Use my code CAPTUREDINWORDS to get $5 off your delicious, high protein Magic Spoon cereal by clicking this link: sponsr.is/magicspoon_capturedinwords_0923 Let me know your favorite standalone fantasy!
I must say, you fill an amazing niche. I have really enjoyed your videos on the kingkiller chronicles, as well as your reviews and videos on the cosmere. Thanks for taking all that time to create such high quality content! (BTW : I discovered your channel when I had just finished WOT and wanted more by Brandon Saunderson) 😊
Favourite standalone fantasy ? Neil Gaiman comes to mind, with books like Stardust and The ocean at the end of the lane. Then there is It by Stephen King, along with The Stand. I guess these two are it, since standalone fantasy imo is one of the hardest genres to write well.
I don't think the Hobbit gets enough credit. Such a good book. It was my first step up from reading GOOSEBUMPS books as a kid and I've been hooked on fantasy and sci Fi ever since. I also try to read it every couple of years and I'm looking forward to sharing it with my kids
The Hobbit is fantastic. I don't know that anyone disputes that. It's at best a YA fantasy though. Really a middle grade book. So, I don't see it making lists limited to adult fiction. Glad to see it on his list.
Guy Gavriel Kay is one of the most gifted authors I've ever read. "Under Heaven" was my introduction to him and it's simply sublime. The beautiful irony of Kay's writing is that he draws inspiration from real historical settings, but then his worlds somehow simultaneously become the most original creations you could imagine.
Piranesi is so, so good. I also highly recommend Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by the same author about 2 magicians in England during the Napoleonic Wars trying to bring back English magic, mixing urban fantasy and alternative history all wrapped up in a style that's a deliberate (and delightful) throwback to Victorian authors like Charles Dickens and Jane Austen. It's definitely a very slow read (one of the title characters doesn't even appear until like 150 pages in) but it is so fun and the world and characters are so interesting, it's an absolute blast.
M.L. Wang (Sword of Kaigen) just released another fantasy standalone called Blood Over Bright Haven which is brilliant and I haven't seen enough people talking about. Book of the year for me.
Some great books on this list. Some of my favorite (older) standalone fantasy novels that I rarely see mentioned are The Face In the Frost by John Bellairs, The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly, The Charwoman's Shadow by Lord Dunsany, and Watership Down by Richard Adams.
The Book of Lost Things was really great! I meant to include that one on this list but totally forgot. The others seem interesting, I'll need to get to them at some point!
Yes on the Lord Dunsany pick. Most readers, if they know Dunsany at all, would pick The King of Elfland's Daughter, but this for me is the better choice. His collections of short stories are great also. Not familiar with the Bellairs book so will have to look it up. I would add Beagle's The Last Unicorn, and going back a bit, writers such as Tanith Lee, Patricia A McKillip (The Forgotten Beasts of Eld my favorite) Poul Andersen (The Broken Sword) and George MacDonald. Happy reading!
Solid list! I've read several and hope to read some of these others soon, including Tress and The Sword of Kaigen. I started reading GGK this year with The Lions of al-Rassan and was blown away. I'll definitely be reading more of him. Glad you didn't forget The Hobbit! :)
M L Wang's new book Blood Over Bright Haven is another stellar standalone, I loved the Sword of Kaigen but I think I enjoyed Blood Over Bright Haven even more. The House in the Cerulean Sea and A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking are two great standalones as well!
I'm so happy you mentioned Perdido Street Station; it's SO good. Its sequels could never quite stand up to it, which was a bit of a shame. Still, I did like "King Rat" and "The City and The City" by Miéville and would recommend them both. As for Gaiman - my top favorite author - "The Ocean at the End of the Lane" is quite possibly his greatest and most personal book, "one for the heads" as one might say. And you should check out his collections of short stories as well. He is, after all, a student of the Poe and Lovecraft legacies, and as such, a real master of the short form. There are a few of them, but "Fragile Things" is the best one. Love the channel :) Enjoy!
Oh, I enjoyed The Scar even more than Perdido Street Station. That massive city of cobbled-together ships and the cast of characters was so weird and interesting. I think it's my favorite of China Meiville's books.
If you like that, you should read the follow up books in the same world as the Goblin Emperor, but following Prelate of Ulis and Witness for the Dead Thara Celehar. There are two books; Witness for the Dead and Grief of Stones. He basically moves to the city of Amalo and starts up being an official Witness for the dead.
I got the book from the library and the character list at the beginning is so long. It was very daunting and the names are hard to pronounce so I return the book back to the library. Is it hard to read and understand? Thanks
Discworld, my favourite cozy fantasy novels. ❤ Brilliant idea to read Small Gods as a stand alone. Terry Pratchett himself recommended not to start with the first one in the series. The first ones are not as good as the rest. My first one was Wyrd Sisters, I loved it! 😍 Piranesi was really good, it reminded me of The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss. The Hobbit is always a favourite. The Sword of Kaigen has been stuck in my TBR pile for months now, need to get round to it, hope it is as good as everyone says. Warbreaker is good, really like Elantris as well. Tress of the Emerald Sea was not a favourite. Prefer Neil Gaimans The Ocean at the End of the Lane and Neverwhere over Stardust. I think I prefer Uprooted over Spinning Silver as well but those two are Naomi Noviks best ones. Need to check out some of your other recommendations. Saw someone recommend The Neverending Story by Michael Ende in the comments. That is one lovely and imaginative YA book. ❤
I use to read a lot of books but after a while I became tire of reading things that weren't so exiting. So I am grateful for all your recommandations. Thank you
So happy to see The Hobbit on this list. Most of these are already on my TBR, so it was great to hear about them. I read the first part of Sword of Kaigen. It was quite good, but life got in the way. I hope to return to it and complete it. For some reason, I have been dragging my feet on Discworld. I would still like to give it a try someday, since I have heard such good things about it. Same with Neil Gaiman. Thanks for sharing!
Recently finished Sword of Kaigen and loved it sooo much! I couldn't believe how much I loved it. Personally I liked the unique structure too, made the book hit that much harder.
I am once again recommending The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold! 😆 It's another of those books that is technically first in a series, but can absolutely be read as a standalone, since the other books in the series each follow different characters, so it's really more of a set of loosely linked stories set in the same world.
Yumi and Tress are lovely. Sword of Kaigen is AMAZING, but you have no idea which is even MORE AMAZING! HER NEXT BOOK - Blood Over Bright Haven. Please read it.. It's stunningly good! I still can't get myself to try Guy Gavrial Kay again. I love his prose style, but they stories are too slow with too much alt-historical context behind them. They are great from prose perspective, but stories lack a little bit oomph that Rothfuss gives to the readers. KKC fanboy out. Also subscribed. Been watching for months but lately the videos hit harder than ever. Great content!
Yumi and Tress are SO good! And wow I didn't know about Blood Over Bright Haven, I will definitely be reading that soon! I think that's understandable with Guy Gavriel Kay, while I do really enjoy his books I can see why many would not. And I agree that they lack a certain quality that Rothfuss delivers well. Thanks, I'm happy you're enjoying the content!
@@CapturedInWords I can second Blood Over Bright Haven. My favorite fantasy book of the year. Haven't read The Sword of Kaigen but most people seem to think Blood Over Bright Haven was even better.
I used to read a lot in the olden days, 10-15yrs ago, but two books i do remember loving a lot are Tigana and Perdido Street Station. Actually only last night i bought the kindle of Tigana, and also the lions of al-rassan, also by GGK. I actually probably do still have the books out in storage somewhere but for now Kindle is much easier. Hopefully I will get around to reading them again soon.
Ive got The Gobin Emperor, Sword of Tigana and Tress of the Emerald Sea sitting on my nightstand waiting for me to read them. Now I just need to decide which one to start on first! 😅
Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman was my introduction to him. My uncle gave me the book as a birthday present when I was a teenager, been a big fan ever since.
Small God's is my fav Discworld book! It's amazing, I to this day will still lean in towards my friend and whisper 'the turtle moves' haha. I think I will read Piranesi based on your description, sounds like it might be my cup of tea! My list would be: 1)The King of Elfland's Daughter - Lord Dunsany 2) Something Wicked this Way Comes - Bradbury 3) The Hobbit - The master himself. 4) The Neverending Story- Ende (Way better than the 1980s film!) 5) The Carpet People - Sir Terry 8) Wizard Knight - Wolfe (Technically a duology but all modern publications are a single volume) 7)Tress of the Emerald Sea - Brando 8) The Buried Giant - Ishiguro 9) Hart's Hope - Card (not for the faint of... ) 10) Echos of the Great Song - Gemmel 11)) The Monk - Lewis 12) The Swordbearer - Cook 13) The Lions of Al-Rassan - Kay 14) The Last Unicorn - Beagle 15) Tailchaser's Song - Williams
@@bolbsie629 love em,caught em on there first US tour with Dayseeker,Caskets and Thornhill then again when they came back with the plot in you and Thornhill again haha.
Good Omens is a wonderful, hilarious, one of a kind story. Reading it made me actually laugh out loud in , of all places, the waiting room at the dentist! As a side note, Stardust is also a favourite, similar in style to, but not as much as The Princess Bride.
My recommendations from Ganman are going to be, perhaps, his most popular books: American Gods and Sandman. Those are at the top for him for a really good reason, they’re great. I read both in my late highschool/early college years and, despite never having read either again, I still think about them, all the damn time. They’re both incredible and, if you like American Gods, there’s a related novel, not a sequel or prequel exactly, called Amanda Boys that I even hear some people say is better than American Gods.
Oh, how could I forget Coraline! Such a great spooky story for kids. And if you like comics, try Marvel 1602! He wrote it just after 9/11 with the specific intent of doing something fun and less serious, so it has very little to do with normal Marvel. Basically, all the characters from the normal comics have appeared in 1602 America instead of modern day America and trying to unravel why that happened and seeing all these Colonial takes on their characters we know and love is super fun.
China Miéville is an amazing author! So underrated in this day and age! "Kraken" is also an absolute best! ("Perdido Street Station" is the first of a trilogy BTW)
Pawn’s Dream by Eric S. Nylund is a fantastic stand-alone portal fantasy novel where a few people exist on two planes of existence. When they go to sleep in one world they wake up in the other. It follows a man who learns that what he has taken to be a lifelong dream of a fantasy world is actually real and is wrapped up in the political machinations of the families that live in both. It also has a fun magic system tied to opposing forces due to the dual nature of these select few. (Fire/Water, Truth/Lies, Life/Death).
So sorry to hear you didn't get to experience being traumatized from reading Coraline as a child. Also, YOU LOVE PRATCHETT WHAT ARE YOU DOING READ GOOD OMENS!
I'm gonna give a second recommendation to people for Warbreaker it is my favorite Cosmere book, and it has my second favorite Cosmere character in it, so I have to shout it out
"Piranesi" and "The Sword of Kaigen" are two of my favorite books of all times. I loved "The Emperor's Soul", but is the only one that I enjoyed from the author. "Perdido Street Station" is so underated. I think China Mieville is brilliant. If you'd like to try a even weirder than "Perdido" but one that does not have much plot then I would sugest "Tainaron. Mail From Another City"by Leena Krohn. It can be summarised like this: 30 letters from a women living in a city of insects...
Hi, congratulations on your video! This summer, I read four thriller books, but the one I liked the most was "Motion Detection," which I stumbled upon on Amz. It's a fantastic book. But I don't understand why nobody talks about it. Have you read it? I highly recommend it!
I think we were reading different books with Witch King. There was no hook, no personality, and a massive law dump without clear explanation. Really disappointing when Murderbot is so good. Also, have you not read any Terry P. before? All of the Discworld novels can be read as standalone.
By Lloyd Alexander; I have, and enjoyed it very much when I was younger. It's time I revisited that series. Although you can follow the plot by reading each book as a stand-alone, the series is definitely improved by being read in order, as the main character grows from a teenager into a young man.
Some interesting titles I haven't heard before. Didn't appreciate the promotion at the beginning- over 90 seconds long. It must be extra money for the viewers it is a pain and unwelcome.
To your credit you have a few older authors, but you continually ignore the legends like Howard, Leiber, Anderson, Vance, and Moorcock, just to name a few, who undeniably have better prose and storytelling ability than the vast majority of modern replicating authors. Maybe just a product of inexperience. Here’s hoping you discover the originators.
The Princess Bride is one of the only books I can think of that is worse than the movie. The movie is a classic while the book version just drags on. For a standalone, I always like going back to The Redemption of Althalaus by David Eddings.
Tigana is, unfortunately, one of the WORST books I've ever had the displeasure to read. I tried three times at, and at the last time I managed to get about 75% into it before I gave up completely. I can be an emotional guy and it doesn't normally take THAT much for me to feel something when I read. Tigana tries to be an emotional book. But it utterly fails. There are SO MANY scenes where something is allegedly sad, but the author just tells us instead of showing us. It felt like I was getting direct cues that "this is a sad part, please cry! I'm telling you it's SAD, look: the character is crying!". Meanwhile, I had zero sh|ts to give.
I will totally echo Piranesi (appropriate verb!), the Princess Bride, Star Dust, and the Hobbit. Solid reads that don't take long. I will hopefully soon have read Night Circus, Sword of Kaigan and many more Neil Gaiman. And I will raise you: Peter Pan by J. M, Barrie, The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling, The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, The Neverending Story by Michael Ende, Coraline by Neil Gaiman, A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness & Siobhan Dowd, and Pan's Labyrinth by Guillermo Del Toro & Cornella Funke. I love how powerful and concise these all are.
Peter Pan is one of my all time favorite classics! I definitely should have mentioned that one, whoops! A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness is really great as well, been a while since I read it and it's time for a reread soon. I love the movies for The Last Unicorn and The neverending story as I grew up watching them, so I definitely need to give the books a read at some point. Thanks for the recs!
@@CapturedInWords Yes, dew it! The Last Unicorn movie is a good reflection of the book, since the same person wrote it, it's just so much deeper and invigorating and somber in prose form. I also love the Neverending Story movie (unlike Michael Ende), but it's a much morphed reflection, true in some areas and radically different in others, and then it keeps going deeper and deeper past the film ( _barely_ resembling the 2nd film at all) until reader's soul is turned inside out, in a good yet terrifying way...like "A Monster Calls" does to you, but much more drawn out. I think you'll love it.
The Wayward Children are great, dark takes on so-called children's "portal fantasies." I highly recommend them. I've tried a couple of McGuire's InCrypted series books and just could not get into them. For urban fantasy, I much preferred her October Daye series.
Favorite standalones from the last few years: The Twice-Drowned Saint by C.S.E Cooney Even Through I Knew the End by C.L Polk Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M Danforth Siren Queen by Nghi Vo The Valley and The Flood by Rebecca Mahoney The Twisted Ones by T Kingfisher Feeder by Patrick Weekes A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T Kingfisher Wylding Hall by Elizabeth Hand Thirteen Storeys by Jonathan Sims And I'll stop there.
