Best fantasy novels
Everything from cosy to catastrophic, so long as the impossible is on the page.
Ranked by how often each title comes up across 42 reading lists on NextBook — not by our opinion of them.
1 of 12recommended on 21 listsThe Night Circus
Erin Morgenstern
Two magical beings bound by an arrangement neither chose, circling each other for years. If the Chava-and-Ahmad current is what you want, this is the nearest thing.
2 of 12recommended on 15 listsShadow and Bone
Leigh Bardugo
An ordinary girl found to possess a rare power and installed at court by a man with plans for her. If the Maven twist landed, the Darkling will land harder.
3 of 12recommended on 14 listsThe Bear and the Nightingale
Katherine Arden
Frost, firelight and household spirits nobody is allowed to acknowledge. If you read The Night Circus mostly to be somewhere else, this does that job beautifully.
4 of 12recommended on 13 listsThe Golem and the Jinni
Helene Wecker
Two magical beings loose in 1899 New York, both trying to pass as human. Historical setting handled with the same care Morgenstern gives her tents.
5 of 12recommended on 13 listsUprooted
Naomi Novik
A girl taken by a cold, powerful wizard to be trained, in a Polish-flavoured wood where the corruption spreads much the way the Fold does.
6 of 12recommended on 12 listsThe Hazel Wood
Melissa Albert
Also about inherited stories that turn out to have teeth, though Albert works in sharp modern shocks rather than Wecker's long patient accumulation.
7 of 12recommended on 12 listsThe Ten Thousand Doors of January
Alix E. Harrow
Doors into elsewhere, a hidden manuscript, and sentences that clearly took someone a long time. Same instinct that wonder deserves the good prose.
8 of 12recommended on 11 listsThe Cruel Prince
Holly Black
If the Darkling was the reason you kept turning pages, Black has built an entire court out of that impulse and refuses to make anybody safe.
9 of 12recommended on 11 listsThe Starless Sea
Erin Morgenstern
Morgenstern doing the same thing again, larger and stranger: an underground library of stories, doors painted on walls, and a plot that matters less than the rooms.
10 of 12recommended on 10 listsAn Ember in the Ashes
Sabaa Tahir
A slave girl spying inside a military academy and a soldier who wants out of it. Grimmer than Red Queen and considerably better written.
11 of 12recommended on 10 listsThe Bone Season
Samantha Shannon
A human held by an older, colder species that considers her useful property, who decides to become indispensable rather than obedient. Jude's strategy exactly.
12 of 12recommended on 10 listsThe Magicians
Lev Grossman
Magic learned as hard, boring, unglamorous work by people who are not nice about it. A corrective to Morgenstern's enchantment, and useful precisely for that.
Start from one you already loved
A genre is a blunt instrument. Pick the fantasy book you actually liked and we’ll rank the next one by what you liked about it.
- Books like The Night CircusErin Morgenstern
- Books like Red QueenVictoria Aveyard
- Books like Shadow and BoneLeigh Bardugo
- Books like The Bear and the NightingaleKatherine Arden
- Books like The Golem and the JinniHelene Wecker
- Books like The Cruel PrinceHolly Black
- Books like The Ten Thousand Doors of JanuaryAlix E. Harrow
- Books like UprootedNaomi Novik
- Books like The Hazel WoodMelissa Albert
- Books like The Starless SeaErin Morgenstern
- Books like An Ember in the AshesSabaa Tahir
- Books like The MagiciansLev Grossman
- Books like Jonathan Strange & Mr. NorrellSusanna Clarke
- Books like The Bone SeasonSamantha Shannon
- Books like The Name of the WindPatrick Rothfuss
- Books like GracelingKristin Cashore
- Books like A Darker Shade of MagicV.E. Schwab
- Books like Six of CrowsLeigh Bardugo
- Books like The Lies of Locke LamoraScott Lynch
- Books like NeverwhereNeil Gaiman
- Books like CaravalStephanie Garber
- Books like NevernightJay Kristoff
- Books like The Poppy WarR. F. Kuang
- Books like City of BrassS. A. Chakraborty
- Books like The Gilded WolvesRoshani Chokshi
- Books like The Ocean at the End of the LaneNeil Gaiman
- Books like His Dark MaterialsPhilip Pullman
- Books like The Invisible Life of Addie LaRueV.E. Schwab
- Books like The Raven BoysMaggie Stiefvater
- Books like Spinning SilverNaomi Novik
- Books like InkheartCornelia Funke
- Books like PiranesiSusanna Clarke
- Books like The Chronicles of NarniaC. S. Lewis
- Books like BabelR. F. Kuang
- Books like MistbornBrandon Sanderson
- Books like Serpent & DoveShelby Mahurin
- Books like The House in the Cerulean SeaTJ Klune
- Books like The Mortal InstrumentsCassandra Clare
- Books like The Priory of the Orange TreeSamantha Shannon
- Books like Ninth HouseLeigh Bardugo
- Books like Strange the DreamerLaini Taylor
- Books like The House of the SpiritsIsabel Allende
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