100 books like The Book of Beasts

By T. H. White,

Here are 100 books that The Book of Beasts fans have personally recommended if you like The Book of Beasts. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of The Lore of the Unicorn

Joseph Nigg Author Of The Book of Fabulous Beasts: A Treasury of Writings from Ancient Times to the Present

From my list on following mythical beasts through time.

Why am I passionate about this?

Ancient mythical animals are all around us in words and images. Following the transformations of such animals through literature and art across millennia has been my passion since the early ’80s. It was then, after years of writing and teaching, that I became intrigued by a winged and fishtailed lion figure on an antique oil lamp hanging in my study. That hybrid creature led me to the eagle-lion griffin and my first published book, The Book of Gryphons. I have followed a host of mythical beasts ever since. My most recent book, The Phoenix: An Unnatural Biography of a Mythical Beast, was published in a 2021 Chinese translation.

Joseph's book list on following mythical beasts through time

Joseph Nigg Why did Joseph love this book?

The unicorn and the dragon are still the two most ubiquitous animals to emerge from the host of fantastic creatures that began spreading through popular books, art, and film in the late 1970s. Years before the unicorn’s commercial popularity, Odell Shepard’s classic book, The Lore of the Unicorn, traced the millennia-long cultural transformations of the mysterious animal, beginning with an early traveler’s tale of the wild asses of India. 

I admire Shepard’s blending of personal voice with wide-ranging research and commentary. He opens his introduction with, “On the table before me, there lies a long straight wand of ivory,” a walking stick made of narwhal tusk, which for centuries had been accepted as unicorn horn.

By Odell Shepard,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Lore of the Unicorn as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This work, created in the early 20th century by Odell Shepard, is one of the better works made through time to craft mythology (and cryptozoology of a fashion) together with more modern historical treatments of its subject matter. It is the unicorn (or alicorn) here which concerns the text- and related material ranging from the quite antiquated, to the medieval, and the then-modern as anthropology and adventure made its way further into the outlands of Africa, India, and Tibet.

Here, of note, is an extensive treatment of the purported healing and anti-poison properties of unicorn horn, medieval medicine processing the…


Book cover of Mythical and Fabulous Creatures: A Source Book and Research Guide

Joseph Nigg Author Of The Book of Fabulous Beasts: A Treasury of Writings from Ancient Times to the Present

From my list on following mythical beasts through time.

Why am I passionate about this?

Ancient mythical animals are all around us in words and images. Following the transformations of such animals through literature and art across millennia has been my passion since the early ’80s. It was then, after years of writing and teaching, that I became intrigued by a winged and fishtailed lion figure on an antique oil lamp hanging in my study. That hybrid creature led me to the eagle-lion griffin and my first published book, The Book of Gryphons. I have followed a host of mythical beasts ever since. My most recent book, The Phoenix: An Unnatural Biography of a Mythical Beast, was published in a 2021 Chinese translation.

Joseph's book list on following mythical beasts through time

Joseph Nigg Why did Joseph love this book?

As the late 1970s popularity of fantastic creatures continued to spread, professor Malcolm South edited a research guide that follows twenty imaginary animals and creatures through time. The substantial 1987 book is highly schematic in South’s earnest attempt to sum up what was known about particular mythical beasts and imaginary creatures during their recent surge in popularity. Illustrations, a glossary, and even a taxonomy supplement specialists’ articles and bibliographies about creatures from the unicorn and other major mythical animals to the vampire and werewolf, giants, and fairies. 

All my previous recommended books are cited in South’s sourcebook. I’ve been much indebted to it for research leads over the years and highly recommend it as a standard source for any reader following mythical beasts and other creatures.

By Malcolm South,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Mythical and Fabulous Creatures as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This serious, scholarly treatment of 20 imaginary beings, from dragon and phoenix to giants and fairies, discusses the origin of each as an idea, its symbolism and lore, and its appearances in art, literature, or film. . . . Extensive bibliographies follow the generally ambitious and erudite essays while a final catch-all article and selective bibliography cover still more ground, at a gallop. . . . [There] are a number of thoughtful and well-written interpretive investigations into the nature and history of some persistent types. Entries on the Basilisk, Harpies, Medusa, and the Sphinx are particularly fine: here one feels…


Book cover of Imaginary Animals: The Monstrous, the Wondrous and the Human

Joseph Nigg Author Of The Book of Fabulous Beasts: A Treasury of Writings from Ancient Times to the Present

From my list on following mythical beasts through time.

Why am I passionate about this?

Ancient mythical animals are all around us in words and images. Following the transformations of such animals through literature and art across millennia has been my passion since the early ’80s. It was then, after years of writing and teaching, that I became intrigued by a winged and fishtailed lion figure on an antique oil lamp hanging in my study. That hybrid creature led me to the eagle-lion griffin and my first published book, The Book of Gryphons. I have followed a host of mythical beasts ever since. My most recent book, The Phoenix: An Unnatural Biography of a Mythical Beast, was published in a 2021 Chinese translation.

Joseph's book list on following mythical beasts through time

Joseph Nigg Why did Joseph love this book?

I love this lavishly produced 2013 book. It overarches my other recommended “best books for following mythical beasts through time.” Titles of early chapters—“What is an Imaginary Animal?” “Every Real Animal is Imaginary,” and “Every Imaginary Animal is Real”—encompass the book’s interplay between nature’s animals, imaginary ones, and human beings.

Open Imaginary Animals anywhere to get a glimpse of its variety and scope. Boria Sax’s interdisciplinary, learned, and conversational text sweeps across folklore, legends, myths, and natural history of worldwide cultures from antiquity to today. Accompanying art, much in color, spans a Lascaux cave painting and a photograph of a human-looking robot; throughout are fantastic creatures in paintings, early natural history engravings, and other pictorial forms.

As Dr. Sax writes, “Imaginary creatures can be overwhelming in their multiplicity.”

By Boria Sax,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Imaginary Animals as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Tales throughout the world generally place fabulous beasts in marginal locations - deserts, deep woods, remote islands, glaciers, ocean depths, mountain peaks, caves, swamps, heavenly bodies and alternate universes. Legends tell us that imaginary animals belong to a primordial time, before we had encompassed the world with names, categories and scientific knowledge.
This book traces the history of imaginary animals from Palaeolithic art to the Harry Potter stories, and beyond. It shows how imagined creatures help us psychologically, giving form to our subconscious fears as 'monsters', as well as embodying our hopes as 'wonders'. Nevertheless, their greatest service may be…


Book cover of Pseudodoxia Epidemica, or, Enquiries Into Very Many Received Tenents, and Commonly Presumed Truths

Joseph Nigg Author Of The Book of Fabulous Beasts: A Treasury of Writings from Ancient Times to the Present

From my list on following mythical beasts through time.

Why am I passionate about this?

Ancient mythical animals are all around us in words and images. Following the transformations of such animals through literature and art across millennia has been my passion since the early ’80s. It was then, after years of writing and teaching, that I became intrigued by a winged and fishtailed lion figure on an antique oil lamp hanging in my study. That hybrid creature led me to the eagle-lion griffin and my first published book, The Book of Gryphons. I have followed a host of mythical beasts ever since. My most recent book, The Phoenix: An Unnatural Biography of a Mythical Beast, was published in a 2021 Chinese translation.

Joseph's book list on following mythical beasts through time

Joseph Nigg Why did Joseph love this book?

Don’t be scared off by this 1646 book. It’s essential for anyone who follows mythical beasts through time. One of the best-known parts of Browne’s influential book is Book III: “Of divers popular and received Tenets concerning Animals, which examined, prove either false or dubious.” By discrediting the classical and medieval authorities that perpetuated them, he considers the griffin, basilisk, unicorn, amphisbaena, and phoenix to be “fabulous,” thus separating them from the actual animal kingdom after centuries of general belief.

The now obscure Alexander Ross, “Champion of the Ancients,” refuted Browne’s book virtually point for point in his 1652 Arcana Microcosmi. Ross lost that Battle of the Books between the ancients and the moderns. Mythical animals rarely appeared in eighteenth-century literature, but they rose again a century later.

By Sir Thomas Browne,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Pseudodoxia Epidemica, or, Enquiries Into Very Many Received Tenents, and Commonly Presumed Truths as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.

This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.

Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been…


Book cover of The Bestiary: A Book of Beasts

Stephen R. Wilk Author Of Medusa: Solving the Mystery of the Gorgon

From my list on the unexpected truths behind myths.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a scientist, engineer, and writer who has written on a wide range of topics. I’ve been fascinated by mythology my entire life, and I spent over a decade gathering background material on the myth of Perseus and Medusa, and came away with a new angle on the origin and meaning of the myth and what inspired it. I was unable to present this in a brief letter or article, and so decided to turn my arguments into a book. The book is still in print, and has been cited numerous times by scholarly journals and books. It formed the basis for the History Channel series Clash of the Gods (in which I appear).

Stephen's book list on the unexpected truths behind myths

Stephen R. Wilk Why did Stephen love this book?

Terence Hanbury White is famous for writing The Sword in the Stone, The Once and Future King, and The Book of Merlin, all about King Arthur and his court. But he wrote many other books, both fiction and nonfiction.

This book is a translation of a Medieval bestiary, filled with strange animals like the Unicorn, the Dragon, the Phoenix, and the Amphisbaena. As White points out, the book was not meant as a mere rainy-day diversion, but was a serious attempt to catalog the animals of the world and how they related to man and the world.

White, a believer in the high knowledge and science of the often belittle Middle Ages, provides extensive footnotes showing that many of the apparently fantastic creatures and behaviors documented in the Bestiary do, indeed, have factual roots.

The Basilisk might stem from an imperfectly understood description of the King Cobra,…

By T H White,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Bestiary as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

ASIN: 0399500340


Book cover of The Book of Barely Imagined Beings

Sam Kean Author Of The Icepick Surgeon: Murder, Fraud, Sabotage, Piracy, and Other Dastardly Deeds Perpetrated in the Name of Science

From my list on the wonders of biology.

Why am I passionate about this?

Sam Kean is the New York Times bestselling author of five books, including The Bastard Brigade, The Dueling Neurosurgeons, and The Disappearing Spoon. He edited The Best American Nature and Science Writing in 2018, and his stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, The New York Times Magazine, and Slate. His work has been featured on NPR’s “Radiolab,” “Science Friday,” “All Things Considered,” and “Fresh Air,” and his podcast, The Disappearing Spoon, debuted at #1 on the iTunes charts for science podcasts.

Sam's book list on the wonders of biology

Sam Kean Why did Sam love this book?

Imagine a medieval bestiary of whimsical creatures, but with a twist. Instead of being imaginary, the animals here really exist. The book moves alphabetically from axolotl to zebrafish, with a new delight on every page. It’s a perfect reminder of what biologist J.B.S. Haldane once said: that the universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it’s stranger than we can imagine.

By Caspar Henderson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Book of Barely Imagined Beings as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From Axolotl to Zebrafish, discover a host of barely imagined beings: real creatures that are often more astonishing than anything dreamt in the pages of a medieval bestiary. Ranging from the depths of the ocean to the most arid corners of the earth, Caspar Henderson captures the beauty and bizarreness of the many living forms we thought we knew and some we could never have contemplated, inviting us to better imagine the precarious world we inhabit.

A witty, vivid blend of pioneering natural history and spiritual primer, infectiously celebratory about life's sheer ingenuity and variety, The Book of Barely Imagined…


Book cover of Mythical Creatures

Jen Yoon Author Of The Greek Mythology Coloring Book: Epic Scenes from Olympus and Beyond

From my list on start the Greek Mythology journey.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve been fascinated by Greek Mythology since I read a book about it in childhood. There was a popular graphic novel series about Greek and Roman Mythology in Korea, and I was one of many kids obsessed with these books. That passion continued and became stronger when I moved to New York. It had various mythology books, including novels and picture books, and there were tons of references, such as paintings, sculptures, and authentic vases. I hope you enjoy the books on the list and feel the same thrill I felt!

Jen's book list on start the Greek Mythology journey

Jen Yoon Why did Jen love this book?

This palm-sized book tells the story of mythical creatures worldwide. As an illustrator, I’m always fascinated by interesting and experimental book designs, and this book instantly caught my attention with 250 illustrations of more than 100 mythical beings.

I couldn’t stop myself from bringing this book home. It was such an inspiration for me because it tells the story of some creatures that I had never heard of before. This book is still on the bookshelf closest to my computer desk.

By Lauren Bucca,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Mythical Creatures as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This miniature bestiary contains some 250 illustrations of more than 100 mythical beings: fire-breathing dragons, sinuous sea serpents, mischievous leprechauns, high-spirited unicorns, the lumbering Golem, fluttering fairies, and many other wondrous creatures drawn from global folklore and mythology. They are depicted in a wide variety of artistic media, from painting and sculpture to jewellery and ceramics, from ancient times to the present. An insightful text explores the history of these creatures and their cultural roles. All lovers of myth and fantasy will delight in this Tiny Folio.


Book cover of Dawn of the Algorithm

R. E. Stearns Author Of Barbary Station

From my list on looking at the familiar differently.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always read speculative fiction for its new perspectives on reality. Now that I write it too, I appreciate the fabulous minds that create these unique views of our universe even more. Experience in higher education and instructional design led me to appreciate organization that flows at the speed and direction of thought. I adore a well-turned phrase and a well-built world, and I hope this list leads you to a new experience of that same joy.

R. E.'s book list on looking at the familiar differently

R. E. Stearns Why did R. E. love this book?

If you, like me, have to consciously choose to read more poetry, this is a fascinating book to add to your collection. The poems’ subjects range from pop culture to body horror to the titular implications of algorithms and AI, and every one of them is a well-structured look at an apocalypse, large or small. Chances are excellent that you will encounter an English word you can’t readily define. Many of the poems are illustrated with haunting and/or humorous line art which even the ebook format renders well. Everything ends, but not every description of those endings are as beautiful as the ones in this book.

By Yann Rousselot,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Dawn of the Algorithm as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Dawn of the Algorithm, Yann Rousselot’s debut collection of poetry, is a bestiary of octosharks and dinosaurs, zombies and pathogens, mecha robots and common mortals.

These monsters were raised on a diet of TV tropes, movie clichés, book snippets, and video game storylines. Some have beating hearts, others interlocking mechanical parts. They are forces of human nature, genetically engineered with a single purpose: to herald the apocalypse.

Building on user-friendly motif and imagery, Rousselot draws acute, playful but painful conclusions about twenty-first century Earth. He paints a darkly comical portrait of humankind, a species plagued by heartbreak and alienation, yet…


Book cover of Bestiary

Shawna Yang Ryan Author Of Green Island

From my list on an otherworldly Taiwan.

Why am I passionate about this?

The ghostly/magical and Taiwan are two of my major interests—I have written about both in my fiction. After living in Taiwan for a few years and getting to know my mother’s side of the family, I gained an appreciation for its complicated history, riveting politics, and the energy of daily life there. Its confluence of people and histories has made it a unique cultural amalgam and these books capture the way folk religion and the spiritual/magical are wedded into the bustling contemporary urban life of Taiwan. I hope you find yourself as enchanted and intrigued by these stories as I have been!

Shawna's book list on an otherworldly Taiwan

Shawna Yang Ryan Why did Shawna love this book?

Though Bestiary is not set in Taiwan, K. Ming Chang’s debut novel incorporates a sense of enchantment not only in her queer retellings of Taiwanese folk tales, but also in her dazzling language. She casts a spell on the reader as a magician of language, making nouns and verbs work together in innovative ways. 

By K-Ming Chang,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Bestiary as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Three generations of Taiwanese American women are haunted by the myths of their homeland in this blazing debut of one family's queer desires, violent impulses and buried secrets.

One evening, Mother tells Daughter a story about a tiger spirit who lived in a woman's body. Her name was Hu Gu Po, and she hungered to eat children, especially their toes. Soon afterwards, Daughter awakes with a tiger tail. And more mysterious events follow: Holes in the backyard spit up letters penned by her estranged grandmother; a visiting aunt leaves red on everything she touches; a ghost bird shimmers in an…


Book cover of The Magic And The Healing

Kim McDougall Author Of Dragons Don't Eat Meat

From my list on urban fantasy with marvelous monsters.

Why am I passionate about this?

Have you ever pretended to be a superhero? What was your special ability? Mine was always the ability to talk to animals. What an amazing world that would be if I could chat with the squirrel nesting in my shed or the stray cat trotting through my yard! Animals of all kinds have always been part of my world, from my own pets to animals that came through rescue ranches where I volunteered. So it’s no wonder that I seek them out in fiction. For my own books, my love for cats and dogs was easy to translate into a love for dragons and hellhounds. 

Kim's book list on urban fantasy with marvelous monsters

Kim McDougall Why did Kim love this book?

Veterinary student BJ Vaughn journeys through the Crossroads to treat amazing creatures such as griffons, centaurs, and unicorns, while dealing with a full course load and all the stresses of being a student. After reading The Magic and the Healing (many, many years ago), I fell in love with supernatural creatures. It made me think, “I want to write something like that!” I’ve never forgotten it.

By Nick O'Donohue,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Magic And The Healing as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

About to give up veterinary school because of a family crisis, BJ Vaughan is chosen to join a special group of healers who venture into the mystical world of Crossroads, where unicorns, centaurs, and other magical creatures live. Original.


5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in unicorns, the Middle Ages, and legendary creatures?

Unicorns 42 books
The Middle Ages 429 books