Top 5 Wednesday – Favourite Science Fiction & Fantasy Books

This post is part of Top 5 Wednesday, created by Lainey , and now hosted by Sam from Thoughtsontomes, you can find the goodreads group, with all the weekly topics here.

March 8th – Favorite Science Fiction & Fantasy Books *BooktubeSFF Awards Crossover Topic!*
–In collaboration with the BooktubeSFF Awards, talk about your favorite science fiction and fantasy books of all time!

This topic was surprisingly difficult, because while I love so many science fiction and fantasy books, picking just five that stand out over the rest, as absolute favourites was so hard. Some answers however stood out as obvious choices.

1 – The Mistborn Series – by Brandon Sanderson

I’ve made no secret of my love for this series, it just keeps getting better and better. Brandon Sanderson’s writing is easy to get into, and produces a vivid picture, I never have any trouble visualizing whats happening with these books. Add to that the incredibly detailed and thought out world building and magic systems, and interesting characters, and you’ll see why this series is a favourite of mine.

2 – The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet – By Becky Chambers

This is one of my all time favourite books, and I haven’t exactly kept it quiet.  It follows a multi-species crew travelling long distance through space. It’s more character focused than plot driven, and over the course of 400 pages, I fell in love with each of the characters. The depths to which they are developed and explored is incredible.

3 – The Old Kingdom Series – by Garth Nix

This book holds a special place in my heart as the first fantasy series that I read completely by myself, and it had a huge impact on me. I recently reread the original trilogy and that reconfirmed it as an all time favourite. Even though I still have to read the newer books, I feel comfortable putting the whole series on this list based on the merits of the original trilogy.

4 – The Daughter of Smoke and Bone Trilogy – By Laini Taylor

I love this series, the writing is wonderful and the world is so creative and vivid. It’s difficult to put into words all the things that I enjoy about this series, the characters, the worlds, the magic systems, they made this series for me. I actually had difficulty putting the books down, and am looking forward to rereading the books many times in the future.

5 – The Shades of Magic Trilogy – By V.E. Schwab

While I’ve yet to start (let alone finish) A Conjuring of Light, I’m a little bit scared for the series to be over to be honest, I loved the first two books. From the various magic systems, the different worlds and parallel Londons, to the interesting and engaging characters, there is a lot to love about this series so far, and I am excited, and scares, to see where this series goes.

As you can see, this list trends towards the fantasy side, not because I like science fiction less, but because I’ve read more fantasy. I love science fiction, especially books featuring space travel, I just haven’t read many. So, if you have any recommendations for me, please let me know, I need more science fiction books on my TBR. You can also find me on twitter (@reading_escape) if you want to chat more there.