Top Ten Tuesday - Underrated Books

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted at The Broke and The Bookish

This Week's Prompt: Top Ten Underrated Books (books you can't believe aren't more popular, books that are more obscure, etc.)

I could really just repost my top ten list from a few months back on underrated authors, but let's see if I can come up with a few more specific works.

1: I found The Worm Ourobouros completely fascinating. See my full review here. It's weird and a little clunky through the beginning, but it might arguably be the first fantasy novel (in the way we currently think of High/Epic Fantasy) EVER. And it's GOOD. It's okay by me that it's rough around the edges.

2: From a similar time frame, Time and the Gods by Lord Dunsany is a wildly imaginative, yet somewhat unknown, set of short stories

3: Switching from classic works to just-released, I've felt lucky to have found the wonderfully original works by Andrea K. Höst, see my recent review of The Silence of Medair.

4: Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart is a charming historical fantasy based loosely on Chinese myth. I had never heard of it before a friend recommended it to me, and since then I've met few people who've read it.

5: The most amusing almost completely unknown book that I own is called The Fleet: Book Two: Counterattack. It's a collection of short sci-fi stories by different authors about an interstellar war. I got it in a mixed lot of paperbacks, and liked some of the stories enough that I wanted to look up the rest of the series, but at the time I had to really hassle the internet to get it to admit that it even existed. Now it's available, but doesn't seem to be too popular. (Maybe I should re-read it before I recommend it highly.)

6: Romance and Legend of Chivalry by A. R. Hope Moncrieff. I found this interesting volume of collected stories and literary critique in the local library. I'll quote from my goodreads review: "Picture an academic of 1913 looking back at the age of chivalry through the lens of his own time.... The second half is a collection of period "romances", yes, a bit prettied up, mostly just made readable, (at least that's the author's claim). Very enjoyable read."

7: I would venture that many people don't know that in the latter half of the Bond series by Ian Fleming there is a unique novel starring a smart adventurous young woman, and only guest starring Bond. The Spy Who Loved Me is dated, but really intriguing.

8: I'm happy for excuses to plug The Cyberiad by Stanislaw Lem, a unique and fun book of short sci-fi stories. Originally written in Polish, but it is excellently translated.

9: After I wrote a favorable review of an assortment of Star Trek Comics from the 90's, I received a graphic novel collection of the Early Voyages comic series. Practically unknown, but it was really quite good, stay tuned for a review soon!

10: I want to give a closing shout-out to Tending the Fire, by Erin L. Snyder. This brand new collection of fabulous original fantasies and fairy tales was edited and formatted by yours truly, and is available for the e-reader of your choice for only 99 cents!  (Kindle, Nook, Smashwords)

Have you read any of my obscure picks?