re: Sci-Fi/Fantasy Recommendation & Discussion Thread

Just wanted to throw out a couple newer authors I read just recently that impressed me. Mark Lawrence has done a yearly self published authors fantasy blog off (SPFBO) where he sends about 300 authors stuff to fantasy review bloggers and narrows it down to a top ten and a #1 for each year. Both these authors were in this the last couple years.

Anyway, first author is Mike Shel,it's called the Iconoclast series, first book was in the top 10 of the SPFBO in 2018. They are a mix of fantasy, indiana jones/laura croft style temple raiding, and psychological horror elements. It's set in a kingdom that found the ruins of an older civilization and uses a guild of explorers to explore them to find magical artifacts and the like while fighting undead. The main character is a former explorer who retired due to one of his raids going bad and his party of friends getting destroyed, and gets called back in to help with a case. On paper it's a generic rpg storyline but it really goes into depth with good character development and builds the story with a nice creeping dread as it goes along.

The other author is M.L. Wang, the book is called The Sword of Kaigen, it won the SPFBO last year. The setting is an asian style world with a mix of high technology and fantasy elements (somewhat of an avatar last airbender battle world, where stuff like airplanes are used in war alongside people with magical powers that could take out entire armies as a group). The characters are amazingly well written, with a great story that doesn't really go necessarily where you would expect.

Going with the asian theme, I'll also throw out another author that I don't think I've seen mentioned in here, Fonda Lee. She has two books out of a trilogy, Jade City and Jade War. It's basically a mix of asian culture, fantasy, and the godfather. It's been a very entertaining series so far.