Fantasy -- read, not read, read, not read. Jonathan Strange is a bizarre treasure of a book. Seems to come from a different era. Loved it.
If I had to push one of those not previously read on you, I'd say the two Wizard Knight books, aptly titled The Knight and The Wizard. Wizard in question being the knight of the first book. See how he did that? Caveat being I haven't read it in about eight years, so what I thought was, like, deep man, might be kind of... not. Seem to remember some heavy-handed biblical/mythological references. But the gist stuck with me, very pretty, very heartbreaking. Maybe I should go back, re-read, see if it's worth anything. I give Wolfe the benefit of the doubt though, since his other stuff is pretty out there in a good way. What'd you think about the two Kingkiller books?
Yeah, originality is difficult. Esp. in the fantasy genre- feel like there are two, maybe three fantasy frameworks, and not much deviates from that. Ultimately, a fantasy novel better have something going for it in terms of style, tone, narrative structure, etc or it's gonna feel like LOTR 8.0. Trying to think of an original contemporary fantasy, coming up goose eggs- maybe Curse of Chalion? That was pretty good. I liked the two Kingkiller books the way I like, say, Star Trek TNG- total comfort food. Feel shitty in any way, there are certain things you can hang out with on the couch and they'll just take your mind off for a while- that's how I approach those two books. That's plenty for me when it comes to fantasy these days.