As a TL;DR, I’ll put the links to the US/CA sale up front, but I do wanna say some thanks too!
US: https://www.amazon.com/Rage-Dragons-Burning-Book-ebook/dp/B07L2VKFP5/
CA: https://www.amazon.ca/Rage-Dragons-Burning-Book-ebook/dp/B07L2VKFP5/
In February, Orbit officially took over all publishing duties and it’s been a whirlwind of a ride. I’ve been invited to participate in my country’s largest literary festival, gotten blurbed by some of my fantasy icons, and messaged back and forth with writers I’ve admired for years. Rage also received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Booklist, Goodreads listed it as one of “The Hottest Books of Summer”, and it’s been written up kindly by wonderful reviewers, whose passion for books blows my mind. All in all, the writing & reading community has been very kind, wonderfully welcoming, and I feel particularly fortunate to have this chance to be part of it.
But, perhaps best of all, The Rage of Dragons will be in libraries this summer. I grew up in libraries, I wrote book 1 in a library, and I’m finishing book 2 in that same library. And, I can’t tell you how much it means to me to know that Rage will be a book that people can borrow and discover in the same way I encountered many of the words and worlds that made reading my lifelong love. I don’t think I even knew how much it meant to me until, randomly, a few days ago, I searched my library’s catalogue for Rage and saw it on order.
That was a moment I won’t ever forget.
This book was originally self-pubbed, but got picked up by a professional publisher and re-edited, so even if you've read it already, you might want to check it out again!
Here's the Amazon listing for the book and here it is on B&N's site. The hardcover version is coming out in July.
THE RAGE OF DRAGONS is also $2.99 today
>The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter
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>your link didnt work for me for some reason, here is the same link, but to amazon smile for those that have a preferred charity they want donated to.
<strong>The Rage of Dragons</strong> by Evan Winters might be a good example for that.
amazon.com/Rage-Dragons-Burning-Book-ebook/dp/B07L2VKFP5
Huh, bit tricky one this. Most of what I'm reading of PF is usually with at least a young adult protagonist. The recommendations below might be what you are looking for (either so grimdark that age does not really matter, or with characters that feel distinctly older regardless of what age they are portrayed as)
- The rage of dragons by Evan Winter
- A testament of Steel by Davis Ashura
- Iron Prince
- Red Rising by Pierce Brown
I would say The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winter would fit.
https://www.amazon.com/Rage-Dragons-Burning-Book-ebook/dp/B07L2VKFP5
Main Character goes from not knowing how to fight very well, to training and becoming crazy powerful.
Imagine the your favorite montage scenes from a movie but on steroids.
​
So far this book is the best example of a character starting from nothing and actually earning the power they get overtime.
It depends on what you're looking for - I haven't read the series you've mentioned, so this list is fairly generic. I find most of the usual recommendations made on these threads (in r/Iteration110Cradle, specifically) to be rather juvenile and shallow (usually made so by some sloppy form of wish fulfillment, a flaw that is sadly ubiquitous in xianxia and litRPG), though I agree with the other commenters about Mother of Learning (a story in which every character self-actualizes, for once, and that concluded this spring, after a decade of one chapter per month) and Rage of Dragons, though I don't think it's quite as good as Cradle or Mother of Learning.
If you want more specific recommendations, I'll eventually get around to replying, but I will otherwise just list off my favorites, and why.
In no particular order:
Fid's Crusade (and the other two books in the same trilogy): a supervillain story. It's well-written, but the premise is very different from the premise of Cradle. Rather than weak to strong, it's more a story about one man's rediscovery of his own humanity, even as his body slowly becomes more machine than living organism, and about the onset of the inevitable.
The Wandering Inn: a fantasy web serial, in which everyday, mundane humans are mysteriously appearing in a fantasy world. It starts off as an exploration of what one particular person would do to survive, and quickly branches out a very character-focused story spanning most of the known world. It could technically be considered litRPG, as it has skills and classes, but they're not used to pad word length with gratuitous lists of meaningless titles. The nature of the system itself is also explored, somewhat, over the course of the story. I'm not up to date, mostly because starting over from the beginning is going to take me a while.
The Spirit Thief: The story of one man whose father told him that he would never amount to anything, and the lengths to which he will go to rub it in that man's face. I'm a little fuzzy on the details - it's been a while since I've read the series. The magic is animistic - everything has its own spirit. The main character is a very unconventional wizard, for reasons that are eventually revealed. This is a story in which powers may come with a price, which is one of the reasons I enjoy it so much. Fortunately, it also predates Rachel Aaron's (she's one of the authors who made the list above) decision to start including poorly written romances in her novels (universally depicted as the bog-standard 'Dark, mysterious man initially butts heads with the spunky main character, then slowly comes to reveal his tender, loving side' - unmitigated tripe that sadly ruins far too many otherwise enjoyable stories, since they're usually predictable the moment that specific man is first described on the page).
Worm: a (completed) web serial about a teenaged girl who, despite being bullied so much she had a psychiatric break and awakened to her powers over creepy-crawlies, initially has the best of intentions, and joins a supervillain gang to spy on them. It's quite an emotional roller coaster, and it's incredibly well-written. It's on the list above (by wildbow). Fair warning: If I recall correctly, there are some real emotional beat-downs in this story, and I burned out on my first read-through when I was trying to binge the whole thing in a couple of weeks. Pace yourself.
Super Powereds: Not my favorite series, per se, but it's generally well-written and well-constructed and explores the nature of what it means to be a hero. In this universe, most people born with powers are born with some drawback that makes those powers either uncontrollable or unusable, and an experimental treatment has just been developed that can fix that. The story focuses on the first group of test subjects as they make their way through the four-year Hero Certification Program (the program is held at a college, hence the four years and four books).
The Chronicles of The Black Company: a series that I've only read once, despite it being one of my favorite series ever created, it details the journey of a mercenary company from a pseudo-eternal war back to the company's homeland (the linked book, despite being an omnibus, is only the 'first' book in the quartet, continued in The Books of the South, The Return of the Black Company, and The Many Deaths of the Black Company). Everything happens as it must, without 'gotcha' moments or deus ex machina, which is both a plus and a minus, because I'll never again be able to read it without knowing what's coming in each of the four books (despite the name of the fourth book, it's not 'everyone dies'). Also Darkwar, for the exact same reasons, though I do occasionally reread that. GLEN COOK DOES NOT WRITE HAPPY BOOKS, though whether the endings are 'happy' or not really depends on your perspective. Stylistically, these books are not at all like Cradle, if that's what you're looking for.
For similar reasons as the above, Dragon Weather, by Lawrence Watt-Evans. Unlike Glen Cook, his books cover a wide breadth of tones. The Misenchanted Sword, despite not being one of my favorites, is a very enjoyable, fairly light-hearted story about a common soldier who is 'blessed' with immortality, but not eternal youth.
Since this is taking far longer than I really meant to spend on it, I'll wrap it up here, with one additional recommendation.
Here's the link to it for Amazon
It also looks like it's available in the Google Play Store for the same price if you have some play credit you'd like to use up.
$2.99 for those wondering