Maps in books (and author worldbuilding skills)

[Ishmayl]

Though I don't particularly like the books or his writing style, Terry Brooks (Shannara stuff) has some really nice maps in his books. Robert Jordan's are neat, too, but with such a large world, I could use smaller detailed maps over large world maps.

[thebax2k]

Although they are children's books, I would nominate the Dinotopia series by James Gurney for being best able to use maps to realize a fantasy world. His maps of the land and waterfall city are a joy to behold--vibrant, colorful and very well executed.

[Richardb]

Though I don't particularly like the books or his writing style, Terry Brooks (Shannara stuff) has some really nice maps in his books. Robert Jordan's are neat, too, but with such a large world, I could use smaller detailed maps over large world maps.

I'll second Terry Brooks. Especially the newer hardbacks with the nice color maps. My only gripe is with one book (don't remember which) where they put fake blood stains on the map. Cheesy. I did that on one of my first maps in the 7th grade... used food coloring. It was cheesy then, and is more so now.