first two books in his Book of the Ancestor Trilogy, and they were good (still very violent), so I would recommend looking into them. 

[NameIess]

Christopher Paolini. He wrote the Inheritance cycle, and it remains one of my favorite series.

[Dunkum he/him]

highly, highly recommend Ursula Leguin's A Wizard of Earthsea.  We did it in my regular 9th grade english class. its technically the first book in a series, but each of those books is more like a standalone story.  It's also short enough to be pretty easily handled in a school curriculum.

Haven't seen Scott Lynch mentioned, but hes good too.  and his short story A Year and a Day in Old Theradane is good, and again short - I know you said any length is ok, but having a few shorter works is probably a good idea - plus its a standalone.

I'll second Pratchett, Gaiman, and Rothfuss as well

Edited November 30, 2019 by Dunkum

[Elric]

Okay, hear me out — Read Michael Moorcock.

His character, Elric of Melnibone has been extremely influential for many writers. Plus, his writing exists in a multiverse, just like Sanderson's, and the books are relatively easy to read because they are short and amusing. 

[FeruchemicalAbhorsen he/him]

I assume you already know Tolkien.

If length is really not an issue, Robert Jordan. Garth Nix's Abhorsen is good, KttK is somewhat strange.

Phillip Pullman. Seconding Christopher Paolini. Zenna Henderson.

[+ILuvHats he/him]

N. K. Jemisin is an excellent choice if you’re looking for more serious SFF. She definitely straddles the line between literary and genre fiction. I’ve read her most recent series, the Broken Earth Trilogy, and it was absolutely brilliant. She did some crazy stuff narratively, and somehow made it work. In fact, every single book in the series won the Hugo award for best novel that year, making Jemisin the first author to do so three years consecutively. Brandon’s also recommended an earlier series of hers, the Inheritance Trilogy (not to be confused with Paolini’s Inheritance Cycle). So she’s definitely one to consider if your friend wants something a little more highbrow than a lot of fantasy.

[+Doomstick he/him]

Seconding Sapkowski, Jordan, Nix, Pullman, and Jemisin

Adding Walter Moers for very strange books but also very good (The 13 1/2 lives of captain bluebear as well as other long titles)

also for more YA fantasy, Angie Sage's Septimus Heap

Also Brent Weeks' Lightbringer

[Just a Lifetime he/him]

I stopped by to make sure N. K. Jemisin has been mentioned.  Since @Ooklidean Geometry took care of that, I'll add Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London (renamed Midnight Riot in the US) as modern (urban) fantasy worth checking out.  In addition to being a lot of fun, this book and the ongoing series it spawned also do a very good job with voice and representation in urban fantasy writing.

Edited January 7, 2020 by Just a Lifetime
Fix minor typo

[Orlion Blight he/him]

Catherynne M Valente is one of the best *cough*actual best*cough* Science Ficition/Fantasy authors writing today. Her work has a broad spectrum of styles, writing from Middle-grade to Adult fiction so depending on exactly what you are looking for recommendations on where to start would vary. (Though I would say Space Opera for adult, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making for Middlegrade).

John Crowley is also essential for anyone who wants to tout how refined their tastes are in SFF. The recommendation here is simple, it's Little, Big. It's even part of Harold Bloom's Western Canon, that's how much pretentious cred it will get you!

Going further back, if you want to go with a foundational fantasy work that is not Tolkien, Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast Trilogy (Titus Groan, Gormenghast and (if you want) Titus Alone) will open up an entirely new vista of what a fantasy novel can be.  

[Moonskin she/her]

On 29/12/2019 at 10:33 PM, Ooklidean Geometry said:

N. K. Jemisin is an excellent choice if you’re looking for more serious SFF. She definitely straddles the line between literary and genre fiction. I’ve read her most recent series, the Broken Earth Trilogy, and it was absolutely brilliant. She did some crazy stuff narratively, and somehow made it work. In fact, every single book in the series won the Hugo award for best novel that year, making Jemisin the first author to do so three years consecutively. Brandon’s also recommended an earlier series of hers, the Inheritance Trilogy (not to be confused with Paolini’s Inheritance Cycle). So she’s definitely one to consider if your friend wants something a little more highbrow than a lot of fantasy.

I can only second that, the Broken Earth Trilogy is probably the best non-Sanderson serie I read in a very, very long time  <3

[kaellok he/him]

Not sure if still relevant due to the inexorable passage of time, but here are a few suggestions that are more of a sci-fi bent since there's already a fairly thorough covering of various fantasy authors.  I've also tried to focus on smaller novels, rather than giant sprawling epics.

1. Passage at Arms by Glen Cook.  Although much more famous for his Black Company and Dread Empire series, Passage at Arms is one of the best 'submarine novels' (claustrophobic; people v. nature, people v. environment, and people v. people; tense with ever-increasing tension--Hunt for Red October is the most famous perfect example, but Alien draws very strongly on the concept as well) ever written, and just happens to be in space.  His other sci-fi novels are generally pretty good, too, and not out of place for a high school class.

2. Absolutely anything by Emma Bull--she has generally tight plotting and a story which is intensely character-driven, with a setting that comes to life and acts as part of the story as much as any of the characters do.  Bone Dance is a wonderful post-apocalypse novel (and there's a reason why it was nominated for the Hugo, the Nebula, and World Fantasy Awards; that it didn't win any of them is a testament to the competition, and also probably a literary crime, but so far nobody has been arrested for it and I'm sure that we're well past the statue of limitations to impose such a punishment anyway, alas).  Territory is a delightful weird west.  Finder is an urban fantasy that gave me strong Shadowrun-universe vibes while being its own thing entirely.  War for the Oaks is a genuine classic

3. Dune by Frank Herbert.  Later books (starting with the second in the series) will draw some immediate and legitimate criticism, with some strong problematic elements.  However, the original is, if anything, even more relevant today than it was when it was published.  It is powerful, while being both simple and fantastically complex.

4. Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells.  A series of 4 linked novellas.  The first one, All Systems Red, is a fully encapsulated story.  Themes of identity, how you are allowed to express yourself, and what makes a person all make for good exploration especially in a school setting where students are expected to still be learning who they are, how they see themselves, how to be the person they want to be, etc.  But it's well-written, so while all of that is there, the actual focus is on other and more interesting things (plot) happening.

5. Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha-Lee.  Wonderful, unique sci-fi.  I was disappointed that although civilization's technologies are math- and calendar-based the novels were full of characters, story, plot, vivid descriptions, politics, betrayals, battles, etc. instead of mathematical equations and complex reference guides.  Characters in the novel get to do them, but at no point is the audience expected to come up with the correct formation to use for their soldiers to negate the impact of the exotic weaponry the opponent is using, while also enhancing the impact of their own weaponry when they return fire, and all before your position is overrun and you all die in one of the highest stakes games of math that the universe knows.  Sometimes all the fun stuff is left for characters in the novels, and we just read about them doing it.  (Seriously though, although it's all math-based, there is no need to understand math, just to know that math exists.  I'd spent a week brushing up on my physics and calculus for nothing, as there was not even an equation as simple as 2+2=4 anywhere to be found.  Still a wonderful trilogy.)