Best Books of 2019 - Fiction

This is third of 3 yearly lists of the best books I read in 2019.  This post contains the best fiction books I read this year.

The Black Prism by Brent Weeks.  Brent Weeks’ Lightbringer series, of which The Black Prism is the first, is a wonderful addition to my collection of fantasy epics.  While it has the seemingly prototype clueless hero, it has a very unique power/magic system and wonderful world building.  With many story arcs and characters you either love or hate, Weeks’ books keep you coming back for more.  I am patiently waiting for the 5^th and last book to come out in paperback.  The other titles in the Lightbringer series I read this year are:  The Blinding Knife, The Broken Eye and The Blood Mirror.

Empire of Glass by Tad Williams.  William’s series, Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, still remains one of my favorite fantasy series.  Empire of Glass is book 2 of a series set in the same world, but decades after the first trilogy.  This book picks up where book 1 ends and drives the various threads of the story along.  And, not surprisingly, Williams leaves you hanging at the end waiting for book 3.  GRRRR!

Tombland by C. J. Sansom.  This is another one of Sansom’s magnificent Shardlake historical mysteries.  Set in 1549 in England, after the death of Henry VIII and during the reign of his son Edward, lawyer Matthew Shardlake, while investigating a mystery, gets caught up in a peasant revolt against the ruling nobility.  The book is long and imposing looking – 866 pages! – but is well-paced and fascinating, both as a mystery and as history.

2^nd Tier reads – good, recommended, just not up to the level of those above:

Fire and Blood by George R. R. Martin

Malice by John Gwynne

Outcasts of Order by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

The Death of Dulgath by Michael J. Sullivan

Twelve Kings in Sharakhai by Bradley P. Beaulieu

Deep Fathom by James Rollins

3^rd Tier reads, somewhat disappointing:

Red Rising by Pierce Brown