100 books like Kushiel's Scion

I'm a fiction author and minister from Upstate New York. As a young boy, I had many supernatural experiences. My earliest memory is of a supernatural basis. For me, the unseen world, and those things that others either deny exist or have relegated to ancient history and myth, have always been real to me. Reading, films, video games, and all other forms of storytelling were ways for me to experience the strange and the mysterious. What I found as I walked through such places as Middle Earth, Narnia, and Ice Wind Dale, was that the stories of these characters that overcame adversity, failures, and weaknesses to become heroes inspired me as well.

I'm the product of a man who married more times than I like to admit to strangers and even family. We moved all the time. Those two elements in my life led me to run out the door immediately upon release from sorting my belongings from their thoroughly packed boxes. I made friends at once with everyone I came across. Who knew how long we’d live there? Over the years, I acquired deep friendships from around the U.S. and often daydreamed of them all being in the same place at once and loving the solidarity. It never happened, but it's a theme that runs through me. It’s what I like to write about.

Morally gray heroes are my absolute favorite kind. Whether it’s Batman, Dean Winchester from Supernatural, or the heroes on this list—if he’s not dark and stormy, well, I’m not interested. There’s a depth to these characters that others often lack, and I find it so fascinating. Especially when there’s romance involved. The books on this list are nearly all polar opposites, and yet... they each stretch our capacity to love to the very breaking point—and then make us catch our breath. How far into the darkness can he go, and still come back with a heart left to give to his heroine?

I believe that in our real world, most heroes are like any other human, exhibiting the struggles, the moral dilemmas, and the psychological battles any human would be. And that is what makes a hero so great. They rise above the internal and external struggles to become something better and something others can look up to. Heroes are not supposed to be Superman. They are Batman, struggling with the darkness of trauma and the weight of responsibility like everyone else. 

I’m a lifelong fantasy reader, but all too often, I find myself grousing at the characters: “Listen! You could solve all your problems with a really confident lie!” Or: “...by revealing the truth in a public campaign before the villain gets you!” Or: “May I suggest a well-placed arrow?” Or: “Is he really the villain? The infrastructure seems pretty sound, and you have no expertise in governance!” Every now and then, I’m delighted to find characters as pragmatic as I am (or as I would be if I were a fantasy hero). These are my favorites.

Give me all the supernatural and fantasy intrigue with love on the side. Sometimes this world of ours is too much to deal with and it’s nice to visit other worlds. To read and write about the justice, love, and magic of other things that may be lacking in your life can be cathartic and gives us something to look forward to and strive for. While some of the more supernatural aspects might be out of reach, the beauty of unbreakable bonds forged in love and trust, people willing to sacrifice for what they believe in, and seeing justice prevail also gives me the hope that it's not unreachable if you believe it. 

I have taken part in the April Blogging from A to Z Challenge #atozchallenge since 2014. I volunteered on A to Z founder Arlee's group early on. I was elevated to co-host in 2017 and became the Team Captain in 2018. In 2019, I ran the "#AtoZChallenge Book Reviews, Tour, and Blog Hop!" My own book, Writing Book Reviews As An Author: Inspiration To Make It Easier, was created because of the challenge. I used my method of writing book reviews, broken down alphabetically, to create a month of blog posts. Then compiled those posts into a book. Authors depend on book reviews, but struggle to write them for others.

I’m a Black woman who writes stories about Black girls who aren’t all that nice. And, to me, that means writing stories where Black girls are at the forefront of their stories and given the space to be whoever they are, wholly and without minimizing their character to make them fit into neat boxes next to others. I do this because being able to take up space as you are is, oftentimes, a privilege. And I want to make sure the stories I write offer that space to every reader who picks up one of my books.

I firmly believe that literature exists to do more than entertain us. It has an incredible power to expand our perspective about the world and the lives of the people around us. Fantasy, in particular, can stretch the mind’s boundaries by asking us to empathize with compelling characters and wrap our heads around strange and wondrous worlds. I try to achieve that in my books, presenting thrilling stories, fantastic worlds, and emotionally charged moments, but always through the eyes of real-feeling people. I hope the books on this list will feel as mind-expanding and empathy-building to you as they did to me!

I am an author and avid reader of romance, especially those full of conflict in a world heavy with magic, shifters, vampires, and others. My dad was a great storyteller and sparked my interest in the paranormal. When I was a kid, he’d tell me stories about growing up in the mountains of Puerto Rico. The evil that lived there. My imagination took it from there. I wish I would’ve written down those stories. I can’t get him to talk about them anymore. It might be the reason why The Nine: Zane had started out as a contemporary romance story until Zane took over with all his paranormal drama.