Here are 99 books that The Nine fans have personally recommended if you like
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As a former journalist-turned-lawyer and a recovering news junky, I’ve spent much of my life watching unhappy scenarios play out. But what’s always astonished me me is how, no matter how bad things get or how difficult the situation, there’s a spark of humanity, of kindness and compassion and optimism, that comes out in people at the most unexpected of times. Now, as an author and a parent, I find myself drawn to stories that remind me of that—that no matter how bleak life may look, how cruel or arbitrary the circumstances, there’s something good and beautiful and worth fighting for, not “somewhere out there,” but inside us.
I read this book after a long, dull period when I couldn’t seem to find anything to read that sparked my interest. Trail of Lightning picked me up, whirled me around, and made me fall head-over-heels in love with speculative fiction again.
Set in a bleak, post-apocalyptic world, it’s brutal and gripping, but where there should only be sadness and despair, there are unexpected moments of un-looked-for kindness. This isn’t a light read, and it isn’t exactly happy—but there’s a beautiful optimism underlying the bleakness, that after all, even in the worst of circumstances and at the worst of times, people can be kind.
One of the Time 100 Best Fantasy Books Of All Time
2019 LOCUS AWARD WINNER, BEST FIRST NOVEL
2019 HUGO AWARD FINALIST, BEST NOVEL
Nebula Award Finalist for Best Novel
One of Bustle's Top 20 "landmark sci-fi and fantasy novels" of the decade
"Someone please cancel Supernatural already and give us at least five seasons of this badass Indigenous monster-hunter and her silver-tongued sidekick." -The New York Times
"An excitingly novel tale." -Charlaine Harris, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Sookie Stackhouse and Midnight Crossroads series
"Fun, terrifying, hilarious, and brilliant." -Daniel Jose Older, New York Times bestselling…
Pantheons and worship are elements of culture I’ve always found fascinating, partly from being a mostly secular person with relatives who are very religious. I read a lot of epic fantasy when I was younger that featured gods, like Erikson, and I love finding more recent works that play with how deities might affect a world, and vice versa. But I also picked some of the books below because they inject cli-fi or solarpunk into their worlds – something I’ve been adding to my second-world fantasy lately. Because why not create the same sort of aesthetic in other worlds?
I went into this book expecting a lengthy god-chase through Lagos, but it quickly spirals into a much larger story with implications for the stability of the entire city. David is a phenomenal character torn between two worlds (human and god) and surrounded by an equally compelling supporting cast, including cranky mentor Papa Udi, ambitious and over-the-top wizard Ajala, beleaguered state god-hunter Onipede, and more. Desperate stakes, and seriously fluid pacing – I find a lot of fantasy novels lengthier than they need to be these days, but Suyi doesn’t waste a single paragraph. Loved every chapter.
Nigerian God-Punk - a powerful and atmospheric urban fantasy set in Lagos.
Since the Orisha War that rained thousands of deities down on the streets of Lagos, David Mogo, demigod, scours Eko's dank underbelly for a living wage as a freelance Godhunter. Despite pulling his biggest feat yet by capturing a high god for a renowned Eko wizard, David knows his job's bad luck. He's proved right when the wizard conjures a legion of Taboos-feral godling-child hybrids-to seize Lagos for himself. To fix his mistake and keep Lagos standing, David teams up with his foster wizard, the high god's twin…
Pantheons and worship are elements of culture I’ve always found fascinating, partly from being a mostly secular person with relatives who are very religious. I read a lot of epic fantasy when I was younger that featured gods, like Erikson, and I love finding more recent works that play with how deities might affect a world, and vice versa. But I also picked some of the books below because they inject cli-fi or solarpunk into their worlds – something I’ve been adding to my second-world fantasy lately. Because why not create the same sort of aesthetic in other worlds?
I’ve only said this once about a book: this is the sort of indie work that traditional publishers should be salivating over but would never have the courage to publish. There is such a wealth of emotion and reality in Heretic’s Guide. It’s a quiet, deliberate but fraught story of a human who doesn’t realize how much he needs the help of the godly being he befriends, or that the godly being needs him just as much. Fair warning that it’s a hefty story that’s more cerebral than action-packed, but the mystery, compelling dialogue and wondrous worldbuilding makes this one of my favorite books of all time. (Also the sequel to this duology is even better. Just saying.)
TRIPLE GOLD MEDALIST IN THE 2019 INDEPENDENT PUBLISHER BOOK AWARDS!WINNER OF THE 2019 READERVIEWS AWARD FOR FANTASY!“Life is transformation. You change or you die.”Ashamed of his past and overwhelmed by his future, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani feels too small for his own name. After a graceless exit from his homeland in the Acharrioni desert, his anxiety has sabotaged every attempt at redemption. Asides from a fiery devotion to his godling, the one piece of home he brought with him, he has nothing.That is, until he meets Reilin. Beguiling, bewildering Reilin, who whisks Ronoah up into a cross-continental pilgrimage to the…
Growing up, many of the female characters in the media I engaged with were thin stereotypes (and some still are). Slowly, culture shifted towards the “strong female character, which quickly became a stereotype of its own. As culture shifts again to more nuanced female characters, many of them are slapped with the label of “unlikeable.” The label usually means that the character isn’t a tired stereotype and is complex, multifaceted, and interesting. Also, nearly all the time, the same traits admired in a male character are despised in a female character (think of Alicent Hightower, whose moral complexity would certainly be celebrated in a man).
In a rather terrifying world of sentient gods, Carillon is an impulsive and short-tempered orphaned runaway who finds herself at the center of a magical plot that involves the thieves' guild, the alchemists' guild, her family, and a terrifying pantheon of gods.
Though a skilled thief, Cari rarely thinks things through and, more often than not, finds herself in trouble as a direct result of her actions. She's also one of those characters whose past comes back to haunt her precisely because she hasn’t properly confronted it.
"The Gutter Prayer is captivating and complex. Guerdon is a city that seethes with history, horror, and hidden secrets" (Nicholas Eames). A group of three young thieves are pulled into a centuries old magical war between ancient beings, mages, and humanity in this wildly original debut epic fantasy. Enter a city of saints and thieves . . .
The city of Guerdon stands eternal. A refuge from the war that rages beyond its borders. But in the ancient tunnels deep beneath its streets, a malevolent power has begun to stir.
I’m an American author and writing teacher both at Harvard and Oxford’s online programs. I've mostly written poetry and nonfiction, then in 2021 I published my first novel, She Never Told Me about the Ocean. I started writing the book when my daughter was born as a way to explore the complicated feelings and fears that suddenly washed over me. The book—like a daughter—outgrew my plans and expectations for it. It became, unexpectedly, a mythology of mothers and daughters. For two decades I've studied fairy tales and myths. Fairy tales deal in fears and the stories we tell ourselves to feel safe—which is why I read them and use them in my writing.
This book is almost too beautiful for words, and reading it you feel like you are falling into a haunted magic mirror where identity and race are explored alongside a host of deep simmering emotions: anger and forgiveness, fear and vanity. A sort of dizzying intergenerational retake on Snow White.
As seen on the cover of the New York Times Book Review, where it was described as “gloriously unsettling… evoking Toni Morrison, Haruki Murakami, Angela Carter, Edgar Allan Poe, Gabriel García Márquez, Chris Abani and even Emily Dickinson,” and already one of the year’s most widely acclaimed novels:
“Helen Oyeyemi has fully transformed from a literary prodigy into a powerful, distinctive storyteller…Transfixing and surprising.”—Entertainment Weekly (Grade: A)
“I don’t care what the magic mirror says; Oyeyemi is the cleverest in the land…daring and unnerving… Under Oyeyemi’s spell, the fairy-tale conceit makes a brilliant setting in which to explore the alchemy…
I’m Mary Sisson, award-winning writer blah-blah-blah, and when I need to pry myself off the feeds before my head explodes, I reach for a particular sort of book: story-driven with a lot of adventure, a dash of humor, another of romance, andset in a well-developed, immersive fictional world. While all of these titles can be read alone (I hate books that were clearly written to sell a sequel—600 pages of filler ending with a cliffhanger? No thank you!)they all also form parts of series, because when my head is about to shoot right off my neck, it helps me to know that I have the remedy at hand. Enjoy!
Magic has appeared on Earth, and Addie doesn’t know what to make of it. In fact, she’s not quite sure what to make of anything—she has no recollection of who she is. What she does know is alchemy: While some people are magical, alchemists makemagic using potions and powders. The magical don’t like the alchemists, and the New Magical don’t like the Old Magical, the creepy, secretive necromancers who run funeral homes and turn people into ghouls and zombies. The Final Formulahas excitement, scares, and some mind-blowing twists—just know that, if you continue with the series, you cannot skip the “in-between” books.
To a master alchemist like Addie, impossible is just another word for challenge. When a fiery explosion destroys the Alchemica, the premier alchemy institute in the United States, she’s left with nothing. No home, no colleagues, and no memory. Learning what happened seems impossible, but she still has one strength, and in her opinion, it’s the only one she needs. She hasn’t forgotten a thing about alchemy.
Addie brews a potion to restore her lost past, but remembers only the flames of the Alchemica’s destruction—and a man among the ashes. A man with the elemental power of fire, who just…
I've always loved stories. After years of observing the importance of stories, and their role in creating our reality, the determination to write my own clicked into place. Storytelling is very much at the heart of my first novel, Strange Gods. Strange Gods features a multiverse of powerful gods, but humans still stand out for their ability to tell self-defining stories. From the inciting incident where Carcass kidnaps Spooky to be his storyteller, to the decisions she makes along her journey, the stories Spooky tells others and herself determine her outcomes. I hope the books on this list inspire you to reflect on the power of any stories you tell, as they've inspired me.
So many fantasy worlds repeat familiar settings, characters, and types of magic. Middlegame delights because it is so different. I couldn’t encapsulate all of it in a single sentence, but to peel back some of the weird layers: alchemists give universal concepts like Good and Evil semi-human forms in a race to control them and attain godhood. This ties into the theme of storytelling because McGuire reframes historic literary greats like Mark Twain as alchemists, who are intentionally creating and changing the nature of the world with their books. If that isn’t a powerful image of a storyteller, I don’t know what is.
Master fantasist Seanan McGuire introduces readers to an America run in the shadows by the Alchemical Congress, a powerful society focused on transmuting reality itself.
Meet Roger. Skilled with words, languages come easily to him. He instinctively understands how the world works through the power of story.
Meet Dodger, his twin. Numbers are her world, her obsession, her everything. All she understands, she does so through the power of math.
Roger and Dodger aren't exactly human, though they don't realise it. They aren't exactly gods, either. Not entirely. Not yet.
Meet Reed, skilled in the alchemical arts like his progenitor…
I’ve been fascinated by paranormal stories for years. One of the first books I truly loved was A Wrinkle in Time. I loved the Dragons of Pern, as well. As a girl, I read more stories featuring witches and magical creatures than one ought. But I also loved mysteries—Nancy Drew,as well as all the Agatha Christie books. At present, I’m working on my fifth Fairy Garden Mystery, and I recently completed a mystery novella featuring an elf. To round out the experience, I have personally crafted over fifty fairy gardens. I’m pretty certain a fairy spirit had something to do with my obsession... or perhaps it all started when I kissed the Blarney Stone.
Years ago, I met Gigi Pandian at a mystery conference. She is a gifted and spiritual woman. I adore her writing.
In this book, Zoe Faust, an alchemist, moves to the Northwest and discovers a stowaway in her luggage—a live gargoyle named Dorian who can cook French cuisine! Oh, man, wouldn’t you love to have a “familiar” that cooks?
Zoe moved, hoping to put her old life behind her, but she can’t when she discovers her new friend Dorian is turning to stone and only she can save him.
This story is clever beyond words. FYI, Gigi is a gargoyle expert! If you meet her, ask to see her collection of photographs.
"Filled with magic, intrigue, and humor, this series is sure to delight fans of cozy mysteries and urban fantasy."―Bookriot
A chance for a new beginning in Portland, Oregon. A stowaway from Paris. Can alchemist Zoe Faust solve the mystery of an ancient book in time to save her new friend? Don't miss the first novel in the award-winning series from USA Today bestselling author Gigi Pandian!
Unpacking her belongings in her new fixer-upper house, alchemist Zoe Faust can't help but notice she's picked up a stowaway. Dorian Robert-Houdin is a living, breathing gargoyle―not to mention a master of French cuisine―and…
I've been making messes with paint, string, and words, as well as in love, mothering, and in virtually every other way imaginable my whole life. Eventually, an expertise began to grow, and the confusion in my life began to make sense through my creations, while at the same time, the seemingly irrelevant words and textures I was making started to tell me something about my life. Eventually, my lived experience and training in the Expressive Arts Therapies have led me to the roles of teacher, educator, and contemplative artist. If we pay attention to what we express and how we express things, we can find our way through any mess we find ourselves in.
I always seek to immerse myself in creative works like film, fiction, and music, and as a mother of three young children, I have now added children's books to this list.
The magic and simplicity of bringing together poetic voice and imagery in picture books have shown me the alchemy of weaving together mediums to convey emotion and meaning in a simple and powerful way.
Of the thousands of children’s books I have read (seriously!) this one struck me as a gem, exploring the vulnerability and enchanting realm of childhood, a place where creativity once roamed free within us.
This simple story of a mother and daughter and the beauty of the imagination and memory as one ages feels like an invitation made just for me asking me to reignite the spark of expression without all the added weight of adulthood.
The Paper Dolls is a stunning, lyrical story of childhood, memory and the power of imagination from Julia Donaldson, the author of The Gruffalo, and award-winning illustrator Rebecca Cobb.
A string of paper dolls go on a fantastical adventure through the house and out into the garden. They soon escape the clutches of the toy dinosaur and the snapping jaws of the oven-glove crocodile, but then a very real pair of scissors threatens . . .
The Paper Dolls is a beautiful and evocative story from Julia Donaldson and Rebecca Cobb, the bestselling creators of The Everywhere Bear.
I am an illustrator of books, comics, and various other things, but no matter what I illustrate I can’t seem to keep a certain darkness out of my drawings. For most of my life I have been attracted to the macabre. This attraction first emerged out of fear but later out of amusement. Itis rather comical to see the amount of effort people are willing to expend in order to avoid thinking and talking about death. I find it far more healthy to acknowledge it everywhere whilesimultaneously having a good chuckle.
This book will lead you on a dark adventure of unexpected horror and amusement. For example: an alchemist creates a woman who is later entrapped, turns into a moth, and eventually gives birth to a cat–fathered by Napoleon, of course. All of this and more are illustrated in gorgeous labor-intensive aquatints that make you feel like you are observing these scenes through the murky waters of a magical puddle.
The author of the New York Times bestseller The Time Traveler's Wife returns with another evocative "novel in pictures," the much-anticipated follow-up to 2005's The Three Incestuous Sisters. The Adventuress follows the dreamlike journey of an alchemist's daughter. After she is kidnapped by a lascivious baron, she turns herself into a moth and flees to the garden of a charming butterfly collector named Napoleon Bonaparte. The story of how the two become lovers, and how their affair ends in tragedy and transcendence, is told through Niffenegger's spare prose and haunting aquatint etchings. With a stunning and distinctive visual style reminiscent…
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