I Loved These 5 Fantasy Books—and You Should Read Them Next

Fantasy has always been my go-to genre. No other genre offers the same sense of possibility. A great fantasy novel can transport readers to a kingdom filled with dragons, send an ordinary person across a deadly magical sea, or make a group of goblins feel like the most relatable characters in the world.

I am always searching for fantasy books that offer something different. I love massive epic adventures, but I also enjoy shorter stories that use humor, clever characters, and unusual magical ideas to create memorable reading experiences.

The five fantasy books on this list represent that variety perfectly.

Some are funny and surprisingly moving. Others feature detailed worlds, dangerous quests, political conflicts, dragons, magic, romance, and characters forced to make impossible decisions. One is a short-fiction collection that moves between fantasy and science fiction, while another is an enormous epic that readers can disappear into for days.

I enjoyed all five of these books and loved how differently they approached the fantasy genre. Whether you want a quick and entertaining novella or a sweeping adventure filled with competing kingdoms, one of these books should become your next read.

5 Fantasy Books You Should Read Next

• Nine Goblins by T. Kingfisher
• Tailored Realities by Brandon Sanderson
• The Magician of Tiger Castle by Louis Sachar
• Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson
• The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

1. Nine Goblins by T. Kingfisher

T. Kingfisher is one of the most reliable authors to turn to when you want fantasy that is strange, funny, imaginative, and a little darker than it initially appears. Nine Goblins delivers all of those qualities in a compact adventure that is easy to read but difficult to forget.

The story follows Sergeant Nessilka and a troop of goblin soldiers who find themselves trapped behind enemy lines after an encounter with a wizard. Their immediate objective is simple: survive the journey and find a way home.

Unfortunately, this is not the most disciplined or capable group of soldiers ever assembled.

The goblins are argumentative, easily distracted, frequently confused, and not particularly heroic. That is exactly what makes them so entertaining. Instead of presenting goblins as nameless monsters for traditional fantasy heroes to defeat, Kingfisher places them at the center of the story.

The result is a fantasy adventure told from a perspective readers do not often get to see.

The novella was originally published in 2013 and has since received a new print edition from Tordotcom Publishing. Its official description calls it a story of “low fantasy and high mischief,” which perfectly captures its combination of military adventure, absurd humor, and unconventional characters.

What I enjoyed most was the chemistry among the goblins. Their conversations are hilarious, but the humor never makes them feel disposable. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that they care about one another, even when they express that affection through complaining and insults.

Kingfisher also uses the novella to examine how enemies are created. Goblins are viewed as naturally violent and unpleasant, but seeing the conflict through their eyes complicates that assumption. They have personalities, fears, loyalties, and reasons for fighting.

That extra layer gives the story more substance than readers might expect from its playful premise.

Because it is relatively short, Nine Goblins is an excellent book for anyone in a reading slump. It moves quickly, introduces its world without overwhelming the reader, and balances comedy with danger.

Read this book next if you enjoy unconventional heroes, humorous fantasy, found-family dynamics, or stories that challenge traditional ideas about monsters.

2. Tailored Realities by Brandon Sanderson

Most fantasy readers know Brandon Sanderson for enormous novels, complex magic systems, and interconnected Cosmere stories. Tailored Realities offers a different way to experience his storytelling.

Instead of following one epic adventure across hundreds of pages, the book collects ten pieces of short fiction spanning fantasy and science fiction. The stories take place outside Sanderson’s Cosmere and range from futuristic mysteries to superhero adventures, space opera, technological fantasy, and alternate realities.

That variety is one of the collection’s greatest strengths.

A reader can finish one story, take a break, and return later for something completely different. The shorter format also allows Sanderson to build a fascinating premise and immediately explore its most interesting consequences.

Many of the stories revolve around one of Sanderson’s favorite questions: What happens when an extraordinary system is placed in the hands of ordinary, flawed people?

Those systems may involve advanced technology, unusual abilities, artificial worlds, or realities that do not behave the way characters expect. Even when the settings lean toward science fiction, the stories retain the sense of wonder and discovery that fantasy readers often seek.

The collection includes previously published works such as Snapshot, Perfect State, and Defending Elysium, along with the previously unseen novella Moment Zero. According to the publisher, many of the selections had never previously been widely available in print together.

I enjoyed seeing Sanderson experiment with different styles and genres. A full-length novel must sustain one central world and plot, but a collection gives an author more freedom. Sanderson can introduce a bold concept, test its limits, and then move on before it becomes repetitive.

Tailored Realities is also a good entry point for readers who are curious about Sanderson but feel intimidated by the size of series such as The Stormlight Archive. You do not need to study a reading order or remember the history of an enormous fictional universe.

You can simply choose a story and begin.

Readers who already love Sanderson will get to see another side of his work. Readers who are new to him will receive a broad introduction to the ideas, mysteries, twists, and inventive world-building that have made him one of fantasy’s most recognizable authors.

Read this collection next if you enjoy imaginative premises, genre-blending stories, speculative mysteries, or fantasy books that can be enjoyed in shorter sittings.

3. The Magician of Tiger Castle by Louis Sachar

Louis Sachar is best known as the author of Holes, but The Magician of Tiger Castle proves that his wit and imagination work just as well in an adult fantasy setting.

The novel takes place in the kingdom of Esquaveta, where the king hopes to secure an important alliance by arranging his daughter’s marriage to a prince. Princess Tullia, however, has fallen in love with someone else.

That leaves Anatole, the magician of Tiger Castle, with an impossible task.

Once celebrated as a brilliant magician, Anatole is no longer treated with the same admiration. His abilities are questioned, his reputation has faded, and the royal family expects him to solve a political and romantic crisis that could determine the kingdom’s future.

The publisher describes the novel as a medieval fable that is simultaneously wise, whimsical, tragic, comic, familiar, and strange. It is also Sachar’s first novel written for adults.

The book’s fairy-tale structure makes it immediately approachable. There is a castle, a princess, a magician, forbidden love, an arranged marriage, and a kingdom facing instability. However, Sachar does not simply repeat familiar fantasy conventions.

He plays with them.

Magic, science, medicine, storytelling, and history overlap in unexpected ways. Anatole is not a distant, all-powerful wizard. He is a complicated narrator trying to explain what happened, defend his choices, and correct the legends that have grown around him.

That narrative voice is a major reason the book works so well.

The story is clever without becoming exhausting and funny without treating its emotional stakes as a joke. It explores love, loyalty, pride, knowledge, and the difference between how history happens and how it is later remembered.

I especially enjoyed how different it felt from the grim fantasy novels that dominate many recommendation lists. There is danger and conflict, but the book retains warmth. It has the playful intelligence readers may remember from Sachar’s earlier work while telling a story designed for an adult audience.

It is a wonderful option for anyone who wants a fantasy novel that feels classic and modern at the same time.

Read The Magician of Tiger Castle next if you enjoy fairy-tale retellings, unreliable or unconventional narrators, courtly adventures, forbidden romance, or fantasy with humor and heart.

4. Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

Tress of the Emerald Sea is one of Brandon Sanderson’s most charming fantasy novels. It contains everything readers could want from a magical adventure: a dangerous voyage, pirates, an unusual world, a mysterious sorceress, friendship, romance, and a heroine who grows into her courage.

Tress lives a quiet life on an island surrounded by an emerald-colored sea. She collects cups brought home by sailors and spends time with her friend Charlie. Her world is small but comfortable.

That changes when Charlie leaves the island and disaster follows.

Determined to bring him home, Tress abandons the safety of everything she knows and begins a journey across deadly seas. She must survive unfamiliar ships, dangerous enemies, strange creatures, and magical environments unlike anything she has encountered before.

Sanderson’s official synopsis describes her mission as a voyage to find the Sorceress of the deadly Midnight Sea.

The world-building is immediately memorable. These are not ordinary oceans. The seas are composed of spores with different properties, making travel both beautiful and extremely dangerous. The magic feels imaginative, but its rules are clear enough that readers can understand the challenges Tress faces.

More importantly, the book has a wonderful protagonist.

Tress does not begin the story as a trained warrior, powerful magician, or natural adventurer. She is thoughtful, practical, observant, and willing to learn. Her greatest strengths develop naturally as she encounters new people and problems.

That makes her journey feel earned.

The novel also has a lighter, more playful voice than some of Sanderson’s enormous epics. It reads like a fairy tale being told by someone who enjoys interrupting the story with jokes, observations, and unexpected wisdom.

Underneath the humor is a sincere story about choosing to act instead of waiting for someone else to solve your problems. Tress repeatedly succeeds because she listens, adapts, helps people, and recognizes abilities that others overlook.

I loved the book’s creativity, atmosphere, and sense of adventure. It feels both comforting and exciting, making it an ideal recommendation for established fantasy fans as well as readers who do not normally explore the genre.

Although the novel is connected to Sanderson’s wider Cosmere, it works as a standalone story. New readers can enjoy Tress’s adventure without reading several other series first.

Read Tress of the Emerald Sea next if you want a whimsical adventure, an inventive magical world, a likable heroine, pirates, romance, or a standalone introduction to Brandon Sanderson.

5. The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

Sometimes you want a short fantasy adventure. Other times, you want an enormous book that allows you to disappear into another world.

The Priory of the Orange Tree is the second kind of reading experience.

Samantha Shannon’s epic fantasy novel presents a world divided by geography, religion, history, and conflicting beliefs about dragons. Ancient evil threatens to return, but the people who may be capable of stopping it do not necessarily trust one another.

The story follows multiple characters in different parts of the world. Their lives involve royal succession, secret organizations, political alliances, forbidden relationships, dangerous ambitions, ancient legends, and competing traditions.

At the center of the western kingdom of Inys is Queen Sabran Berethnet, whose family line is believed to protect the realm from a terrifying enemy. Ead Duryan serves close to the queen while secretly remaining loyal to the Priory of the Orange Tree.

Across the world, Tané dreams of becoming a dragon rider, but one decision threatens everything she has worked to achieve.

These separate stories slowly reveal the scope of the conflict and the connections between cultures that have misunderstood one another for generations.

Bloomsbury describes the novel as a rich high-fantasy story that places women and their experiences at the center of its magical world. The original edition runs more than 800 pages, giving Shannon room to develop its characters, histories, religions, and political tensions.

The dragons are one of the novel’s biggest attractions, but they are not all treated in the same way. Different regions have radically different relationships with them. Some dragons are feared as forces of destruction, while others are honored and deeply connected to cultural identity.

That contrast gives the world depth.

I also enjoyed that the novel delivers the scope of a fantasy series within one large volume. There are additional stories set in Shannon’s Roots of Chaos world, but The Priory of the Orange Tree tells a substantial and satisfying central story.

It requires more commitment than the other books on this list, but that commitment is rewarded with immersive world-building and a large cast of characters whose decisions have meaningful consequences.

This is the book to choose when you want court politics, dragons, secret societies, romance, mythology, magic, and a threat large enough to change the entire world.

Read The Priory of the Orange Tree next if you love epic fantasy, powerful women, detailed world-building, political intrigue, multiple perspectives, or standalone novels that feel as expansive as a complete series.

Which Fantasy Book Should You Read First?

Each of these books offers a very different experience, so the right place to begin depends on what you are currently in the mood to read.

Choose Nine Goblins when you want a quick, funny, and unconventional adventure. It is the perfect choice for a weekend read or for escaping a reading slump.

Pick up Tailored Realities if you enjoy short stories and want to explore Brandon Sanderson’s ideas without beginning a massive series.

Read The Magician of Tiger Castle when you want a clever fairy tale filled with humor, romance, unusual magic, and a narrator with a fascinating story to tell.

Choose Tress of the Emerald Sea if you want a charming standalone adventure with pirates, dangerous magic, an imaginative world, and a heroine worth cheering for.

Save The Priory of the Orange Tree for a time when you are ready to become fully immersed in an epic world of dragons, queens, political conflict, mythology, and ancient enemies.

Final Thoughts

One of the best things about fantasy is that the genre can contain all five of these books without any of them feeling the same.

Nine Goblins finds humor and humanity in characters usually treated as monsters. Tailored Realities explores a wide range of inventive speculative ideas. The Magician of Tiger Castle transforms familiar fairy-tale ingredients into something intelligent and unexpected.

Tress of the Emerald Sea delivers a magical voyage led by an ordinary young woman who refuses to remain ordinary. The Priory of the Orange Tree offers an expansive world filled with dragons, secrets, politics, and unforgettable characters.

I enjoyed all five books, and each reminded me why fantasy continues to be my favorite genre. They transported me to places that could not exist while introducing characters and ideas that still felt meaningful.

Whether you want something short and funny or an epic novel you can become lost in, these five fantasy books deserve a place on your reading list.

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