[neverending]

Well, I know you said you found Tolkien "boring" so we won't go into that...

Fritz Lieber's Fafhrd & the Grey Mouser series are great favorites of mine. They were written as a reaction to the big dumb barbarian fantasies of Conan and the like, and are quite clever and the world he creates is richly detailed.

I've only read a few of Mercedes Lackey's books, but I really liked them.

Alan Garner's Weirdstone of Brisingamen is a children's novel, but it's really good.

Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy is really wonderful. It's like a fantasy series with no fantasy in it. There's no elves, dwarves, wizards or magic of any kind, but the books still read like fantasy. Highly recommended.

And then there's Michael Moorcock, who stands in a category all his own.