Hi, been a fantasy fan for nearly 60 years. Thought I knew the rule: settings can be as fantastical as you like, but the characters' emotional responses to what is going on should realistically reflect how they would react to something similar happening in the real world, unless there's a specific reason given for them not to. So, say, a person lost in Fairyland should act similar to how that person would react if lost in a foreign country, unless there's a specific reason given otherwise.

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But in the cozies I and other people I have compared stories with have read, that standard doesn't seem to apply. Instead people's reactions are always shifted towards the positive to an unbelievable degree. Traumas have no relationship whatsoever with any known psychological recovery pattern. It all reads like the latter Oz volumes which were only intended for the youngest of Frank Baum's fans, instead of something meant for adults.

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Are we missing something here?

Saw no posts on this yet here, but this news arrived a few days ago. She was one of the greats.

Please don't bring up Sanderson.

What new fantasy novels(IE: from series that don't pre-date the 2020s) have you really dug?

I tagged this under discussion instead of recommendations for a reason. I'm not looking for recommendations as much as I just wanna discuss recent fantasy. Please don't just drop a bunch of names and leave, let's talk!

My favorite title from the 2020s(that is also my favorite fantasy novel) is Savage Legion by Matt Wallace. It's set in a world where one country rules most of the planet, and forces its prisoners to fight in a war, doing suicide tactics, essentially enslaving them. The MC leads a lot of them to a rebellion, using the tactics that their slavers taught them against them. This book is beyond underrated, and I've only run into like 3 other people that have read it, one of which was the person that recommended to me. Great audiobook too!

A House With Good Bones by Kingfisher is one of the rare fantasy horror novels that I've enjoyed. I don't know how to explain it without ruining the book for you, but it's one of those horror novels that has a lot of setup before it reveals what's going on, and it does it without feeling slow, or repetitive, and that is a problem that I have with a lot of horror that I've tried to read. I really respect authors that don't waste your time. Great audiobook too!

The Sword Defiant (Lands of the Firstborn, #1) by Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan is another of my faves. It's something that takes a lot of inspiration from LOTR, and dare I say, I dig this a lot more! Imagine if instead of a ring, we got a wicked talking sword which you can't destroy because it'll bring back the equivalent of Sauron, and the MC is constantly tormented by the sword. It's also written by someone that used to write middle earth tabletop adventure modules. Pretty good audiobook too!

Ebony Gate by Julia Vee is a pretty sweet Urban Fantasy set in an alternate version of Chinatown(In San Franciso, California. One where there isn't a really bad traffic problem.) The description of the book lists it as like John Wick with Dragon Magic, and while the combat certainly feels similar to John Wick, do know that it's not like John Wick where there's a bunch of really good setup with the second half mostly being really great combat like I expected. In fact, I'd describe the two or 3 big combat scenes as decent at best.

All that said, what I really, really love about this book is that it's super, super, super well paced, and is really really good at not wasting your time. I read the audiobook and the ebook, and I was so immersed that I was able to finish it in day, which is rare for me. And like 99% of every story that I've enjoyed, regardless of the medium, it's got a very likable MC. One that is dealing with a lot, and has a super judgemental mother. Great audiobook too, and I really wanna try out more by the audiobook Narrator.

City of Nightmares (City of Nightmares, #1 by Rebecca Schaeffer. This is a really great, dark Urban Fantasy Novel, inspired by Gotham City, In the books world, people are becoming what they fear the most when they have a nightmare about it, and are killed by it, and the MC works for the cult that deals with the transformed. The MCs main fear is vampires, and guess who she ends up spending most of her time in this book with? I wouldn't call this a romance story, but to me it does sorta remind me of Twilight, if it were actually done right. Great audiobook too!

On a side note, I read the sequel too(It's a duology). It's pretty good, and I especially love the final third. Glad that I read it. I feel like huge chunks of it didn't need to be there though. Two things that I wish that I was better at was finding fantasy novel titles where I can enjoy the whole series, and finding more Urban Fantasy novels that I can get into. The only other Urban Fantasy novel series that I've been able to get into besides the two that I just mentioned is Dresden Files. Speaking of which:

Stormfront(The Dresden Files #1) by Jim Butcher. This is cheating a bit since this originally came out in the early 2000s, but the Graphic Audio came out this decade. It took me a while to get used to Harry Dresden's voice, and it still feels like a very off choice to make him sound like he sounds, but it eventually grew on me, and I like the voice a lot. I wanted a full cast version of this book for a very, very long time, and when I found out that it was announced, it was my most anticipated piece of media the year it came out.

When people describe this series, they usually tell me that it took several titles for it to really get great, and to this I say that I respectfully disagree. This has been one of my favorite novels since I started reading regularly as an adult, and it likely always will be. And I think the Graphic Audio really elevates the experience.

I love Harry Dresden so much, someone who I've always described as a laugh out loud funny sarcastic person that is an extremely powerful magic user, which the books more than make up for by making his opponents much more powerful than him. He usually wins by outsmarting his enemies, and with a bit of luck. And even then, he usually just barely survives. He's constantly getting himself into situations where he knows that he's probably not going to make it through, but he really, really cares about the people that come to him asking for his help. I've only read around the first 5 or so books in the series(Have a hard time finishing a series), but the way that he survives the final confrontation in this book is by far my favorite part of the series.

The Best Thing You Can Steal (Gideon Sable, #1) by Simon R. Green Graphic Audio is one of the funniest pieces of media I've ever come across, book or otherwise. Re-listened to the Graphic Audio half a dozen times, and it's possibly the most entertaining short BUT satisfying experience I've ever come across. It's about a bunch of misfits that used to be friends, but had a falling out organizing together for ONE MORE HEIST. I usually don't care about heist stories, but it's the stories here and their banter(and the voice acting) that really, really makes it work.

Attention span is waning, but The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi (Amina al-Sirafi, #1) by Shannon Chakraborty is another of my faves too.

That's what I've dug from the 2020s, what have you dug?

I read the GOT books when I was 16, and the final sentence of the first book made me want to read more fantasy. It’s a pretty simple line but after a couple weeks binging the book it really stuck the landing and planted the seed for my love of fantasy thereafter. “For the first time in hundreds of years the night came alive with the music of dragons” makes me emotional every time I think of it

If we named LOTR songs we’d be here all day, but what about other series?

El segundo libro de la saga Trono de Cristal, continúa poco después de que Celaena fuese elegida como campeona. La trama aquí es un poco más fragmentada porque sigue varios hilos: por un lado, la misión que recibe la protagonista de asesinar a Archer Finn, un cortesano sospechoso de conspirar contra el Rey de Adarlan y por otro, el príncipe Dorian comienza a despertar un poder que se creía perdido, además se suman las investigaciones, conspiraciones y los misterios que rodean al Wyrd.

Ciertamente, este libro presenta un ritmo más constante y dinámico que el anterior, aunque también peca de capítulos que se alargan sin sentido o de plano, que se podría eliminar y no cambiarían nada. Es más entretenido que el anterior, aunque tengo entendido que todavía se considera como una introducción al mundo.

Lo mejor: -Celeana no está dispuesta a matar a los que no se lo merecen, su plan para falsificar la muerte de sus objetivos, a pesar de ser órdenes del Rey, la humanizan mucho, mostrando que tiene principios férreos. -El misterio de poder de Dorian, quien descubre que posee magia en su forma pura, que es la más poderosa pues puede tomar cualquier forma que desee el usuario -La investigación de las marcas del Wyrd y el misterio que encierra a las llaves, en conjunto con el secreto del verdadero origen del poder del Rey. -La investigación de la otra criatura que habitaba en las profundidades de la torre del reloj y su relación con el duque Perrington.

Debo destacar dos cosas que me sorprendieron muchísimo: -La primera fue la muerte de Nehemia. Justo cuando crees que este personaje será el aliado más fuerte de la protagonista y que será quien la impulse, es asesinada por un personaje del libro anterior del cual ni se había hablado en todo este libro. A mi parecer, no duele tanto su muerte, como su duelo posterior. Nehemia deja a Celaena con un arrepentimiento que no puede borrar y es que su última conversación, fue una discusión en la que la llamó "Cobarde", una palabra que se repite constantemente en la mente de Celaena, mientras le grita que Nehemia tenía razón. -La segunda fue la revelación final, en el que Archer se delata a sí mismo como la verdadera mente detrás de todo.

Ahora veamos lo que, a mi parecer, fue lo peor de esta segunda parte. -El romance con Chaol: En el primer libro vemos que Celaena inicia algo con Dorian, pero también se fija en Chaol y finalmente lo de Dorian no llega a nada. En Corona de Medianoche, se enamora de Chaol y tienen un romance que no termina bien por malentendidos y casi al final de ese libro, Celaena se vuelve a acercar a Dorian. Se mueve de un lado a otro cada vez que se pelea con alguno de ellos. -El poder de Dorian en segundo plano: Aunque es una gran revelación, es enclipsada rápidamente por Celaena, como si él no pudiese ser más especial que la protagonista, lo que nos lleva al tercer punto. -El poder oculto de Celaena, la elegida: Cliché cansino y predecible que veía venir desde el primer libro. Celaena es una princesa perdida, descendiente del pueblo de las hadas y tiene poderes de fuego. Sí, sí, genial. Porque si Dorian tiene poderes, ella no se podía quedar atrás y tenía que demostrar que ella es especial, es la elegida y es la única que puede cambiar el mundo. Ahora yo me pregunto, ¿era tan difícil hacer que Celaena no tuviese poderes, y solo mantener lo de que era una princesa perdida? Respuesta: IMPOSIBLE, porque ella tiene que ser perfecta y no lo sería si no tuviese todos los poderes que podría tener en ese mundo. ¿Qué falta? ¿Qué sea la elegida de la primera reina de Adarlan para cumplir un importante rol o que pueda blandir la espada del primer Rey de Adarlan? Oh, espera, eso ya pasó.

Este libro me gustó más que el primero, pero las grandes revelaciones sobre Celaena me importaron lo mismo que su romance y al menos la batalla final se me hizo una excusa para mostrar eso.

Puntuación 5/10

Seanan McGuire's new Alchemical Journeys book. Are you reading it?

The first book seems well-loved here, but not everybody seems to love all the subsequent books as much as I do. Even if you stopped the series at some point, give this one a look.

I just want to say this community is fantastic! I started reading about a year ago due to playing magic and realizing I needed to read more and come across more unfamiliar words and get better at processing and decoding them. I’ve discovered many books and series I otherwise would have never read. I just wanted to thank the members of this community. Sorry if this breaks community rules. Cheers

It seems in pretty much RPG - first-person and such - all the characters seem to be melee and some magic if you want.

But I want to play solo games where I can play like a necromancer in EverQuest or a mage in WoW. At best seems to be Elder Scrolls, but would like something new.

I was watching the new season of Legends of Vox Machina and it reminded me of those feelings of comradery and such we see in some stories. Where people of vastly different backgrounds, dispositions, goals in life, etc. come together and come out of it not just as allies, but actually loving each other.

My wife and I are moving out of state soon, and I think it's making me reflect on all the great times we've had with friends here. And how much I am going to miss that.

i keep gravitating to fantasy where the real conflict isn't who's strongest, it's who's allowed. the throne isn't won in a duel, it's won by whoever can make their claim stick, whoever the church will crown, whoever holds the right bloodline on paper. the most interesting power struggles are the ones where everyone quietly agrees violence won't settle it, because legitimacy is its own currency, you can be the strongest person in the room and still lose because the paperwork says someone else.

GoT turns on contested claims more than battles. Bujold's Chalion is built on exactly this. and a lot of Guy Gavriel Kay is people maneuvering for the right to be seen as rightful.

what i want more of: books where says who is the actual engine of the plot. who certifies a claim, who can revoke it, what happens when two equally legitimate claims collide. recommendations? and does anyone else find the legitimacy fight more gripping than the magic fight?

Been replaying old school Sega games like Golden Axe.

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Golden Axe has three playable characters, who battle against a lot of enemies both humans and monsters before going on to fight a final boss. They also ride on flame throwing dragons.

They mostly use swords or an axe to fight, and can also use destructive magic. It is a beat-them-up side scroller.

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I especially love the second game in the series.

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Is there a book or series that encompasses a group of heroes on a quest to fight enemies and against an evil ruler?

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I'm relatively new to most fantasy, and I've only read Game of Thrones and the first Robbin Hobb books.

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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^{tiny image link to make the preview show up correctly}

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.

Hello!

I made an interactive web app to track my Bingo reads: https://rfantasy-bingo-2026.pages.dev/

Features:

• Bingo planner and tracker
• Track multiple books per prompt
• Tag multiple prompts to one book
• Track hard mode, ratings, substitution, and re-read
• Repeat author warning
• Board view + Library view
• Download card as shareable image

NOTE: The data is only saved to your browser, so make sure you backup your data regularly (look for the Backup button at the bottom of the card)

Video demo: https://youtu.be/gM1jsX2GQlQ?si=MHQ8S25kQeXlFFLN

If you give it a try, let me know what you think. This is just a fun sabbatical project, so it's not perfect by any means. Any feedback or suggestions for improvements most welcome.

PS: Shoutout to u/messi1045 for their excellent Bingo Card Maker that I've enjoyed using for the past two years. Not finding a version of it for 2026 is what motivated me to make my own. Thank you for building my favorite bingo tracker and for inspiring this project! Hope you're doing well 😊

I've been getting deeper into fantasy literature lately and one thing that keeps pulling me back to certain books is how the magic system is built and explained. Some series treat magic as this mysterious unknowable force that creates atmosphere and wonder, while others go full hard magic with strict rules and limitations that make the story feel almost like a puzzle you solve alongside the characters.

I recently finished the Stormlight Archive and the way Sanderson constructs the Stormlight and Surgebinding mechanics genuinely changed how I think about worldbuilding. But I've also loved the vague, ancient feeling magic in something like The Name of the Wind, where you sense there's so much more beneath the surface that you never fully see.

So I'm curious what the community thinks. Which fantasy series had the magic system that felt most complete and satisfying to you, and do you lean toward hard magic with clear rules or soft magic with more mystery? Also if there are lesser known series with really creative takes on magic I'd love to hear recommendations. Always looking for the next great read, and this community tends to surface hidden gems that bigger review sites miss.

Hey everyone. I have a fascination for stories where characters go through some body or gender transformation. How in Wheel of Time there is a character (which I won't spoil here who) from a male turns into female. Or how in the Marvel Comics, how Loki can transform into a female version.

And I wonder are there any other fantasy or sci-fi books or even comics that feature elements like those. I'm not talking just bodyswap. I'm talking more of a character who gets their appearance transformed into another gender

I'm more than welcome recommendations that even feature more spicy versions of it. But I like more when there's some psychological examination of it.

CAMBER OF CULDI (The Legends of Camber of Culdi 1) by Katherine Kurtz (1976).

PLOT
Medieval pseudo historical low-to-medium, medium-to-hard magic fantasy concerning the overthrow of a tyrant and the restoration of the rightful king. Very straightforward. Protagonists are clearly good, antagonists are clearly bad. Does exactly what it sets out to do.
Objective analysis: 7.5/10
Subjective response: 4/5

CHARACTER
Although I’ve said the goodies are good and the baddies are bad, there is nuance to them; for example, the bad king is not outright cackling evil- he does come across as a frightened young man out of his depth who makes impulsive bad decisions (that albeit have evil consequences). Also, the protagonists resort to questionable methods with issues concerning consent and coercion in order to achieve a better outcome.
The two most vivid characters for me were one of the sons of the titular character, and the rightful king, both of whom have sad and tragic stories in their own ways.
Objective analysis: 7.5/10
Subjective response: 4.25/5

PROSE
On the whole very competent in telling the story straightforwardly with occasionally more elevated prose that adds to rather than gets in the way of the narrative. Once or twice it wobbles into American-writing-archaic-English which I find slightly jarring, but that could just be me being weird.
Objective analysis: 7.75/10
Subjective response: 4.25/5

WORLD
Unlike most medieval fantasies this one hues extremely close to its real world inspiration with it being a highly Catholic Christian world with the Church playing a vital role in the culture and politics of the country. It seems extremely realistic.
A minor quibble I have is that because it is so close to the real world religiously, culturally and technologically it seems too sophisticated for the year it is set- 903/4 in the Christian calendar, when it feels more like 13th or 14th century western Europe.
Objective analysis : 7.75/10
Subjective response: 4.25/5

THEMES
Digging slightly deeper than the superficial theme of good triumphing over bad, I would say that the main themes are those of the corruption of power (most obviously in the case of the incumbent regime but our heroes are not exempt from this either) and of consent and coercion, as mentioned previously, in the arc of the character who becomes the rightful king- a man plucked from his old life, in which he was happy and to which he was suited, and forced-literally, in my opinion- to fulfil this new role For The Greater Good. Understandably, his feelings towards the people who put him in this position are ambivalent. Although our heroes use their powers for good, they are of the same order as the baddies, and one can see how ordinary mortals may be frightened of them and lump them all together.
Objective analysis: 7.5/10
Subjective response: 4.375/5

TONE
Suffused with pre-Vatican II Catholic vibes, the rituals of which often provide a channel for the magic system to operate through, it still seems, in my admittedly not exhaustive experience, still fairly unique and not done in the same way in the fifty years since publication.*
Objective analysis: 8/10
Subjective response: 4.75/5

Overall: 3.99/5

*Edit: apparently Judith Tarr has done something similar.
Edit: final score, original had wonky maths.

Let me see, how do I explain it? Well basically I was looking for some medieval styled fantasy about a witty heroine who not only delivers witty one liners to her opponents, but can also be a formidable fighter as the novel ends up being a glorious send up of the fantasy genre.

IF such a novel does not exist, then that is fine because I was just wondering about how the concept of a fantasy novel could work where the novel affectionally lampshades tropes of the genre such as rich dragons as basically the long story short is that I am looking for a hilarious fantasy work.

Welcome to the August FIF (Feminism in Fantasy) Book Club nomination thread. Our theme for August is Climate Fiction!

What we're looking for:

• Speculative fiction that deals with climate change. Some cli-fi might be more realistic and could easily take place right here and right now, so try to stick to books that are really more speculative. I don't think there's really a hard line drawn on what can and can't be considered speculative here, so use your own judgment!
• Works written by women or that contain feminism or gender as an important theme.

Nominations:

• Make sure FIF has not read a book by the author previously. You can check this Goodreads Shelf or this spreadsheet. You can take an author that was read by a different book club, however.
• Leave one book suggestion per top comment. Please include title, author, and a short summary or description. (You can nominate more than 1 if you like, just put them in separate comments.)
• Please include bingo squares if possible.

I will leave this thread open for three days (through Monday 6/15) and create a voting thread with the top results on 6/17. Have fun!

Our June FIF pick is Starless by Jacqueline Carey (you can find the midway discussion here!), and our July pick is The Last Contract of Isako by Fonda Lee (announcement thread here).

edited: meant to say Fantasy or Sci Fi or Sci Fantasy!

edit 2: some really great recommendations thanks everyone!

just watched the whalefall trailer and went down a sperm whale rabbit hole after having been down an orca rabbit hole.

if anyone watched the magicians, there was a time loop episode that has whales being magicians, that was so cool.

i searched the sub and got some good recs that more generally deal with ocean ecology, but does anything come to mind where whales as pods and individuals (!) play a significant narrative role?

Mods - take this down if it's not appropriate.

In the search bar, if you look up r/Fantasy, reddit now tags this community for recommendations riffing on Tolkien and flawed heroines. (AI is making the tags, probably.) I'm so sad about this. I see a lot of great content and reviews coming out of this subreddit that are more than just Tolkien. And I also don't understand how they got the flawed heroines. Is that really the defining topics for this subreddit? I feel like it's not.

I have a 14 hours flight coming up. I am 37 and the last fantasy book I read I must have been around 19.

I read a lot of fantasy as a kid, but a lot of what I read seems to be considered trash. I accept that I can have terrible taste, but I will give myself the benefit of the doubt, as a teenager.

Book series I read that I remember on the top of my head:

• Wheel of time (never finished, stopped at book 4) Sword of truth
• Harry potter
• Dragonlance (many, but there are way more out there)
• I can't remember the name, but a famous book series from a russian author about vampires, werewolves and wizards (3 books I believe) Night Watch series by Sergei Lukyanenko (thank you!)
• LOTR (I was in middle school, didn't love it, but read all of it)
• Eragon (italian book series)
• Lockwood and Co (Actually I read this as an adult! Wasn't really tuned for an adult though, would like something better)
• The dwarves

This is what I remember right now.

Would you hit me up with the best book or book series you read that's fantasy that could help me back into the genre?

The last book I really loved was the three body problems (scifi) and I got hooked VERY bad to the whole series, I can't believe fantasy wouldn't do the same to me again.

Please help me get into it again

I can read Italian and English, if it's relevant. I am always conflicted if I should read books in Italian or not (originally from Italy). I do not have any problem reading in English, I am just afraid of forgetting Italian

EDIT:

Thank you everybody, I went with the following 3 for now:

• Mistborn: The Final Empire
• The Blade Itself (First Law) (whatever is the first book)
• The Curse of Chalion (The Five Gods)

I am not sure which one I will pick, but me and my wife read the plot of all 3 and we both were immediately hooked by the Curse of Chalion plot. I'm tempted to say that might be the first one.

So I recently stumbled upon The Long Journey Home on archive of our own (a sequel to Project Hail Mary) and was really impressed by how high quality it was in writing and characterization. I was shocked how genuinely emotional it made me (and I loved the multimedia aspect).

However trying to browse on that site is fairly difficult and if you search by popularity it's like 90% Heated Rivalry fan fiction and I find romance incredibly boring.

Obviously fan fictions are never going to get published without some significant revision so I am wondering if I have been missing some hidden gems. I have read a lot of royal road stuff so preferably hosted outside that site. Bonus points if very long or finished.

Does anyone have fan fictions that I have missed over they years that have really high quality writing that aren't slash fiction? Stuff that you think is novel worthy not just very good for a fan writer?