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Best Sword and Sorcery

A listing of your favorite pulp stories from the classic Sword and Sorcery genre.
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171 books · 166 voters · list created October 12th, 2009 by Chad (votes) .
32 likes · 
Lists are re-scored approximately every 5 minutes.


Chad 95 books
75 friends
Greyweather 2660 books
65 friends
Cheryl 1543 books
3 friends
Liane 930 books
13 friends
Jeremiah 2 books
42 friends
Daniel 29 books
0 friends
Phoenixfalls 851 books
50 friends
Jonathan 790 books
6 friends

More voters…


Comments Showing 1-8 of 8 (8 new)

dateUp arrow    newest »

message 1: by Greyweather (new)

Greyweather A Song of Ice and Fire isn't Sword and Sorcery, it's Epic Fantasy (sometimes called High Fantasy).


message 2: by Jonathan (new)

Jonathan Madison Ditto for the Riftwar Saga by Feist


message 3: by Shannon (new)

Shannon Lewis Per the above comments and furthermore the books on this list which are actually Heroic/High/Epic Fantasy

@ The Dragonbone Chair The Dragonbone Chair (Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, #1)
@ The Daggerspell series
@ The Darkover Series
@ Vlad Taltos Series
@ Twelve Houses Series

Essentially Sword and Sorcery as a sub-genre is characterized in its most simple form as stories which replicate the qualities of the sword and sandal genre while adding otherworldly elements.
The Sword and Sandal genre is that genre of historical and biblical epics such as Taras Bulba, Spartacus, Samson and Delilah and The Ten Commandments etc.


message 4: by Dearg (new)

Dearg Glas I agree... some of these things are not like the others!


message 5: by Kevin (new)

Kevin Some people truly have no idea what Sword and Sorcery is.

Unlike epic fantasy, sword and sorcery does not concern itself with world-endangering events; the stakes, rather, are far more personal. The danger to the hero is usually immediate rather than long term. Sword & Sorcery has a strong preference for fast-paced action tales rather than sweeping story arcs. That means there is (usually) no band of heroes facing off against dark lords that seek to destroy the world, but rather a lone hero on a personal quest of some sort.


message 6: by Andrew (last edited Oct 31, 2013 01:07PM) (new)

Andrew Obrigewitsch Another list full of books that don't belong on it with idiots voting non genre books to the top of the list.


message 7: by David (new)

David What a crap list. It's filled with just any kind of Fantasy. I'd love to see a real list of strictly Sword and Sorcery books.

Goodreads Lists are crap because anyone can add to them and no one is allowed to delete from them. Stupid Goodreads.


message 8: by Jim (new)

Jim Kuenzli Bunch of non sword and sorcery on this list. Weird.


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