So, the main topic of conversation here recently has been the amount of violence in fantasy. So we can move beyond sounding like old men complaining about Wolfeinstein or Doom, lets think about what a fantasy book without violence would look like. Where would the plot/conflict come from? What other books could we look at to get an idea of how to write one?

I don't write and in no way am I about to start but who knows maybe if we prime someones imagination enough they might try. (This might make a good post for you blog Larry not sure).

My first thoughts: Sci-fi has a few of these. Ursula Le'Guin has most of them. The Lathe of Heaven really doesn't have much violence and the dispossed really only has one scene of it. Maybe character studies like these or political novels would be a way to go?

Gabriel Marquez does fantastical realism that is without violence or much of it. 100 years of solitude didn't have much violence really (and was plenty odd enough to be called fantasy in my book).

Thoughts?