9 Historical Romantasy Books

Arthie Casimir has a great set up: her fancy tearoom services high-class customers by day, and is a vampire-filled blood house by night. In this world, vampires live alongside humans with their own society and criminal underbelly. When Arthie’s tearoom gets caught up in danger, she recruits a band of misfits to pull a heist: her adoptive brother Jin, Felicity, Matteo, and Laith. The characters are all bonded as friends, and have their own romantic feelings as well. It’s a book with a lot of moving parts, perfect for genre-blend fans.

During the Tang Dynasty, Zilan studies and practices alchemy illegally in her small town in China to support her family. She gets paid to resurrect the dead. When she gets a chance to take imperial exams, she travels to the capital and unfortunately finds that her reputation proceeds her. Li Hong, the crown prince, worries he’s going to be killed and enlists Zilan’s help. The two get caught up in various political machinations while they get closer.

Though this is the third book in the Last Binding trilogy, and I wholeheartedly recommend the preceding two as well, Marske’s final installment is a wonderful end to her fantastical romance series. After the first two books set up the stakes of the conflict in magical England, the merry band of queer lovers and friends are working to find the knife, the final part of the Last Contract. The perspective characters of the book, Alan Ross and Jack Alston (Lord Hawthorn), are working against the corrupt magical government, but they’re on opposite sides of a class war that complicates Alan’s relationship to his own desire for Jack. The final standoff at Jack’s ancestral home is a truly harrowing magical battle that brings together everyone and everything from the trilogy.

The first in the Magic in Manhattan series, we’re introduced to a version of New York in 1925 where magical items are smuggled in a way similar to the alcohol that was banned during Prohibition. Rory works as an appraiser in an antique shop, and he has the ability to see the history of an object with one touch. Arthur Kenzie is on the lookout for a magical amulet that can control the tides before it gets into the wrong hands and causes catastrophic damage. As Rory and Arthur butt heads, their fates become intertwined and they have to work together against the nefarious actors around them.

In Mexico during the Jazz Age, Casiopea Tun is stuck in her small town with her terrible family and desperate for a way out. When she opens a box in her grandfather’s room, she releases the God of the Mayan Underworld, Hun-Kame. He was overthrown by his brother, who hid parts of his body around the country to prevent him from becoming whole and reaching his full power. Casiopea jumps at the chance to travel with Hun-Kame and restore him to power, so they embark on a journey across Mexico.

Due to a fairy’s curse, a soldier falls asleep during the Civil War and wakes up in 1965. Russell Krause has to make his way through an extremely confusing world, full of unrecognizable technology and confusing social dynamics. He was a Union soldier, and thankfully his side won, but the thing he can’t get over is how tetchy people’s attitudes are about men who love each other. He strikes up a friendship with Caleb, who helps Russell get up to speed with what the world has turned into. As the two grow closer, Caleb has to deal with his own internalized homophobia while Russell deals with the grief of waking up without everyone he’s ever known.

Set in Regency England, this version of history includes fae and magic alongside London’s unforgiving class structure. Roger Barnes wants to solve the poverty crisis for lower-magic humans in England, but unfortunately, the Council sticks him with an old fae rival, Wyndham Wrenwhistle. They have to work out their differences and deal with being accidentally engaged, all while trying to solve inequality in magical England.

The Untermarkt exists right below Covent Garden in Victorian London, and it’s a place where you can bargain for anything, even extra time. Deri has existed in the Market, owned by one of the merchants, for years, but he’s finally seen a way out. Through a bargain with a runaway princess, he gets caught up in the ripple effects of her royal destiny. At the same time as he’s negotiating his way out of tight spots, he’s met and fallen for Owain, who is also dealing with nefarious actors in the market.

In England in the nineteenth century, Zacharias Wythe is the adopted, now free / formerly enslaved person who assists the Sorcerer to the Crown. Even though he disdains the way the English treat him, Zacharias has to find out why England’s magic seems to be draining away. Prunella is another disenfranchised person, working at a ladies’ finishing school that Zacharias visits. He discovers there that she is a magician, which women in England are not supposed to be.