Favorite sci-fi/fantasy series of books?

[3mnkids]

Discworld for me. Terry Pratchett's books are like whole new worlds, that live, breathe and constantly evolve. There's silly characters, black humour, interesting stories and everything is brilliantly and cleverly written. My favourite sub-series within them are the ones that feature Death.

I wanted to name my daughter Ella Saturday from discworld      My husband wasnt going for it. I did get to name one of the boys after a character in a Stephen R Donaldson book though.    

Fantasy is mainly what I read and there is no way I could pick a favorite.

[Zapranoth]

I'll have to cast my vote for Fred Saberhagen as my favorite.  IF i have to pick a favorite.

I didn't go for the "Berserker" stuff, but my goodness, read _Empire of the East_. 
Then there are the "Swords" books.

For SciFi, Gibson is my favorite.  (William Gibson).

Guess my two favorites have in common that they are both excellent wordsmiths -- they are incredibly thoughtful about how they place the words together, and which they choose.

JRR Tolkein doesn't have my favorite writing style, but you have to bow down before him; he started it all in so many ways.  I still haven't been able to choke down the Silmarillion tho.  :P

[Newt]

I'll have to cast my vote for Fred Saberhagen as my favorite.  IF i have to pick a favorite.

I didn't go for the "Berserker" stuff, but my goodness, read _Empire of the East_.  
Then there are the "Swords" books.

Saberhagen is awesome. I loved the "Swords" books and I did 'go' for the " 'Berserker' stuff"  

I'm a longtime fan of older SF.  Give me Isaac Asimov to read and I am very happy.  So I rank Asimov's Robot stories high, as well as his "Foundation" series.

For fantasy, I enjoyed Guy Gavriel Kay's "The Fionavar Tapestry" trilogy.  It has been a long while since I read it but at the time it struck me as 'next generation' Tolkien.