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/lit/ - Literature

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4985575 No.4985575[DELETED]  [Reply] [Original]

What are the best fantasy books or series that have a dark feel throughout.

MBOTF does have some funny parts in it but for the most part it is pretty dark.

>> No.4985596
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4985596

>>4985575

C.S. Friedman is my favorite author for dark fantasy, I recommend the Coldfire and Magister trilogies.

Garth Nix writes pretty dark YA fantasy, especially Shade's Children.

>> No.4985652
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4985652

>> No.4986691

Glen Cook's Black Company series. Some consider it a poor imitation of MBOTF but I think it's got enough of its own thing going for it. Erikson himself called it vietnam fiction on peyote. If anything its almost too stark where I felt MBOTF fleshed things out a little more in the immediate action, you fill in 90% of the situation with Black Company.

>> No.4986695

Kentaro Miura's dark fantasy masterpiece Berserk.

>> No.4987602

>>4985652

Great series, mah nigga

>> No.4987631

>>4985575
What the hell is it with that cover? It looks like WoT. Is it real or is this just fanmade?

>> No.4987655

>>4986695

Yeah. When I think of "dark fantasy", I can only think of Berserk and Souls games.

Are there any books like that? Malazan is more "edgy fantasy" than "dark fantasy".

>> No.4989444

>>4985575
The Black Company.
Gets very brutal, dark, and violent. But then there's a scene where a guy is trying to escape on his horse, but his horse was actually a shapeshifted Taken who just turned back. So in the short seconds that he's still alive, he's straddling this stanky wizard dude.

>> No.4989468

What do you mean by "dark"? Cynical and morally grey or has gothic/horror themes?

>> No.4989807

ASOIAF

>> No.4990090

>>4987655
Yeah, I'd read the fuck out of something that evoked the same mood as Berserk and Souls.

/lit/ had a thread about this a while ago, actually, and the closest anyone got was Blood Meridian.

>> No.4990424

Anyone read The Witcher series? Based off of the games, I'd guess the series is pretty dark, but I have no clue whether they're good or not.

>> No.4990475

>>4990424
I thought the game was based off the books, not the other way around?
Anyway I've read the first book, it was good, dark fantasy, but nothing grand, no Gene Wolfe or Glen Cook.
Of course, I read the English translation, so maybe someone reading it in it's original Polish gets much more out of it.

>> No.4990477

Gormenghast trilogy

>> No.4990488

>>4990424
I did and enjoyed it. The quality varies but in Polish it's quite well put together with dialogues being the strong point all along the series. I think you can find fan translations of varying quality online.

The short stories vary in mood from outright light-hearted to melancholy to grimdark. The series itself is quite dark and the major source of the darkness is regular folks - not the Big Bads or psychos, but the faceless crowd of petty assholishness, prejudice, and plain indifference. You do get small hope spots, little happy touches and examples of basic human kindness as well so it's not all as grimdark as the games can get.

>> No.4990490

>>4987655
Stephen Donaldson has a series that starts with a guy with leposy raping a virgin

>> No.4990496

What are the best fantasy books or series that have a dark feel throughout.

All of Michael Moorcock

>> No.4990509
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4990509

These books are much superior to anything in the thread

http://www.robert-low.com/oathswornseries.htm

>> No.4990514
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4990514

>>4990509
Also

>> No.4990964

bridge to terabithia

>> No.4991851

Joe Abercrombie

>> No.4991874

>>4990424
I read the first one and it was one of the worst things I've read. It's a bunch of loosely related stories of Geralt in some kind of a fairy tale scenario and each one ends up having an M. Night Shyamalan twist such as "the monster isn't evil after all!".

>> No.4992123

>>4990475
Sorry, I worded that strangely. I meant that based off of my experience with the games, I would guess that the books are probably dark. I'll check them out.

>> No.4994332

>>4990475
no Gene Wolfe or Glen Cook.

that is a good thing

>> No.4994421

>>4994332
Gene Wolfe is pretty divisive, but this is the first time I've seen someone dislike Glen Cook.

>> No.4994468

>>4994421
lmao i'll bet

>> No.4994697

>>4994468
So you're saying you have shit taste then.

>> No.4995209

>>4994421
He is shit

>> No.4995246

>>4987655
Elric?

>> No.4995495

I read a book about cannibal witches once but can't remember the name

>> No.4995501

>>4985575
Im in toll the hounds right now
Im 17% into the books, feels a bit slow compare to the previous ones. Hopefully it will pick up soon

>> No.4995570
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4995570

>>4985575
>What are the best fantasy books or series that have a dark feel throughout.
OP, I'm at work so I don't have the "clean" version of this but enjoy non the less. The blue Arrows.

>> No.4995607

>>4990490
Don't listen to that fagget. /lit/ made me read the book and I wish I could cut someone to get back my lost time.

That book was horrible stay away from Stephen Donaldson

>> No.4995785

>>4995570
>brent weeks
>dark
anon plz

>> No.4996158

>>4994421
I can't say I outright dislike him, but I tried to read the first Black Company book and couldn't make it more than 50 pages in. The prose was just so awful.