I love LitRPG and have read a lot of it but find it’s becoming repetitive

Any fantasy recommendations that aren’t necessarily so heavy on the statistics

I’m not gonna lie - I was disappointed like most people hearing year after year that George Martin, Pat Rothfuss and Scott Lynch aren’t coming out with books as hoped. But it has forced me to read new authors I may not have otherwise discovered. Some of the ones I would recommend are Anthony Ryan, Christopher Buehlman, Michael J Sullivan, Brian Lee Durfee and Brian Staveley. Has anyone else had the same experience and what authors would you recommend?

In many games, orcs are depicted as having green skin. Especially Warhammer.

What about trolls? I have seen trolls with kind of a turquoise and blue skin, with fiery red hair. I like the way it looks, but I don’t know where it’s from. Does anyone here know?

I first saw this in a game called Kingdom Rush.

I'm looking for some books on the level of the first few Harry Potter books to read my son at bed time. This is both in terms of reading level and overall scariness / violence.

HP books 4-7 are a bit too much on both metrics. Similarly, we're not quite ready for the Hobbit. My recollection of The Lightning Thief is that it will be too scary as well. I need something in between these and series like Magic Treehouse. Any advice welcome.

I love stories where someone from our world ends in a fantasy world, specially with a female protagonist. In my experience, there's not a lot and Modern Girl in X World fanfics have been my main source of portal fantasy for years.

In 2019, Alix E. Harrow published The Ten Thousand Doors of January, around the same time Erin Morgenstern published The Starless Sea. This year Harrow won a Hugo with The Everlasting. Recently we also have Time of Iron, Dark Lord Davi and This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me (which are more MY type of portal fantasy).

There's also the massive popularity of Dungeon Crawler Carl. I know, I know, not exactly portal fantasy, but it ticks some of the boxes (protagonist from our world ends in a different world with different rules and has to adapt to survive the adventure). It will probably result in more LitRPG being traditionally published instead of more Portal Fantasy, but a girl can dream that they'll pick The Wandering Inn first, lol.

So, as the title asks: will we be seeing more authors publishing portal fantasy?

I just finished up a retelling of Sleeping Beauty, A Spindle Splintered, was pretty good. It got me thinking about the explosion of retellings of myths, fables, and fairy tales since the 2010s. What are your feelings on this subgenre, I've about 4 books in this style, both Madaline Miller books, Juniper and Thorne, I'm a fan but I can see some of the problems people would have with it, it can feel derivative, it requires a certain amount of asumuntion on the part of the author, retellings can also stumble whilst trying to make their points.

I’m in a bit of a fantasy reading rut lately. Kind of tired of reading fantasy that’s full of complicated court intrigue and/or war and with a ton of POV characters. Sadly that seems to be the trend lately.

Are there any long series that mostly feature epic questing, dungeon crawling and world exploration? And only focus on one or a few main characters.

I would love me some fantasy Indiana Jones too

Hey guys, just looking for recommendations for good book groups on reddit, Facebook possibly even discord. Healthy groups that chat about booke with great interactivity :)

This is the third book in the Ana and Din Mysteries/Shadow of the Leviathan series. In "The Tainted Cup," I was like, "I like the worldbuilding, the characters are a little too one-dimensional and over-the-top sometimes." "A Drop of Corruption" improved upon this--the characters didn't seem so over-the-top, but the worldbuilding was still good. This one has maybe gone too far in eroding the characters' unique traits.

Din and Ana travel to a province where cattle is the big industry because everyone likes eating meat. There are two rival aristocratic families in the livestock business who are a big deal locally, even if not the richest or most important on the scale of the entire empire. The daughter from one house is found dead; the son from the other is found covered in her blood. A Romeo and Juliet tragedy? Frame job?

The exciting part of this, for me, was that Din inadvertently runs into one of his sisters, Fotia. Din took the job as an investigator, with the biotech modifications that ensues, as a way to pay off his family debts and provide for them. But he hasn't spoken to them in years, and Fotia is not happy about it when they reunite. The comparison and contrast between the paths they've taken in life, and how it might or might not be construed as sacrifices for monetary advancement, was neat.

RJB has a fun sense of humor, I like stuff like "I got to intimidate people by reminding them that I have a perfect memory and they shouldn't mess with me. They don't stop to think about the fact that my memories are kinda meaningless if they remove my head from my shoulders."

In book one, it was an important part of the plot that Din is dyslexic. By now, however, he's able to read things and translate well even in his second language. Ana's ranting and raving used to get them sideways looks from authority figures they need to work with; now, it's more confined to her complaining about aristocrats to Din, but being ultimately chill with the fact that Fotia is enaged to one. There was a Reddit post about "the vault had four dials with thirty possibilities each, which meant that the total amount of combinations was unable to be brute-forced. Ana mentioned 'yeah, that's 810,000, that's too many' and everybody was impressed that she could do math in her head," except, as the Redditor pointed out, "a lot of us can do 30^4 in our heads, that's not something you do every day but it's also not rocket science?" Intelligence being more an informed attribute than indirectly revealed.

This wouldn't be an issue if I was otherwise invested in the characters and the story, but this one is more of a downer.

"It makes me wonder--is such a people worth maintaining? For a willingness to tolerate suffering for one's comfort only grows over time, in my experience. In facct, the more I read, the more I suspect, Din...perhaps we now echo an older age of the Empire. One that failed--perhaps deservedly."

I studied her, unnerved. Whenever Ana had spoken of protecting the Empire before, she had always listed the many unsatisfying compromises one had to make to keep it all upright--but she had never suggested that it might be better to send it all tumbling down.

Din's response to this attitude a couple chapters later is a Candide-esque "well, we just have to cultivate our garden," but I found it unconvincing.

Bingo: Published in 2026, Murder Mystery

I’m trying to find some fantasy novels that have the main characters be from low social classes, commoners, or just not a particularly important lineage

The weekly Tuesday Review Thread is a great place to share quick reviews and thoughts on any speculative fiction media you've enjoyed recently. Most people will talk about what they've read but there's no reason you can't talk about movies, games, or even a podcast here.

Please keep in mind, users who want to share more in depth thoughts are still welcome to make a separate full text post. The Review Thread is not meant to discourage full posts but rather to provide a space for people who don't feel they have a full post of content in them to have a space to share their thoughts too.

For bloggers, we ask that you include either the full text or a condensed version of the review along with a link back to your review blog. Condensed reviews should try to give a good summary of the full review, not just act as clickbait advertising for the review. Please remember, off-site reviews are only permitted in these threads per our reviews policy.

And I really would love to hear other people's thoughts on Alain. This is one small part of a deeply intricate character, but I can't help thinking about Henri, and how he made it pretty clear to Alain (without saying the words) that he was Alain's biological father, not just his foster father. When Henri brings Alain back home after his captivity / the cataclysm, and asks Alain if he knows who his father is now - it drove me kind of crazy that Alain continued to say "I don't know."

I also wondered if anyone else thought he was supposed to be a Jesus-like figure, like the blessed Daisan. Though that doesn't really make sense given that his mother is known, it's his father who isn't.

Anyway, I would just love to hear what people have to say about Alain!

My fiancé had never been into reading despite trying multiple times. He often claimed that fiction just wasn’t for him but would only get a few pages into the nonfiction self help books he chose for himself before giving up.

I LOVE to read and am constantly reading fantasy and sci-fi, telling him about my favorite ones but never really catching his interest. After he saw a man on Instagram talking about Red Rising, he decided he was going to give it a go (it’s one of my favorite series but I think seeing a man similar to him recommend it was what he needed!) He hasn’t been able to put it down!! Staying up after I fall asleep to read and listening to the audiobook as he does daily tasks and it warms my heart!! He’s giggling and telling me about his favorite parts - he even looked over at me today and said ‘I love reading!’

I never realized how badly I wanted to share this hobby with him!! Here’s hoping he keeps loving it and finds many more stories to bring him joy.

Books with medieval ships that are magical? Robin Hobb, I know about that. Are there any else?

The votes are in! Our HEA Book Club read for Asian Fantasy Romance in November 2026 is:

Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto

HAMMAJANG | adjective. Definition: In a disorderly or chaotic state; messed up. Chiefly in predicative use, esp. in all hammajang. Etymology: A borrowing from Hawaiian Pidgin. Source: Oxford English Dictionary.

Edie is done with crime. Eight years behind bars changes a person - costs them too much time with too many of the people who need them most.

And it's all Angel's fault. She sold Edie out in what should have been the greatest moment of their lives. Instead, Edie was shipped off to the icy prison planet spinning far below the soaring skybridges and neon catacombs of Kepler space station - of home - to spend the best part of a decade alone.

But then a chance for early parole appears out of nowhere and Edie steps into the pallid sunlight to find none other than Angel waiting - and she has an offer.

One last job. One last deal. One last target. The trillionaire tech god they failed to bring down last time. There's just one thing Edie needs to do - trust Angel again - which also happens to be the last thing Edie wants to do. What could possibly go all hammajang about this plan?

Ocean's 8 meets Blade Runner in this trail-blazing debut science fiction novel and swashbuckling love letter to Hawai'i about being forced to find a new home and striving to build a better one - unmissable for fans of Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir and Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo.

Reminders:

This month (September 2026), we're reading Celestially Yours by Al Hess&restrict_sr=on&sort=new). The midway discussion will be this Thursday, 10-Sep-2026.

What is the HEA Book Club? Every odd month, we read a fantasy romance book and discuss! You can read about it in our reboot thread here.

Ranked Choice Voting Results:

We had 11 voters. A book needs 6 votes to earn a majority.

First Round:

1. Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto 5
2. The Star-Touched Queen by Roshani Chokshi 2
3. Thrice Married to a Salted Fish (Novel) Vol. 1 by Bi Ka Bi 2
4. Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan 1
5. The Tiger's Daughter by K. Arsenault Rivera 1
6. A Crane Among Wolves by Jane Hur 0

First we eliminate any book that got zero first-choice votes. In this case, we eliminate A Crane Among Wolves by Jane Hur.

Then we eliminate the lowest vote-getter. Here, Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan and The Tiger's Daughter by K. Arsenault Rivera are equally the lowest. We eliminate those and redistribute their votes to their second choices.

Second Round:

1. Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto 7
2. Star-Touched Queen by Roshani Chokshi 2
3. Thrice Married to a Salted Fish (Novel) Vol. 1 by Bi Ka Bi 2

Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto wins after 2 rounds! It now has 7 votes, more than the 6 necessary to win.

Looking for series set on a time where firearms are starting to revolutionize war tactics (or are otherwise a part of the setting), empires and nation states are engaging in colonialism and fighting with each other, and class issues and ethnic tensions are starting to boil over into conflict

Has anyone read anything like this? Think Pillars of Eternity.

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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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 love jungles, and am looking for fantasy books/series with a well fleshed out jungle, where the jungle kind of feels like a character on its own. Preferably adult fantasy with strong character work. I'm aware of "The Book of Koli", but while I loved the setting I didnt connect with the narration, another example I have read is "Blood and Bone" (part of malazan). One (sci-fi?) book I have on my TBR is, set at least partially in a jungle, is "Cage of Souls" by Adrian Tchaikovsky, Thoughts?