Best Fantasy Books of 2023
Last updated: May 16, 2024
Get ready to embark on epic journeys, traverse mystical realms, and encounter fantastical creatures as we delve into the best fantasy books of 2023. From the imaginative minds of authors, this year has delivered an enchanting array of tales that will transport readers to uncharted worlds and captivate them with gripping narratives.
“The First Bright Thing is a fantasy novel about magical circuses and found family. It’s been compared with The Night Circus, and I can see why, but the vibes are different. It’s a historical fantasy set in America during the Roaring Twenties, with a time travel element. It’s about a circus in which everyone has a magical ability that’s called a spark. They use their powers to put on performances that can change a person’s life right at the moment they need it. One of the performers has the ability to see the future, and glimpses the Holocaust and World War Two looming ahead. They want to use their powers to prevent it from happening. They’re also on the run from the Circus King, who is obsessed with the Ringmaster and has his own terrible circus that goes around terrifying people. It’s a beautiful story about people using their abilities to work together to make a better world. I’m a sucker for that.” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Debuts of 2023
Yume Kitasei, Novelist
“This is a contemporary fantasy set in California, New York, France, and many other places. It’s a fun paranormal adventure story that contains a very sweet romance. The main character is a woman who has given up her powers and gone into hiding to take care of her elder brother and protect him from their younger brother. She’s been making herself smaller: she has extraordinary abilities but chooses to do something mundane for a living to preserve their cover identities. As the book unfolds, this all starts to unravel and she is forced to confront the past. It’s really fun. The magic system in the novel is based on Chinese calligraphy. Tsai has built a very rich world. She is multilingual and made a cool choice not to translate any of the other languages (Chinese and French) in this book – you can understand a lot through context, even though there’s no translation. It works really well.” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Debuts of 2023
Yume Kitasei, Novelist
“Nona the Ninth is the third in Muir’s Locked Tomb series. Every installment so far has been nominated for a Hugo. ‘Nona’ has the body of Harrow, the titular character of the second book, and is suspected of having the mind of either Harrow or Gideon. Whoever she is, she is now amnesiac, and has a childlike mind in her older body. “ Read more...
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards
“Nettle and Bone follows Marra, the third and least important princess of a small kingdom, who is sent to a convent following her sister’s marriage to a powerful prince—he doesn’t want her producing any rivals to the throne. The tone is set: this man is trouble. When Marra understands just how much trouble, and how dire her sister’s situation is, she sets out to enforce justice. The journey is packed full of familiar motifs. She must accomplish three impossible tasks, visit a goblin market, encounter a necromancer-witch and a fairy godmother, and descend into labyrinthine tombs. Between these set-pieces and archetypal characters, we find a dazzling array of detail: a demon that is also, emphatically, a chicken; a woman voluntarily controlled by a horrifying wooden child; a crushing wheel of dead souls…This is fairytale fantasy. The magic is chilling and under-explained, considered supernatural even within the uncanny world of the book.” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards
“Scalzi returns with a sci-fi caper that begins in New York in the early days of the pandemic. The novel is, gleefully and explicitly, pandemic escapism – the book that Scalzi wrote when producing his intended brooding epic novel proved impossible. As Scalzi says in the author’s note: ‘It’s a pop song. It’s meant to be light and catchy, with three minutes of hooks and choruses for you to sing along with, and then you’re done and you go on with your day, hopefully with a smile on your face.'” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards
“Moreno-Garcia’s novel The Daughter of Doctor Moreau takes place in Yaxaktun, Mexico, and follows two voices: Doctor Moreau’s daughter Carlota, and his mayordomo (household manager) Montgomery. The doctor is creating human-animal hybrids, claiming that they offer hope of medical advances—but he is also beholden to a patron, who hopes the experiments will ultimately provide cheap labour. The moral uncertainty is well-drawn, but takes a back seat to the human (or part-human) relationships. These feel real; there are no simplistic character choices made to serve romance or villainy, and the resulting relationships are unpredictable and compelling. The story also gains verisimilitude from its historical setting, with fact and fiction deftly woven together.” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards
“Mary Robinette Kawal won this award back in 2019 with The Calculating Stars, in which a meteorite strike forces colonisation of the moon and Mars. Here, in The Spare Man, space is already inhabited; the futurist technology of the spaceship setting is richly imagined, but it is a backdrop to the plot, which is entirely unconcerned with space exploration or species survival. Instead, The Spare Man is a murder mystery. While some of the forward momentum derives from the need-to-know-who-dunnit, Kawal deftly holds readers’ interest through several mechanisms at once. The protagonist’s spouse is accused, building a powerful tension from the outset, and as the book unfolds the danger from both the true murderer and law enforcement mounts. This is intelligently crafted storytelling.” Read more...
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards
“Legends and Lattes is about an orc. And after war, after fighting, after being what an orc is supposed to be, this orc decides one day that they don’t want to fight anymore. They want to open a coffee shop. Think about that – that’s what the book is about. It’s not about going on epic adventures, or fighting huge, tremendous evil. It’s literally about opening a coffee shop in a little city.” Read more...
T.J. Klune, Novelist
“It follows the story of a young man who is brought to Oxford from China. He is brought there to learn this magic, along with several other people from various backgrounds from around the British Empire, all brought in to use their powers to further the Empire. Over time, he begins to turn against this. It turns into this beautifully written anti-colonial narrative that’s also imbued heavily with magic, as well as people’s interpersonal relationships, and then the history of the time. It’s really well done.” Read more...
The Best Historical Fantasy Books
P. Djèlí Clark, Novelist
The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 2023: The Hugo Awards, recommended by Sylvia Bishop
The Hugo Awards, first presented in 1953, were originally known as the ‘Science Fiction Achievement Awards.’ But, in practice, their shortlists encompass speculative fiction as a whole, including fantasy—and is considered one of that genre’s most prestigious prizes. Here, Sylvia Bishop offers an overview of this year’s nominees in the ‘Best Novel’ category, which represent the most popular sci-fi and fantasy books of 2023.
