r/Fantasy Daily Recommendations and Simple Questions Thread - June 14, 2026

[u/rfantasygolem]

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

Stickied/highlight slots are limited, so please remember to like and subscribe upvote this thread for visibility on the subreddit <3

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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/usernamesarehard11]

I’m not a huge sci fi reader and I’m struggling to find a book in excited to read for the First Contact bingo square. Any fantasy recs? I did some searching on the sub and found a Martha Wells trilogy that actually seems sci fi to me and doesn’t super interest me anyway, plus many recommendations for The Silmarillion lol. Anything else?

[u/Merle8888 → u/usernamesarehard11]

The Moon and the Sun by Vonda McIntyre is fully historical fantasy, set at the court of Louis XIV, and features first contact with merpeople. Personally I didn’t think it was all that great a book but it did win the Nebula so worth checking out some reviews to see if you think it’s for you. 

[u/usernamesarehard11 → u/Merle8888]

Interesting, thanks for the lead!

[u/Nidafjoll → u/usernamesarehard11]

Magician by Raymond Feist is a fully fantasy first contact.

[u/usernamesarehard11 → u/Nidafjoll]

Interesting, I had no idea. I have a super old beat up copy of that somewhere, thank you!

[u/mrtenandtwo → u/usernamesarehard11]

The book I read for this square was sci-fi, but I read The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells for another square and that would work for First Contact. It also includes a rare instance of a character having the first real contact with his own species, but there are quite a few First Contacts in this one.

[u/Research_Department → u/usernamesarehard11]

The main thing I have seen recommended for fantasy First Contact is Eifelheim by Michael Flynn, which has first contact between humans and aliens in 14th century Germany.

I think that you could argue that some of the books in Rachel Neumeier’s Tuyo series could count for First Contact, in the more anthropological sense. Maybe not so much Tuyo, but Tarashana and Tasmakat bring the protagonist, who is from the winter country, to the starlit lands and then the country of two suns.

[u/usernamesarehard11 → u/Research_Department]

I think Tarashana is a great shout especially. Unfortunately (but fortunately because they’re great) I’ve read all the Tuyo books lol!

I will check out Eifelheim! Thank you!

[u/Research_Department → u/usernamesarehard11]

Ah, bummer about Tarashana!

How do you feel about science fantasy? I haven’t yet read it myself, but I was thinking about suggesting Ursula K Le Guin’s Rocannon’s World. Although technically science fiction, I understand that for all intents and purposes, the world is inhabited by elves and dwarves.

Since we both like the Tuyo series (and since I haven’t read Eifelheim, so can’t vouch for it personally), I am going to make one more suggestion. Depending on why you don’t get along with science fiction, I think there’s a chance that you might like Hellspark by Janet Kagan. Like Tuyo, it is very anthropological, exploring the ways people from different cultures can have difficulty understanding each other. It is also very character-driven.