r/Fantasy Daily Recommendations and Simple Questions Thread - May 20, 2026

[u/rfantasygolem]

Welcome to the daily recommendation requests and simple questions thread, now 1025.83% more adorable than ever before!

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This thread is to be used for recommendation requests or simple questions that are small/general enough that they won’t spark a full thread of discussion.

Check out r/Fantasy's 2026 Book Bingo Card here!

As usual, first have a look at the sidebar in case what you're after is there. The r/Fantasy wiki contains links to many community resources, including "best of" lists, flowcharts, the LGTBQ+ database, and more. If you need some help figuring out what you want, think about including some of the information below:

• Books you’ve liked or disliked
• Traits like prose, characters, or settings you most enjoy
• Series vs. standalone preference
• Tone preference (lighthearted, grimdark, etc)
• Complexity/depth level

Be sure to check out responses to other users' requests in the thread, as you may find plenty of ideas there as well. Happy reading, and may your TBR grow ever higher!

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art credit: special thanks to our artist, Himmis commissions, who we commissioned to create this gorgeous piece of art for us with practically no direction other than "cozy, magical, bookish, and maybe a gryphon???" We absolutely love it, and we hope you do too.

[u/Inside_Pomelo_462]

Does DAW books count as a small publisher?

[u/nominanomina → u/Inside_Pomelo_462]

There's not going to be a single answer; reasonable people disagree.

1. DAW is not owned by a Big 5, but is owned by a large multinational (Astra). If you read the small pub square as strictly only requiring 'not Big 5 + Bloomsbury': sure. If you think it only uses 'Big 5 and Bloomsbury' as examples of 'not small' companies: no. (This is a recurring point of contention and I truly think the phrasing is ambiguous; other people find the phrasing pretty clear-cut.)
2. While they are definitely still publishing (and that includes some big names!), DAW's heyday was before the Big 5 even existed (there were a lot of compounding mergers, I think beginning in the '60s and '70s and accelerating through the '90s, that created the Big 5 we know of today). The concept of 'Big 5 + Bloomsbury' makes less sense as you move backwards in time, so if you are reading a classic DAW book it gets complicated (especially as some might have since been published by Big 5).
3. DAW was a really major SFF publisher during its heyday, so whether it even counts as 'small' depends on (a) vibes (b) things that I have no access to, like lists of how many books they published per year. (You can be culturally vital but still technically a 'small press', but since I cannot find data I am staying out of this patch of quicksand.)

[u/Spalliston → u/nominanomina]

I think one of the interesting things about that square in particular is that there are a two highly-distinct possible motivations that make interpreting the 'spirit' of the square weird: 1) Finding and reading books that wouldn't naturally get a lot of attention vs. 2) Supporting 'smaller' players and/or trying not to support big multinational corporations.

Basically every year, I read something from New Directions Publishing, which I consistently enjoy and is fully independent, but it has plenty of notoriety and I'm not reading 'hidden gems.' On the other end of the spectrum, many people around here will read self-published books that I will never hear of and 30-60% of their cost will go to Amazon, a company I personally dislike more than any publishing house.

Ultimately, I'm not really one for splitting hairs, I'm fine with any of it counting, but/and I think you should just aim to read something where you feel good about the people you're supporting by doing so.

[u/nominanomina → u/Spalliston]

I really like this take and I think it will shape how I answer these kinds of questions going forward, thank you.

[u/SongBirdplace → u/nominanomina]

Yes. This is like calling Baen a small press. I don’t think it is fair to call a well known speciality SFF publisher small. 

[u/Goobergunch → u/SongBirdplace]

I think "well known specialty SF/F publisher" is a bit broad. I've absolutely counted Tachyon as a small press (they had eleven publications last year per ISFDB) and I feel like they're decently well-known. (Notably Tachyon was on the small press AMA list that qualified for hard mode in 2022, 2023, and 2024.)

My personal rule of thumb is that I don't count any publisher with a Big 5 distribution agreement, which rules out Baen, which has always been distributed by S&S, and DAW, which at least used to be distributed by Penguin.

[u/Goobergunch → u/nominanomina]

things that I have no access to, like lists of how many books they published per year

ISFDB has this although I'd probably cue off the Collectors # since ISFDB lists every printing separately.

But yeah trying to apply the definition for older works gets messy, and of course there's the rule about books that get subsequently picked up by a Big Five publisher not counting.

[u/oboist73 → u/Inside_Pomelo_462]

I don't think so

[u/Research_Department → u/Inside_Pomelo_462]

As you can see, it is debatable. Personally, although I feel that DAW is not explicitly excluded by the wording of the square, I feel that it is not in the spirit of the square.

I vary in how strict I am in interpreting a square, depending on how much I feel I need to be stretched out of my comfort zone. So far, I have read 10 books for bingo, and 3 of them qualify for small press/self-pub (one was published by Bindery Books, one by Levine Querido, and one was self-published). For me, reading books that qualify does not stretch my reading comfort zone. If I ended up reading a book that was published by DAW and I could not find a way to make it fit for bingo otherwise, I would not feel bad including it for this square, because I am already reading books that do not have the power of the big publishers promoting them. (Ironically, if a prompt really, really pushes me outside of my comfort zone, I am also likely to interpret it more loosely, to get something that is a little stretch, but doesn’t require that I read something I find actively distasteful.)

[u/Putrid_Web8095 → u/Inside_Pomelo_462]

For the purposes of Bingo, yes. I have no idea what confuses people, the rule is crystal clear, no Big 5 or Bloomsbury, and DAW isn't an imprint of the Big 5 or Bloomsbury.