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[Avelon]

The Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny - 10 books divided into 2 subseries. The Corwin Cycle encompasses the first 5 novels, and the Merlin Cycle encompasses the last 5. Merlin is Corwin's son. I really must insist that you read them in order or not at all, as that will greatly impact your enjoyment of the series. Since the world as we know it is one of the many realities traversed through the books, it has elements of Sci-Fi to it. But the method is quasi-magical in nature and the overall theme is fantasy moreso than sci-fi.

The books are written in the first person perspective, and narrated by the main character as events unfold. Because of this, and the skill with which it is written, you might find yourself actually becoming nervous when the character is in a tense situation, or reveling in his triumphs. =) It's a very nicely done effect. The flavor is almost like a detective noir style for the Corwin cycle. Very interesting take on Sci-Fi/Fantasy.

The Corwin Cycle titles (volume: "The First Chronicles of Amber"):
Nine Princes in Amber
The Guns of Avalon
Sign of the Unicorn
The Hand of Oberon
The Courts of Chaos

The Merlin Cycle (The Second Chronicles of Amber):
Trumps of Doom
Blood of Amber
Sign of Chaos
Knight of Shadows
Prince of Chaos

---

I would also recommend you check out the Valdemar series by Mercedes Lackey. The reading level is significantly lower but the stories are excellent nonetheless. I recently re-read them myself.

[Sigulbard]

I don't read much sci-fi, but one book I've read was 'The City and the Stars,' which was pretty good.

[MonkeyHead]

+1 for anything by Iain M Banks. He has terminal cancer and apparently only a few months to live, so you mght wanna buy his stuff sooner rather than later. If you want reccomendations, I would be happy to oblige.

[Sirus]

Any sort of sub-genre you're looking for?
Space opera?
Nitty-gritty military combat?
Any preference of sci-fi "hardness"?
High or low fantasy?

[Starver]

Look into the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov, i just love that golden age science fiction.

That was in my first (lost) attempt at posting.  Glad to see I avoided that ninja.

([Various other books are] set in the same universe as I, Robot and Foundation.)

I think that it started off accidental (though later pursued), but once I'd read enough near-future (Susan Calvin), mid-future (Spacer/'Caves'-era) and the far(/further yet)-future Foundation series to see all the connections, I personally found it giving me a happy brain on that issue.

But, they can generally be read stand-alone, too, lest the OP gets scared off.  (Point of fact, my first Foundation book was "...and Earth", for some obscure reason.  Obviously reading it again after starting from the start of the Foundation series give it a bit more sense.)


@ninjaing MonkeyHead: Didn't know whether to say anything about that...  Personally I'm most hit by the increasingly inevitable loss of Pratchett from the scene (although his daughter seems to have proven herself enough to be in his confidence regarding writing derivative works)...  Although that's more likely (unforseen circumstances allowing) to be a well-planned trip to Switzerland, some years hence, and I can't imagine he will absent himself from the 2014 (UK) Discworld convention, and we'll surely have him for the 2016/18 ones as well...

[Zrk2]

- The First Law Trilogy - Joe Abercrombie

Seconded.

Sci-fi: Ender's Game for classic science fiction.

Also seconded.

Dune. The spice must flow!

Seconded to the nth degree,

Now, for my picks:

Sci-fi:
The Eternity Artifact, by L E Modesitt Jr, or any of his other sci-fi novels.

Fantasy:
The Wheel of Time, despite the persistent complaint that the bog down part way through the series I really enjoyed them. I haven't read the last one yet, but as soon as I can I will.
A Song of Ice And Fire, because it's very interesting, and a different take on fantasy.
The Malazan Book of the Fallen, by Steven Erickson, it's better than either of the above two. Simply amazing.
The Black Company, by Glen Cook, very dark, very awesome. It's been described like this: "If your standard fantasy novel is propaganda for the winning side, then this is the reality."
The Saga of recluce, by L E Modesitt Jr. A very interesting take on magic. But the books are somewhat repetitive. Read two or three then decide if you want to read the whole bunch of them.
His Dark Materials, by Phillip Pullman. Very interesting. Ignore the movie.
Lord of the Rings, for obvious reasons.
Deryni Chronicles, by Katherine Kurtz, for a very different take on fantasy. One of the few fantasy authors to avoid invoking the Tolkienistic tropes.
Magician, by Raymond E Feist

[Urist McScoopbeard]

The 'Dwarves' series by... A german gentleman whose name escapes me, is a bit of a different take on... You guessed it: Dwarves.

[Zrk2]

Markus Heitz.

[MrWiggles]

DRESDEN FILES BY JIM BUTCHER!

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The only thing I would have to add at this point  would be the Joe Ledger Series (Patient Zero, The Dragon Factory), but you are thusly given two forewarnings:

A. These are very light sci-fi thrillers. By very light, I mean that they are set in the present day but involve the introduction of science fiction elements to an otherwise contemporary society, which results in the main conflict. If you want sci-fi to be more integrated with the world presented, don't read these.

B. The author is a military/weapons buff. If you don't want to be reading extensively detailed descriptions of equipment and combat every twenty pages or so, don't read these.

[Gervassen]

I recommend the Aubrey-Maturin series, perhaps better known as Master and Commander, by Patrick O'Brien.

Not because it's great fantasy--it's not fantasy at all--but because it's great. At 20 books, you will be sailing the seas of Napoleonic-era Europe for quite some time, and he's a master of getting the tone right and making you feel in-period. His characters are well-thought in a way that you'll just never get in fantasy fiction.

Stay clear of GRRM, though. His "works" are just trash consisting of rape, lists of menu items at various dinners, persistent repetitions of set phrases, and other filler to make weight on a book that undiscriminating fans expect to be 900+ pages long.

[Jo]

Step into my office, <cracks knuckles>

Anything by Robert E. Howard is great. Fun and impactful. Classic.

For Sci Fi, check out the Honor Harrington series or anything by David Weber. Also very good is anything by Bujold. Falling free is her best story so far.

If you've been around Sci Fi for awhile and want something dirty and fun try John Ringo.

If Fantasy is your ticket, and you are a noob, go with The Hobbit. DO NOT go with Wheel of Time or Song of Ice and Fire unless you have a ton of time and epic fantasy is in your thing.

If you want to read a bunch of solid stuff quickly, pickup some Morecock, Pournelle and Stirling.

Ditch that literary nonsense. Life is too short to try to act all sophisticated because you've read The Heart of Darkness. That story sucks, but at least it's short.

As to what other people have recommended.

Ender's Game: One of the best sci fi books ever written. Calling it 'classic' is a misuse of the term, but 30 years from now it definitely will be a classic. The problem is they are making a movie. YOu'll ruin the movie for yourself if you read the book...

The Black Company: very good call. Surprised it was mentioned.

Zelazny: anything he writes is solid.

Leguinn, same.

Dune and Foundation are both great. Not everything Asimov did was awesome though, so hit Foundation first then maybe hit his robot books and flow from there.

My biggest recommendation is to just read fast. Skip over the boring crud and read like the wind. It's just as fun and you get to experience way more!

[gimlet]

Lots of great suggestions, I'll toss in a few I haven't seen mentioned or were just touched on.   Leans heavily to military sf and sword and sorcery fantasy, 'cause that's the way I like to game:

anything by C J Cherryh - ranges from fantasy to military sci-fi.  I especially like the Alliance Universe stuff - from Downbelow Station, Cyteen, Chanur's series.  I only read about half the Foreigner series, that's up to like 15 books now - I like her earlier stuff a bit better.  Great writer who makes you care about the characters, pulls you into the story and keeps the action moving. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._J._Cherryh

anything by Lois McMaster Bujold - sci fi 10 or so books in the Miles Vorkosigan series, these are a lot of fun.  Richly detailed fantasy stuff with the Chalion series. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_McMaster_Bujold

anything by Elizabeth Moon - good military sci-fi with the Families Regnant stuff and some good fantasy series too: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Moon

John Scalzi - Old Man's War series http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Scalzi - these were great military SF.

Greg Bear - mind blowing universes - try at least Forge of God but again I haven't read a bad thing by him.

David Weber - the Honor Harrington series - Horatio Hornblower in space (that's actually a pretty good series too - not quite as rich as Master&Commander but HH (by CS Forester) and Bolitho (by Alexander Kent) used to be the 2 "go to" series for Napoleonic naval war fiction).  Anyway, Weber is not nearly as good a writer as any of the above, some fairly contrived stuff, but it's still among the best military SF and is great to get inspired to fire up something like Aurora (mechanics based REALLY heavily on Weber's Starfire series).

fantasy -
anything by Harry Turtledove - lots of different fantasy series/one-offs
anything by Raymond Feist - great fantasy stuff - I saw one book mentioned above, I've read about 4 of his series and all were solid, esp. Riftwar.
anything by Fritz Leiber - CLASSIC fantasy, one of the pioneers.  esp. the Fafhrd and the Mouser series, still one of the best ever.

older stuff:
Joe Haldeman - Forever War - classic, flip side of Starship Troopers.  Follows a soldier through centuries of war due to time dilation during travel.
John Steakey - Armor - another great bleak story of a hugely put-upon trooper.
David Drake - Hammer's Slammers series - solid military sci-fi
Gordon Dickson - Dorsai series - ditto
Keith Laumer - Bolo series - giant AI armored tanks.
Fred Saberhagen - Berserker series - huge self-replicating robot space ships programmed to destroy all life.
Philip K Dick - every book is flawed but still great and weird.  Basis for Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report, etc.   Man in the High Castle won a Hugo, alternate-history fantasy.
E E "Doc" Smith - classic space opera - Lensman/Skylark of Space - try one and see if you like it, it's definitely dated but still a great read imho.
Mervyn Peake - Gormenghast - Insanely detailed flavor, creepy fun gothic fantasy.
ER Eddison - Worm Ouroborous series -
ER Burroughs - I esp love the Mars series, bummer the movie was so bad.
Robert Howard - Conan!  Awesome books.
HP Lovecraft - Cthulhu ftw - absolute must read.
Cordwainer Smith - each story is a jewel.

Other authors on my "go to" list - Andre Norton, Jack Vance, Poul Anderson, Roger Zelazny, Fred Pohl, Jack Williamson, Norman Spinrad, Robert Sheckley, Harry Harrison, Edgar Pangborn, Robert Silverberg, RA Lafferty, John Varley, Vernor Vinge, Bruce Sterling

Used bookstore tips - go in with your lists of authors in alphabetical order, try to buy series in chronological order (if you're JUST starting one and not familiar with it, you can usually figure out the order from the list of books by that author just after the copyright page, or from the ads for series on the last few pages).  When in doubt, go for the earliest copyright date (but usually try for the latest *publication* date - some authors have revisions).  When you like an author, get the rest of their bibliography from wikipedia/other sources.  I list the books  I have, by author, on 3x5 cards so I don't end up with duplicates.   The more recent books are easier to get in to but alas the very best are hard to find in used books stores - that's why I list a bunch of older ones, so if you like "classic" sf it's pretty good hunting.  For other ideas, look at lists of Hugo/Nebula winners and nominees, ha here's a site that lists  winners of 11 different awards - still go to the individual lists to get the nominees too.

ED to fix the ONE name I didn't doublecheck :p

[Skyrunner]

I keep telling myself I'm reading the Foundation series and I keep forgetting.
Asimov's short story The Last Question (iirc) is fantastic as his otherworks. Thought-provoking

[Sirus]

Jack Webber - the Honor Harrington series - Horatio Hornblower in space (that's actually a pretty good series too - not quite as rich as Master&Commander but HH (by CS Forester) and Bolitho (by Alexander Kent) used to be the 2 "go to" series for Napoleonic naval war fiction).  Anyway, Webber is not nearly as good a writer as any of the above, some fairly contrived stuff, but it's still among the best military SF and is great to get inspired to fire up something like Aurora (mechanics based REALLY heavily on Webber's Starfire series).

Sorry for being nitpicky, but the man's name is actually David Weber. I have several of his books in front of me right at this moment