I’m passionate about dark fantasy stories due to the fact of their characters and worlds. The eeriness of their landscapes can tell a tale of their own. Dark fantasy has always been a drawing interest for me when it comes to telling stories. I read these books mainly because of their dark fantasy worlds. The stories and characters which come to life as I read them only captivated my creativity to tell my own stories. It is my sincere desire that you take a look into these books on this list and have your creativity sparked just as my own to craft your own dark fantasy stories.
I loved how The Gunslinger pulls you into a new world. A world layered with mystery and intrigue.
Who is The Gunslinger? Who is The Man in Black? What is The Dark Tower? These questions form in my mind as I read through the pages. Seeing how much the landscape of Mid-World brings. This book in particular had inspired me in many ways of my own creativity.
The Dark Tower is now a major motion picture starring Matthew McConaughey and Idris Elba.
'The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.' The iconic opening line of Stephen King's groundbreaking series, The Dark Tower, introduces one of his most enigmatic and powerful heroes: Roland of Gilead, the Last Gunslinger.
Roland is a haunting figure, a loner, on a spellbinding journey toward the mysterious Dark Tower, in a desolate world which frighteningly echoes our own.
On his quest, Roland begins a friendship with a kid from New York named Jake, encounters an alluring woman and faces…
I am recommending this book because it introduces you to The Witcher himself. It is a short story collection easily to be read as I was quickly pulled into the world of The Continent to witness Geralt of Rivia on his adventures, encountering monsters of fathomable horrors and allies along the way.
The book’s dark fantasy aura with hints of political intrigue is what drew me in even more and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I was drawn to the character Solomon Kane, a Puritan traveling the lands of this world only to seek out evil and to slay it. It didn’t matter of the evil in his sight were monstrous or human, he would extinguish it.
How can anyone not be drawn into the stories of Solomon Kane and not find them impressive. I wasn’t aware of the classic pulp tales of the early 1900s until I stumbled upon Solomon Kane. My introduction to him led me to countless other pulps which still hold up to today and should be enjoyed by readers everywhere.
With Conan the Cimmerian, Robert E. Howard created more than the greatest action hero of the twentieth century—he also launched a genre that came to be known as sword and sorcery. But Conan wasn’t the first archetypal adventurer to spring from Howard’s fertile imagination.
“He was . . . a strange blending of Puritan and Cavalier, with a touch of the ancient philosopher, and more than a touch of the pagan. . . . A hunger in his soul drove him on and on, an urge to right all wrongs, protect all weaker things. . . . Wayward and restless…
When it comes to dark fantasy books, The Sandman must be included. Even though it is a comic book series later compiled into ten graphic novels, I had to include it in this list. It inspired me not only to improve my creative writing skills but also taught me about the captivations of mythology. How myths impact generations and still touch others to this day. The combination of dark fantasy and mythology enriches a tale to be told. No matter the setting or the format.
While reading The Sandman, I became attached to Dream of the Endless and his stories. What I took away from it was the fact that dreams never die; they only grow into something more. Something… endless.
New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman's transcendent series THE SANDMAN is often hailed as the definitive Vertigo title and one of the finest achievements in graphic storytelling. Gaiman created an unforgettable tale of the forces that exist beyond life and death by weaving ancient mythology, folklore and fairy tales with his own distinct narrative vision. In PRELUDES and NOCTURNES, an occultist attempting to capture Death to bargain for eternal life traps her younger brother Dream instead. After his 70 year imprisonment and eventual escape, Dream, also known as Morpheus, goes on a quest for his lost objects of power.…
Who doesn’t like ghost stories? especially when there’s an occult detective eager to solve the case. That is what Carnacki, The Ghost-Finder, presented to me.
What I loved about the short stories is that Thomas Carnacki investigates the mysteries of the supernatural, seeking to solve them with his skillset. Sometimes, the cases are just pranks by humans, others by small spirits, and even some with malevolent forces.
This collection of supernatural dark fantasy sparked my imagination. Even to the point of inspiring me to create my own occult detective character.
Six tales of Carnacki the Ghost Finder, tales of the outre, the unexpected, and the unexplained from a reknowned master of the macabre, William Hope Hodgeson.
U.S. Marshals and Homicide Detectives Preston Maddox and Emily Weston are charged with a task to solve a series of murders that have conjured up in New Haven, Connecticut.
Preston has a lead on who may be the cause of the murders. At the moment his childhood friend Hoyt Bennett returns to New Haven from prison, old enemies reappearing from the past trigger a turn for the worst when Preston and Emily find themselves lost in shadows.
I once saw a play at the renowned Oregon Shakespeare Theatre. A play about Sor Juana. It was a good play, but it felt like something was missing like jalapenos left out of enchiladas. The play kept nudging me to look further to find Sor Juana, and so for the next five years, I did so. I read and read more. I listened for her voice, and that is where I heard her life come alive. This isn’t the only possibility for Sor Juana’s life; it is just the one I heard.
Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, this brilliant 17th century nun flew through Mexico City on the breeze of poetry and philosophy. She met with princes of the Church, and with the royalty of Spain and Mexico. Then she met a stunning, powerful woman with lavender eyes, la Vicereine Maria Louisa, and her life changed forever. As her fame grew, she dared to challenge the diabolical Archbishop once too often, and he threw her in front of the Inquisition, where she stood, alone.
Sor Juana's work is studied still today, and justifiably so. Scholars study her months on end; mystics…
This astonishingly brilliant 17th century poet and dramatist, this nun, flew through Mexico City on wings of inspiration. Having no dowry, she chose the life of a nun so that she might learn, so that she might write, so that she might meet the most fascinating people of the western world. She accomplished all of that, and more.
One day a woman with violet eyes, eyes the color of passion flowers, entered her life. It was the new Vicereine, Maria Luisa. As the two most powerful women in Mexico City, the bond between them crossed politics and wound them in…
