Although it's maybe not exactly in the same vein as what you've read before, in addition to what others have recommended I can highly recommend the Malazan Book of the Fallen.
this post was submitted on 12 May 2026
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He Who Fights With Monsters.
LitRPG like Dungeon Crawler Carl. The main character is a little /r/IAmVerySmart to begin with but much like his chin it gets smoothed out over time.
For some additional fantasy options that were enjoyed by a fellow Sanderson fan:
I will never miss an opportunity to plug Joe Abercrombie, The Blade Itself and the others in the First Law series are excellent and will get you about 10 books worth of excellent stories.
Chris Buehlman's The Blacktongue Thief is also quite good and the third in the series after the first book and a prequel come out later this year.
Red Rising and the following books in the series by Pierce Brown are very good and very popular.
James Islington's Hierarchy and Licanius books were quite good.
The First Law series is phenomenal!
Since you’ve read Cradle and Dungeon Crawler Carl I’ll throw out the Divine Dungeon and Completionist Chronicles series by Dakota Krout. Both are progression focused, pun-laden, and very light-hearted. They are sometimes sloppy in tying things together, but they spark my imagination in ways most other books don’t. Technically Divine Dungeon is a prequel to Completionist Chronicles, but enough time has passed between them that it doesn’t especially matter.
Literally anything by Terry Pratchett. There are flowcharts.
Or my personal favorite: the Aubrey/Maturin series by Patrick O’Brian. It’s not fantasy, but the writing and action might pique your interest. I think the best place to start would be the third book, HMS Surprise.
Sun Eater series by Christopher Ruocchio. First book(Empire of Silence) is half Dune then it finds its own story to tell. It gets really fucking interesting. The whole series explodes into this grand space opera. Good stuff.
This is how I felt about it too, I saw a one star review of it that called it the most derivative work ever created which made me laugh a lot. I am interested in the rest of the series as I only finished the first book and everyone seems to love them despite the Dune adjacent story in the beginning.
The books get better as the story moves along. Though there are some pain points. Depending on if you like Game of Thrones dynasty type drama, there's some of it sprinkled in there that was a drag for me to get through. Then there's a reliance on one character in particular that becomes sort of heavy handed as the story goes on. For the most part it's at it's best when talking about the Cielcin and the other space stuff. Overall I'm loving it. 4 books in and there's no way I'm stopping. Plus it's a completed series!!
Would you be interested in something like Dungeon Crawler Carl? It's not really fantasy per se but uses heavy fantasy elements in a sci-fi setting. New book also came out yesterday and I believe there's going to be two more.
The Lord and Savior? Lol
I didn't know the new book dropped, I will have to check it out.
Practical Guide to Sorcery (I think it counts as progression fantasy?)
If you enjoyed progression fantasy like Cradle, Dungeon Crawler Carl or The Dresden Files might be up your alley.
The Dresden Files
Reminded me to look up if book 18 was out again. It finally is. Hell yeah, thanks for that.
If people haven't read before, it gets better as it goes. Kinda like The Dark Tower, younger authors age.
Already listened to Dungeon Crawler Carl... Got a long commute. Might have to check out Dresden files. Why do you recommend it?
The author is a good writer and has great character moments. Someone else mentioned it picking up at book 5, I would say earlier around the middle of book 3. And honestly they aren’t bad from the first book, the author was just new and so it is just immature writing, cliche heavy, etc… but the story’s are good. And if you are an audio book person, the reader is actor James Marsters, and he does a really good job.
He also has another completed series that is fun called Furies of Calderon that grew out of a bet about what makes a good story, that pitted good writing vs novel idea.
The Dresden Files are good and captivating and easy to read. I just read 12 of them in a row. It takes some time but the story really hits a stride in book 5ish, though they're short and finish quickly. The magic becomes interesting, the world feels real and the monsters dangerous but familiar, there's some faith and family aspects that are quaint and Harry is a character who is fun to ride along with and watch do his thing, recommended but I can understand that it might not be everyone's cup of tea also.
Chrysalis by RinoZ is fantastic. Isekai but the MC is reincarnated as a giant ant.
Grimnoir trilogy by Larry Correia. Alternate history where humanity begins developing individual magical talents in the 1800s. Takes place late 1930s.
Murderbot diaries. Has live action adaptation in progress on some streaming service. Main character is an artificial biological/machine construct. It is not, in fact, a murderous machine. Unless you threaten its humans.
The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett. Murder mystery in with an eldritch horror twist. I've enjoyed this book and the sequel more than anything else I've read in the past few years.
I love the Dresden files. Can't recommend it enough
Robin Hobb's Realm of the Elderlings series. It's right up there with Sanderson IMO.
Reading order is the Farseer trilogy, Liveship Traders trilogy, Tawny Man trilogy, the Rain Wild Chronicles and finally the Fitz and the Fool trilogy. IMO they're all absolute page turners from start to finish. I've read the whole lot twice, some of them more.
It's not quite as daunting as it looks as the Liveship Traders trilogy and the Rain Wild Chronicles follow a different cast of characters from the other 3 trilogies albeit set in the same world and with some crossover.
The one thing that sets it above Sanderson's work for me is that it's complete with no loose threads. Hopefully he gets there one day too!
I think you have it backwards. Where Sanderson is good, Hobb is great.
Either way you rank them, they're both well worth reading.
You should try Semiosis. I just read the second in the series and waiting to get the last one to the library. It's about a earth colony on another planet and each chapter is a different characters point of view most of which are different generations. Great sci-fi concept with a fun read
Have you read wheel of time? Brando finished that series and it’s really good.
Agree with this, Wheel of time was also the reason I found Sanderson. Some people might say it is a bit dated, but I still find it highly enjoyable
Joe Abercrombie, ideally starting with The Blade Itself and working your way through the rest of the First Law series.
There's a sequel to Dragon's Egg called Starquake. I didn't like it quite as much as the original, but it's still pretty good.
I have read it, it was better than I expected. But agreed.
I hear the bible is pretty popular fiction
Unfortunately, I have already read it. Honestly it's overrated compared to other fictions of the same genre.
Tanith Lee.
Neil Gaiman stole his style and most of his best ideas from her.
"Red As Blood" is a short story collection where the princesses are the evil ones. Cinderella is a witch and Snow White is a vampire.
"Night's Master" is an Arabian Nights-style story of a demon prince who loves to seduce and/or torture humans.
Pillars of the Earth is pretty sick if you can look past horrible amount of SA scenes. Writers bareky disguised fetish and all that.
Fatherland by Robert Harris.
It is an alternate history where the Nazi’s weren't defeated and control about half of the world.