[words words words] i read books.
david (& leigh) eddings
His work is really not for everybody - he's formulaic and has recognizable character archetypes in all his books bar one - but I like the formula and I like the characters, so I...don't care. He's very big on the HERO'S JOURNEY with the MAGIC THINGIE and the BOSS VILLAIN. In his short bio in 'Rivan Codex', he explains that yes, he's aware of this, it's deliberate (so it'd be great if people could stop pointing it out like it's a revelation, what). I have fun finding the similarities and connections, because I'm a weirdo that way.
My personal favourites of his are the Elenium and Tamuli trilogies (Martel's canon), and Redemption of Althalus. Belgarath, if you're interested, belongs to The Belgariad/Mallorean series - which all up is thirteen books.
piers anthony
I just mentioned him to you, so I should include him here. Piers Anthony writes a FUCKTON OF STUFF, but I'm gonna talk about Xanth because it's what I like best and this is my list. Xanth is what happens if you take this and make it a fantasy series. That is the best description I can give to someone who hasn't read it, although it is also a description I should be hurt severely for.
I like best anything with Magician Trent.
raymond e. feist
Feist is the gift that keeps on giving because holy shit this guy does not know when to put the pen down. I am okay with that, because I like the world/s that he's working with. With Magician, Feist begins the Riftwar Saga That Does Not End No Seriously. Magician focuses mainly on Pug (and his childhood buddy Tomas), who is...the magician of the title, ultimately, and the beginning of the (get this) riftwar. Midkemia and Kelewan are two separate worlds, connected abruptly by a ~*magical rift*~ through with the Tsurani (of Kelewan) come honking through to start some shit with the Midkemians. This goes on for a really long ass time until it stops, but it's not over yet, because there are more adventures to be had in Midkemia, there's a trilogy set on Kelewan (about Mara of the Acoma), and my personal favourite trilogy: Legends of the Riftwar.
Baron Morray comes from the second Legends book, Murder in LaMut.
mercedes lackey
I'm recommending her mostly because you said you'd read basically anything. I first noticed Ms Lackey when I picked up If I Pay Thee Not In Gold (coauthored with Piers Anthony, the reason I picked it up), which I didn't hate enough to look for more stuff she'd written on her own. For murder mysteries, I really enjoyed Four And Twenty Blackbirds (note: relatively graphic depictions of the creatively murdered corpses), which is part of a series I didn't read the rest of. It worked for me as a standalone. I also like The Black Swan, which was a retelling of Swan Lake from the perspective of Odile. The Fire Rose is basically Beauty and the Beast, and I own a copy.
Piers Anthony has a v. low opinion of her. Trivia!
tad williams
To put some scifi on this list: I haven't read a lot of Tad Williams, but I liked the Otherland series, which is...basically an epic tale of taking virtual reality like ONE GREAT LEAP FOR MANKIND too far. I haven't looked at this again recently so I can't really say much about it, but one of my favourite things is the little in-universe quotes at the beginning of every chapter. They're a neat touch.
lois mcmasters bujold
READ THE MILES VORKOSIGAN BOOKS. DO IT DO IT NOW. That is all.
joel rosenberg
Joel Rosenberg is one of the authors that I didn't already mention Feist has had co-write books with him for the Riftwar Saga. Now you know! I read Not Exactly The Three Musketeers and Not Really The Prisoner of Zenda (more on The Prisoner of Zenda in a minute) before I read Murder in LaMut, and was surprised and delighted when Pirojil, Kethol and Durine (Rosenberg's own characters from the aforementioned novels) showed up in Midkemia. If you read MiLM and you like those dudes, you should go and check out Rosenberg's other stuff with them because it's great.
anthony hope
With The Prisoner of Zenda, Anthony Hope made his own genre - Ruritanian Romance. A Ruritanian Romance is a story set in a fictional country, usually in Middle Europe or East Europe, such as the Ruritania that gave the genre its name.
Hope's TPoZ is about Rudolf Rassendyll, the younger brother of a British Earl who is distantly related to the Ruritanian royal family by way of an ancestor's indiscretion, and by coincidence of genetics and fate is a dead ringer for the current presumptive King. Who promptly gets kidnapped while Rudolf is visiting and he gets pressed into pretending to BE the King while having madcap adventures trying to RESCUE the King (and falling madly in love, of course, with the King's woman). It's written like a memoir, it's in incredibly floral language, it's really goddamn old and I love it like burning. You can read it online here, and both it and the sequel (Rupert of Hentzau) are available at Project Gutenberg.