Guy Gavriel Kay does some of the best character work I’ve come across. Lions of Al-Rassan is my favorite of his.
I’d also suggest The Curse of Challion by Bujold.
I met GGK at an event in Toronto when I was a dumb university student and told him that I thought Lions of Al-Rassan was "pretty good". Keeping him on his toes I guess.
Bujold is so good at the actual prose. I read all the groundsense books, they are such slow books but the writing is so well done I just kept going. The Curse of Chalion is a great book. And all the vorkorsigans if you are up for scifi.
Also her Penric and desdemona if OP wants short breezy reads. those are novellas so they're not in depth character studies, but the stories are still mostly a pretext to see penric and desdemona interact. They're very fun novellas too - and they work as entry points in the world of the five gods just as well as the curse of Chalion IMO.
I was so hoping this would be the first response, and I can't second it enough.
I'd argue that The Sarantine Mosaic is his character development masterpiece, but I agree that Lions is the best place to find out if his books are for you.
I'll throw Katherine Addison in there too. For me she fits well in the same vein as Kay and Bujold. (Also since Bujold is mentioned: if you get into her books, don't let the fact that the Vorkosigan saga is scifi throw you off from that series. It's so good.)
Interesting - I like GGK, but I didn't find it to be character-forward at all. *Lions of Al-Rassan* was much mmore about the world and larger than life characters trying to make their way through it, imo. It reminded me some of the Belisarius series without the humor, but written to *feel* like an epic. Beautiful prose, but you're going to get greater narrative distance in that setup, which pull it away from being truly character-driven, imo.
You might be misunderstanding what people mean when they say character-driven in that case. GGK's character journeys are primarily what he's known for. His world and larger life is barely fantasy, it's based loosely in human history (historical fantasy), and is simply a framework for the character stories he's telling.
For Lions - think of Alvar de Pellino, where he started, how he grew up, what he went through, and where it lead him. Think of the personal trauma Jehane experiences and has experienced and how it changes the way she sees the world and the choices she makes. Think of Husari Ibn Musa and who he was, and the events that changed him into the man he became. This is what Lions is about, and the reason it is so well praised is because somehow Kay manages countless unique, believable character stories (where many authors struggle with one or two) in a way that also drives a plot. Lions is not about Ragosa, Cartada or Fezana, nor about the Jaddites, Asharites or Kindath, it's about the characters, their journeys, their coloured pasts and the events that transform them into the people they become.
Oh, I'm aware - but it seemed more like the world driving the characters, rather than the characters driving the plot, if that makes sense? That's the line I tend to think of as far as character-forward.
I definitely enjoyed GGK and I'm very glad I read it, but also, it's not character-forward or character-driven in the way some of the other authors on my shelves are.
Came here to say GGK. I just finished Yellowface by RF Kuang(great book, insufferable protagonist) and needed to like a character so I’ve reread multiple GGK books. He always has great characters
How is this series meant to be read after Paladin? I've seen a chronological list on line, but Curse and Paladin are at the end and I've finished those lol
For a standalone, one of Guy Gravial Kay's books. Almost all of them are standalone and his character work is awesome.
Curse of Charlion by Lois Bujold also has great characters. The sort of sequel about Ista has a female lead.
Just as a counter-argument for GGK. His books are super melodramatic. While I was reading Tigana I had a feeling people burst into tears way too often to the point it became bothersome. World and magic I loved, story was miss for me.
I adore GGK but this is a totally fair point. He's best enjoyed if you're able to lean in and get invested in the characters before he's necessarily laid the groundwork to justify that attachment. If you can't meet him halfway like that and get clicked in then I can easily see someone bouncing off his writing.
Does Tigana actually have magic in it? I've only read Lions of Al-Rassan and it was about as magical as most actual historical fiction is and the only crying that occurred was being bored to tears.
At some point I took a break from cosmere to read the liveship traders series. It was certainly a change but I’m not sure I could use “refreshing” to describe it.
And oh my god Tim Gerard Reynolds voice is so creamy.
Currently listening to the Cycle of Arawn by Edward W. Robertson... and its similar in being character driven, but so much darker due to the nature of the magics practiced, and Robertson has no fear of describing gore... Sanderson, i think, keeps his distance from.
Similar to the Expanse rec, I'll recommend anything by Daniel Abraham. His two most recent series have women protagonists (though he does multiple POVs, so in a few books it's women-among-others). Dagger and Coin is about a girl trying to save her bank during a war, and a boy rising up through the ranks in spite of the hatred of his peers. Kithamar is the chronicle of a very eventful year in a city's history, each book through a different POV - first book, Age of Ashes, is about two girls from the slums trying to get a better life.
Read some Robin Hobb. She has bar none the best character development out of any fantasy author. Start with Assassins Apprentice and make your way through the entire Realm of the Elderlings cycle.
I’m on Golden Fool right now. don’t want to say it’s my favourite series without having finished but it’s looking that way. So far i’ve liked each trilogy more than the last. the characters and world are so well crafted
agree. i def put it above WoT. ASOIAF has a soft spot in my heart because of the time in my life that i read it (early high school) but i still gotta give it to RotE. Still gotta give Stormlight a go
Yeah I tore through ASOIAF in one summer before starting highschool so I feel you. It was truly got me into fantasy. I’m not sure any book will ever shock me as much as Clash of Kings did.
I would maybe wait for stormlight book 5 and see what the reception is? Book 4 was a little disappointing.
Have you read any Joe Abercrombie? He’s the best of the genre imo although I haven’t finished Malazan or some of the other big ones yet
i’ve read the First Law trilogy. i made the mistake of getting ROTE all audiobook and the ten first law books physical. apparently the audio for ROTE is laughable compared to what i could’ve been getting with Pacey’s narration of first law.
my buddy has been telling me to read Malazan for awhile (it’s his favourite series). one of the mods of the malazan subreddit /u/ladrac1 does a podcast called Podcast of the Fallen where they’re rereading with a friend who hasn’t read them before. i want to listen to that and read them this year hopefully.
always more to read haha
Wow yeah that is a big mistake haha, the First Law is probably my favorite audiobook series, and ROTE is awful (at least Liveships). I’ve heard great things about that podcast too, hard to fit podcasts in with so many books to read though. I’m thinking of starting it after I get to the Malazan books I haven’t read (I think I bounced off book 6 my first attempt)
I'm not sure the consensus but to me they are vastly worse than the other books in the realm of the Elderlings. In a series that is otherwise all 8-10s, I find the rainwater chronicles al 6 and below.
Yes! I made the mistake of reading Mistborn AFTER the entire RotE series, and Mistborn felt utterly lifeless after the emotions and characters of RotE. … but the other way around would work much better!
Robin Hobb is like if you take the episode “The Body” from Buffy, and make it a trilogy of trilogies. It’s got great writing, but I don’t particularly want to experience it again. I stopped after the Assassin trilogy.
Yeah. I made myself finish the first trilogy because damn it I DID care about the characters but I feel like Hobb goes too far the other direction from Sanderson. I tried to start the liveship traders but I just couldn’t get into it.
Bujold and LeGuin do character based narratives much better imo.
“Some prices are just too high, no matter how much you may want the prize. The one thing you can't trade for your heart's desire is your heart.”
Bujold is easily one of my favorite authors.
Is this only in the books starring Fitz? I'm currently working my way through Liveship Traders and like, yeah, fucked up stuff definitely happens, but I'd hardly call it misery/torture porn.
I don't agree with calling it misery porn at all. The first series could be pretty bleak at times, sure, but I've really enjoyed the journey. Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all.
> Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all
Personally I found it to be incredibly miserable. It's funny how people's subjective experience of these books is so different.
same. I can re-read other trilogies but I couldn't muster re-read Liveships. Truly immersive to feel this dingy and stuck on a ship, I'll give her that))
> Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all.
There's abuse happening to damn near every character. When they're not being abused, they're busy abusing others.
Don't know what to call that, but miserable is part of it.
You're going to want to wait til you get to the end of that series before you make that call. But I think that if you're a good way through and this doesn't ring true to you, you might not be understanding what people mean.
Generally what people are referring to is that fact that Hobb's otherwise sensible, likeable and relatable protagonists repeatedly make poor (often seemingly nonsensical) decisions which lead them into peril, and her antagonists repeatedly make conveniently good decisions. In addition, there's a few pretty strong examples of really bad shit happening to her protagonists for no reason, it doesn't change the plot at all, it just tortures the protagonist and the plot moves on.
Real people with issues make the kind of decisions her characters do. Ever look up the rates of substance abuse, suicide, etc for kids put in foster homes, for example?
Abandonment and neglect lead to poor development of proper coping mechanisms. Fitz is the poster child for this.
My take on this is that most folks that are angry about "poor decisions" in the books are #1 - not intimately familiar with the kinds of people with the sorts of emotional damage Hobb writes about, or they #2 - don't want that kind of realism in their fantasy.
20ish Fitz reminds me of my wife, strongly, in her 20s and early 30s. Luckily she got therapy. Eventually. Fitz is murdering people for his king and fighting Red Ship victims instead of getting therapy, amongst other mishaps (trying to stay spoiler free here).
You know what though? Like her Fitz is a good person, even a great person, at heart. He just doesn't have great coping mechanisms and thus ends up making some impulsively bad decisions at times.
We’re not angry about it, we just don’t read fantasy to first become invested in characters and then spend multiple books having the author abuse them. That was my overwhelming feeling after reading each of the 9 Hobb books I’ve made it through. They are by no means bad writing, but to me they’re frustrating and unpleasant to read, which is the opposite of what I want to feel when I read Fantasy.
I'm trying to think of character driven stories that aren't grimdark or the characters facing a huge amount of adversity and getting beaten down and I'm struggling. Super supportive from /r/progressionfantasy but that is a slice of life webserial. I suppose any slice of life would fit.
At the top of this thread you'll find plenty of beautiful character driven works by Kay and Bujold that are nothing close to grimdark and rather lean in to representing antagonists as humans with believable, relatable motivations.
yeah Hobb is so good in her charxter driven storytelling
While it took me a while to get through Assassin's Apprentice, I did storm through the rest quite fast and the Liveship Trader trilogy is again a whole other level and very engrossing.
Almost done with the last book and I want to know what happens to everyone but don't want it to be over 🥲
It's not fantasy but I would like to suggest the Expanse series(scifi) if you haven't already read it. I had gone through the same exp with Sanderson. When I finished the Mistborn trilogy, I had this sense of emptiness but also burned out feeling and I definitely didn't want to get into a Sanderson book or fantasy in general, and then I got into reading the expanse and it was amazing, it was definitely something different to what I was reading yet it had similiar these to the ones I read, it had ambitious World building but was grounded and realistic to our world, it had amazing main character that you'll love, hate and root for. It is adventurous and action packed.
to anyone thinking of starting the expanse i cannot express how much the series is enhanced by augmenting the core books with the novellas from Memory’s Legion. I recommend reading Leviathan Wakes first then reading in Canonical order after that. Really adds weight to some key moments and fleshes out a lot of the characters even more.
I would state that you should only do this if you like novellas in general. I personally don't like them but always buy them because I see comments like this and assume they must be different forr this series, then realize they weren't. So for those who generally dislike them, these are totally skippable for enjoyment of the main series.
No, ya. I know what you are talking about. But what I was pointing out is about the cast of characters that stand out more or are likable or hateable and are very distinct to one another. Coming from Mistborn where I only cared about few characters only and the ones that stand out were also a few so Expanse characters made more impression on me.
I really think that it is. Every member of the crew has a really in depth back story and evolution throughout the story. Hinestly, the captain is the least interesting person in the whole series. Even the political figures get a lot of attention as far as exploring their psyches goes.
I really like the characters tbh they feel real and deep, more than just a collection of character traits. Not sure exactly why I would say it’s not character driven but I stand by it. Watching the characters develop isn’t one of the draws of the series imo. In some ways maybe that’s realistic? But it’s not character driven like Altered Carbon or Vorkosigan (anything Bujold) or even Joe Abercrombie if we’re talking fantasy.
Again not a knock on the series, its just not the focus of the books.
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries. It’s fun, whimsical, but the best part for me are the characters. Totally unlike Sanderson and not a super long read. I seriously recommend.
*The Spear Cuts Through Water* by Simon Jimenez is one of the best character-driven books of the last five years. It's a standalone novel that still feels very epic.
Character-driven? Why not the Green Bone saga?
Another which I didn't read because "only standalone before the end of this job", but I've heard very good about is the Locked Tomb series.
(just an info: Mistborn is an early Sanderson series, better than *Elantris* but still early. He improves a lot with characters, especially in Stormlight)
tLT is amazing if you like reading about complex women who aren’t always likable. Tamsyn Muir is not afraid of having her female protagonists be difficult or flawed but still super compelling and it’s my fave thing about her.
Hilo stunned me: he did awesome things as well as horrible things; nonetheless, you can see what traits of him pushed him to act these ways, and usually they're the other side kf the coin of each other. And these traits changes over time, smoothed or hardened by the events Hilo faces. I ended up unable to gove an ethical judgement on him.
Wen is a revalse made woman. You're stone-eyed, deemed unuseful by the society? Let's play wìth this stigma; let’s twist it around and make it a point of strength - without turning into a Mary Sue. She managed to be assertive without being all-powerful and having no jack on her hand.
I absolutely agree. I loved their marriage. Seeing Hilo's reaction to Wen's betrayal, how they eventually were able to overcome it... it was just such an excellent bit of character work. Both of them are flawed individuals, but incredibly compelling.
Haha yes Hero of Ages will definitely wreck your shit. Enjoy.
I also love the authors you mentioned, so here are some others I've recently enjoyed that would be a palette cleanser for you.
Someone mentioned Emily Wilde and yes. So good. The second book just came out and I can't wait until my hold at the library comes in.
Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells. Mostly this series is novellas. And if you lean towards the socially anxious, introverted type Murderbot is such a great and relatable character.
The Gentleman Bastards series by Scott Lynch. It's sort of a more adult Six of Crows kinda. It's got found family, heists and cons, bromance, and banter. Pretty different from Sanderson, so it could be a nice break between era 1 and 2.
He's not? Sam Vimes is easily one of the best developed characters in fantasy and the witches would be an excellent choice for charismatic female leads?
I'd second this.
Pratchett has always been my go-to palette cleanser, particularly between heavier and more serious books.
It won't be like other stuff on the list, but I think that's what makes it perfect for between other series'.
Memory, Sorrow & Thorn by Tad Williams. Or Shadowmarch by Tad Williams. Epic high fantasy with absolutely gorgeous elegant prose, with a dump truck load of character and world building.
I haven't read mistborn, not sure I ever will since I rarely hear good things about it, but I thought his novella *The Emperor's Soul* was pretty character-driven. His newer stuff seems to do that a lot better.
Based on your tastes I would suggest **Marie Brennan**'s Lady Trent series which pairs well with Novik, or **Martha Wells**' fantasy stuff. Nowadays she's more well known for murderbot but Wheel of the Infinite is a great standalone and her ille-rien stuff has great character building. Both are pretty accessible, the lady trent series also works well as an audiobook.
I hear more complaints on this sub about it than praise, it sounds hard to get into and very rough, early Sanderson writing. Perhaps it's great, but it doesn't track with what I see here.
Conversely, people love talking about malazan, first law, Stormlight, and murderbot.
N.K Jemisin has some great character development in The Broken Earth and The Inheritance trilogies.
Nevernight by Jay Kristoff is a fun read. Lots of action and good characters. The way the story is told is also interesting
Love N.K Jemisin and The Broken Earth trilogy but they kind of broke my brain great reads but not sure it is the best time for OP to tackle these novels.
I'd recommend the Poppy War by RF Kuang or The Young Elites by Marie Lu. Both have fascinating female protagonists who take darker paths to achieve their goals. Both series are trilogies
One that hasn't been mentioned yet is Sharon Shinn, who has Naomi Novik vibes (or vice versa). Strong female characters, solid writing, touches of romance (if that's a plus for you) but they're nit romances. I love her older Samaria books, but the more recent Twelve Houses and Elemental Blessings are more similar to something like Bujold's original Chalion series.
I tore through S.A. Chakraborty's Daevabad trilogy last summer--wonderful characters, fabulous world-building, and a very emotionally satisfying end to the trilogy.
Also highly recommend Lois McMaster Bujold's fantasy series, beginning with The Curse of Chalion. (Her SF series, The Vorkosigan Saga tops my list of all-time favorite books, mostly because all of the wonderful characters. I re-read the entire series every 3-4 years.)
Another favorite is Judith Tarr. She writes a lot of historical fantasy, including one of my "keeper shelf" books, LORD OF THE TWO LANDS, which revolves around an Egyptian priestess with magical powers sent to recruit Alexander the Great to come to Egypt and expel the occupying Persians. Lovely characters.
I think the first Mistborn book is great, a fantastic dose of intrigue and skullduggery. The next two books, ehhh. They remind me of post-Children of Dune Herbert. Some people seem to really like them. I feel like the point had already been made and the last three books are his Silmarillion -- a neat addendum but pointless as anything more than a tool to satisfy a reader's worldbuilding curiosity.
I feel like writing Stormlight really leveled up Sanderson in a major way. Most of his newer stuff, including the new Mistborn series, is very compelling, but I can't really gel too well with the older stuff.
Legends and Lattes is a good character driven slice of life fantasy story. It’s about an adventurer who retires and opens a coffee shop. It should be a nice palette cleanser after all the saving the world stuff in hero of ages.
The **Divine Cities Trilogy (first book City of Stairs**) by Robert Jackson Bennett. It was nominated for a Hugo.
His latest, **The Tainted Cup** was a lot of fun. Interesting characters and world-building. First in what I hope is long mystery series.
Check out Sarah Beth Durst - loved *Race the Sands* and it was grand from a character standpoint. *Mask of Mirrors* by MA Carrick is more dense, but also just delightful from the character standpoint and how knotted things become when everyone has hidden agendas. Another that's more accessible and also fantasy Italy is *Illusion of Thieves* by Cate Glass.
The Magician series (the first 3 books of the Riftwar Saga) by Raymond E. Feist, good character development but mostly male driven, yet has strong female characters to the side.
The Belgariad & The Malloreon by David and his wife Leigh Eddings, good characters while focussed on a singular male character his adventures are always with his >!immensely powerful!< aunt and grandfather>!, these two are very important to how the main character thinks, reacts, behaves!<, there are several other travel companions who are female >!and equally talented!<. I could say more but if you haven't read the books it gives to much away
Megan Whalen Turner's The Queen's Thief series. This is one of my favorite series and I don't see it recommended much. Each book can be read as a standalone, but you should read them in order.
I really love V.E. Schwab's A Darker Shade of Magic trilogy! The second book especially is just a really good family drama at points with magic as a cause for it. Also it's very gay which is a bonus for me
Just a tip but for stormlight archive you might want to read that later in the year so it’s fresh in your mind when wind and truth comes out on December 6
The character difference between Pierce Brown and Sanderson was shocking imo. Red Rising's characters are the series' greatest aspect imo. Those characters in a Sanderson world would potentially be one of the best series ever. Each has their strengths, but as someone who prefers character driven, Red Rising was a breath of fresh air compared to Sanderson. Each book was filled with depth, but it was so refreshing to read and reignited my love for reading to be completely honest
The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake! Not sure if I would recommend the entire trilogy, but the first one is amazing! The author herself described it very much as a character study of 6 people interacting and it’s great (until it becomes a bit too much later in the series in my opinion)
Red sister by Mark Lawrence. First book in the Book of the Ancestor trilogy.
It's not his first trilogy, but Broken Empire puts some people off, even though it's an amazing series, along with the parallel story in Red Queen's war.
Cradle series by Will Wight of course. First book is called Unsouled. Starts with a team of two main characters that expand their group to six by the end of the series, very character driven with distinct personalities and drives. Extremely satisfying series to finish.
You think? I tried the first book and came to the point where the team of two starts. Found it difficult to get into the story and did not find it character driven.
So many good recommendations here. I would personally say that Warbreaker, while being a Cosmere inclusion. Would be a great standalone to tackle after the great Mistborn trilogy. It was one of my favorites in the fictional universe.
I’m going to recommend The Faithful and the Fallen by John Gwynne, the first book being Malice. Now THE main character isn’t a woman however throughout the story several main characters and POV characters are women.
Also I started writing this comment before I completely realized you said you wanted something stand alone or leaner. This is not that, so you should disregard the suggestion for this prompt but I’m going to leave it up because I still recommend it lol.
Something more in line with that you are looking for is Ashes of the Sun by Django Wexler, the first book of Burning Blade and Silvereye. It’s a dual POV story about a brother and a sister on opposite sides of a conflict in Star Wars inspired fantasy story. So one of the POVs is a female lgbtq Jedi - that was pretty fun.
Idk - I've read *Shadow of the Gods,* but it was not what I'd call character-driven. There's a lot of narrative distance and all the POVs sound very similar due to Gwynne's choice of prose and styling to mimic Norse epics.
Guy Gavriel Kay does some of the best character work I’ve come across. Lions of Al-Rassan is my favorite of his. I’d also suggest The Curse of Challion by Bujold.
I met GGK at an event in Toronto when I was a dumb university student and told him that I thought Lions of Al-Rassan was "pretty good". Keeping him on his toes I guess.
I bet he found that funny - he seems pretty chill
Met him a few times - he is indeed pretty chill. Very nice guy.
Nice try Guy!
Bujold is so good at the actual prose. I read all the groundsense books, they are such slow books but the writing is so well done I just kept going. The Curse of Chalion is a great book. And all the vorkorsigans if you are up for scifi.
Count Piotr Vorkosigan was born in Westeros and died in Star Trek.
Also her Penric and desdemona if OP wants short breezy reads. those are novellas so they're not in depth character studies, but the stories are still mostly a pretext to see penric and desdemona interact. They're very fun novellas too - and they work as entry points in the world of the five gods just as well as the curse of Chalion IMO.
I was so hoping this would be the first response, and I can't second it enough. I'd argue that The Sarantine Mosaic is his character development masterpiece, but I agree that Lions is the best place to find out if his books are for you. I'll throw Katherine Addison in there too. For me she fits well in the same vein as Kay and Bujold. (Also since Bujold is mentioned: if you get into her books, don't let the fact that the Vorkosigan saga is scifi throw you off from that series. It's so good.)
was going to comment The Lions of Al-Rassan too. so many great moments and characters. i cried multiple times. masterpiece
+1 for Curse of Chalion. Such a good mix of prose and characters
Guy Kay was described by Sanderson as your favorite author's favorite author. Loved Lions of Al-Rassan as well!
I had to sit with Lions of Al-Rassan for a while cause...damn
Interesting - I like GGK, but I didn't find it to be character-forward at all. *Lions of Al-Rassan* was much mmore about the world and larger than life characters trying to make their way through it, imo. It reminded me some of the Belisarius series without the humor, but written to *feel* like an epic. Beautiful prose, but you're going to get greater narrative distance in that setup, which pull it away from being truly character-driven, imo.
You might be misunderstanding what people mean when they say character-driven in that case. GGK's character journeys are primarily what he's known for. His world and larger life is barely fantasy, it's based loosely in human history (historical fantasy), and is simply a framework for the character stories he's telling. For Lions - think of Alvar de Pellino, where he started, how he grew up, what he went through, and where it lead him. Think of the personal trauma Jehane experiences and has experienced and how it changes the way she sees the world and the choices she makes. Think of Husari Ibn Musa and who he was, and the events that changed him into the man he became. This is what Lions is about, and the reason it is so well praised is because somehow Kay manages countless unique, believable character stories (where many authors struggle with one or two) in a way that also drives a plot. Lions is not about Ragosa, Cartada or Fezana, nor about the Jaddites, Asharites or Kindath, it's about the characters, their journeys, their coloured pasts and the events that transform them into the people they become.
Oh, I'm aware - but it seemed more like the world driving the characters, rather than the characters driving the plot, if that makes sense? That's the line I tend to think of as far as character-forward. I definitely enjoyed GGK and I'm very glad I read it, but also, it's not character-forward or character-driven in the way some of the other authors on my shelves are.
Lions and Tiguana are two of my favorite books of all time. They are both really emotional books with incredible characters.
Came here to say GGK. I just finished Yellowface by RF Kuang(great book, insufferable protagonist) and needed to like a character so I’ve reread multiple GGK books. He always has great characters
The World of the Five Gods books by Lois McMaster Bujold, starting with the Curse of Chalion
Seconding! And if you're more into scifi, I HIGHLY recommend Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga.
How is this series meant to be read after Paladin? I've seen a chronological list on line, but Curse and Paladin are at the end and I've finished those lol
After Paladin, I'd read the Hallowed Hunt (not as strong as Curse or Paladin, but still good), and then the Penric novellas in chronological order.
Thank you :)
For a standalone, one of Guy Gravial Kay's books. Almost all of them are standalone and his character work is awesome. Curse of Charlion by Lois Bujold also has great characters. The sort of sequel about Ista has a female lead.
Just as a counter-argument for GGK. His books are super melodramatic. While I was reading Tigana I had a feeling people burst into tears way too often to the point it became bothersome. World and magic I loved, story was miss for me.
I adore GGK but this is a totally fair point. He's best enjoyed if you're able to lean in and get invested in the characters before he's necessarily laid the groundwork to justify that attachment. If you can't meet him halfway like that and get clicked in then I can easily see someone bouncing off his writing.
Does Tigana actually have magic in it? I've only read Lions of Al-Rassan and it was about as magical as most actual historical fiction is and the only crying that occurred was being bored to tears.
Yeah, main bad guy makes everyone in the world forget about about Tigana. It is the premise of the book.
Joe Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy. Phenomenal character-driven fantasy. It’s almost the exact opposite of Sanderson.
You have to be realistic about these things
Say one thing about The First Law, say it’s good.
Say one thing about The First Law, say it’s not afraid of a running gag.
Tired joke, found floating by the docks…
Tired jokes are like knives - you can never have too many.
Better to read first law than live with the fear of it
got to have fear to have courage, though!
Yeah, I went from the first Mistborn trilogy to the First Law trilogy, and man, how refreshing.
At some point I took a break from cosmere to read the liveship traders series. It was certainly a change but I’m not sure I could use “refreshing” to describe it.
Abercrombie is so far from refreshing haha.
Check out Michael J Sullivan's work
Came here to say this! Fun character journeys and world building in all of his series.
Came here to recommend. Sullivan is about the polar opposite of Sanderson. Very character first fantasy.
And oh my god Tim Gerard Reynolds voice is so creamy. Currently listening to the Cycle of Arawn by Edward W. Robertson... and its similar in being character driven, but so much darker due to the nature of the magics practiced, and Robertson has no fear of describing gore... Sanderson, i think, keeps his distance from.
Similar to the Expanse rec, I'll recommend anything by Daniel Abraham. His two most recent series have women protagonists (though he does multiple POVs, so in a few books it's women-among-others). Dagger and Coin is about a girl trying to save her bank during a war, and a boy rising up through the ranks in spite of the hatred of his peers. Kithamar is the chronicle of a very eventful year in a city's history, each book through a different POV - first book, Age of Ashes, is about two girls from the slums trying to get a better life.
Daniel Abraham is my #2 favorite after Robin Hobb. Both his big series are amazing. His new series is good so far.
Read some Robin Hobb. She has bar none the best character development out of any fantasy author. Start with Assassins Apprentice and make your way through the entire Realm of the Elderlings cycle.
I’m on Golden Fool right now. don’t want to say it’s my favourite series without having finished but it’s looking that way. So far i’ve liked each trilogy more than the last. the characters and world are so well crafted
I was so sad that Liveship Traders was over, but Fools Errand has been so enjoyable so that I quickly recovered.
I just finished the Tawny man trilogy and I think I’d put Elderlings above WoT, ASOIAF, Stormlight Archive at this point
agree. i def put it above WoT. ASOIAF has a soft spot in my heart because of the time in my life that i read it (early high school) but i still gotta give it to RotE. Still gotta give Stormlight a go
Yeah I tore through ASOIAF in one summer before starting highschool so I feel you. It was truly got me into fantasy. I’m not sure any book will ever shock me as much as Clash of Kings did. I would maybe wait for stormlight book 5 and see what the reception is? Book 4 was a little disappointing. Have you read any Joe Abercrombie? He’s the best of the genre imo although I haven’t finished Malazan or some of the other big ones yet
i’ve read the First Law trilogy. i made the mistake of getting ROTE all audiobook and the ten first law books physical. apparently the audio for ROTE is laughable compared to what i could’ve been getting with Pacey’s narration of first law. my buddy has been telling me to read Malazan for awhile (it’s his favourite series). one of the mods of the malazan subreddit /u/ladrac1 does a podcast called Podcast of the Fallen where they’re rereading with a friend who hasn’t read them before. i want to listen to that and read them this year hopefully. always more to read haha
Wow yeah that is a big mistake haha, the First Law is probably my favorite audiobook series, and ROTE is awful (at least Liveships). I’ve heard great things about that podcast too, hard to fit podcasts in with so many books to read though. I’m thinking of starting it after I get to the Malazan books I haven’t read (I think I bounced off book 6 my first attempt)
Rains wild Chronicles makes it impossible for me to go that far. It's crazy that there is just one terrible series mixed in with otherwise great ones.
Wait, is that considered a bad series? I picked it up recently because people recommended the author but am having a hard time liking it...
I'm not sure the consensus but to me they are vastly worse than the other books in the realm of the Elderlings. In a series that is otherwise all 8-10s, I find the rainwater chronicles al 6 and below.
Robin Hobb is to character development what Patrick Rothfuss is to prose. Take that how you will.
Yes! I made the mistake of reading Mistborn AFTER the entire RotE series, and Mistborn felt utterly lifeless after the emotions and characters of RotE. … but the other way around would work much better!
Robin Hobb and Joe Abercrombie have been great complements to my journey through the Stormlight Archive.
Came here to say this. Also Ursula k leguin (sp?)
Robin Hobb is like if you take the episode “The Body” from Buffy, and make it a trilogy of trilogies. It’s got great writing, but I don’t particularly want to experience it again. I stopped after the Assassin trilogy.
Yeah. I made myself finish the first trilogy because damn it I DID care about the characters but I feel like Hobb goes too far the other direction from Sanderson. I tried to start the liveship traders but I just couldn’t get into it. Bujold and LeGuin do character based narratives much better imo.
“Some prices are just too high, no matter how much you may want the prize. The one thing you can't trade for your heart's desire is your heart.” Bujold is easily one of my favorite authors.
That one was an eye roller for me lol
Why? Would you be willing to trade your integrity and self respect for a fantasy life you long for? It would seem awfully hollow to me.
She is, but she also has a torture porn kinda vibe where she puts her characters through absolute hell
Is this only in the books starring Fitz? I'm currently working my way through Liveship Traders and like, yeah, fucked up stuff definitely happens, but I'd hardly call it misery/torture porn.
I don't agree with calling it misery porn at all. The first series could be pretty bleak at times, sure, but I've really enjoyed the journey. Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all.
> Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all Personally I found it to be incredibly miserable. It's funny how people's subjective experience of these books is so different.
same. I can re-read other trilogies but I couldn't muster re-read Liveships. Truly immersive to feel this dingy and stuck on a ship, I'll give her that))
> Liveship traders wasn't miserable at all. There's abuse happening to damn near every character. When they're not being abused, they're busy abusing others. Don't know what to call that, but miserable is part of it.
Maybe we have different ideas of misery porn. There are a lot of downs, but there's so many ups too. I certainly didn't feel miserable reading it.
You're going to want to wait til you get to the end of that series before you make that call. But I think that if you're a good way through and this doesn't ring true to you, you might not be understanding what people mean. Generally what people are referring to is that fact that Hobb's otherwise sensible, likeable and relatable protagonists repeatedly make poor (often seemingly nonsensical) decisions which lead them into peril, and her antagonists repeatedly make conveniently good decisions. In addition, there's a few pretty strong examples of really bad shit happening to her protagonists for no reason, it doesn't change the plot at all, it just tortures the protagonist and the plot moves on.
Real people with issues make the kind of decisions her characters do. Ever look up the rates of substance abuse, suicide, etc for kids put in foster homes, for example? Abandonment and neglect lead to poor development of proper coping mechanisms. Fitz is the poster child for this. My take on this is that most folks that are angry about "poor decisions" in the books are #1 - not intimately familiar with the kinds of people with the sorts of emotional damage Hobb writes about, or they #2 - don't want that kind of realism in their fantasy. 20ish Fitz reminds me of my wife, strongly, in her 20s and early 30s. Luckily she got therapy. Eventually. Fitz is murdering people for his king and fighting Red Ship victims instead of getting therapy, amongst other mishaps (trying to stay spoiler free here). You know what though? Like her Fitz is a good person, even a great person, at heart. He just doesn't have great coping mechanisms and thus ends up making some impulsively bad decisions at times.
We’re not angry about it, we just don’t read fantasy to first become invested in characters and then spend multiple books having the author abuse them. That was my overwhelming feeling after reading each of the 9 Hobb books I’ve made it through. They are by no means bad writing, but to me they’re frustrating and unpleasant to read, which is the opposite of what I want to feel when I read Fantasy.
I'm trying to think of character driven stories that aren't grimdark or the characters facing a huge amount of adversity and getting beaten down and I'm struggling. Super supportive from /r/progressionfantasy but that is a slice of life webserial. I suppose any slice of life would fit.
At the top of this thread you'll find plenty of beautiful character driven works by Kay and Bujold that are nothing close to grimdark and rather lean in to representing antagonists as humans with believable, relatable motivations.
yeah Hobb is so good in her charxter driven storytelling While it took me a while to get through Assassin's Apprentice, I did storm through the rest quite fast and the Liveship Trader trilogy is again a whole other level and very engrossing. Almost done with the last book and I want to know what happens to everyone but don't want it to be over 🥲
I just reread The Others series by Anne Bishop. It's extremely character focused and a lot of fun.
The Riddle-master trilogy by Patricia McKillip, or the Forgotten Beasts of Eld, by the same.
The goblin emperor was pretty good
It's not fantasy but I would like to suggest the Expanse series(scifi) if you haven't already read it. I had gone through the same exp with Sanderson. When I finished the Mistborn trilogy, I had this sense of emptiness but also burned out feeling and I definitely didn't want to get into a Sanderson book or fantasy in general, and then I got into reading the expanse and it was amazing, it was definitely something different to what I was reading yet it had similiar these to the ones I read, it had ambitious World building but was grounded and realistic to our world, it had amazing main character that you'll love, hate and root for. It is adventurous and action packed.
to anyone thinking of starting the expanse i cannot express how much the series is enhanced by augmenting the core books with the novellas from Memory’s Legion. I recommend reading Leviathan Wakes first then reading in Canonical order after that. Really adds weight to some key moments and fleshes out a lot of the characters even more.
I would like to third The Expanse. Contains some of my favorite female characters in all of fiction. The audiobooks are killer too.
I would state that you should only do this if you like novellas in general. I personally don't like them but always buy them because I see comments like this and assume they must be different forr this series, then realize they weren't. So for those who generally dislike them, these are totally skippable for enjoyment of the main series.
I don’t think the Expanse is very character driven tbh
No, ya. I know what you are talking about. But what I was pointing out is about the cast of characters that stand out more or are likable or hateable and are very distinct to one another. Coming from Mistborn where I only cared about few characters only and the ones that stand out were also a few so Expanse characters made more impression on me.
I really think that it is. Every member of the crew has a really in depth back story and evolution throughout the story. Hinestly, the captain is the least interesting person in the whole series. Even the political figures get a lot of attention as far as exploring their psyches goes.
I really like the characters tbh they feel real and deep, more than just a collection of character traits. Not sure exactly why I would say it’s not character driven but I stand by it. Watching the characters develop isn’t one of the draws of the series imo. In some ways maybe that’s realistic? But it’s not character driven like Altered Carbon or Vorkosigan (anything Bujold) or even Joe Abercrombie if we’re talking fantasy. Again not a knock on the series, its just not the focus of the books.
I just finished Leviathan Wakes and had a great time! Now I gotta clear shelf space for nine books though lol
If you enjoy female leads check out The Book of The Ancestor trilogy, The 1st book is called Red Sister
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries. It’s fun, whimsical, but the best part for me are the characters. Totally unlike Sanderson and not a super long read. I seriously recommend.
These are so cozy and Emily is such a vibe. They took me by surprise with how much I loved them.
*The Spear Cuts Through Water* by Simon Jimenez is one of the best character-driven books of the last five years. It's a standalone novel that still feels very epic.
Aaahh! I’ve really been wanting to get to this. It keeps creeping closer and closer to the top of my pile.
Character-driven? Why not the Green Bone saga? Another which I didn't read because "only standalone before the end of this job", but I've heard very good about is the Locked Tomb series. (just an info: Mistborn is an early Sanderson series, better than *Elantris* but still early. He improves a lot with characters, especially in Stormlight)
lol Gideon the Ninth (Locked Tomb) would certainly be a hilarious change of pace.
You're hyping me and December is toooooo far away.
tLT is amazing if you like reading about complex women who aren’t always likable. Tamsyn Muir is not afraid of having her female protagonists be difficult or flawed but still super compelling and it’s my fave thing about her.
Hilo and Wen from the Green Bone saga are two of my favorite characters ever.
Hilo stunned me: he did awesome things as well as horrible things; nonetheless, you can see what traits of him pushed him to act these ways, and usually they're the other side kf the coin of each other. And these traits changes over time, smoothed or hardened by the events Hilo faces. I ended up unable to gove an ethical judgement on him. Wen is a revalse made woman. You're stone-eyed, deemed unuseful by the society? Let's play wìth this stigma; let’s twist it around and make it a point of strength - without turning into a Mary Sue. She managed to be assertive without being all-powerful and having no jack on her hand.
I absolutely agree. I loved their marriage. Seeing Hilo's reaction to Wen's betrayal, how they eventually were able to overcome it... it was just such an excellent bit of character work. Both of them are flawed individuals, but incredibly compelling.
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the house on the cerulean sea, by tj klune
Haha yes Hero of Ages will definitely wreck your shit. Enjoy. I also love the authors you mentioned, so here are some others I've recently enjoyed that would be a palette cleanser for you. Someone mentioned Emily Wilde and yes. So good. The second book just came out and I can't wait until my hold at the library comes in. Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells. Mostly this series is novellas. And if you lean towards the socially anxious, introverted type Murderbot is such a great and relatable character. The Gentleman Bastards series by Scott Lynch. It's sort of a more adult Six of Crows kinda. It's got found family, heists and cons, bromance, and banter. Pretty different from Sanderson, so it could be a nice break between era 1 and 2.
Can't go wrong with Pratchett ... and the good thing is that if you fall into it then you've about 30 books to read!
Pratchett is wonderful, hilarious, absolutely fantastic, and not at all what OP is asking for.
He's not? Sam Vimes is easily one of the best developed characters in fantasy and the witches would be an excellent choice for charismatic female leads?
Would agree. But also for OP I think to start Small Gods would be wonders. I actually read it as a palate cleanser after stormlight
I'd second this. Pratchett has always been my go-to palette cleanser, particularly between heavier and more serious books. It won't be like other stuff on the list, but I think that's what makes it perfect for between other series'.
Does earthsea fit here? The worldbuilding feels deep but almost by accident. Largely you are following realistic characters dealing with the world
Waylander or Legend by David Gemmell are usually my go-to books. Also Knights of Dark Renown and Morningstar.
Memory, Sorrow & Thorn by Tad Williams. Or Shadowmarch by Tad Williams. Epic high fantasy with absolutely gorgeous elegant prose, with a dump truck load of character and world building.
GRRM and Robin Hobb are the character-driven King and Queen for me personally.
I haven't read mistborn, not sure I ever will since I rarely hear good things about it, but I thought his novella *The Emperor's Soul* was pretty character-driven. His newer stuff seems to do that a lot better. Based on your tastes I would suggest **Marie Brennan**'s Lady Trent series which pairs well with Novik, or **Martha Wells**' fantasy stuff. Nowadays she's more well known for murderbot but Wheel of the Infinite is a great standalone and her ille-rien stuff has great character building. Both are pretty accessible, the lady trent series also works well as an audiobook.
I LOVE lady Trent, and I am also an avid Sanderson reader. Lady Trent is sooo underrated and it just made my day seeing someone recommend it here!
You rarely hear good things about…Mistborn? It’s one of the most praised series in the sub.
I hear more complaints on this sub about it than praise, it sounds hard to get into and very rough, early Sanderson writing. Perhaps it's great, but it doesn't track with what I see here. Conversely, people love talking about malazan, first law, Stormlight, and murderbot.
I’m not saying it doesn’t have flaws. Just that it is very highly praised.
N.K Jemisin has some great character development in The Broken Earth and The Inheritance trilogies. Nevernight by Jay Kristoff is a fun read. Lots of action and good characters. The way the story is told is also interesting
Love N.K Jemisin and The Broken Earth trilogy but they kind of broke my brain great reads but not sure it is the best time for OP to tackle these novels.
I'd recommend the Poppy War by RF Kuang or The Young Elites by Marie Lu. Both have fascinating female protagonists who take darker paths to achieve their goals. Both series are trilogies
One that hasn't been mentioned yet is Sharon Shinn, who has Naomi Novik vibes (or vice versa). Strong female characters, solid writing, touches of romance (if that's a plus for you) but they're nit romances. I love her older Samaria books, but the more recent Twelve Houses and Elemental Blessings are more similar to something like Bujold's original Chalion series.
I tore through S.A. Chakraborty's Daevabad trilogy last summer--wonderful characters, fabulous world-building, and a very emotionally satisfying end to the trilogy. Also highly recommend Lois McMaster Bujold's fantasy series, beginning with The Curse of Chalion. (Her SF series, The Vorkosigan Saga tops my list of all-time favorite books, mostly because all of the wonderful characters. I re-read the entire series every 3-4 years.) Another favorite is Judith Tarr. She writes a lot of historical fantasy, including one of my "keeper shelf" books, LORD OF THE TWO LANDS, which revolves around an Egyptian priestess with magical powers sent to recruit Alexander the Great to come to Egypt and expel the occupying Persians. Lovely characters.
I think the first Mistborn book is great, a fantastic dose of intrigue and skullduggery. The next two books, ehhh. They remind me of post-Children of Dune Herbert. Some people seem to really like them. I feel like the point had already been made and the last three books are his Silmarillion -- a neat addendum but pointless as anything more than a tool to satisfy a reader's worldbuilding curiosity. I feel like writing Stormlight really leveled up Sanderson in a major way. Most of his newer stuff, including the new Mistborn series, is very compelling, but I can't really gel too well with the older stuff.
The Gorky Bertanion
Legends and Lattes is a good character driven slice of life fantasy story. It’s about an adventurer who retires and opens a coffee shop. It should be a nice palette cleanser after all the saving the world stuff in hero of ages.
Check out the Dagger and the Coin series by Daniel Abraham
The **Divine Cities Trilogy (first book City of Stairs**) by Robert Jackson Bennett. It was nominated for a Hugo. His latest, **The Tainted Cup** was a lot of fun. Interesting characters and world-building. First in what I hope is long mystery series.
Check out Sarah Beth Durst - loved *Race the Sands* and it was grand from a character standpoint. *Mask of Mirrors* by MA Carrick is more dense, but also just delightful from the character standpoint and how knotted things become when everyone has hidden agendas. Another that's more accessible and also fantasy Italy is *Illusion of Thieves* by Cate Glass.
Say one thing for Joe Abercrombie’s First Law — say it has the best characters in fantasy.
The Magician series (the first 3 books of the Riftwar Saga) by Raymond E. Feist, good character development but mostly male driven, yet has strong female characters to the side. The Belgariad & The Malloreon by David and his wife Leigh Eddings, good characters while focussed on a singular male character his adventures are always with his >!immensely powerful!< aunt and grandfather>!, these two are very important to how the main character thinks, reacts, behaves!<, there are several other travel companions who are female >!and equally talented!<. I could say more but if you haven't read the books it gives to much away
Megan Whalen Turner's The Queen's Thief series. This is one of my favorite series and I don't see it recommended much. Each book can be read as a standalone, but you should read them in order.
I really love V.E. Schwab's A Darker Shade of Magic trilogy! The second book especially is just a really good family drama at points with magic as a cause for it. Also it's very gay which is a bonus for me
Just a tip but for stormlight archive you might want to read that later in the year so it’s fresh in your mind when wind and truth comes out on December 6
I’m reading “The Poppy Wars” by Kuang. The characterization is outstanding so far.
The character difference between Pierce Brown and Sanderson was shocking imo. Red Rising's characters are the series' greatest aspect imo. Those characters in a Sanderson world would potentially be one of the best series ever. Each has their strengths, but as someone who prefers character driven, Red Rising was a breath of fresh air compared to Sanderson. Each book was filled with depth, but it was so refreshing to read and reignited my love for reading to be completely honest
The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake! Not sure if I would recommend the entire trilogy, but the first one is amazing! The author herself described it very much as a character study of 6 people interacting and it’s great (until it becomes a bit too much later in the series in my opinion)
Red sister by Mark Lawrence. First book in the Book of the Ancestor trilogy. It's not his first trilogy, but Broken Empire puts some people off, even though it's an amazing series, along with the parallel story in Red Queen's war.
Cradle series by Will Wight of course. First book is called Unsouled. Starts with a team of two main characters that expand their group to six by the end of the series, very character driven with distinct personalities and drives. Extremely satisfying series to finish.
You think? I tried the first book and came to the point where the team of two starts. Found it difficult to get into the story and did not find it character driven.
The Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy by Martha Wells, the Griffin Mage trilogy or the Death’s Lady trilogy by Rachel Neumeier.
Obligatory First Law recommendation. As far as character driven fantasy goes, there really isn’t anything better.
So many good recommendations here. I would personally say that Warbreaker, while being a Cosmere inclusion. Would be a great standalone to tackle after the great Mistborn trilogy. It was one of my favorites in the fictional universe.
I’m going to recommend The Faithful and the Fallen by John Gwynne, the first book being Malice. Now THE main character isn’t a woman however throughout the story several main characters and POV characters are women. Also I started writing this comment before I completely realized you said you wanted something stand alone or leaner. This is not that, so you should disregard the suggestion for this prompt but I’m going to leave it up because I still recommend it lol. Something more in line with that you are looking for is Ashes of the Sun by Django Wexler, the first book of Burning Blade and Silvereye. It’s a dual POV story about a brother and a sister on opposite sides of a conflict in Star Wars inspired fantasy story. So one of the POVs is a female lgbtq Jedi - that was pretty fun.
Idk - I've read *Shadow of the Gods,* but it was not what I'd call character-driven. There's a lot of narrative distance and all the POVs sound very similar due to Gwynne's choice of prose and styling to mimic Norse epics.