# Fantasy&SF books which are easy to read in English? HELP NEEDED



## harry_gold (Sep 27, 2005)

Hello!

I am a fan of Fantasy for a long time. I was reading fantasy books in my birth language.(LOTR, Pratchet, Zelazny's Amber, Witcher,Aldiss...and lots more. So far about 100 novels or so ) 
Not all good novels or series are published here. Therefore I would like to ask which books are easy to read ( Fantasy or Science fiction ) in ENGLISH. 
I read 10 books in english so far : Pratchetts Interesting Times, Dan Browns Angels and demons and Da vinci code which were ok to understand. Than I read some criminal stories and Salingers Catcher in the rye.I did understand all these books well.
I wanted to buy Steven Erikson's Gardens of Moon but when I read the first pages It seemed pretty complicated. ( the same for Salvatores the dark elf chronicles but maybe it is easy enough I read only a half a page on airport) 
Also I played a lot RPG games so I am familiar with a lot of magic, weapon, and other fantasy vocabulary in English.

Do you have any sugestions please? Please don't sugest Harry Potter.  

Thanks for every answer!


( they have Brooks shanara three book compilation here for example but I am not sure If it is easy reading in english )


I am not sure If I will like Teenage fantasy books. I don't have problem with complicated plot but with complicated vocabulary and expressions.


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## Salazar (Sep 27, 2005)

harry_gold said:
			
		

> Do you have any sugestions please? Please don't sugest Harry Potter.


Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince


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## Arkangel (Sep 27, 2005)

It all depends on the writers. I only pick books with good vocabulary. So i guess the books i pick are the once you should not since you will be aghast by the use of language. 

You can try Warhammer series in SF. Pretty simple language. But if you want good storytelling. I would say. Improve your vocabulary, English is not such a difficult language to learn.


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## ras'matroi (Sep 27, 2005)

i have the same 'problem'. but i stayed for about a year in the us so my english might be a bit better.

i'm reading the malazan books right now and it is true it is hard if you aren't a native speaker. but the story isn't easy, too.
the first series i read was the wheel of time. i wouldn't say it was too hard. but what helped me there was that i read the first book in my language and continued on in english.
another series i read at the begining was a song of ice and fire. it is a realy great and detailed story. the storyline might be a bit complex but the text is easy to understand.
a good thing to try might be shortstories or single books. i liked andre norton a lot.

tell me if you find something. i'm always interested....


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## harry_gold (Sep 27, 2005)

Arkangel said:
			
		

> It all depends on the writers. I only pick books with good vocabulary. So i guess the books i pick are the once you should not since you will be aghast by the use of language.
> 
> You can try Warhammer series in SF. Pretty simple language. But if you want good storytelling. I would say. Improve your vocabulary, English is not such a difficult language to learn.


 
English is easy as language. It depends on literature also. Try reading Focault in english and let me know if you understood something. The thing is I am pretty good at English I am studying in at US university. I wanted only to know some of easier fantasy books. I might try Warhammer. I am used to read very quickly (300 pages in couple of hours ) so I get bored If I have to struggle with english words.


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## Brys (Sep 27, 2005)

Raymond E Feist's novels are quite good and quite easy to read - if you can read Pratchett in English, you can probably read Feist in English. Glen Cook's another whose very easy to read, but still writes decent novels.


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## harry_gold (Sep 27, 2005)

Brys said:
			
		

> Raymond E Feist's novels are quite good and quite easy to read - if you can read Pratchett in English, you can probably read Feist in English. Glen Cook's another whose very easy to read, but still writes decent novels.


Thanks for the answer. As I am looking into my library I found some more book which I read. Thompsons Fear and loathing in LA and Burroughs Naked Lunch ( I quit reading NL after 100 pages or so being too dificult for me ).

What about Salvatore's Shanara trilogy? 

Dark elf trilogy?


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## Brys (Sep 27, 2005)

I haven't read those myself, but from what I hear they're amongst the easier fantasy novels to read. If you understood Catcher in the Rye without any significant problems, you should have no trouble with these.


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## Rosemary (Sep 28, 2005)

I think you will find Salvatore's books quite easy to read.

Have you tried any of Mercedes Lackey's Books yet?  She has a lot of series to choose from.  My favourite set was The Mage Winds Trilogy.  They all seem very straight forward Fantasy with lots of 'magic'.

I do hope you find a writer that suits your taste.


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## chump (Sep 28, 2005)

The shannara books by Terry Brooks are good and are not difficult to read.


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## garreth Jacks (Sep 28, 2005)

Hello have not bean here for a while now as I have not had accses to the internet a lot of what has bean said alredy is true but i have to acree with Brys as Raymond E Feist's is a brillent writer his books are very good another good writer would be David Eddings his books are good and easy to read but very simlar to each other.


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## Jason_Taverner (Sep 28, 2005)

david gemmell his is all straight forward and entertaining enough


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## Leto (Sep 30, 2005)

In SF book, Robert Heinlein ones are not difficult to read. And to improve faster your vocabulary, you can try re-read in english one book you've already read in your mother language.


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## Jayaprakash Satyamurthy (Sep 30, 2005)

In fact, a lot of  classic SF authors are remarkably easy to read, even when they deal with very cool and complex concepts. Two more that I'd suggest are Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury. Asimov has cool ideas and a very clear, crips style. Bradbury's style is much more vivid and poetic, but again beautifully clear and simple at the same time.


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## GOLLUM (Oct 1, 2005)

Yep as someone who has read fairly widely in the Fantasy genre I was going to suggest Ra Salvatore's books and Terry Brook's Shannara series also. Other than the original Ice Wind Trilogy, which you may want ot read to get a better idea of the character background Dark Elf trilogy is for me the best of salvatore's work.

Raymond E Feist and David Eddings are two others I can think of, although I'm not really an Eddings fan.

Like some other members here I tend to go for the more complex prose provided the story is still well told of course.

As far as Erikson's excelent Malazan series goes, what languages do you speak Harry???.....

I ask this becasue foreign language rights have been sold for Germany, France, Poland, Russia, Latvia and Holland to my knowledge, although I don't have a timeline on when they would be translated.anslator and have gleaned something of the formidable ta


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## finvarre (Oct 2, 2005)

GOLLUM said:
			
		

> Raymond E Feist and David Eddings are two others I can think of, although I'm not really an Eddings fan.


 




			
				GOLLUM said:
			
		

> As far as Erikson's excelent Malazan series goes, what languages do you speak Harry???.....
> 
> I ask this becasue foreign language rights have been sold for Germany, France, Poland, Russia, Latvia and Holland to my knowledge, although I don't have a timeline on when they would be translated.anslator and have gleaned something of the formidable ta


 
In Poland all 5 books have been translated (Midnight Tides a year ago) an the Blood Follows as well. We're waiting for the Healthy Dead and the Bonehunters should come out in April. (OK, I know you haven't asked but I wrote this just in case...) 

As for  books that are easy to read in English, David Gemmell's novels were among the first I read when still learning the language, and personally I found them easiest to follow. I suppose that's the case with RA Salvatore as well.. I recall that I didn't have difficulties with Guy Gavriel Kay's style back then, and I think Feist is a good recommendation as well, as is Andre Norton, whose style is very clear. Mercedes Lackey would be easy to read, too, but I liked her books when I was younger and wouldn't recommend them now, although of course you might enjoy them.


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## harry_gold (Oct 3, 2005)

GOLLUM said:
			
		

> Yep as someone who has read fairly widely in the Fantasy genre I was going to suggest Ra Salvatore's books and Terry Brook's Shannara series also. Other than the original Ice Wind Trilogy, which you may want ot read to get a better idea of the character background Dark Elf trilogy is for me the best of salvatore's work.
> 
> Raymond E Feist and David Eddings are two others I can think of, although I'm not really an Eddings fan.
> 
> ...


 

I speak Slovak but read mostly in Czech language as more books are being published in Czech republic. I believe the fourth book of Malazan series is out in Czech republic.


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## Leto (Oct 3, 2005)

Read it first in czech then in english to get the vocabulary right,  then follow with the next one directly in english. Frankly, it's much easier to search for the meaning of a word in the same book in context, than to try to read from scratch with a dictionary on hand.


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