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Here are some series I can't recommend enough:
Cradle by Will Wight — A young man born too weak to matter in a world where martial artists can shatter mountains and walk on air decides that's not good enough. Starts small and intimate, then escalates into genuinely insane power fantasy. The progression system is crack cocaine. 12 books, all out, binge-worthy.
The Black Magician Trilogy by Trudi Canavan — A slum girl accidentally discovers she has magic, which is very illegal if you're not from the right family. Gets accepted into the Magicians' Guild under suspicious circumstances and slowly uncovers something rotten at its core. Cozy, character-driven, and surprisingly political.
The Lightbringer Series by Brent Weeks — Magic is literally made of light and color, and drafters slowly go mad from using it. Packed with political scheming, morally grey characters, and one of the best slow-burn mystery plots in fantasy. Weeks hid twists in plain sight for five books and sticks the landing.
The Licanius Trilogy by James Islington — Time travel, prophecy, and a magic system where using power costs you years off your life. Dense and intricate in the best way, the kind of series where you flip back to chapter one after finishing it and realize how much you missed. Islington clearly planned every page from the start.
All are fantastic series, happy reading! 📚
Thanks. Haven't read any of these and you make em all sound pretty rad.
I'll add that I hated the Lightbringer series. It starts out alright, gets progressively worse, and ends with a big fat literal deus ex machina. Weeks is a flaming Mormon, and if you know anything about the faith, you can see its stink everywhere.
I did like his Night Angel trilogy.
Cradle is pretty amazing.
Can you tell me more? I'm not religious and don't know much about Mormonism. I've heard similar things about other authors like Sanderson. I gotta say, the comments are a bit underwhelming since no one explains the actual problem.
There's a lot of religion in the books. People are always praying for this and that. Biblical names. Some thinly veiled biblical references. Any character who expresses agnosticism or atheism is eventually proved bad or wrong in some manner. There are some very angelic-like beings that pop up later. Some fallen ones as well. Every single woman character pines over the guys at some point and really just wants to settle down and pop out kids. Oh, and everything is wrapped up neatly in the last book when the very obvious Jesus figure confronts God on top of a tower, sacrifices himself, is subsequently resurrected, and they fly in on a literal airplane and save everyone in the 11th hour. It's trite and disaffecting and pretty much assured I won't be reading anything from Weeks ever again.
While I understand your perspective, I believe we hold differing interpretations of the series. I am not seeking an argument, as I consider this to be a fantastic piece of literature, and I believe Weeks effectively portrays religious piety. Additionally, it features remarkably strong female characters. It is quite interesting how we can read the same words on a page and arrive at such different interpretations. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.