I vividly remember the first time a book transported me—it was in Mrs. Paul’s second-grade math class, and I was reading The Voyage of the Dawn Treader under the desk. It carried me away to a different world. I’ve been looking for that same magic in every book since, hoping to fall into a picture or open a wardrobe door to another place and time. This list contains a few of my favorites, the stories that have earned permanent spots on my shelves, the ones that get pulled down when I need some enchantment in my life. (And don’t we all need a little magic these days?)
I love all The Chronicles of Narnia books, but this one is my favorite.
How could it not be, with Eustace Clarence Scrubb, a boy almost as terrible as his name, as well as the giant-hearted talking mouse Reepicheep?
There are battles and adventures galore, but it’s also quieter than the other books in the series—the characters explore the landscape around them and wrestle with who they are and what they are becoming.
Written close to a century ago, there’s dated language and ideas for sure, but I’ve rarely found another story that captures so well the bittersweetness of growing up and facing grief and loss.
A beautiful paperback edition of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, book five in the classic fantasy series, The Chronicles of Narnia. This edition is complete with cover and interior art by the original illustrator of Narnia, Pauline Baynes.
A king and some unexpected companions embark on a voyage that will take them beyond all known lands. As they sail farther and farther from charted waters, they discover that their quest is more than they imagined and that the world's end is only the beginning.
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is the fifth book in C. S. Lewis's classic…
One of the first ‘grown-up’ magical books I ever read, it’s the gateway drug into the Arthurian Saga series.
Merlin is a young illegitimate boy struggling to find his place in the post-Roman world.
He has a keen intelligence that is often overlooked and a love of the natural world. It’s these two traits, as well as a knack for being in the right place at the right time, that are responsible for so much of his success later in life, as well as a low-key magic.
A book to savor, with beautiful language and a setting you don’t so much read about as fall into.
Vivid, enthralling, absolutely first-class - Daily Mail
So begins the story of Merlin, born the illegitimate son of a Welsh princess in fifth century Britain, a world ravaged by war. Small and neglected, with his mother unwilling to reveal his father's identity, Merlin must disguise his intelligence - and hide his occasional ability to know things before they happen - in order to keep himself safe.
While exploring the countryside near his home, Merlin stumbles across a cave filled with books and papers and hiding a room lined with crystals. It is…
In 1939, on a remote Pacific island, botanical researcher Irene Greer plunged off a waterfall to her death, leaving behind a legacy shrouded in secrets. Her great-niece Julia, a struggling journalist recovering from a divorce, seeks answers decades later.
Tasked with retrieving Dr. Greer’s discovery–a flower that could have world-changing…
It’s the story of Bod, adopted as a baby by the ghosts of the graveyard and by his guardian, the mysterious Silas, after his parents are murdered.
Living in the graveyard, Bod becomes friends with and is mentored by its inhabitants, who teach him a wide variety of things—how to read, for example, how to behave, and how to vanish. But the people who murdered Bod’s family are always searching for him, and Bod must use everything he’s learned plus his own wits and courage to survive.
The book is a marvelous metaphor for the bittersweet business of growing up, learning about the world, and leaving home. Bonus points for listening to the audiobook, which is read by the author himself.
When a baby escapes a murderer intent on killing his entire family, who would have thought it would find safety and security in the local graveyard? Brought up by the resident ghosts, ghouls and spectres, Bod has an eccentric childhood learning about life from the dead. But for Bod there is also the danger of the murderer still looking for him - after all, he is the last remaining member of the family. A stunningly original novel deftly constructed over eight chapters, featuring every second year of Bod's life, from babyhood to adolescence. Will Bod survive to be a man?
The second in the Dark Is Rising series, the story follows Will Stanton, last of the Old Ones.
On his eleventh birthday, he learns he is a warrior with great power, compelled to take part in the ancient cycle of battle between the Dark and the Light.
Moody, atmospheric, and with a carefully constructed backstory filled with Celtic folklore and the natural world, it’s beautifully written, sophisticated in a way children’s literature rarely is, and has echoed in my mind for years.
On the Midwinter Day that is his eleventh birthday, Will Stanton discovers a special gift-- that he is the last of the Old Ones, immortals dedicated to keeping the world from domination by the forces of evil, the Dark. At once, he is plunged into a quest for the six magical Signs that will one day aid the Old Ones in the final battle between the Dark and the Light. And for the twelve days of Christmas, while the Dark is rising, life for Will is full of wonder, terror, and delight.
He’s riddled with guilt. She’s annoyed with the status quo.
The death of a crime boss’s daughter forces Detective Neil Caldera to leave NYC. He seeks refuge in the tranquil embrace of a small town, where he finds himself entangled in the labyrinth of a teenage girl’s murder. Tess Fleishman’s…
Its allegiance shifts and changes over time. To hold it, Houses of Magic put on an epic tournament at every Turning, where their best and brightest act as champions in battle. But what the champions don’t know, because their elders have never taught them, is that the magic itself draws from a dark source, and that source is crumbling.
Powerful magician Sydney has emerged from The House of Shadows to fight for a sponsor who wishes to establish his own house. But Sydney has first-hand experience with the darkness.
And she doesn’t want to help restore the establishment. She wants to burn it to the ground.
"A remarkable writer." -Neil Gaiman, bestselling author of American Gods
An Alex Award Winner
There is a dark secret that is hiding at the heart of New York City and diminishing the city's magicians' power in this fantasy thriller by acclaimed author Kat Howard.
In New York City, magic controls everything. But the power of magic is fading. No one knows what is happening, except for Sydney-a new, rare magician with incredible power that has been unmatched in decades, and she may be the only person who is able to stop the darkness that is weakening the magic. But Sydney…
Life is looking up for Holly Darling, granddaughter of Wendy—yes, that Wendy. That is, until she gets a call that her daughter, Eden, who has been in a coma for nearly a decade, is missing. Worst of all, Holly knows who must be responsible: Peter Pan, who is not only very real, but very dangerous. Holly’s desperate to find Eden and protect her son, Jack, from a terrible web of family secrets before she loses them both.
A certain reimagined pirate and fairy lend a hand, and while the magic of the classic Peter Pan is there, Darling Girlalso explores the dark underpinnings of fairy tales, grief, aging, motherhood, and just how far we will go to protect those we love.
Five days before the end of humanity, five unlikely heroes find themselves on an impossible quest to outlive the apocalypse.
5 Stars is the survival story of a mother and her baby facing impossible odds amidst a global apocalypse. Set in a dying world overseen by “The Neon God,” the…
Born the half-breed, bastard son of an orc chieftain, Wrank tries to survive life in OrcHome among ignorance and spite aimed at his human heritage even as he develops a Talent for folding shadow. When life is no longer viable among the clans, he escapes into the world of humans…
