My Top 10 (Completed) Science Fiction/Fantasy Series

Before diving into the list itself, I’d like to establish a few things. These are my favorite series, and do not necessarily reflect the best writing in series I’ve read. This ranking takes into consideration things like prose, dialogue, characters, worldbuilding, and plot. In some cases, weight will be given more to phenomenal prose; in others, the focus will be on setting or characters or whatever.

It also ignores incomplete series, so you won’t see any love for The Kingkiller Chronicle or The Stormlight Archive, among others. Similarly, it ignores standalone books, so no The Windup Girl or The Left Hand of Darkness or Roadside Picnic or the like.

That said, let’s dive on in. Continue reading

Book of the Week – August 13th, 2015

The Book of the Week is back! I know it’s been a couple weeks, and this has been harder to keep consistent than I thought it would. First, my computer decided to consistently freeze while I was on vacation—resulting in zero posts for over a week, and no writing done on Seeds of Sand, the way I’d planned—and then I came back to Colorado and started a new job almost immediately. It’s been a busy couple weeks.

But anyway, I’m trying to get back on schedule with things now. The Book of the Week is The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story by Stephen R. Donaldson.

The Gap Into Conflict: The Real Story

Cup of Dcaf: Writing a Second-World Fantasy Series

The fantasy genre is famous for long series, and many of the highest-profile authors have received their share of criticism for how long the series went. Whether it was Robert Jordan when The Wheel of Time bogged down in the late middle of the series, or George R. R. Martin for the Meereenese Knot, or whoever the author du jour happens to be, the fact is that lots of fantasy series slow down at points. Why this happens is a subject of debate, where many people accuse authors of moneygrubbing and others think the writers just wrote themselves into corners, there is a certain solidarity that I have discovered as I move into writing more seriously.

When you create a world, and put hours and hours and days and days into building it, fleshing it out, making it rich, you become proud of it. Continue reading

Drew’s Wheel of Time Reread – The Eye of the World Part 1

Welcome to Drew’s Wheel of Time Re-read! Today I’ll be covering Part One of The Eye of the World, from the prologue to Shadar Logoth. There will be spoilers for the entire series in these posts, so proceed with caution if you haven’t read through A Memory of Light. For those wondering, I will be covering the prequel, New Spring, after Book Seven, A Crown of Swords. I will be using a lot of acronyms in this reread series, especially with book titles. For reference, check out the handy list in my introductory post here. And now, onward. Let the Dragon ride again on the winds of time! Continue reading

Drew’s Wheel of Time Reread – Introduction

I’m doing a Wheel of Time reread! For those who know me personally, you know how I feel about this series; for those who don’t, WoT is a formative series in my life and is the main reason I became a writer. The depth, complexity, and creativity of the world and story just sucked me in, all those years ago, and ignited the spark of storytelling. Robert Jordan’s crowning work truly opened my eyes to everything the fantasy genre can offer.

This reread will be structured into (hopefully) two or three posts per book. It will likely be one post every week, as I want to take my time reading through it. I’ll be discussing my impressions, both from the first time I read the series, and now, on this umpteenth reread. I’m looking forward to getting a lot of my thoughts down and seeing where WoT takes me this time. Continue reading

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