As of yesterday (March 1, 2011) a second novel of Patrick Rothfuss in the Kingkiller Chronicles is available, called The Wise Man’s Fear.
Based on what I have heard so far about the book, it is of at least the same level as the first novel, The Name of the Wind, one of the best fantasy novels of the last decade. That means that The Wise Man’s Fear will contain a complex and intriguing story and will be an amazing read.
The next installment in the series will be called The Doors of Stone. If Rothfuss continues like this, the Kingkiller Chronicles will definitely earn it’s place among the best fantasy series ever, making him one of the best fantasy authors around.
Official summary
“There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.”
An escalating rivalry with a powerful member of the nobility forces Kvothe to leave the University and seek his fortune abroad. Adrift, penniless, and alone, he travels to Vintas, where he quickly becomes entangled in the politics of courtly society. While attempting to curry favor with a powerful noble, Kvothe discovers an assassination attempt, comes into conflict with a rival arcanist, and leads a group of mercenaries into the wild, in an attempt to solve the mystery of who (or what) is waylaying travelers on the King’s road.
All the while, Kvothe searches for answers, attempting to uncover the truth about the mysterious Amyr, the Chandrian, and the death of his parents. Along the way, Kvothe is put on trial by the legendary Adem mercenaries, forced to reclaim the honor of the Edema Ruh, and travels into the Fae realm. There he meets Felurian, the faerie woman no man can resist, and who no man has ever survived. Under her tutelage, Kvothe learns much about true magic and the ways of women.
In The Wise Man’s Fear Kvothe takes his first steps on the path of the hero and learns how difficult life can be when a man becomes a legend in his own time.
After a year that has not been too special on the fantasy front, I really don’t know where to start off discussing the short term future of fantasy; there are simply too many great new things happening in the fantasy genre during 2011!
Novels that will surely be amazing, endings of series that have taken decades to create and have held millions in their grip. Blockbuster movies and a television series that can only blow our minds.
Here are my personal hightlights: the best and most anticipated fantasy titles of the year to come!
Books and Series
The novel I am looking most forward to is The Crippled God by Steven Erikson. It is the last installment of the Malazan Book of the Fallen series and should be several hundreds of pages filled with the resolution of all mysteries that Erikson has created during the series. Allthough, knowing Erikson a bit, much will probably remain unsolved.
Close second on my list, mostly because we will have to wait till the end of September before it will be released, is A Dance with Dragons, the fifth novel in George R.R. Martin‘s already legendary A Song of Ice & Fire series. Together with the first season of Game of Thrones (see below), this novel will put a huge spotlight on the fantasy genre.
Soon available (in March) is the latest book of Patrick Rothfuss called The Wise Man’s Fear. After the succes of The Name of the Wind, the anticipation for this new novel is very high.
Last book I want to mention is A Memory of Light by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson, the last installment in The Wheel of Time series. I somewhat lost interest in the series over the years but for many fans this novel will be the most anticipated of the year and it is bound to be high in the New York Times bestsellers list for a long time. It is expected for November 2011.
Movies
Several interesting fantasy movies will be released in theatres in 2011 so there is a lot to look forward to but none of them are guaranteed to be very good. The most promising one is the last movie in the Potter series: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows II, set to premiere in July. I am not that much of a fan of the Potter movies but the first Deathly Hallows movie was quite good so I am expecting a lot from part II.
The comedy fantasy movie Your Highness can go either way. Or it will be a hilarious ridicule of fantasy movies or it will be a annoying succession of desperately-trying-to-be-funny fantasy scenes. Your Highness will be in theatres on April 8.
Another movie I am not so sure about is Thor, with a story based on the Marvel comics. There is a good chance of this being a movie solely revolving around action scenes with the story having no depth and the characters being flat. Thor will premiere late April/ early May.
Last in this category of doubtfull movies is the remake of Conan the Barbarian. They will have to make an extremely good movie to come near the “level” of the original movie and to shake of the criticism and cynicism that fans will surely have. We will have to wait a while for Conan as it will not be in theatres until August.
One movie I am personally definitely not looking forward to is the first of the two Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn movies that will be released in November 2011.
Game of Thrones
I simply cannot say it enough: Game of Thrones is starting in 2011! On April 17, the first episode will air on HBO in the US and on Sky in the UK and like almost everybody with a heart for fantasy, I love Martin’s A Song of Ice & Fire series and am highly anticipating this television series.
As mentioned before, 2010 was not the greatest of years for the fantasy genre but 2011 will surely make us forget all about it. In addition, we will have the anticipation of the movie The Hobbit that is scheduled for 2012…
The start of a new year is a good time to glance back at the past year and try to make some sense of everything that happened. I will do this in a small way by summing up some of the major ripples in the pond called fantasy during 2010. This means that I have made an overview of the best fantasy novels, series, movies, TV series and games of the past year.
Perhaps this short overview will point out a movie you have not seen or remind you of a novel you should have read during last year. If not, it will at least help you form an opinion of the level of the fantasy media in 2010.
Fantasy books and series
First, a quick look at the most popular fantasy books of the pas year. Several novels stand out but in particular Towers of Midnight, the 13th novel in Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series. It has been written by Brandon Sanderson and the general opinion is that he has done this quite well. This is also reflected by the number one position of the book in the New York Times Best Seller list and the fact that it remained high in this list and was sold in high numbers for many weeks.
Another novel that is absolutely worth mentioning is Under Heaven, written by Guy Gavriel Kay. Kay is probably best know for Tigana but has shown that he can become a stable and important author in the genre.
Last book I want to mention is the recently released Stonewielder. Written by Ian Cameron Esslemont and set in the Malazan world he has created with Steven Erikson, it is a great read that I will review in the near future.
Fantasy movies, TV series and games
The major fantasy event on the screen in 2010 must have been the latest Harry Potter movie The Deathly Hallows: Part I. This penultimate movie in the Potter Series was of course very popular and successful and, I have to admit, quite good. I will review the movie sometime in the coming weeks.
Of course there were more new fantasy movies in 2010, like Twilight: Eclipse and Clash of the Titans. Both are entertaining films but not ones you will remember as a classic.
Looking at fantasy television series, there was the news of the cancellation of Legend of the Seeker which is a shame but not that big a loss as this TV series had dwindling viewer ratings and simply wasn’t that good. Hopefully, HBO can fill the gap and show how a fantasy TV series should be made when Game of Thrones airs on April 17, 2011!
On the game front there has not been much fantasy activity worth mentioning. The World of Warcraft expansion pack Cataclysm was very successful but that was hardly surprising.
Looking back, I would say it was a pretty decent year for the fantasy genre but not a great one. In one of the next posts I will look ahead and will explain what the year 2011 has to offer and boy, that will be something!
Stonewielder, the new Malazan novel by Ian Cameron Esslemont, is on its way to the stores and will be available soon!
In this latest novel, set in the work Esslemont created together with Steven Erikson, we will learn more about the legendary Greymane and the Empire’s Korelri campaign.
Personally, I thought that Esslemont’s previous novels, Night of Knives and Return of the Crimson Guard, were not yet completely at the same level as Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen series but I thorougly enjoyed the books and he is getting there so I am really looking forward to his latest work.
Stonewielder will be published by Bantam Books on December 28, 2010.
Synopsis
Greymane believed he’d outrun his past. With his school for swordsmanship in Falar, he was looking forward to a quiet life, although his colleague Kyle wasn’t as enamoured with life outside the mercenary company, the Crimson Guard. However, it seems it is not so easy for an ex-Fist of the Malazan Empire to disappear, especially one under sentence of death from that same Empire. For there is a new Emperor on the throne of Malaz, and he is dwelling on the ignominy that is the Empire’s failed invasion of the Korel subcontinent. In the vaults beneath Unta, the Imperial capital, lie the answers to that disaster. And out of this buried history surfaces the name Stonewielder. In Korel, Lord Protector Hiam, commander of the Stormguard, faces the potential annihilation of all that he holds dear. With few remaining men and a crumbling stone wall that has seen better days, he confronts an ancient enemy: the sea-borne Stormriders have returned. Religious war also threatens these lands. The cult of the Blessed Lady, which had stood firm against the Riders for millennia, now seeks to eradicate its rivals. And as chaos looms, a local magistrate investigating a series of murders suddenly finds himself at the heart of a far more ancient and terrifying crime – one that has tainted an entire land…”Stonewielder” is an enthralling new chapter in the epic story of a thrillingly imagined world.
Source: Amazon
The Ten Thousand is a fantasy novel written by Paul Kearney, an Irish fantasy author.
Based on ancient Greek myths, he tells the story of 10.000 Macht mercenaries, soldiers from a warrior-orientated human society, who are employed by a Kefren prince who intends to overthrow his brother’s rule and become Great King of Kuf. The Macht display their superior fighting skills but things go not as planned and the Macht become stranded on a strange and hostile continent.
The story is an combination of epic and low fantasy as it describes massive battles in a world other than our own and different races but does not include no magic (except for the mysterious and somewhat magical black armor that some of the Macht wear). The Macht are humans resembling ancient Greeks. Several other races like the Kefren and the Juthan are described but, although having different traits, no race seems to have any special abilities.
The Ten Thousand is a good book but not a great one. The story is interesting, although it is definitely not revolutionary and plot changes can often are often predictable.
Besides the somewhat predictable story, a major downside of the novel are the shallow characters. I had a hard time connecting to them as they remain either good or bad characters without many complexities and with a predictable and lineair development.
Nonetheless, I was fascinated by the story which is also partly due to the fact that Paul Kearney is a good writer who managed to keep my attention which a colorful but not too elaborative style of writing.
Conclusion: The Ten Thousand is a good read but not one you will remember when you are grey and old. Kearney has planned to write at least two more novels revolving around the Macht. They will not be among the first on my “books I need to read” list but I think I will pick them up in due time.
We have established that the genre of fantasy originated long ago, has done well in the past and has thrived in the last decennium but what about its future?
Books, (TV) Series, Movies and Games
As stated in my post about the current state of fantasy, there are lots of good fantasy authors around, both old legends who are still writing and promising newcomers. For example, on the short run, I am really looking forward to the final part of The Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson. But also oldtimers like Martin, Pratchet and Feist are still alive and kicking, meaning that we can expected many more novels and series from them.
When talking about TV series and Movies two major events are expected for the foreseeable future. The first is the upcoming television series Game of Thrones, based on George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series, which will start airing in 2011. The second is the movie The Hobbit, based on the classic novel by J.R.R. Tolkien. It is still unclear if the movie will really be made but there definitely plans for making it.
Lastly there are the fantasy computer games. More and better looking fantasy games can be expected in the future. Also, the influence of games will keep increasing as gaming has become more and more accepted.
World of Warcraft will remain huge, Final Fantasy and Zelda having new games coming out and the genre of fantasy will always be a very popular source of inspiration for game producers.
Conclusion
So it looks like we fantasy fans do not have to worry for the near future. Plenty of great fantasy books, TV series, movies and games can be expected for the years to come.
An alltogether different point to make is hoe technological developments will change our way of reading fantasy novels. Of course movies and games will become even more impressive with better visuals and graphics but what about books? Ebooks are already around and selling well but personally I really like to hold a real book in my hands. In the near future I will look into this.
After the genre became well-known and accepted/ respected during the second half of the twentieth century, the question was how fantasy would develop after the year 2000. Had it reached it’s top and would the genre settle down again or would it remain strong and continue to strenghten it’s position in literature and on the screen?
Authors
The authors that were big in the nineties, like George R.R. Martin, Robert Jordan (who regretably passed away in 2007), Raymond E. Feist and Robin Hobb, continued to write and dominate the world of fantasy literature. Most of them are still working on series that are far from finished.
However, new talents also have emerged. There have been quite a few newcomers, one more successful than the other, but for me the most notable are Steven Erikson (The Malazan Book of the Fallen) and Patrick Rothfuss (The Name of the Wind).
Old and new authors combined, I would say that the genre still is thriving and that we can be assured to have great new fantasy books and series for years to come!
Movies and television series
Many high profile fantasy movies have been made during the first decade of the new millennium. Of course there was the Lord of the Rings trilogy brought out between 2001 and 2003. Also the Harry Potter movies were released from 2001 onwards. Other fantasy movies worth mentioning aar The Chronicles of Narnia movies (2005 and 2008), The Golden Compass (2007) and Pan’s Labyrinth (2006).
Besides the successful movie releases, several new fantasy television series were produced between the year 2000 and 2010. Examples of these are Legend of the Seeker (cancelled after season 2), True Blood and BBC’s Merlin.
Not all movies and TV series have been of the utmost quality and/ or successful but from the perspective of movies and TV series, I think we can say the new millennium started out pretty good!
We have seen that fantasy remained a force to be reckoned with over the last ten years and managed to find the general audience better than ever but what is the current state of the fantasy genre and how will develop in the future?
After having discussed the origins of fantasy earlier, here is a short overview of how the genre developed during the second half of the twentieth century and positioned itself as a genre to be taken seriously.
Authors and their works
After publishing The Hobbit in 1937, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings was published in 1954-1955. The books became very popular and influenced the whole genre. Around the same time C.S. Lewis wrote The Chronicles of Narnia and not long after, during the late sixties and early seventies, Ursula K. Le Guin wrote her Earthsee novels. Soon after, several other influential authors entered the scene. Most noticeble were Terry Brooks (Shannara) and David Eddings (Belgariad) who wrote their fantasy series mainly in the late seventies, the eighties and the early nineties.
The likes of Raymond E. Feist, Robert Jordan, George R.R. Martin, Robin Hobb and Robert Jordan joined the genre throughout the eighties and nineties, helping to make fantasy into a mature genre.
Movies in the eighties
Not only the world of literature picked up and started to accept fantasy, Hollywood also stepped in. Many great fantasy movies were produced of which several were big hits with mainstream audiences. Everyone has heard of movies like The Neverending Story, Conan the Barbarian, Legend and Willow, and probably can name a few more they remember from those days. Together with the new fantasy books and series that were coming out, these movies helped introduce fantasy to the masses and make it allright to like the genre: people no longer needed to feel embarressed to read or watch fantasy.
This is how a genre that started out as myths told over camp fires and children’s tales, became a mature literature and movie genre, read and watched by many millions.
Next time, I will go into the developments during the first decade of the new millenium.
Almost all good fantasy stories come in the form of series. As discussed earlier, it is difficult to find a single book containing a good and well-balanced fantasy story. The genre has a preference for series, probably because it provides more room for building and describing the world the author has created.
Written in 1990 by Guy Gavriel Kay, Tigana is one of the few exceptions to the rule. Kay has managed to encompass his fantasy story in one book and, while not focusing on too much details, did make it feel like a real world and also made enough pages available for character development.
The story
Tigana tells the story of a peninsula called the Palm, ruled by two foreign sorcerers and their armies, dividing the continent in two parts. The sorcerer king Brandin lost his son during the conquest of one of the kingdoms of the peninsula called Tigana and therefore cast a spell to make all people, except those from Tigana, forget the name of the kingdom. Together with several other people Alessan, the former Prince of Tigana, plots not only to kill Brandin but also the other sorcerer Alberico of Barbadior. Alessan sees killing them at the same time as the only way to really free Palm from the oppressors.
Another main part of the story is the life of Dianora, a woman from Tigana who intented to kill Brandin but becomes part of his harem, falls in love with him and ends up as his wife.
Both story lines slowly come together throughout the book and as a reader you find out how the characters are connected to each other and how the story will play out in the end.
Conclusion
Tigana is a great book, with a good story, original concepts and interesting characters. Magic, and with it fantasy, is not a very big element in Tigana. Wizards mostly have subtle powers like influencing other people.Therefore, the book can be considered as low fantasy.
I have to admit that I haven’t read other books by Guy Gavriel Kay but, based on Tigana, I will definitely do so in the future.
Time for a bit of background information. A resource on any topic should contain some background info on the topic in question and what better then a look at the origin and history of the topic. This being a website focusing on fantasy… here is an insight in the origin of the fantasy genre.
I don’t want to go too far back in history but all fictional stories as we know them today have their origin in storytelling as was done by our ancestors: sharing stories at the camp fire. At some point mythology came into the picture with stories about the fantastic deeds of gods and the horrors committed by terrible mythical creatures like werewolves and the like.
Fantasy as we know it today definitely has its origins in these stories. Gods or godlike characters are still very popular in the fantasy genre, often based on ancient cultures like the Greeks, the Romans, the Vikings or the Egyptians. Mythical creatures like vampires and werewolves also often pop up.
Whereas storytelling clearly was the origin of all fiction and thus also fantasy, the actual start of the genre of fantasy as we have come to know it today originates from the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century.
Although opinions differ, an author that is seen by many as (one of) the creator(s) of the fantasy genre is George Macdonald. During the second half of the 19th century he wrote several fantasy books and by doing so inspired fantasy legends like J.R.R. Tolkien (Lord of the Rings) and C.S. Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia).
These authors, together with the likes of Robert E. Howard (Conan), H.P. Lovecraft (Cthulhu) and L. Frank Baum (The Wizard of Oz), showed up during the 20th century and really put fantasy on the map as genre that was to be taken seriously. The works of these authors were much more than simple childrens storie about boogymen and it became more and more accepted to acknowledge fantasy as literature.
So far this overview of the early days of the fantasy genre. In the near future I will discuss the development of the fantasy genre during the second half of the 20th century when in the sixties Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings began to take the world by storm and the eighties and nineties brought fantasy to the movie theatres.
I have always found it difficult to form a decent opinion about the Harry Potter series: somehow something has never felt completely right.
As you may have seen they are not on my list of best fantasy series and the movies are placed 7th on my list of best fantasy movies but mainly because of their huge popularity. On the one hand I appreciate the books and enjoy watching the movies but on the other hand they just do not seem to be able to catch my attention.
Not my type of fantasy?
I can think of several reasons why Harry Potter is not my thing. Sure, the story itself is pretty good, the characters are quite well established and the magical elements often are cool and original. However, it just not be the type of fantasy I am into. The series is not particularly epic in scale nor is it mysterious or dark and it lacks the humor I like. Therefore, the series simply lacks the qualities I appreciate in fantasy.
Generation gap?
Another reason for not being a fan of Harry Potter is the fact that I don’t fit in the target age group. Many will say that the series can be read by young and old but I feel that the books but especially the movies are focused on a specific ‘age bandwidth’. The first movies are aimed at very young teenagers and book by book the content and style of the series gradually changes to match this group. Given that I am not a teenager anymore, Potter always appears just a bit childish to me. The Halfblood Prince was even ‘snoggy’ at times.
Conclusion
I can think of other reasons, like Harry Potter being too commercial for its own good but in the end I know that I shouldn’t complain to much. To be honest, we have to be grateful to J.K. Rowling for providing a very nice introduction to fantasy for a couple of million young people. Looking at it like this, she did the entire genre a favor and not just her bank account. However, the series has been quite one-dimensional and personally I believe it to be a good thing that the series is finished and that movies are also coming to an end.
