The Ultimate Fantasy Series Ranking

Author page

David Eddings

4 universes Last reviewed 2026-08-12

David Eddings was an American fantasy novelist born July 7, 1931, in Spokane, Washington, and he died June 2, 2009, in Carson City, Nevada, at age seventy-seven. He earned a bachelor's degree from Reed College in 1954 and a master's degree from the University of Washington in 1961, and worked as an assistant professor at Black Hills State College before turning to fiction full-time. Writing from 1953 to 2006, Eddings produced more than two dozen novels, most famously the five-book Belgariad (1982–1984) and its sequel series The Malloreon (1987–1991), followed by The Elenium (1989–1991), The Tamuli (1992–1994), and The Dreamers (2003–2006). From 1995 onward his novels were jointly credited to his wife, Leigh Eddings, reflecting a collaboration that had, by his own account, existed from the start of his career, even though her contributions went formally uncredited in his earliest books. Upon his death, Eddings left eighteen million dollars to Reed College to support language and literature studies, along with ten million dollars to the National Jewish Medical and Research Center for pediatric asthma research, a philanthropic legacy as notable as his prolific output of bestselling epic fantasy.

Universe(s)

Belgariad Universe

  • Core Canon books: 12
  • Current rank: #168 in the official ranking
  • Weighted average: 4.14
  • Award recognitions: 7 finalist mention, 3 nomination

The Elenium Universe

  • Core Canon books: 6
  • Current rank: #402 in the official ranking
  • Weighted average: 4.01
  • Award recognitions: 1 finalist mention

The Redemption of Althalus

  • Core Canon books: 1
  • Current rank: #641 in the official ranking
  • Weighted average: 3.86
  • Award recognitions: None recorded

The Dreamers

  • Core Canon books: 4
  • Current rank: #864 in the official ranking
  • Weighted average: 3.33
  • Award recognitions: None recorded

Books

Aggregate across all universes

These are separate, unrelated universes; the totals below are plain sums of already-published per-universe facts, never a blended or averaged score across them. See each universe's own figures above.

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