100 Must-Read Books Featuring Fantastical Creatures
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What is a fantastical creature? I choose to define it as any creature that does not exist in reality, only in the minds of the imaginative and on the pages of fantasy novels everywhere. For the purposes of this list, I chose to avoid titles that are geared towards sci-fi or horror and tried to stick with supernatural and fantasy titles. These are tales and bestiaries featuring creatures like unicorns (WHY IS THIS CATEGORY SO VERY WHITE?!?), fairies, genies, gnomes, dragons, vampires, shapeshifters, and other not-quite-humans. Some of these fantastical creatures are unique to their specific books; others have been present in the lore of the world for centuries, millennia even. Some, like fae and dragons, have personalities and characteristics that vary drastically depending on the region of origin and target audience. And before you go and tell me I forgot Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them or The Silmarillion, I made an effort to avoid some of the most obvious and more mainstream titles in favor of books you may not have picked up without a little nudge.
- The Legend Begins by Isobelle Carmody
- Red Hot Fury by Kasey MacKenzie
- Prophecy by Ellen Oh
- Monstrous Affections: An Anthology of Beastly Tales edited by Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant
- Fae edited by Rhonda Parrish
- Menagerie by Rachel Vincent
- Pegasus by Robin McKinley
- Acorna: The Unicorn Girl by Anne McCaffrey & Margaret Ball
- Troll Fell by Katherine Langrish
- Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews
- The Taken by Vicki Pettersson
- The Subtle Beauty by Ann Hunter
- Tides by Betsy Cornwell
- The Curse of the Chocolate Phoenix by Kate Saunders
- The Menagerie by Tui T. Sutherland & Kari Sutherland
- The Cloud Roads by Martha Wells
- Huntress by Malinda Lo
- The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey
- The Unicorn Girl by M.L. LeGette
- Drink, Slay, Love by Sarah Beth Durst
- Into the Fire by Kelly Hashway
- The Fairy-Tale Detectives by Michael Buckley, illustrated by Peter Ferguson
- Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin
- The Devourers by Indra Das
- The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker
- The Divine by Boaz Lavie, illustrated by Asaf Hanuka & Tomer Hanuka
- The Visitors by Simon Sylvester
- Unnatural Creatures edited by Maria Dahvana Headley & Neil Gaiman
- The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
- The Simoqin Prophecies by Samit Basu
- Wildfire by Mina Khan
- Heart of Stone by Christine Warren
- Rampant by Diana Peterfreund
- Unico by Osamu Tezuka
- City of the Beasts by Isabel Allende, translated by Margaret Sayers Peden
- Moonshine by Alaya Dawn Johnson
- Silvertongue by Charlie Fletcher
- Dreams and Shadows by C. Robert Cargill
- Slave to Sensation by Nalini Singh
- Dragon of the Lost Sea by Laurence Yep
- Promise of Shadows by Justina Ireland
- Wolf Mark by Joseph Bruchac
- Falling in Love with Hominids by Nalo Hopkinson
- Silver Phoenix by Cindy Pon
- The Girl at Midnight by Melissa Grey
- Hunter by Mercedes Lackey
- Rebel of the Sands by Alwyn Hamilton
- A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan
- The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison
- Monstress by Marjorie Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda
- Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older
- The Jumbies by Tracey Baptiste
- The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
- The Secret of Platform 13 by Eva Ibbotson
- Lord of the Changing Winds by Rachel Neumeier
- Ingo by Helen Dunmore
- Kynship by Daniel Heath Justice
- The Sea of Trolls by Nancy Farmer
- The Shadow Speaker by Nnedi Okorafor
- Coal by Constance Burris
- Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
- Uprooted by Naomi Novik
- Song of the Summer King by Jess E. Owen
- Vampires in the Lemon Grove by Karen Russell
- Bayou Magic by Jewell Parker Rhodes
- Eon by Alison Goodman
- Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed
- Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler
- Ico: Castle in the Mist by Miyuki Miyabe, translated by Alexander O. Smith
- Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
- The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle
- Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr
- Soulless by Gail Carriger
- Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor
- Bad Unicorn by Platte F. Clark
- The Last Dragonslayer by Jasper Fforde
- Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
- Teeth by Hannah Moskowitz
- Zombies Vs. Unicorns edited by Holly Black
- Black Swan Rising by Lee Carroll
- Brian Froud’s Goblins! by Ari Berk, illustrated by Brian Froud
- Jinn and Juice by Nicole Peeler
- Asteroid Made of Dragons by G. Derek Adams
- Stormdancer by Jay Kristoff
- Tales from an Israeli Storyteller by Uri Kurlianchik
- Silver in the Blood by Jessica Day George
- The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett
- Jackaby by William Ritter
- The Little Book of Magical Creatures by Elizabeth Pepper & Barbara Stacy
- The Flame of Olympus by Kate O’Hearn
- The Unofficial Middle-Earth Monster’s Guide: Hunt Hobbits, Hoard Treasure, and Embrace Your Villainous Nature by The Mordor Collective
- The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Barker
- Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine
- Isle of Winds by James Fahy
- The Forbidden Wish by Jessica Khoury
- Phoebe and Her Unicorn by Dana Claire Simpson
- The Resurrectionist: The Lost Work of Dr. Spencer Black by E.B. Hudspeth
- Gnomes by Wil Huygen, illustrated by Rien Poortvliet
- Moon Called by Patricia Briggs
- The Element Encyclopedia of Magical Creatures by John Matthews & Caitlin Matthews