Hello! I've run out of books I'm excited to read and desperately want some more! I know there is debate about what literary fantasy actually means. For me I just mean really well written fantasy that could be considered literature.
To help explain my taste:
Some books I loved:
Anything written by Robin Hobb
Circe by Madeline Miller
The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden
Deathless by Catherynne Valente
The Just City by Jo Walton
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson
Some books I didn't enjoy for various reasons (some just aren't my taste some I don't consider "literature")
Piranesi
Books by T Kingfisher
Books by VE Schwab
Books by Sarah J Maas
This is how you lose the time war
Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
The Priory of the Orange Tree
Also if you're feeling really generous and have an inkling I'd love to hear what you think through lines of my taste are so I can get better at searching for this stuff myself!
Thank you so so much!!
by Helpmeeff
10 Comments
The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker might be up your alley.
The Broken Earth trilogy by N.K Jemisin
The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera
Split Tooth by Tanya Tagaq
Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi
It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over by Anne de Marcken
The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman would fit here.
I do get the taste you’re describing too. Some fantasy seems to owe more to works of magical realism than the works of pulp fiction like Conan and the D&D novels. I love both traditions but they do strike me as distinct traditions of fantasy fiction.
Lions of Al Rassan,
Pretty much anything by Dianne Wynne Jones. Yes most of her books are set as YA but they’re really well written and lots of fantasy included.
If you didn’t enjoy piranesi I would still recommend the night circus, it’s a stand alone but dips its toe enough into fantasy.
I thought Spear by Nicola Griffith was so stunningly beautiful. I am not usually particularly into that “sword and sorcery” style of fantasy, but I still really loved it.
Tigana – Guy Gabriel Kay
The Thief Series – Megan Whalen Turner
The Red Knight series – Miles Cameron
Perdido Street Station or The City and The City – China Meiville
Curse of Chalion etc – Lois Bujold
Kafka on the Shore or Wind-Up Bird Chronicle – Murakami
100 Yeads of Solitude – Marquez
LeGuin
Have you tried Lord Dunsany eg _The King of Elfland’s Daughter_,
(Or perhaps _The Goblin Emperor_?)