100 books like The Sword of Summer

I loved this book since before it was published.

I gave a quote for the cover of the first printing of it, in fact. Fifteen years later, it still remains a book that can carry me away to a world where magic is not a gift but a challenge to overcome.

Kristen had a fresh idea here, but it still folded into my love of adventure and magic and finding out who we are inside.

That’s a story that will always get my attention, and the writing in this one is also lush enough to make me want to pause and re-read lines.

I adored the imagery and descriptions in this book (the entire trilogy, really), and I loved the fresh take on angels and demons, who really aren’t angels and demons. Not in a religious sense, anyway.

I usually like my books with more spice, but the author has woven a masterful story across different worlds. It also includes enemies to lovers, which is my all-time favorite trope, so I can forgive the lack of steam.

I loved the teeth, the chimera, and the sparks in the angel's wings. It’s one of those stories I wished I could have written, but no way would I have done it justice. It's a truly epic book.

Black Diamond is definitely the darkest and scariest choice out of my five picks. There’s magic, demons, ghosts, and rituals, but it stops short of horror and stays in the fantasy category. The characters are so well written, portraying the more annoying aspects of the youngsters, that you might find yourself getting cross or frustrated with them. But the mystery and magic will have you rooting for them to succeed, and you will get caught up in their journey, trying to uncover the truth of the English mansion and its occupants.

I love books where dragons feature as complex characters, and I’m particularly interested in their relationships with humans. Hartman’s dragons are magnificent creatures and, like humans, full of paradoxes. Our heroine, Seraphina, lives in a kingdom celebrating a forty-year peace treaty with the dragons, though not everyone is happy about this treaty.

Seraphina is quirky, clever, and a geek for intellectual pursuits like art and philosophy, and a talented musician. But she’s also moody and reclusive, isolating herself not just because of her insecurities… she has a dark secret, revealed over the course of the story. In addition to the mystery of a royal murder and in the background of a plot to destroy the peace treaty, Seraphina falls in love with the Captain of the Queen’s guard, who is engaged to someone else.

I’m not generally drawn to romance novels, but this romance developed in such an organic way,… show more.

This series of short back-up strips in the 1960s Thor comic from Marvel retold and embellished on the myths in characteristically bombastic Lee/Kirby fashion. While Thor himself, in the main feature, battled costumed supervillains in contemporary New York, the supporting feature dealt with his youth, his allies and enemies in Asgard itself and the rest of the Nine Realms, and a whole host of sorcerers, witches, and grotesque monsters. Kirby in particular seemed enthused by the project and it shows in his artwork.

Riordan had me at Norse mythology. Love it! Written in the usual tongue-in-cheek humor I’m used to with the author’s style, I loved the way he rebranded Norse myths to fit into the young adult genre he’s so famous for writing. It begins as homeless Magnus Chase (cousin to Annabeth from The Lightning Thief) is plucked from the real world (he literally dies) and taken to Hotel Valhalla, where he’s put through the gantlet over and over again (and dies many times in the process) until he teams up with an unlikely (and likable) diverse cast of characters who embark on a journey to recover his birthright—the Sword of Summer. However, what Magnus doesn’t count on is finding out the truth about who he really is, and his place in Asgard. 

The Norse God: Vidar

Suspense, Horror, Romance, Adventure—this book has it all! Vidar’s steadfast search for the mortal woman he loved and lost, and the complications of her return as a cynical scientist at a research outpost in the modern world are both “wild and melancholy.” I love the idea of a god with such a loyal heart. This book gets bonus points for going all-in on Odin as the villain of the piece, but also features Loki in full Trickster form, and touches on many of the other gods of Asgard.

Klas Östergren is one of Sweden’s foremost literary novelists and The Hurricane Party was his contribution to Canongate’s early 21st-century Myth Series (although it was apparently subsequently removed from it). The Hurricane Party is the most imaginative retelling of Norse mythology that I’ve read. It focuses on events that precede Ragnarök and takes place in a futuristic, climate-ravaged, dystopian Stockholm. The plot centers around the Flyting of Loki, a pivotal scene from The Poetic Edda in which Loki turns against the gods and kills one of their servants. Östergren’s novel follows the journey of the father (his own invented character) of this servant as he searches for answers to his son’s death against this unique backdrop. The setting and premise are among the most original I’ve ever encountered. 

This fun read, full of humor and adventure, is a mash-up of Viking lore and the story of Beowulf in a contemporary setting. Abby, grieving over the death of her mother, is also at a new school—not to mention training as the last of the Aesir warriors destined to hunt and kill Grendels. When a Grendel starts hunting her instead, Abby has a lot to unravel and conquer, fast. 

I adore quirky stories that play with Western myths (heck, I wrote one), and this book has that in spades. For kids that love Norse mythology, this will provide smiles, snorts, and a perfect dose of white-knuckled page-turning. We grow with Abby as she builds new friendships and conquers old fears. She’s a great contemporary heroine with absolutely relatable problems.

This was another one of my favourites for learning about the Norse gods and the Norse religion. I found the information about the different gods, where their names came from, and how they were worshipped invaluable, as well as the detailed information about the different worlds the Vikings believed in and those who lived on those worlds.

This book was great for learning about how the Scandinavian people viewed their religion and how it affected their lives and their views on magic and the cosmos. I found it useful to learn about their afterlife and how the Vikings viewed it. It’s another book I regularly revisit when writing my novels.