Hype your favorite book series

[Savonarola]

I beg you all, please read anything by Charles Willeford.  I don't think anyone here will be disappointed.  Exquisitely literate pulp with the darkest humor.  If only it were set in the 1600s instead of the 1980s, I could money-back guarantee it to this crowd.  But he is an overlooked genius.  And a super-decorated WWII tank commander.

Sav, it is to be marked MUST READ for your Florida sojourn.  The Shark-Infested Custard before the Hoke Moseley novels, though.

I'll put it on the list. 

When I first moved here I read Edna Buchanan's nonfiction works; "Never Let Them See You Cry" and "The Corpse had a Familiar Face," about her work on the crime beat of The Miami Herald in the early 1980s. In the first chapters I thought Miami was just like Detroit.  About midway through the book it sounded like Miami was a combination of Detroit, Baudelaire's Paris, Jaws and a Raymond Chandler novel.  (Naturally Miami is different now than it was in the age of Don Johnson.)

[Maximus]

This is one thing that I was always pretty impressed with in regards to Orson Scott Card. I know he has very firm political and religious views. And those views certainly inform his writing, but he is not slavishly devoted to them in a manner that gets tedious. In fact, some of his stories are pretty anti-religion in tone, while still (I think) allowing him to make a statement about the nature of faith and knowledge.

Have you read Brandon Sanderson? He may be familiar as the guy who finished off the Wheel of Time series. IMO he vastly improved the quality of that series, but his own works are even better if you like fantasy. His worlds are filled with incredibly creative magical systems.

He reminds me of Card in some ways. I don't know that he has made his political views known, but he is also a mormon and he has stated that he has no intention of that bleeding into his books.

You can buy many if not all of his books in e-book format DRM-free on his site. You can download The Warbreaker for free, but it is not his best work IMO. The novella The Emperor's Soul is a much better sample.

[Berkut]

The Baroque Trilogy by Neal Stephenson.

Yup. 

Definitely.

[crazy canuck]

This is one thing that I was always pretty impressed with in regards to Orson Scott Card. I know he has very firm political and religious views. And those views certainly inform his writing, but he is not slavishly devoted to them in a manner that gets tedious. In fact, some of his stories are pretty anti-religion in tone, while still (I think) allowing him to make a statement about the nature of faith and knowledge.

Have you read Brandon Sanderson? He may be familiar as the guy who finished off the Wheel of Time series. IMO he vastly improved the quality of that series, but his own works are even better if you like fantasy. His worlds are filled with incredibly creative magical systems.

He reminds me of Card in some ways. I don't know that he has made his political views known, but he is also a mormon and he has stated that he has no intention of that bleeding into his books.

You can buy many if not all of his books in e-book format DRM-free on his site. You can download The Warbreaker for free, but it is not his best work IMO. The novella The Emperor's Soul is a much better sample.

I read book one of the Stormlight series and really enjoyed it.  Problem is it is taking him forever to get book 2 out.

[Maximus]

I read book one of the Stormlight series and really enjoyed it.  Problem is it is taking him forever to get book 2 out.

He finished  the Wheel of Time series before working on the second book. Stormlight is very good, but it is intended to be an epic. One of the stand-alone books may be better as a sample.

[Jacob]

A lot of good ones have been mentioned already. To add a few:

Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander is an excellent young adult fantasy series based on Welsh mythology.

Captain Alatriste by Arturo Pérez-Reverte is pretty damn enjoyable as well. Follow the exploits of a hardened yet somewhat romantic adventurer and soldier as the Golden Age of Spain starts to lose some of its lustre. It's not nautical at all, but it still scratches a bit of the same itch as the Aubrey-Maturin books, at least for me.

In spite of the less than completely gushing review I gave them in the books thread, I did really enjoy Ian Hamilton's Ava Lee series - exotic locales, shady individuals, and all sorts of adventure as the diminutive forensic accountant tracks down missing millions and returns them to their rightful owners (minus a percentage, of course).

[crazy canuck]

I read book one of the Stormlight series and really enjoyed it.  Problem is it is taking him forever to get book 2 out.

He finished  the Wheel of Time series before working on the second book. Stormlight is very good, but it is intended to be an epic. One of the stand-alone books may be better as a sample.

It is the epic sweep of the first book that got me hooked.  I see on his website that the draft is finished.... so hopefully it will be released soon.

[Darth Wagtaros]

How abuot the Fiovanar Tapestry? And the Sarantium books.

[Sheilbh]

Not really in the style of the other ones but if you like Victorian fiction then I'd really recommend Trollope's Barchester novels and the Palliser series. It's worth getting a good edition (Oxford World's Classics, or Penguin) for the end-notes. Not essential but very helpful

[jimmy olsen]

Toby Frost's Space Captain Smith books are good mindless fun in a Futurama meets British Empire kind of way.

The name of the third book is absolutely fantastic!

[Jacob]

How abuot the Fiovanar Tapestry? And the Sarantium books.

I've enjoyed all of Kay's books, but I don't know if I'd call them a series as such.

[Gups]

Not really in the style of the other ones but if you like Victorian fiction then I'd really recommend Trollope's Barchester novels and the Palliser series. It's worth getting a good edition (Oxford World's Classics, or Penguin) for the end-notes. Not essential but very helpful

I'm working my way through the Barchester Chronicles (only read the first two so far). I've no idea why I neglected Trollope for so long or why he is so underrated. He combines the gentle wit of Austen with the gossipy insights of Thackeray.

[Darth Wagtaros]

Thieves World and the MYTH books by Robert Aspriin.

[KRonn]

My favorite is the Game of Thrones series, which most or everyone knows about.

The Grass Crown by Colleen Mccullough is another favorite. About Rome in the time preceding and into the rise of Caesar. Very well done historical novels. Has lots of historical info on Roman ways, warfare, political machinations, the people and personalities of leaders and others.

[ulmont]

the MYTH books by Robert Aspriin.

Those really went to hell after 1993 though.