Category: Fantasy

Island of Exiles (The Ryogan Chronicles #1)

By Erica Cameron

Khya is a trained warrior on the island of Shiara. From day one she is told to give everything to her people, but when her brother goes missing and her council betrays her, she sets out to save him and her island home.

Publisher’s Description:

“In Khya’s world, every breath is a battle.

On the isolated desert island of Shiara, dying young is inevitable. The clan comes before self, and protecting her home means Khya is a warrior above all else.

But when following the clan and obeying their leaders could cost her brother his life, Khya’s home becomes a deadly trap. The only person who can help is Tessen, her lifelong rival and the boy who challenges her at every turn. The council she hoped to join has betrayed her, and their secrets, hundreds of years deep, reach around a world she’s never seen.”

Genre: Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls: Khya
Cis boys: Tessen
Intersex: Etaro, Sanii
Shiaran society includes three genders – male, female and ebet (uses  eir/ey pronouns)
According to an author tweet ebet is most closely related to our definition of intersex.

Sexual and Romantic Orientation
Bisexual or pansexual: Khya
Asexual: Etaro
Romantic orientation is not mentioned in the book, it is presumed to be the same as the characters’ sexual orientation.

Race/Ethnicity: Not mentioned.

Disability:

Additional Notes: In Shiaran society bisexuality and pansexuality are the most common sexuality, though other orientations exist. Asexuality is known as ‘ushimo’. Shiaran society also includes three sexes: male, female and ebet (intersex; ey/eir pronouns).

The Uncrossing

By Melissa Eastlake

Magic mafias control New York, and Luke works for his family undoing curses. He discovers Jeremy, prince of Kovrov family, is under a curse, and he hopes to break it with true love’s kiss.

Publisher’s Description:

Luke can uncross almost any curse—they unravel themselves for him like no one else. So working for the Kovrovs, one of the families controlling all the magic in New York, is exciting and dangerous, especially when he encounters the first curse he can’t break. And it involves Jeremy, the beloved, sheltered prince of the Kovrov family—the one boy he absolutely shouldn’t be falling for.

Jeremy’s been in love with cocky, talented Luke since they were kids. But from their first kiss, something’s missing. Jeremy’s family keeps generations of deadly secrets, forcing him to choose between love and loyalty. As Luke fights to break the curse, a magical, citywide war starts crackling, and it’s tied to Jeremy.

This might be the one curse Luke can’t uncross. If true love’s kiss fails, what’s left for him and Jeremy?

Genre: Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis boys: Luke, Jeremy

Sexual Orientation:
Gay/Queer: Luke, Jeremy

Romantic Orientation:
Not explicitly mentioned.

Race/Ethnicity:
White: Luke, Jeremy

 

Wild Beauty

By Anna-Marie McLemore

A magic garden is tended to by a family of women who can never leave and never love. When a boy appears in the garden with no memory of his past or who he is, they discover secrets of their garden and the power of their family.

Check out this book and more on our best of list for books with Latinx characters.

Publisher’s Description:

For nearly a century, the Nomeolvides women have tended the grounds of La Pradera, the lush estate gardens that enchant guests from around the world. They’ve also hidden a tragic legacy: if they fall in love too deeply, their lovers vanish. But then, after generations of vanishings, a strange boy appears in the gardens.

The boy is a mystery to Estrella, the Nomeolvides girl who finds him, and to her family, but he’s even more a mystery to himself; he knows nothing more about who he is or where he came from than his first name. As Estrella tries to help Fel piece together his unknown past, La Pradera leads them to secrets as dangerous as they are magical in this stunning exploration of love, loss, and family.

Genre: Fantasy/Magical Realism

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls: Estrella
There is a genderqueer side character.

Sexual and Romantic Orientation:
Estrella is bisexual and biromantic

Race/Ethnicity:
Estrella is Latinx

Ownvoices: The author is Mexican-American and Queer.

Lumberjanes (series, based on the graphic novels)

By Mariko Tamaki

Based on the bestselling graphic novels, this ongoing series of middle-grade novels contains all-new adventures.

Publisher’s Description:

Welcome to Miss Qiunzella Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s Camp for Hardcore Lady Types. The five scouts of Roanoke cabin—Jo, April, Molly, Mal, and Ripley—love their summers at camp. They get to hang out with their best friends, earn Lumberjane scout badges, annoy their no-nonsense counselor Jen . . . and go on supernatural adventures. That last one? A pretty normal occurrence at Miss Qiunzella’s, where the woods contain endless mysteries.

Genre: Fantasy, Graphic Novel

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls: April, Molly, Mal, Ripley
Trans girls: Jo

Sexual Orientation:
Lesbian/Queer: Mal, Molly
April, Ripley and Jo’s sexual orientation is not explicitly addressed.

Romantic Orientation:
Not explicitly addressed.

Race/Ethnicity:
White: April, Molly, Rosie
Black: Jen
Latinx: Ripley
East Asian: Mal
Multiracial: Ripley (Irish/Mexican)
Not mentioned: Jo

Ownvoices: Author and Illustrator are queer and author is a person of color.

Perfect Ten

By L Phillips

Sam has been in a love drought since he broke up with his boyfriend two years ago, but his Catholic-turned-Wiccan friend is here to help. After casting a love spell, three perfect boys show up, and his ex might still be in the running.

Publisher’s Description:

It’s been two years since Sam broke up with the only other eligible gay guy in his high school, so to say he’s been going through a romantic drought is the understatement of the decade. When Meg, his ex-Catholic-turned-Wiccan best friend, suggests performing a love spell, Sam is just desperate enough to try. He crafts a list of ten traits he wants in a boyfriend and burns it in a cemetery at midnight on Friday the thirteenth.

Enter three seemingly perfect guys, all in pursuit of Sam. There’s Gus, the suave French exchange student; Jamie, the sweet and shy artist; and Travis, the guitar-playing tattooed enigma. Even Sam’s ex-boyfriend, Landon, might want another chance.

But does a Perfect Ten even exist?

Genre: Contemporary/Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis boys: Sam

Sexuality:
Gay/Queer: Sam

Romantic Orientation:
Homoromantic: Sam

Race/Ethnicity:
White: Sam

 

Girls Made of Snow and Glass

By Melissa Bashardoust

Mina had her heart replaced with glass by her magician father and was told she could never love or be loved. She goes to court to become queen, where she meets Lynet, who is similarly made of snow as a replacement for her lost mother. The two are rivals for the same crown, but respect and love may win out.

Publisher’s Description

Frozen meets The Bloody Chamber in this feminist fantasy reimagining of the Snow White fairytale

At sixteen, Mina’s mother is dead, her magician father is vicious, and her silent heart has never beat with love for anyone—has never beat at all, in fact, but she’d always thought that fact normal. She never guessed that her father cut out her heart and replaced it with one of glass. When she moves to Whitespring Castle and sees its king for the first time, Mina forms a plan: win the king’s heart with her beauty, become queen, and finally know love. The only catch is that she’ll have to become a stepmother.

Fifteen-year-old Lynet looks just like her late mother, and one day she discovers why: a magician created her out of snow in the dead queen’s image, at her father’s order. But despite being the dead queen made flesh, Lynet would rather be like her fierce and regal stepmother, Mina. She gets her wish when her father makes Lynet queen of the southern territories, displacing Mina. Now Mina is starting to look at Lynet with something like hatred, and Lynet must decide what to do—and who to be—to win back the only mother she’s ever known…or else defeat her once and for all.

Entwining the stories of both Lynet and Mina in the past and present, Girls Made of Snow and Glass traces the relationship of two young women doomed to be rivals from the start. Only one can win all, while the other must lose everything—unless both can find a way to reshape themselves and their story.

Genre: Contemporary

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls:  Lynet, Nadia

Sexual  Orientation:
Lesbian/Queer: Lynet, Nadia

Romantic Orientation:
Homoromantic: Lynet, Nadia

Race/Ethnicity:
Lynet is described as having light brown skin

 

Daughter of the Burning City

By Amanda Foody

When Sorina’s starts getting murdered, she wants to know who’s behind the killings and why. In the course of her investigation she’ll learn more about the world than her sheltered upbringing ever showed her and she may, perhaps, even find someone to be her prince or princess in the fairy tale ending she dreams of in a story that seeks to explore what it means to be human.

Publisher’s Description:

A darkly irresistible new fantasy set in the infamous Gomorrah Festival, a traveling carnival of debauchery that caters to the strangest of dreams and desires

Sixteen-year-old Sorina has spent most of her life within the smoldering borders of the Gomorrah Festival. Yet even among the many unusual members of the traveling circus-city, Sorina stands apart as the only illusion-worker born in hundreds of years. This rare talent allows her to create illusions that others can see, feel and touch, with personalities all their own. Her creations are her family, and together they make up the cast of the Festival’s Freak Show.

But no matter how lifelike they may seem, her illusions are still just that—illusions, and not truly real. Or so she always believed…until one of them is murdered.

Desperate to protect her family, Sorina must track down the culprit and determine how they killed a person who doesn’t actually exist. Her search for answers leads her to the self-proclaimed gossip-worker Luca. Their investigation sends them through a haze of political turmoil and forbidden romance, and into the most sinister corners of the Festival. But as the killer continues murdering Sorina’s illusions one by one, she must unravel the horrifying truth before all her loved ones disappear.

Genre: Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls: Sorina, Nicoleta, Venera, Hawk
Cis boys: Luca, Unu, Du, Crown, Blister

Sexuality:
Lesbian: Nicoleta
Bisexual: Sorina
Demisexual: Luca
Heterosexual: Venera, Hawk, Unu, Du, Crown, Blister

Romantic Orientation:
Homoromantic: Nicoleta
Biromantic: Sorina
Heteroromantic: Venera, Hawk, Unu, Du, Crown, Blister
Demiromantic: Luca

Race/Ethnicity:
Not mentioned.

Religion:
Atheism: Sorina

Disability:
Sorina has no eyes and thus faces microaggressions based on her appearance.

Trigger Warnings:
Murder
Aphobia/Amisia
Self-harm

Additional Notes:
One of the plot twists may be harmful to readers on the asexual spectrum.

 

Runebinder

By Alex Kahler

Magic returns to the world, ending mankind, bringing about beasts called Howls, and only Hunters can stop them. Tenn is a Hunter, but his loyalties become split between fellow Hunter Jarret and magic user Tomas.

Publisher’s Description:

When magic returned to the world, it could have saved humanity. But greed and thirst for power instead caused mankind’s downfall. Now, once-human monsters called Howls prowl abandoned streets, their hunger guided by corrupt necromancers and the all-powerful Kin. Only Hunters have the power to fight back in the unending war, using the same magic that ended civilization in the first place.

They are losing.

Tenn is a Hunter, resigned to fight even though hope is nearly lost. When he is singled out by a seductive Kin named Tomás and the enigmatic Hunter Jarrett, Tenn realizes he’s become a pawn in a bigger game. One that could turn the tides of war. But if his mutinous magic and wayward heart get in the way, his power might not be used in favor of mankind.

If Tenn fails to play his part, it could cost him his friends, his life…and the entire world.

Genre: Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis boys: Tenn

Sexual Orientation:
Gay: Tenn

Romantic Orientation:
Not explicitly addressed.

Race/Ethnicity:
White: Tenn

 

Release

By Patrick Ness

This novel takes place over one day in the life of Adam Thron, a preacher’s son. Some of Adam’s closest relationships are put to the test, he has a fight with his father, and undergoes an ordeal at work.

Publisher’s Description:

It’s Saturday, it’s summer and, although he doesn’t know it yet, everything in Adam Thorn’s life is going to fall apart. But maybe, just maybe, he’ll find freedom from the release. Time is running out though, because way across town, a ghost has risen from the lake…

 

Genre: Contemporary/Fantasy

Representation:
Gender:
Cis boys: Adam

Sexual Orientation:
Gay/Queer: Adam

Romantic Orientation:
Not explicitly addressed.

Race/Ethnicity:
White: Adam

 

The Gallery of Unfinished Girls

By Lauren Karcz

Mercedes is an artist, but she’s been experiencing a creative block for some time now. A neighborhood invites her to paint at the Mangrove Estate, but there’s a catch: nothing she paints can leave the estate.

Publisher’s Description:

Mercedes Moreno is an artist. At least, she thinks she could be, even though she hasn’t been able to paint anything worthwhile in the past year.

Her lack of inspiration might be because her abuela is in a coma. Or the fact that Mercedes is in love with her best friend, Victoria, but is too afraid to admit her true feelings.

Despite Mercedes’s creative block, art starts to show up in unexpected ways. A piano appears on her front lawn one morning, and a mysterious new neighbor invites Mercedes to paint with her at the Red Mangrove Estate.

At the Estate, Mercedes can create in ways she hasn’t ever before. But Mercedes can’t take anything out of the Estate, including her new-found clarity. Mercedes can’t live both lives forever, and ultimately she must choose between this perfect world of art and truth and a much messier reality.

Genre: Contemporary

Representation:
Gender:
Cis girls: Mercedes

Sexual Orientation:
Bisexual: Mercedes

Romantic Orientation:
Not explicitly addressed.

Race/Ethnicity:
Latinx/Puerto Rican: Mercedes