Taking a stab at fantasy.

I've never really read fantasy novels before. The closest I get is space opera. I've been wanting to check out some for a while, but don't know what would be a good starting point.

So, I was thinking of possibly starting George R. R. Martin's epic fantasy tale "A Song of Ice and Fire", consisting of 4 books. Is anybody familiar with this, or this author for that matter? I don't want to end up wasting my time reading something shitty, but this won some fairly reputable awards such as the Hugo.

Ursula Le Guin, pretty much anything by her. The Earthsea series is considered a classic.

If you're a history buff Harry Turtledove would be a good choice, he's rewritten WWII, only with magic and dragons.