Here are 74 books that The Gilded Girl fans have personally recommended if you like
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I grew up reading all kinds of stories, but I was also a big fan of playing outdoors. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was always a favorite of mine, but as an adult, I realized something…the one main female character who was my age, Becky Thatcher, didn’t seem to like adventure at all! I loved the idea of Becky being as much of a mischief-maker as the boys – and that became my first novel, The Actual and Truthful Adventures of Becky Thatcher. I love retellings of classics and how they respect the original story, but are also able to imagine a new path! I hope all readers have adventures, inside and outside of books!
A Wish in the Dark by Christina Soontornvat is a retelling of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables set in a Thai-inspired fantasy world. I cannot say enough about the gorgeous setting details and atmosphere that support the characters in this novel. From the very first pages, I felt drawn into the world of Pong and Nok. This novel will feel familiar in theme and plot to those familiar with Victor Hugo’s classic, but it also stands alone as a new story that needs to be read and shared.
A boy on the run. A girl determined to find him. A compelling fantasy looks at issues of privilege, protest, and justice.
All light in Chattana is created by one man — the Governor, who appeared after the Great Fire to bring peace and order to the city. For Pong, who was born in Namwon Prison, the magical lights represent freedom, and he dreams of the day he will be able to walk among them. But when Pong escapes from prison, he realizes that the world outside is no fairer than the one behind bars.…
I’m a children’s book writer from Frisco, Texas. I’ve published two middle grade chapter books, Pippa Park Raises Her Game and Pippa Park Crush at First Sight. I’ve always been captivated by novels that make me hungry; you can blame formative children’s books like If You Give a Mouse a Cookie or Stone Soup for that. That’s why today I’m sharing my top 5 favorite middle grade books that have a foodie twist. Some of them revolve entirely around food; others simply offer a notable scene. Either way, I hope you’ll find them as delectable as I do!
Eleven-year-old Mimi is the youngest child in a family full of high-achievers. Determined to prove herself, she enters a baking contest at a newly opened bakery in town, but when strange things begin happening to those around her (such as her food critic dad losing his sense of taste), Mimi must pair her culinary skills with her detective skills to get to the bottom of the magical mystery.
If I had to pick one word to describe this book, it’d be: sweet. Plus, this adorable book is also a retelling of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. And if you know me, you know I adore retellings!
A Kirkus Best Book of 2019! An Indies Introduce Selection for 2019! An Indie Next Pick for Summer 2019!
"A delectable treat for food and literary connoisseurs alike." Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW
"What a wonderful, intriguing, and magical book. And wow, did it ever get my tastebuds going! Each time I picked it up, I felt the urge to head to my kitchen. . . . What I loved most was the smartness of it. It never once doubted its young readers." Kathi Appelt, Newbery Honor- and National Book Award-Nominated author
"Midsummer's Mayhem is an enchantment of a novel, bursting…
I studied retellings as I prepared to write my own take on The Secret Garden. Retelling a classic story can not only usher something like The Secret Garden or Peter Pan into our current time and place in history, but it can also awaken the wonder and magic many of us experienced when reading these tales for the first time in a new generation. It’s been so fun for me to see how modern authors put their own spin on these stories, and I hope you will enjoy them too.
In this unbelievably gorgeous take on Peter Pan, Lily and Wendy are step-sisters who must now spend a summer apart. But a mysterious boy has been watching from the window and intends to take them away forever to a mysterious land. This book tackles head-on the problematic aspects of the original story and contains a story both thrilling and fun. Family, sisterhood, and magic reign supreme in this hard-to-put-down retelling.
Five starred reviews! In this beautifully reimagined story by NSK Neustadt Laureate and New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Leitich Smith (Muscogee Creek), Native American Lily and English Wendy embark on a high-flying journey of magic, adventure, and courage to a fairy-tale island known as Neverland...
Lily and Wendy have been best friends since they became stepsisters. But with their feuding parents planning to spend the summer apart, what will become of their family-and their friendship?
Little do they know that a mysterious boy has been watching them from the oak tree outside their window. A boy who intends to…
I studied retellings as I prepared to write my own take on The Secret Garden. Retelling a classic story can not only usher something like The Secret Garden or Peter Pan into our current time and place in history, but it can also awaken the wonder and magic many of us experienced when reading these tales for the first time in a new generation. It’s been so fun for me to see how modern authors put their own spin on these stories, and I hope you will enjoy them too.
This contemporary retelling of The Secret Garden sets the story in a closed-down tuberculosis sanitarium. Roo's journey to uncover the mysteries of the house and bring life to the garden tucked away inside it unfolds beautifully on the page. With well-developed characters, a deeply haunting revelation, and a setting that springs to life with vivid detail, this was a great take on a classic.
Hiding is Roo Fanshaw's special skill. Living in a frighteningly unstable family, she often needs to disappear at a moment's notice. When her parents are murdered, it's her special hiding place under the trailer that saves her life.
As it turns out, Roo, much to her surprise, has a wealthy if eccentric uncle, who has agreed to take her into his home on Cough Rock Island. Once a tuberculosis sanitarium for children of the rich, the strange house is teeming with ghost stories and secrets. Roo doesn't believe in ghosts or fairy stories, but what are those eerie noises she…
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?)
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…
Escapism is my drug of choice. As a child, I was angry that my existence was confined to this reality, and I did everything I could to find a way out. Stories made it bearable. Whether it was Thor’s Bifrost, the wardrobe of Narnia, or the mirror in Stephen R. Donaldson’s Mordant’s Need duology, I was hooked. Now, I tell my own stories of escape. I create and invite others to find solace, adventure, love, and passion in fantasy realms, outer space, and reinvented parallel realities. This door is always open.
Remember A-ha’s video for Take on Me? In it, a man in a comic book pulls a woman into that two-dimensional world, and in a moment of desperation, he sends her back to save her. But true love prevails, and she pulls him into a three-dimensional life. I loved this video far more than the song, and I think I know why.
I have long been fascinated by interdimensional travel, and Donaldson’s book might be the root of the reason. A young woman, dissatisfied and disillusioned with everyday life, is offered an opportunity to escape and she takes it by following a man who crashed through her mirror. She becomes the unlikeliest of heroes as she navigates enemies and intrigue in a world she knows nothing about. The escapist in me relished the thought of finding another world and slipping away. Not knowing if the return was possibly teased out…
With The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Stephen R. Donaldson changed the face of fantasy fiction forever. In The Mirror of Her Dreams, the astonishing first novel in the two-volume Mordant’s Need series, Donaldson shows us a world of wondrous beauty and seductive illusion, where mirrors hold the deadliest of magics and nothing is what it seems. . . .
The daughter of rich but neglectful parents, Terisa Morgan lives alone in a New York City apartment, a young woman who has grown to doubt her own existence. Surrounded by the flat reassurance of mirrors, she leads an unfulfilled life—until the…
I read almost any genre, but fantasy is what I love most, both reading and writing. Stories are magic, but when they have actual magic in them, I’m hooked. Having studied both Film and Creative Writing at university, I love to go in-depth on storytelling and have reviews aplenty on my website if you want further recommendations. The books I’ve chosen for this list have incredibly unique worlds full of bizarre magic. When I enter a new world, I want it to be exactly that: new and exciting with a touch of the surreal. To me, these books showcase magic at its most vivid and creative.
I loved the atmosphere of this book; it’s so quiet and understated, and I really felt like I was growing up with the main character. I loved how her perception of the magic changed over time. She’s at first wonderstruck by the beauty of flight, then hungry to earn her wings, and then we see her crushed by the weight of responsibility as she becomes a mentor to the next generation.
There’s such a thoughtful balance between excitement at the magic and critique of how that magic is ‘gifted.’ Plus, it’s a standalone, so there's no waiting around for that next brick in the series (I’m looking at you, Winds of Winter).
“Told with a true storyteller’s voice: clear, singing, persuasive, and wonderfully moving . . . a truly wonderful book.”—Jane Yolen
From #1 New York Times bestselling author George R. R. Martin and acclaimed author Lisa Tuttle comes a timeless tale that brilliantly renders the struggle between the ironbound world of tradition and a rebellious soul seeking to prove the power of a dream.
Among the scattered islands that make up the water world of Windhaven, no one holds more prestige than the silver-winged flyers, romantic figures who cross treacherous oceans, braving shifting winds and sudden storms, to bring news, gossip,…
I’m an author of Young Adult Fantasy fiction. When my oldest was six, I started reading Harry Potter to him. It was such a bonding experience that we both cherish. We still talk about the stories, even though he's all grown up and lives away from me most of the time. The thing about fantasy is that stories set in worlds or with people that don’t actually exist make it easier for us to swallow deep meanings, storylines with which we can identify, and that crawl deep down into our souls and nest there. It’s not just about escaping into a fantasy world, but about finding human experience in otherworldly situations and characters.
I have a deep love of history and all stories that feel historical, specifically when royalty is involved (call it my royal roots, if you will). This story is a little bit like royal history, only in a fantasy setting (which, let’s be honest, is part of the draw of history) with a strong, deep female heroine who is able to save herself, along with the boy who broke her heart, and her entire kingdom along with them. What’s not to love about that?
In this epic fantasy adventure, a teen girl embarks on a quest to apprehend her father’s killer and finds magic, intrigue, and herself along the way.
Seventeen year-old Britta Flannery is at ease only in the woods with her dagger and bow. She spends her days tracking criminals alongside her father, a legendary bounty hunter—that is, until her father is murdered. The alleged killer is none other than Cohen Mackay, her father’s former apprentice. The only friend she’s ever known. The boy she once loved who broke her heart.
I grew up on books, every page filling my mind with words. I have since written many novels, but WORDS ON FIRE is my love letter to books and the power of words. From the moment I first discovered the story of the Lithuanian Book Smugglers, I wanted to better understand why these brave people risked their lives to save their books. I came to understand that books were their way to preserve their language, their culture, even the very existence of their country. If it was so important to them, would it not be just as important for us to ensure that children – all children – have access to books.
Mickey is angry about nearly everything in his life, which makes the ad for the Anti-Book even more tempting. When it comes, it has only one line of instruction: To erase it, write it. He fills the book with everything he dislikes, and soon it begins to change. But is that really what he wants? This is a darkly funny book about life, struggle, and learning to accept change.
Mickey is angry all the time: at his divorced parents, at his sister, and at his two new step-mums, both named Charlie. And so he can't resist the ad inside his pack of gum: "Do you ever wish everyone would go away? Buy The Anti-Book! Satisfaction guaranteed." He orders the book, but when it arrives, it's blank - except for one line of instruction: To erase it, write it. He fills the pages with all the things and people he dislikes...
Next thing he knows, he's wandering an anti-world, one in which everything and everyone familiar is gone. Or are…
I’ve had a passion for weirdness in mundane settings since my childhood days watchingThe Addams Family in a boring suburb. I grew up with the Apollo program, but as I realized I’d never be an astronaut, I increasingly turned to writing science fiction and fantasy set on Earth. I discovered role-playing games shortly after D&D came out, but when I became bored with characters who were only after money and mayhem, I found other RPGs and began writing for them. FGU’s Bushidointroduced me to Japanese mythology, which inspired my first urban fantasy novel, The Art of Arrow Cutting, which led me to being invited to write Shadowrunnovels.
Wizard is one of Seattle’s homeless magicians, a seer who tells the truth to those who need it, haunted by a nebulous menace and hiding from his past. Apart from its (often ambiguous) fantasy elements, it’s a beautifully-written guide to urban survival and to downtown Seattle (as well as the setting for my latest novels).
The fifth book in the Megan Lindholm (Robin Hobb) backlist.
Seattle: a place as magical as the Emerald City.
Subtle magic seeps through the cracks in the paving stones of the sprawling metropolis. But only the inhabitants who possess special gifts are open to the city's consciousness; finding portents in the graffiti, reading messages in the rubbish or listening to warnings in the skipping-rope chants of children.
Wizard is bound to Seattle and her magic. His gift is the Knowing - a powerful enchantment allowing him to know the truth of things; to hear the life-stories of ancient mummies locked…
