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The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. Quite similar.. and REALLY GOOD BOOKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have a hard time reading most modern fantasy after Tolkien - they all seem way too derivative and lack the tragic depth and haunting wonder of LotR. I agree with others who recommend switching up your genres just a bit. A few books that are very different when it comes to subject matter, but still convey a sense of real magic and "if only this were true" are:

"Little, Big" by John Crowley - my all-time favorite
Mary Stewart's semi-historical Merlin trilogy (starting with "The Crystal Cave")
"American Gods" by Niel Gaiman (by far his best book)
"The Road to Corlay" by Richard Cowper

Happy reading.

The Golden Compass is somewhat similar... except that it's written from a child's perspective. And it's massively shorter.

Gormenghast Trilogy? No one?

Patrick Rothfuss trilogy

The first book "The name of the wind", I quite like it,
Now I am about to read the second one "The Wise man's fear", the third one is still to be released.

Will wrote: "Gormenghast Trilogy? No one?"

I agree!! This is also high fantasy and Mervyn Peake is always overlooked when discussions start about the 'greats' of fantasy. The first book, Titus Groan, was published well before LOTR and the whole trilogy is a work of art that does not get bogged down in poetry and external mythology. highly recommended.

Titus Groan

Gormenghast

Titus Alone

I should say 'his dark materials' by Phillip Pullman....I don't know which is my favourite fantasy series LOTR or His Dark Materials......you should try it.....

I love fantasy authors that create their own world. Here are some of my suggestions for adults:
1. The Sacred Hunt/Sun Sword/House War series by Michelle West
2. The Dragon Prince/Dragon Star series by Melanie Rawn
3. Memory, Sorrow and Thorn/Otherland/Shadowmarch series by Tad Williams
So far, these are the best at world building that I have come across. Especially Tad Williams.
For YA, I like the Lyra world by Patricia C. Wrede and the Tortall world by Tamora Pierce.

Will wrote: "Gormenghast Trilogy? No one?"

I said 'Peake' - I assumed people would realise I meant Gormenghast.

Hello Ann
You might also enjoy these books by Kristen Britain:
Green Rider (1)
First Rider's Call (2)
The High King's Tomb (3)
Blackveil (4)
My son introduced me to Green Rider when the first book came out and I couldn't wait for the sequel. Kristen Britain hasn't disappointed me yet.
Diana

Any here ever tried Steven Erikson's series the Malazan Book of the Fallen? it's incredibly well written and a very well realised world. Apparently he'd played the whole world with his friend a fellow archeology student for 15 years before starting to write it. The other guy, Ian C Esslemont also writes in the same world.

But seriously, I haven't read anything like it, it's the deepest, most well thought out, well plotted series I've ever read. Completely unique.

Enjoy.

Another vote for Mervyn Peake here. And for Dune, though I really did lose patience with the sequels very fast. And for American Gods, which is just amazing.

China Mieville's Bas-Lag trilogy is very consciously trying not to be like Tolkein, and is incredibly enjoyable for it. Plus the man has a gift for creating weird and unsettling monsters, and a dark sense of humour - give "Perdido Street Station" a go and see if you like the different flavour.

I also read Joe Abercrombie's "The Heroes" earlier this year and am now having a go at his First Law Trilogy, which I'm enjoying so far. Again, they're more subversive of Tolkein than imitative of him, but that's no bad thing.

Peter V Brett's "Painted Man" series has been shaping up well. Someone else mentioned "The Name of the Wind", which was a lot of fun, I have yet to read the second.

And if you want an entirely different take on Tolkein's own world, Kirill Eskov's "The Last Ringbearer" is worth investigating.

Everything mentioned here (apart from Dune) is "fantasy" but there are some wildly different takes on the genre - Eskov's book ranges from history lecture to spy thriller at different points, while Mieville jumps around genre from book to book, and Gormenghast's final book, "Titus Alone", goes gloriously off the rails if memory serves.

I found the original trilogy of the Dragonlance series was a very close second to LOTR. Another Epic series I found fascinating was the Denyni series of Katherine Kurtz

Her website is here:

Mieville is fantstic, Perdido Street Station was such a great book, a realy breath of fresh air, unique and yet all the trademarks of a great fantasy.
Also Joe Abercrombie's First Law was awesome. Very blody. He does some of the best close quarter combat scenes I''ve read.

High Fantasy is a difficult genre to get right. Tolkien's works are insurmountable in my eyes (That goes for everything he wrote - so try The Silmarillion or Narn i Chîn Húrin or The Lays of Beleriand if you're looking to build on LotR)

But Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern series is truly brilliant (in a different way) and the same goes for Katherine Kerr's Deverry Cycle. I would recommend either of them before Jordan or Eddings or Martin, because they do something new with the genre, though the latter is very good if you can get over the grittiness.

I thought the Earthsea Trilogy by Ursula le Guin was very good.

The Prydain Chronicles by Lloyd Alexander is has great characters and story.

The Book of Three

Josh wrote: "I'm currently reading Clash of Kings, the second book of George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series. I'd certainly add my voice to the recommendations it's getting. So far it feels more like ..."

don't know if you know this but A game of thrones was made into a mini series - 10 episodes. you can down load them. It is brilliant. They are making the second book into same series at moment.

Irene wrote: "I have loved reading these comments as I now have so many new Authors to try. Thank you so much. I would recommend Stephen Donaldsons Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. Nothing is like Lord of the Ring..."

I read a series called "the crowthistle chronicals" by Cecelia Dart-thornton. Im a LOTR fan as well as The Live ship Traders and Farseer Trilogy etc and this was just as good. Dart-thornton has a few different series and I have enjoyed them all.

Inheritance cycle by Christopher Paolini.

Tolkien is listed as one of his influences.
(The last book of this series is releasing today. I am hoping its spectacular!)

A song of ice and fire - it's a must read! It's as intence as LOTR

A few have mentioned Feist's work and I second them on that. Also, The Dark Tower series by Stephen King is majestic...

Meh wrote: "Read Belgariad by David Eddings, that's a good yarn, but all the other series by him are rewrites of the Belgariad, so don't bother."

I'll second the notion of skipping the rest of Eddings too.

As for a recommendation, try Raymond E. Feist's Riftwar Trilogy.

People complaining of Tolkien ripoffs are like Tool fans, ughhh.

I have to echo many of the postings in here. The Raymond Feist books are great, as well as Rothfuss, Martin, Salvatore, and Terry Brooks. Read them all!

Easy answer, the Gormenghast trilogy (well, actually just the first two books): it was written about the same time, has equally beautiful writing, a possibly internal rather than an external setting, but has other resonances as well.

Go back to the beginning: Beowulf!

You can try and read The Hobbit. Lot's of people prefer it to LOTR (I don't). Or any other book by Tolkien. He has lots.

I like Jack Chalker's Flux and Anchor series; John Varley's Titan, Wizard, Demon series; The Warded Man and The Desert Spear by Peter V. Brett.

Anne McCaffrey; Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series is excellent; Stephen King's Dark Tower series is one of my favorites.

you might try The Deeds of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon.

Well, Tolkien's LOTR and related books (but not only his books, think of C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia) created a big precedent. Obviously, every other High Fantasy book must somehow "copy" parts of these books - and that in itself is not bad. The great Greek classics have been copied thousands of times and even Tolkien writes based on his knowledge of past books. It is how you copy something - how you transform the 'old' into 'new' - that shows your genius.

That said, many fantasy books make me yawn for their predictability - I pick them up and let them go. Until I started A song of Ice and Fire by George R R Martin.

Like Josh said, Martin manages to be original: magic has disappeared and people have become skeptic, but it is returning slowly - and there's nothing nice about it (or the rest of the non-magic world and society for that matter).

Then there's his style: gritty, graphic, but also with a touch of subtlety and even naivety at times. In short, the style screams 'adult literature' in alternative to 'highschool and young adult literature'.

As for other suggestions, I'll join in with...

-Rook (go back and read all the other big sagas).
-Allison (Silmarillion is also my favourite from Tolkien's work)

After reading the "Belgariad", I tremendously enjoyed Eddings' "Belgarath The Sorcerer", and "Polgara The Sorceress" was enjoyable. Donaldson's "Chronicles" series was good. Goodkind's "Sword of Truth" series is captivating, but I fell of sometime during the fourth book--it was quite repetitive and there is not enough time to read all I want to--sacrifice. I could increase this list ad infinitum.

There are many novels and series that are good, but if you're looking for something to equal LOTR, you will be disappointed. There are as many suggestions here as there are readers here and now I have a few new ideas for my to-read shelf, thank-you.

*sidenote: I saw one suggestion for the Harry Potter series on this thread and it was half-hearted and apologetic, at best. This shows me (micro-cosmically) that the majority of LOTR BOOKS fans don't even compare the two.

What is with all the LOTR vs. HP on this website? Have we allowed our children to become so stupified?

Try Michael Scott Rohan's "Winter of the World" series; it's the closest to Tolkien, both in quality of writing and depth of research, that I've found. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28...

The first three books in Ursula K. LeGuin's Earthsea series are of the same calibre, too.

I would suggest the Earthsea series by Ursula Le Guin, it's another high fantasy type series.

I would suggest:

The Saga of Recluce series by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.

The Sword, The Ring, and The Chalice trilogy by Deborah Chester

and I'd second The Farseer Trilogy (or most anything else) by Robin Hobb

I'm going to go way off the reservation here and recommend A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Sure, it's listed as "science fiction," but the "science" is of the Star Wars "yeah, we kind of made this up as we went along" sort. The cast of characters and races are almost as diverse as LOTR (especially if you get to later novels) and best of all... they're free to download. Legally. Can't beat free. :-D

I'm also going to commit heresy and recommend you stay away from A Song Of Ice And Fire. It's nowhere near finished, and Martin is just about the slowest writer going (at least, since Robert Jordan died). It took several years between the release of book 4 and 5, and there are no signs that book 6 will be written any quicker. Besides, Joe Abercrombie does the same style much faster, and a hell of a lot better... I'll take Best Served Cold over anything in ASOIAF so far.

In that same vein, I'm reading through Glen Cook's Chronicles of The Black Company. It's grim, dark, and totally hilarious in a black comedic way. There are some dead spots (Bleak Seasons was a slog and a half because the narrator was unstuck in time), but so far it has been a rewarding read.

Finally, if dark and gritty fantasy isn't your thing, you could try Dennis L. McKiernan's Mithgar novels. The first two (The Iron Tower Omnibus and The Silver Call) were written as proposed sequels to LOTR, but when he couldn't get the rights to the franchise, he rewrote them in his own style, and added on with some powerful books of his own (Dragondoom, Voyage of the Fox Rider, and the Hel's Crucible Duology to name some).

I know I'm going to come off as a total jerk, but 80% of these recommendations are pure garbage. The people recommending the works of George R.R. Martin and Robert Jordan as books similar to The Lord of the Rings need to have their heads examined. Terry Brooks wrote a pale imitation to the Lord of the Rings and instead of being ignored he's celebrated? I feel like Gordon Ramsey yelling "For #^%#$ Sake!" The Dragonlance trilogy, which was something I loved as a teenager, isn't worthy. Neither is David Eddings, Raymond R. Feist, or any other number of writers who wanted to show you how cool their D&D campaigns were.

Some people make good recommendations, and for that I salute them. Guy Gavriel Kay helped Christopher Tolkien edit The Silmarillion, and while his Fionavar Tapestry is B list at best, most of his output is very well done.

Jack Vance's Lyonesse Trilogy is absolutely fantastic, and should be on the shelves on anyone interested in the Fantasy Genre. Put it right on your shelves next to Gene Wolfe's "The Knight" and "The Wizard".

I'm amazed that no one has recommended Ursula K. Le Guin. The Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, and The Farthest Shore have more magic and humanity in their tiny little paperback spines than the entire bloated mess of Robert Jordan's 13000 page "epic".

I'd also look backwards in time, from before the Lord of the Rings were published. E. R. Eddison's "The Worm Ouroborus" is a little tough to chew on, but well worth it. Lord Dunsany was writing fantasy before it was a genre.

If you want something epic try "the blade Itself" by Joe Abercrombie , one of the best series i have read after Tolkien.

"Lyonesse" is very nastily misogynistic - I really could have done without all those rapes - and is therefore unsuitable for someone who likes Tolkien's books.

Hyarrowen, I'm very intrigued by your comment about Lyonesse. I can't think of anything specifically misogynistic about the books, but neither can I think of a good rebuttal to your comment, besides the fact that the main characters for the first and last book are women. Of course, now I'm thinking of Suldrun's fate and maybe that's giving your opinion more credence? I plan on reading the books again soon. This will be something I'll look out for.

I was thinking more about the actual rapes - I can think of four off-hand, though it's years and years since I read the books. And they're *all* of women. I'd actually forgotten about Suldrun's fate, but yes, that's unpleasant too. Also the Ska king's(?) comment that he couldn't have emulated Aillas' restraint with said king's daughter - creepy IMHO. Great basic story idea, and I skim-read it to find out what happened - but OMG the attitudes!

My vote is for the Earthsea series.

One that hasn't been mentioned that I really enjoyed was the Book of Words trilogy by J.V. Jones. The first book is The Baker's Boy. I also enjoyed the Belgariad and the Dragonlance Cronicles, as well as the works of Dennis McKiernan.

Allison wrote: "George R. R. Martin's series A Song of Ice and Fire is a great series, and very Tolkien-esque. The characters are awesome, I am 350 pages in and am LOVING. :)"

Let's see...

Tolkien had an epic quest, a clear plot, a limited number of characters, a struggle between clear good and clear evil, and orcs and elves and such...

Martin has incest, politics, a murky-as-hell plot, characters falling from the sky to add even more viewpoints, moral ambiguity and did he really sleep with his sister?!?

Yep... totally see the similarities. /sarcasm

Ann wrote: "I know that nothing can be the same as LOTR - and I'm not looking for anything to take its place. However, if anyone has any suggestions to help steer me towards other books with a similar flavor ..."

I hate to self-promote, but I suspect you may like my soon-to-release epic fantasy series. Maybe just email me if you'd like to know more.

Ursula Leguin's old series "The Wizard of Earthsea." Superb!

Battle royal.

try the Earthsea quartet by Ursula Le Guin - i think the first book was made into a film

I'm gleaning some titles for my to-read list, as well. Thanks for all the suggestions.

You could also try Alan Garner's first three books, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, The Moon of Gomrath and Elidor. They're children's books and have excitement and magic aplenty - the endings are slightly underwritten, but perhaps that's what makes them stick in the mind.
http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...

Keep the recommendations coming! This is the best thread on Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ. Don't forget to read Patrick Rothfuss's initial two books!