The best fantasy novels with gods as characters

A classic from the eighties, The Initiate is the start of the Time Master Trilogy. (Nothing to do with Doctor Who!) A powerful young sorcerer finds refuge among the Initiates, scholar-sorcerers who serve the seven gods of Order, but the seven outcast gods of Chaos, their ancient counterparts and enemies, claim Tarod for their own. Tarod’s journey into himself is a dark one. Politics, magic, friendships betrayed, and gods you really do not want to put any faith in or reliance on taking an active part in events as Chaos tries to take back control of the world it once ruled in a reign of terror. I’ve loved this series and reread it I don’t know how many times. 

The first book in The Twilight Reign starts off an epic fantasy series of war, loyalty, sacrifice, prophecy, and Gods with their own agendas, to whom their chosen champions are game-pieces to be used in a conflict in which mortals have only a partial understanding. The hero, Isak, is a young man born to be a violent warrior, a tool of prophesy and the Gods, but he never stops struggling to be more than what he was made, and to make himself master of his own fate. This is a satisfyingly rich fantasy world to plunge yourself into.

The Gates of Heaven is book three of Seven Brothers, a four-book series, in which the presence and role of the gods become more and more apparent as the overarching story unfolds. Llesho’s story starts off as what you might expect of a young prince in exile, sold into slavery as a pearl-diver, who escapes and sets out to find his scattered brothers. It doesn’t end up where you think, and this book is the point in the series where the story of gods and goddesses and dragons involved in human affairs really takes over as the main plotline, though the threads of it have been there from start. Mountains, grasslands, ancient cities, and their trade routes—this is an excellent silk road fantasy as well.

I’ve loved Glen Cook’s work since reading The Black Company back in the eighties. Tyranny of the Night begins The Instrumentalities of the Night. Yes, the series isn’t finished. No, that doesn’t matter; each book might be part of a larger history but each is a satisfying story on its own, so read them anyway. A world of realistically complex late-medieval politics and mostly unpleasant gods with their own agendas that have little to do with the desires of their human worshippers. It’s a secondary world, but the fastest way to describe the main character, Else/Piper, is to say he’s a Janissary sent back undercover to the people from whom he was stolen as a boy, living as a double, or maybe a triple agent—but it gets more complex than that, as you’d expect from a) Glen Cook and b) a hero who begins his story by using artillery against a god.

Although this is called a sequel to The Curse of Chalion, it’s a standalone novel about Ista, dowager royina of Chalion, who is a secondary character in the first book. A middle-aged widow recently cured of madness by the lifting of a curse, Ista rebels against the cage of her life and thinks to find a taste of freedom by going on pilgrimage, but she finds herself the chosen mortal instrument of the god called the Bastard, charged with a task that will take her, most unwillingly, into the bloody heart of war. This book is reflective, philosophic, and humane, with great adventure and thrilling battle scenes too, as well as one of my favourite gods in fantasy, the Bastard, god of misfits and “disasters out of season”. My absolute favourite Bujold character is Ista and this is my favourite of all Bujold’s many books.