There’s also Sherwood Smith’s Once a Princesses and sequel, which are smart and funny, and the lots of other books by her…

Connie Willis is also really smart and funny –To Say Nothing of the Dog is a good one to start with.

The only thing about Octavia Butler is that her books are not totally devoid of violence against women, so I’m not sure I’d recommend them in this situation. Definitely otherwise though, they are outstanding! Especially Kindred.

Yes! So you Want to Be A Wizard… which I think is totally funny (when it’s not sad) 😉

“exciting plot and good characters with interesting relationships”: I’m missing the obvious! The Assassin’s Apprentice and following books by Robin Hobb. Also known as the Farseer Trilogy followed by the Fool Trilogy. There are a lot of them, and they are the only standard high fantasy I unreservedly love. Narnia meets Nightrunner meets meets Once and Future King meets Jane Eyre meets David Copperfield meets Tolkien–well, that doesn’t sound very good, but the books are. There is an arch-villainess, but only for forms sake. She isn’t even discovered until the very end of the Fool books.

Have you read T.H. White, for that matter?

“Dorothy Sayers, but with fantasy rather than mystery.”
–Oh, I wish! I just finished Strange Poison.

I’ve been racking my brains, and I think that Kage Baker may be the closest thing to a fantasy Sayers. There are a lot of characters in her books. She does sideline vignettes. She has a bit of authorial remove, a sense of the absurd, and a comic appreciation for her own characters without just being a puppeteer. AND she lets them have develop slowly-revealed deep feelings that carry you clear through the series caring more and more what happens to them. She even does a send-up of the Inklings in a couple of the books! I really don’t know why she isn’t more popular. Maybe because her books fall in the fantasy-sci-fi crack? They are packaged as sci-fi, but they read like a cross between historical fiction and fantasy. Like Sayers, Baker is incredibly smart and not afraid to let it show, but also not too proud to clown for her readers.

Not important at all, I don’t think. You’re right, they aren’t a proper series, just a group of books set in the same world. And if you read The Harp of Imach Thyssel first, and do not like it, don’t judge the whole Lyra world by that. It is my least favorite.

Bujold writes both fantasy and science fiction; I’ve read one of her fantasy series that starts with The Curse of Chalion (her other fantasy series, The Sharing Knife, is on my TBR). They’ve got one of the neatest, most logical religious systems I’ve come across in fantasy. I don’t remember if the second book in that series has an attempted rape or not (although judging by Bea’s comment, yes?), and the third one starts out with a woman being accused of killing the heir apparent, who she claims was trying to rape her, but I don’t remember any of the actual rape attempt being “on screen”. I’ve only read the first two books of her sci-fi series, and the first one, Shards of Honor, does have an attempted rape in it that’s a bit more graphic, but it doesn’t feel pointless; it’s an important catalyst for a lot of things that happen later.

The main things I love about Bujold is that 1) she doesn’t write “typical” stories – they’re not standard quest adventures, and her fantasy in particular has a lot elements I haven’t seen elsewhere, and 2) she writes wonderful characters, particularly women. In my brain, she’s sort of the female equivalent of Guy Gavriel Kay, except not as lyrical but more creative in her world building. (I didn’t recommend Kay for this question, since he’s not a humorous writer, but he writes some lovely, lovely fantasy novels.)

Oh, I also have a question for you, judging from some of your comments below: How important is it to read Patricia C. Wrede’s Lyra novels in order? The Enchanted Forest Chronicles were some of my favorite books when I was younger, but I’m just now getting my hands on some of her other books, and I can’t tell whether the Lyra novels are a series proper, or just books set in the same universe.

Yes! Exactly! It’s often voyeuristic (not in this one, I don’t think, but often), and that bugs me. Good to know I must steer clear of Terry Goodkind!

DWJ and Neil Gaiman are two of my top most favorite ever all-time authors with bookshelves devoted exclusively to them. Which makes me inclined to trust you about The Nameless Witch. 🙂