Book recommendations requested

[marydell]

I have a friend who is going through some stuff, and I want to send her a book that's

1. a fantasy 
2. is about a woman (preferably, anyway)
3. has some kind of journey or transformation in it (internal or external). 
4. is uplifting.  

Unfortunately she reads way faster than I do, and borrows books from me, so she's read most of what I have in my library that fits that description, including assorted De Lint & Gaiman, Tam Lin, and War for the Oaks.  But that's the sort of thing I'm looking for--something to bolster a person's belief in life's possibilities, without being treacly.  Also I'm not sending her anything elegiac or sad, despite liking those things myself, because now is not the time for those, so that's limiting my choices.

Help, o readerly friends?

Comments

[kate_nepveu]

Bujold's _Paladin of Souls_ is custom-made but several years old now.

N.K. Jemisin's _The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms_ probably fits, and is very new.

[etumukutenyak.livejournal.com]

I vote for this one too. Not many books out there have a 40-year old woman running around doing things. It's one of my personal favorites. :-)

[fadethecat.livejournal.com]

I'd agree on Paladin of Souls, but I'm not sure if I'd recommend The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms for this particular set. I mean, I thought it was an excellent book, but almost soul-crushingly depressing in places, and I wouldn't call the end uplifting so much as a Pyrrhic victory. (That said, clearly YMMV on how uplifting it is.)

[pixelfish.livejournal.com]

Ditto Paladin of Souls. First thing I thought of. Second thing, Bujold's Sharing Knife. (Fawn is 18, so a bit young, but it's her coming of age story.)

There's also Sharon Shinn's Archangel books, which skew a bit romancey. (Dunno if that's a problem.)

Tamora Pierce's books seem to have recced multiple times down yonder in the comments.

http://www.whatshouldireadnext.com/identify.php may also help...

[richila.livejournal.com]

I don't know if your friend reads children's literature, but one of my favorite books of all time is Ella Enchanted. The book has a lot more to it than the movie.

[slrose.livejournal.com]

Mercedes Lackey; I'd recommend The Fairy Godmother and The Serpent's Shadow. Both stand alone well, although they have loosely related series.

Michelle Sagara's Cast in ___ series; they broke a spate of unable to read anything new for me.

Shanna Swendson's series beginning with Enchanted, Inc.

Lisa Shearin's Magic Lost, Trouble Found.

Elizabeth Moon's Deed of Paksennarion.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

Paksenarrion is quite good, but it has some *very* triggery scenes in it.

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

"Fire" by Kristin Cashore, if she doesn't mind YA. Or "Graceling" by the same author.

[viorica8957.livejournal.com]

The Wizard's Ward (and the sequel, The Destined Queen) by Deborah Hale. Cheesy, but still good reads.

[unhappytriad.livejournal.com]

If your friend doesn't object to YA novels, the Protector of the Small series by Tamora Pierce is cool.

[sabotabby]

Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner. Or, on the YA side, Un Lun Dun by China Miéville.

[rikibeth.livejournal.com]

Seconding Privilege of the Sword.

Also, when I was a teenager, I found Spider & Jeanne Robinson's Stardance very uplifting. The sequels don't measure up, though.

[carbonel]

The King's Peace and The King's Name by Jo Walton, assuming that having a full life and coming to the end of it doesn't count as elegaic or sad.

Also, pretty much anything by Tamora Pierce, if she's okay with YA.

[calanthe-b.livejournal.com]

Dian aWynne Jones' Fire and Hemlock? Caroline Stevermer's A College of Magics and maybe When the King Comes Home, though depending on how you interpret it that can have an elegiac feel, so maybe not. Any of Terry Pratchett's 'Witches' novels, or the Susan+Death books. Patricia McKillip's The Tower at Stony Wood. Margaret Mahy's The Changeover.

[lenora-rose.livejournal.com]

Sherwood Smith's Crown Duel.

Ditto on most of Calanthe_b's votes, though I prefer Mahy's The Tricksters. (And Paladin of Souls. I do love that book). (Fire and Hemlock, Paladin of Souls, and the Privilege of the Sword are on my faves shelf).

Would just generally cheerful and adventury books work? Because then I could happily recommend Jim C. Hines' Princess books (The Stepsister Scheme and the Mermaid's Madness)

Martha Well's The Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy, starting with the Wizard Hunters, begins with a woman planning her own suicide who goes on to kick butt. (And even the opening, with the suicide and the mouldering house and the invading magical army, has the reader a lot more cheerful than the heroine).

[princessofg.livejournal.com]

Tehanu by Ursula Le Guin.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Kij Johnson, Fudoki

[vcmw]

Maybe Larque on the Wing, by Nancy Springer?

[redrose3125.livejournal.com]

The Interior Castle - Katherine Blake - housewife in the early 1980s finds herself daydreaming into a fantasy land, and establishing a connection with the women there. Triumphs in both places.

[unhappytriad.livejournal.com]

Ooh, seconded. But I think the correct title is "The Interior Life", and I believe it's out of print.

[bifemmefatale.livejournal.com]

M.Z. Bradley's The Shattered Chain and Thendara House. It's a sf/f hybrid and a little dated, but I still love it.

[mirrorshard.livejournal.com]

Barbara Hambly's Dragonsbane might be good, but for the love of all the little gods stay away from the sequels.

[llennhoff.livejournal.com]

Daughter of the Empire (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/055327211X?ie=UTF8&tag=lennhoff-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=055327211X) and sequels?

[cristalia.livejournal.com]

Nina Kiriki Hoffman's A Fistful of Sky.

[ashnistrike.livejournal.com]

When I'm in that mood, I'm awfully fond of Diana Paxton's Brisingamen. It's about a classics grad student, stuck in ABD-land, who comes into possession of an enchanted necklace connected with Freya. The magic is surprisingly subtle, and particularly interesting to any reader with Pagan sensibilities. But I always come out of a reread feeling much more balanced and ready to face life and move forward again.

Second Blake's Interior Life. It's out of print--I got mine on PaperbackSwap.