Classics/groundbreaking stuff or the newer, more successful works that rode the trend?
Absolute agreement on Charles de Lint -- I think he's pretty much mandatory. :)
ETA: Also Emma Bull's War for the Oaks, if you're talking foundational works!
EETA (sorry!): Maybe Gael Baudino's Gossamer Axe? That was one of the earliest modern city/Faerie crossovers I remember coming across, and it's got a strong focus on modern culture vs. Sidhe/trad Irish culture.
EEETA (man, I should just stop and collect my thoughts before I do this, huh? *grin*): Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere! Doesn't get more quintessentially urban fantasy than that, and it's modestly early for the genre.
I'm much more concerned with the earlier classics...i think i have a pretty good handle on the newer works. So if you have any more ideas on classic books fell free to post them!
Emma Bull's book, i keep coming across that one, probably means i should read it.. and yes Neil Gaiman is definitely a must!
Oooh! Oooh! Rosemary Edghill's Twelve Treasures series -- bonus SCA mentions! :) Not really *classics*, though, maybe...
Some other older candidates (I think of the peak of the first wave of this stuff as being the late 80s, early 90s): Tanya Huff's Blood Price series - vampire detective, but predates almost everything else in that field - or else her Keeper's Chronicles, depending on what niche you need
Martin Millar, Good Fairies of New York - people either love or hate this
Alice Hoffman, Practical Magic - a true "mainstream" example, never once shelved in the SF section
Mark Helprin, Winter's Tale - another mainstream success
Pamela Dean, Tam Lin - this one's a little odd, it's set on a modern college campus, but it's a campus based on one in Minnesota so not particularly *urban* per se -- definitely modern life vs. Shakespearean elf life, though. :) Worth reading.
Peter S. Beagle, Folk of the Air - loosely SCA-inspired
Oh, and I forgot about Sean Stewart! A Perfect Circle, maybe, or Mockingbird. He's newer, but absolutely brilliant, and I'm quite sure people will be reading his stuff 20-30 years down the road or more.
Also, I forgot to mention you should look out for "magical realism" as a useful search term -- a lot of what I would consider high-end urban fantasy got labelled that so as not to get stuffed into the SF ghetto. :P
Laurell K. Hamilton, Jim Butcher, Kim Harrison, Patricia Briggs.
Those would be my major "central to the genre" authors. Text wise, probably the first in each of their most well-known series (first Anita Blake, Dresden, Hollows, and Mercy Thompson books).
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Absolute agreement on Charles de Lint -- I think he's pretty much mandatory. :)
ETA: Also Emma Bull's War for the Oaks, if you're talking foundational works!
EETA (sorry!): Maybe Gael Baudino's Gossamer Axe? That was one of the earliest modern city/Faerie crossovers I remember coming across, and it's got a strong focus on modern culture vs. Sidhe/trad Irish culture.
EEETA (man, I should just stop and collect my thoughts before I do this, huh? *grin*): Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere! Doesn't get more quintessentially urban fantasy than that, and it's modestly early for the genre.
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Emma Bull's book, i keep coming across that one, probably means i should read it.. and yes Neil Gaiman is definitely a must!
Reply
Some other older candidates (I think of the peak of the first wave of this stuff as being the late 80s, early 90s):
Tanya Huff's Blood Price series - vampire detective, but predates almost everything else in that field - or else her Keeper's Chronicles, depending on what niche you need
Martin Millar, Good Fairies of New York - people either love or hate this
Alice Hoffman, Practical Magic - a true "mainstream" example, never once shelved in the SF section
Mark Helprin, Winter's Tale - another mainstream success
Pamela Dean, Tam Lin - this one's a little odd, it's set on a modern college campus, but it's a campus based on one in Minnesota so not particularly *urban* per se -- definitely modern life vs. Shakespearean elf life, though. :) Worth reading.
Peter S. Beagle, Folk of the Air - loosely SCA-inspired
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Also, I forgot to mention you should look out for "magical realism" as a useful search term -- a lot of what I would consider high-end urban fantasy got labelled that so as not to get stuffed into the SF ghetto. :P
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Those would be my major "central to the genre" authors. Text wise, probably the first in each of their most well-known series (first Anita Blake, Dresden, Hollows, and Mercy Thompson books).
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Wizard of the Pigeons by Megan Lindholm (she's got another book in the similar vein)
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