[Barbarossa]

Does anybody else think that certain books or even whole genres/subgenres outside the fantasy genre do appeal to many if not most fantasy fans?

Perhaps closest (besides SF that is) would be historical novels, espeially of the old fashioned swashbuckling kind.

Here a few of my favorites:

The three musketeers by Alexandre Dumas, not only a classic but also one of the most often filmed books ever. (If only someone would have burned the recent disney version *puke*)

"The adventures of Rode Orm" by Frans Bengtson
A really great book, about the adventures of a hypochondric Viking, at least in Skandinavia a classic (Bengtson wasn't only a contemporary of Tolkien but also professor for old Germanic languages)

"Ivanhoe" by Sir Walter Scott, forget about historic accurancy, but a fun book, and a classic with a reason.

"The Masters of rome" series by Colleen Mc'cullough.
Those who love Martin will like this too, based on the last 70 or 80 years of the Roman republic with great intrigues and battle scenes. Very well reseached.

[Lotus]

Yes, historical fiction will certainly appeal to the fantasy fan. How abotu all the Arthurian romances - Mists of Avalon, etc ?

Also how about Alternate History ? For example, Harry Harrison's The Hammer & the Cross and sequels (set in the time of Alfred the Great, Vikings) - which puts forth an entirely different path that history could have taken .. it has strange creatures in it too.

Padma

[Barbarossa]

I would say that alternate history is a subgenre of fantasy, or in samoe cases of SF, if there are technical explanations like time machines.

At least a good part of Arturian fiction is fantasy too, in my opinion. I certainly would put the Mists of Avalon in the fantasy corner if i owned a bookshop.

[Cadfael]

As I have mentioned elsewhere on the forum, I am a big fan of medieavel mysteries, just like fantasy but without the magic... http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/smile.gif, although having said that, in some of the books the characters do believe in elves, demons and the like.

I agree that alternative history books are a sub-class of the fantasy genre... I suppose these book could be classed as SpecFic, and ain't I gonna pay for that term http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/smile.gif.

[FitzChivalry]

Hard to say what other genres a fantasy fan will like, because the fantasy genre has everything, romance, mystery, wars, politics, adventures, etc.
The only criterion is that it will also have magic or strange creatures or for it to happen on a different strange world.
Every fantasy fan likes more different things in his/her fantasy reading, so it's hard to say which other genre will be interesting for the fantasy fan.

[MajicK]

Would I count? I was first mainly a fan of psychological thrillers, and was actually getting quite tired of them before I came to fantasy. Now, fantasy novels take up most of my to-read list. I'm too easy though--I'll read anything.

[tamlyn]

From reading posts in this forum i've noticed a lot of people like mystery. i like ghosts/spirits too.

[sueVee]

I too enjoyed reading all of the Dumas Musketeers adventures. I like historical books both fact and fiction. Sometimes the factual ones outdo the fiction in horror, particularly WW II and Vietnam. I also enjoy biographies, particularly those of historical characters. I loved reading fact and fiction on the kings of England (I loved Henry II) and France. I even like reading the historical (St. Crispian Day's speech always gets me) and lite plays of Shakespeare (I do not care for the tragedies.) Lately though I have been browsing Tom Brokaw's books on the WW II generation. I am afraid I never got into the mysteries though I do enjoy a few horror books, mainly King and Rice with a little Anita Blake, vampire slayer.

[FitzChivalry]

Mystery doesn't really mean ghosts and and voodoo.
Mystery is anything that has well.. mystery in it, i'd say the majority of the genre is detectives books, Sherlock Holmes, Aghata Christy's detectives, etc.

[tamlyn]

mystery and ghosts were two seperate sentences.i like mystery and i like ghosts. if they are in the same book it is because something has happened that people explain away as a ghost and it solves up as something normal.