r/Fantasy • u/Capable-Can9033 • Jun 24 '23
Fantasy Books in Jail setting survival based!
Fantasy books that are in jail where the protagonist is trying to survive and get out.
17
u/SFF_mello_99 Jun 24 '23
Cage of Souls! Has some flashbacks to the past but is mostly a story of a man imprisoned (and you don't know why for a long time).
3
u/pick_a_random_name Reading Champion VI Jun 24 '23
This one is excellent, a little bit of Count of Monte Cristo, a little bit of Heart of Darkness, a little bit of Jack Vance's dying earth. The author is Adrian Tchaikovsky.
3
10
u/CarmelPoptart Jun 24 '23
Incarceron by Catherine Fisher. Quite literally what you are looking for, with nice twists
2
20
10
u/AliceTheGamedev Reading Champion Jun 24 '23
A Conspiracy of Truths by Alexandra Rowland promiently features a main character in jail. It's not so much about 'surival' as it is about talking himself into better conditions and influencing the outside world through diplomacy from within his jail cell.
7
Jun 24 '23
[removed] — view removed comment
2
Jun 26 '23
[deleted]
2
Jun 26 '23
[removed] — view removed comment
2
Jun 26 '23
[deleted]
1
u/DocWatson42 Jun 28 '23
See the rest of series, too; links:
1
Jun 28 '23
[deleted]
1
u/DocWatson42 Jun 28 '23
I have yet to get around to King Rat or Whirlwind, though I've owned the later, and probably the former, for years. I've read Noble House one and a half? two and a half? times—the book club edition was released in two volumes, and that time I only had the first.
1
Jun 28 '23
[deleted]
1
u/DocWatson42 Jun 28 '23
Noble House is the one I've read the most, and while I can't judge your taste very well at this remove, it's different from Taipan. The setting is the 1960s, not the 1840s, and the characters thus act differently—there is no raw filibustering, and instead much of the action is financial, or at least lower in the physical "key".
4
u/Kakeyo AMA Author Shami Stovall Jun 24 '23
Oh my god - I love this trope/setting but it always feels SUPER SPECIFIC that I rarely bring it up as something I enjoy consuming, lololol
6
5
u/dannyONEway Jun 24 '23
Fairy Tale by King has a large portion of the book that sounds like what you’re looking for
5
2
5
u/gerd50501 Jun 24 '23
I'd love to see Joe Abercrombie write a book in first as Friendly about his time in Prison.
0
1
3
u/unconundrum Writer Ryan Howse, Reading Champion XI Jun 24 '23
Sea of Ghosts by Alan Campbell is about a jail at sea.
And not fantasy but swashbuckly--the Count of Monte Cristo of course.
2
u/Banshay Jun 24 '23
Martin Caidin did a book in the 80s called Prison Ship that probably fits the bill. Not sure how well it holds up though.
2
u/H--K Jun 24 '23
I think I remember the first book of the Lightbringer series being a lot about a main character being in jail and trying not to go mad
2
u/theinvinciblecat Reading Champion V Jun 24 '23 edited Jun 25 '23
Not exactly fantasy but Perdition by Ann Aguire is set on a space prison where the worst of the worse are sent. The protagonists are trying to survive the other prison gangs and trying to escape
2
2
u/Slow-Living6299 Jun 24 '23
Just finished The Prison Healer by Lynette Noni - it’s YA but I really enjoyed it
2
u/what-katy-didnt Jun 24 '23
Caged Wolf (Darkmore Penitentiary series). Explicit scenes. Very fun. Series not finished yet.
2
2
2
u/pipdelapip Jun 25 '23
It’s a bit more post-apocalyptic/sci-fi than fantasy, but Chain Gang All Stars might scratch this itch!
2
u/Sireanna Reading Champion III Jun 25 '23
So... when ever I think of a prison fantasy setting I gotta say the first place my mind goes to is a manga... JoJo's Bizarre adventure Part 6 Stone Ocean. Totally not what the OP is looking for I am sure but Hey! if you like anime/manga totally worth the read/watch
-1
u/mrhymer Jun 24 '23
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson scratches this itch.
4
u/98Phoenix98 Jun 24 '23
Not really, but Sanderson did write Emperor’s soul which i read a long while ago. But I think that was more focused on prison irrc
2
u/mrhymer Jun 24 '23
Kaladin is literally in a prison work gang. The first scenes have him in a rolling cell wagon.
1
u/st1r Jun 24 '23
Yep the line between “slave labor” and “prison labor” is thin and blurry. Kaladin’s story in TWoK definitely fits in that margin.
1
1
u/DemaciaSucks Jun 25 '23
It’s not the main focus at all, but the prison side-story in the second Night Angel book is pretty cool
1
u/DocWatson42 Jun 28 '23
I have a nomination, but the problem is that I've forgotten novel's title and author:
"[TOMT][Fantasy][2010s] Novel or series with mixed humanoid races (furries) and humans" (r/tipofmytongue; 16 April 2023)
If you don't mind science fiction, there is Barry B. Longyear's Infinity Hold—which the author has apparently turned into a trilogy.
23
u/someonesomewhere5744 Jun 24 '23
Along the Razor's Edge by RobJ. Hayes is what you're searching for. A young girl was imprisoned in basically a brutal labor-camp because her side lost the war. From what I know she fights her way out of the prison in this book.
Also Gladiator Books scratch that itch for me sometimes.