Fantasy TOP - land of best fantasies

What makes them different from the gas station literature that you avoid reading? No offense to anyone who reads those books, I just happen to have a different taste in literature.

Mostly because...

In my opinion the thing that sets fantasy books apart and takes them to another level is the fantastical part. You might be thinking something along the lines of "wooh big surprise". However it's not because of the fancy monsters and the magic, well not just because of those magnificent objects of imagination. It is mostly due to the potential in the aspect of fantasy.

The potential I am speaking of is the potential to do "anything you want", the characters can disappear, get melted, fly, walk through mountains. This is pretty intriguing to me because although my imagination seeks to be limitless, there are still possibilities and scenarios I have yet to explore. Also the scenarios themselves can be thrilling, entertaining and enlightening.

Some say all books are "exercise for the mind", and others say only some are, books like "Ulysses" and other even more bizarre. Books that seem directionless and purposeless to young fellows like me, boring to put it simply. However fantasy books, as the name implies, provides exercise to your imagination, a challenge if you will, and pushes you towards greater heights.

Ultimately you should be able to evolve your imagination, even your creativity through reading quality fantasy books. A few that comes to mind, The Lord of The Rings, Malazan Book of The Fallen series. There are massive amounts of books that are somewhat similar to Tolkien's work, but they never reach the same level. This is why reading the original Lord of The Rings is what I would recommend.

However although Malazan Book of The Fallen can probably be interpreted in a way that makes it seem similar to LOTR, but the excellent fictive characters and the thrilling universe in general makes such a thing seem completely unimportant.

The conclusion being, if you don't read fantasy and you want to evolve your imagination or creativity, read some fantasy books of your own choice.