Best Grimdark Fantasy Books

One of the more popular subgenres of Fantasy now (there’s debate as to whether it’s a legit subgenre or just an artistic category) but one can hardly argue its prevalence in the fantasy genre).What is Grimdark? Take what is good about the world and humans, then grab a bucket of shit and dump it all over both. Toss in a horrific amount of blood, even more dry sarcasm, shove in a cast of morally ambiguous, emotionally tortured heroes that probably hate each other and the world at large, and you are aiming in the right direction.This 'style' of fantasy has been around for more than a decade now with the grandfather of it all arguably Glen Cook's (fabulous) Black Company books which helped map out the edges of the current grimdark expression. Martin, too, helped define this genre. Perhaps the biggest influence to the current shape of grimdark (and arguably writer of the quintessential definition of it) is Joe Abercrombie who pretty much single-handedly shaped it to what it's become now with his First Law trilogy and on the vanguard of the movement with every book he releases (the man's twitter is "lordgrimdark).Of course, there's more than a few writers who have since taken up the standards of grimdark and are marching with it such as Scott Lynch, Bakker, Mark Lawrence, Richard Morgan, and the most recent authors being Luke Sculls, Jeff Salyards, and Richard Ford.The grimdark movement does NOT look like it's going anywhere any time soon folks, so learn to enjoy it because aspects of it have influenced most new fantasy books, which if are not strictly grimdark, are at least take elements from it.If you are the type who can't stand all this darkness in your fantasy, then check out our Best Feel Good Fantasy list for books that will actually make you feel good about life after you finish reading them. For the rest, here's the best grimdark novels in the fantasy genre.