My Favorite Books (and Authors) of All Time

Here’s my list of favorite books and authors of all time. If an author has written more than one of my favorite books of all time, I’m combining all their works into one notation. This list will contain both novellas and short stories in addition to novels because short work frequently punches above it’s weight and I want to feature them.

This list is entirely subjective, and I am more than willing to admit that some of the books on here are qualitatively worse than others not on the list. I am using Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time books as a standard for my judging: I like reading WoT, so everything I like more than that goes on this list. I’m keeping this list mainly Fantasy genre lit for the sake of comparing apples to apples and oranges to oranges.

  1. Patricia McKillip- Riddle-Master, Cygnet, and her standalones
  2. Angelica Gorodescher- Kalpa Imperial, Trafalgar
  3. Lois McMaster Bujold- Vorkosigan and the World of the Five Gods
  4. Adrian Tchaikovsky- Guns of the Dawn
  5. Robin McKinley- Sunshine, The Blue Sword
  6. Zamil Akhtar- Gunmetal Gods
  7. Madeline Miller- Circe
  8. Barry Hughart- The Chronicles of Master Li and Number Ten Ox
  9. Scott Hawkins- The Library at Mount Char
  10. Max Gladstone- Craft Sequence, This is How You Lose the Time War
  11. Garth Nix- Old Kingdom Series
  12. Guy Gavriel Kay- Tigana, Lions of Al-Rassan
  13. Terry Pratchett- Discworld, Good Omens
  14. Rachel Aaron- The Detroit Free Zone
  15. N. K. Jemisen- Moonblood, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
  16. Rebecca Roanhorse- Black Sun
  17. Tolkien
  18. Margaret Rogerson- Vespertine
  19. Frank Herbert- Dune
  20. Ben Aaronovitch- Peter Grant series/Rivers of London
  21. Brandon Sanderson- Cosmere (No Wheel of Time)
  22. J. K. Rowling- Harry Potter (also Cormoran Strike, but that’s Mystery)
  23. Fonda Lee- Jade City
  24. Susanna Clarke- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell
  25. George Saunders- Lincoln in the Bardo
  26. Amberlough
  27. Jim Butcher- Dresden Files, Codex Alera
  28. Django Wexler- Shadow Campaigns, Chosen
  29. Mark Lawrence- The Book of the Ancestor
  30. Samantha Shannon- The Priory of the Orange Tree
  31. Annihilation
  32. Jacqueline Carey- Kushiel’s Legacy, Miranda and Caliban
  33. Robert Jackson Bennett- The Cities of XYZ
  34. Elizabeth Bear- Eternal Sky Trilogy
  35. P. Djeli Clark- A Master of Djinn
  36. G. Willow Wilson- Alif the Unseen
  37. Aliette de Bodard- Obsidian and Blood trilogy, Dominion of the Fallen
  38. Bradley Beaulieu- Song of the Shattered Sands, Lays of Anyuskaya Trilogy
  39. Brian McClellan- Powder Mage, Gods of Blood and Powder, War Cry
  40. Naomi Novik- Uprooted, Temeraire
  41. Diana Wynne Jones- The Magids, Derkholm
  42. Brent Weeks-
  43. Seth Dickenson- The Traitor Baru Cormorant
  44. Nicky Drayden- Prey of Gods
  45. Mary Robinette Kowal- Ghost Talkers, Glamourist Histories
  46. Drew Hayes- The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant, Undeath and Taxes
  47. Sam Sykes- Seven Blades in Black
  48. Ken Liu- The Paper Menagerie and the Dandelion Dynasty
  49. Senlin Ascends
  50. Lies of Locke Lamora
  51. Tamora Pierce- Circle of Magic, Tortall
  52. Jhereg
  53. Gail Carriger- Soulless
  54. Ursula K. LeGuin- Earthsea
  55. James Islington- The Shadow of What Was Lost
  56. Myke Cole
  57. Kathren Arden- The Bear and the Nightingale
  58. S. A. Chakraborty- The City of Brass
  59. Mythago Wood
  60. Nnedi Okorafor
  61. George. R. R. Martin- A Game of Thrones
  62. William Shakespeare
  63. Robert Jordan- Wheel of Time