His was a long career, so his writing changed a lot with age and time. We have to remember he started The Colour of Magic in 1983: fantasy/fiction has developed as a genre a LOT these past 40 years.

I think one thing a lot of people don't really consider is how ridiculously funny he is; and somehow that humour spills into his world-building without making it seem like it was done just for a gag.

I can understand why you might find some of his books dull. There are a lot of them, and they aren't all written the same, so there's bound to be bits which don't appeal to you personally. Some of the more action-y scenes in the later Rincewind books aren't my favourite either. However, I value humour much more highly than action, and his wit is unparalleled. If I'm not straight up laughing out loud, I'm nodding to myself with a rueful grin going, "Holy shit that was god-damned hilarious."

His humour and world-building stay consistently top-tier, and that's why I think Terry Pratchett is the GOAT.

 

Suprising to me that no one has mentioned the Kingkiller Chronicles, yet. Some of the best prose in all of fiction, in my opinion. The plotting could sometimes use a bit of work, and the story that's told is not going to win many prizes for originality, but it is perhaps the single best told story that I think I've ever read. We've had a very long wait for the third and final book, and likely another three to five years before we see it, but unlike many that doesn't especially bother me. If you're offended by authors taking a long time to finish a series, vis a vis ASOIAF, then you might want to pass until the third book is released.

Most all of Sanderson's work can qualify if you're a fan of a large cast POV characters. Personally, it's not my preference, but it cannot be denied that Sanderson knows his business. Mistborn is probably my favorite of his series, in large part due to the smaller selection of POVs compared to his larger works.

If we're just talking good fantasy series, though, then:

Alex Verus is a pretty good take on a Dresden-esque character. Main character is a diviner; someone who can see into the future, but who otherwise has no magical combat abilities that aren't given to him by enchanted objects or magical creatures. He runs a shop in London, and frequently involves himself in conflicts well above his pay grade for a variety of reasons. But unlike Dresden, he has to get himself through his battles mostly through cunning.

Of course, there's the requisite mention of the Dresden Files, if you somehow haven't heard of them. Obligatory mention that the first three novels aren't very good, but they do sincerely get better after that. Some people believe the novel's peaked around Changes, but with the exception of Ghost Story, I honestly think they've only gotten better. Some people dislike the power ups Dresden has gotten in recent novels, but it's been a quite consistent theme throughout all the novels that he's gotten stronger and stronger to be able to take on bigger and bigger threats. It perplexes me that people are now starting to get offended by it, but whatever. There's also been a long wait between Skin Game and Peace Talks, but we now have two confirmed novels this year, and as I've said previously, waiting for good novels doesn't really bother me.

The Iron Druid series started out fairly good, but honestly, I hesitate to even mention them because of the deep level of hate I posses for the last three books in that series, in particular the final volume. I don't think I've ever seen any piece fiction, not even fanfiction, bungle the conclusion of a story as badly as Hearne did with the final novel in that series, to the extent that I will never again pick up another novel written by him. He pissed away every single good relationship, characterization, theme, and opportunity for epic battle that he'd been building up for 8 books. Further, he actively turned against many of the themes and characters he'd been building up for 8 books and 5 years.

It's hard for me to judge why, but scrolling through his Twitter, it kinda feels like to me that at some point in 2013ish, he started to get ultra-woke, worse still the neckbeardish flavor of ultra-woke and was uncomfortable with the novels he'd written previously, so just crapped out the conclusion to be done with it.

Ignoring all of that though, the first 4-5 novels are pretty decently entertaining little novels, about on par with fairly good fanfic, though you do have to be willing to power through some pretty cringeworthy scenes early in the first novel, where the main character ends up sleeping with a literal goddess, almost apropos of nothing. Hearne also cannot write female characters for shit, and his female pov attempts are legitimately godawful. There are some quite good fight scenes throughout all the novels, though (excepting the last one), and the plot is usually very engaging, again last 3-4 novels not withstanding. Good timewasters, but do yourself a favor and pretend they ended at book four or five.

The Pax Arcana series by Elliott James is also pretty good, better in some ways and maybe on average then the Iron Druid series, but they also have their serious flaws. The story follows a half-werewolf named John Charming who has been being chased for the better part 50 years by an organization he used to be a part of. That organization, the Knights Templar, has had the job of protecting the Pax Arcana for the last five hundred or so years; the Pax Arcana being a spell cast by long disappeared Elves, whose goal was to protect magical creatures from being detected by ordinary humans except in extraordinary situations.

In terms of world building, it's one of the more interesting Urban Fantasy stories that I've read. Often quite original, reasonably well flushed out, reasonably well thought out. The plot is almost always quite interesting in all the novels and short stories, and there are some quite well written twists in there as well. The biggest failings of this seriess, though, comes from the author's voice, and his characters interactions with each other. In particular, many of the conflicts between the lead character and his allies make almost no sense. They're often times contrived, overly reliant on soap opera style emotional conflict, and frustrating to read.

And as for the primary romantic relationship... I don't want to say it's bad, exactly, in the fashion the Iron Druid's relationships being bad, i.e. clearly written by an author with little to no understanding of romantic relationships or the opposite sex; but it does come across as quite cliche, and it is breathtakingly forced, especially in the first book. Almost soul bond level of cliche, but maybe slightly better. It reads like it was written by someone who got married 6 months into their second relationship ever three decades ago, and has been happy ever since, if that makes any sense. Still, though, I'd put it above the Iron Druid in many categories, especially in the category of prose, though it doesn't look like we're going to get any more novels, since the author vanished off of what little social media he had years ago with no explanation. Dead, maybe.

The Eric Carter series by Stephen Blackmoore is pretty decent. Follows yet another urban mage, but this one is a necromancer. He has some ability to cast "ka-boom" spells, but it isn't really his forte. Honestly, nothing about this series except for some fairly okay twists and relatively well written emotional conflicts is all that outstanding to me, and the only major flaw I can think of is that it can become a bit too obsessed with how edgy it is sometimes. Quite grim-dark, and most of the good things that the main characters gets, he ends up losing, and ending up even lower then where he was before. Again, good timewaster, maybe a bit better then Pax Arcana in some ways, quite a bit worse in most others.

Sandman Slim is mostly just a better version of Eric Carter, in a lot of ways. Follows a mage who was cast down to hell by his old group of magical super-friends, and claws his way back out after fighting in Hell's arenas for thirteen years. The nature of how he managed to survive for so long is a substantial plot point in the first book, so I'll leave it there. Can also get too grim dark, but not to the same degree, and its substantially better written and plotted then Eric Carter. Unlike many of the previous examples I gave, I am reasonably certain that the author has had a pretty decent idea of where he was going with the series from book 1, as major plot conflicts between books line up quite nicely. This series is perhaps about as good as Alex Verus, and a fair bit worse then Dresden.

Look to my next post for the final story I wanted to talk about.

 

I am torn on Rothfuss/Kingkiller Chronicle, the first book is a more than solid and might well deserve the moniker of a masterpiece if only for the way it is written but the second book is sadly unable to to keep to that standard. The writing is still great but the plotlines and characters, especially the whole sex-weekend/vacation with the famous fae, is thoroughly unoriginal if not downright cringeworthy and overall the story doesn't really seem to match up to the epic story promised by book one the interludes and the whole end of the world scenario. Especially with the whole thing set-up as a trilogy which I frankly don't see working out very well. Though perhaps I should give this a re-read and see if lesser expectations will result in less disappointment.

I accept that some may view some of Sanderson's work as a masterpiece but while I enjoyed some his earlier work, especially the first Mistborn book I found the rest of the trilogy to be a serious disappointment (I think the handling of the romance and female character(s) played a major role there though again has been quite some time since I read them) and never really managed to get into his later works.

And baring Dresden Files, I really don't think that any of the UF series you mention (baring Pax Arcana which i haven't read yet) are deserving to be called a masterpiece. Don't get me wrong they are not bad books, well most of them at least, but I would struggle to rate a single one above 3/3,5. They are fun time-wasters but not exactly literary treasures.

 

@Erandil

Like I said, if you're just looking for good fantasy. With regards to the other series I wanted to talk about, it's mostly just Cradle by Will Wight. I'm a bit tired right now, but suffice it to say that it stands head and shoulders above the rest of the timewaster fantasy I mentioned. Nearly on par with Dresden Files, in my view. Though that isn't to say Cradle is without flaws, it has many, most notably the lack of meaningful emotional development between the lead characters. Some development happens, to be sure, and what is there is reasonably good, I just think there should be quite a bit more.

Rough ordering from best to worst of the ones I spoke of:

Fantasy masterpieces:
1. Kingkiller Chronicles
2. Most of Sanderson's work

Good fantasy:
1. The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher
2. Cradle by Will Wight
3. Alex Verus by Benedict Jacka
4. Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey
5. Pax Arcana by Eliott James
6. Iron Druid Chronicles by Kevin Hearne
7. Eric Carter Series by Stephen Blackmoore