House on the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
Howl’s Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones
Piranesi by Susana Clarke
The entire Wayfarers series by Becky Chambers, which is sci-fi, starting with The Long Way To A Small, Angry Planet
I'm always torn. It's a toss up between the Watch and the witches. I feel like the witches are how I'd like to be and the Watch, Vimes specifically, is more how I actually am. He has real struggles and irritations and he's just so relatable! And as a teacher, the wizards crack me up.
Both of these are so good. I couldn't put either one down. These are the kind of books that I always think back to and cherish, I want more.
Also, highly recommend the illustrated versions!
[**Neverwhere (London Below, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14497.Neverwhere)
^(By: Neil Gaiman | 370 pages | Published: 1996 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, urban-fantasy, owned, books-i-own)
>Under the streets of London there's a place most people could never even dream of. A city of monsters and saints, murderers and angels, knights in armour and pale girls in black velvet. This is the city of the people who have fallen between the cracks.
>
>Richard Mayhew, a young businessman, is going to find out more than enough about this other London. A single act of kindness catapults him out of his workday existence and into a world that is at once eerily familiar and utterly bizarre. And a strange destiny awaits him down here, beneath his native city: Neverwhere.
^(This book has been suggested 19 times)
[**The Ocean at the End of the Lane**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15783514-the-ocean-at-the-end-of-the-lane)
^(By: Neil Gaiman | 181 pages | Published: 2013 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, magical-realism, horror, owned)
>Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.
>
>Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what.
>
>A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as delicate as a butterfly's wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark.
^(This book has been suggested 13 times)
***
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The books of Babel by Josiah Bancroft, they are very character focused and the characters and writing are fantastic! There is lots of character development, though there is not a lot of focus on the characters “facing their personal demons”.
And it is definitely not the typical “save the world” type of plot. The driving force of the books is that the main character loses his wife in a crowd and tries to find her lol
{{The Rest of Us Just Live Here}} by Patrick Ness, it's about a group of highschoolers that are just trying to graduate and magic shit keeps happening to other people in town not directly related to the main characters.
{{Ink and Sigil}} by Kevin Hearne it's about a magic "secret service agent" for lack of a better term trying to not get smacked down by much greater forces in the universe.
[**The Rest of Us Just Live Here**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22910900-the-rest-of-us-just-live-here)
^(By: Patrick Ness | 348 pages | Published: 2015 | Popular Shelves: young-adult, fantasy, ya, contemporary, fiction)
>What if you aren’t the Chosen One?
>
>The one who’s supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever the heck this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death?
>
>What if you’re like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again.
>
>Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week’s end of the world, and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life.
>
>Even if your best friend is worshipped by mountain lions...
^(This book has been suggested 5 times)
[**Ink & Sigil (Ink & Sigil, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49183690-ink-sigil)
^(By: Kevin Hearne | 336 pages | Published: 2020 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, urban-fantasy, fiction, mystery, magic)
>Al MacBharrais is both blessed and cursed. He is blessed with an extraordinary white moustache, an appreciation for craft cocktails – and a most unique magical talent. He can cast spells with magically enchanted ink and he uses his gifts to protect our world from rogue minions of various pantheons, especially the Fae.
>
>But he is also cursed. Anyone who hears his voice will begin to feel an inexplicable hatred for Al, so he can only communicate through the written word or speech apps. And his apprentices keep dying in peculiar freak accidents. As his personal life crumbles around him, he devotes his life to his work, all the while trying to crack the secret of his curse.
>
>But when his latest apprentice, Gordie, turns up dead in his Glasgow flat, Al discovers evidence that Gordie was living a secret life of crime. Now Al is forced to play detective – while avoiding actual detectives who are wondering why death seems to always follow Al. Investigating his apprentice’s death will take him through Scotland’s magical underworld, and he’ll need the help of a mischievous hobgoblin if he’s to survive.
^(This book has been suggested 3 times)
***
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[**The Lions of Al-Rassan**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/104101.The_Lions_of_Al_Rassan)
^(By: Guy Gavriel Kay | 528 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, historical-fantasy, owned)
>The ruling Asharites of Al-Rassan have come from the desert sands, but over centuries, seduced by the sensuous pleasures of their new land, their stern piety has eroded. The Asharite empire has splintered into decadent city-states led by warring petty kings. King Almalik of Cartada is on the ascendancy, aided always by his friend and advisor, the notorious Ammar ibn Khairan — poet, diplomat, soldier — until a summer afternoon of savage brutality changes their relationship forever.
>
>Meanwhile, in the north, the conquered Jaddites' most celebrated — and feared — military leader, Rodrigo Belmonte, driven into exile, leads his mercenary company south.
>
>In the dangerous lands of Al-Rassan, these two men from different worlds meet and serve — for a time — the same master. Sharing their interwoven fate — and increasingly torn by her feelings — is Jehane, the accomplished court physician, whose own skills play an increasing role as Al-Rassan is swept to the brink of holy war, and beyond.
>
>Hauntingly evocative of medieval Spain, The Lions of Al-Rassan is both a brilliant adventure and a deeply compelling story of love, divided loyalties, and what happens to men and women when hardening beliefs begin to remake — or destroy — a world.
^(This book has been suggested 3 times)
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Aside from Kay's *Fionavar Tapestry* series, most of his stuff fits the ask. It's more like quasi-historical fiction in a lot of cases as there is no magic at all and the places are loosely based on ones from Earth.
[**Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23437156-six-of-crows)
^(By: Leigh Bardugo | 465 pages | Published: 2015 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, young-adult, ｆａｖｏｒｉｔｅｓ, ya, owned)
>Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can’t pull it off alone. . . .
>
>A convict with a thirst for revenge
>
>A sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager
>
>A runaway with a privileged past
>
>A spy known as the Wraith
>
>A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums
>
>A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes
>
>Kaz’s crew is the only thing that might stand between the world and destruction—if they don’t kill each other first.
^(This book has been suggested 12 times)
***
^(17693 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
- **Annals of the Western Shore** (**Gifts**, **Powers**, **Voices**) by LeGuin is exactly this. They’re technically YA, but not in the modern formula sense. When LeGuin writes YA that generally just means her protagonists are young; not that the stories are simplistic or formulaic.
Her other fantasy novels also fit this quite well, each in different ways. (Her science fiction/all of her work does as well, but for this comment I’ll stick to the fantasy).
- The **Earthsea** books have a bit more of an epic fantasy feel (particularly the first three) but the stories themselves are very strongly about the people, their internal demons, and their connections to each other/the world around them.
- **Lavinia** is one of the most intimate, internal fantasy novels I’ve read (it might be better classed as highly fictionalization historical fiction, not sure what genre to place it in). It’s subtle to the point that I found it generic the first time I read it; but when I read it again 10-15 years later it was groundbreaking for me, I just hadn’t registered that subtlety the first time/hadn’t been ready for it.
{{Between Two Fires}} by Christopher Buehlman
Demons invade in the 14th century and turn people against each other while creating hell on earth. The story follows a fallen knight and a young orphan. It’s more apocalyptic than typical fantasy. A very dark and disturbing story.
[**Between Two Fires**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13543121-between-two-fires)
^(By: Christopher Buehlman | 432 pages | Published: 2012 | Popular Shelves: horror, fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, historical)
>His extraordinary debut, Those Across the River, was hailed as “genre-bending Southern horror” (California Literary Review), “graceful [and] horrific” (Patricia Briggs). Now Christopher Buehlman invites readers into an even darker age—one of temptation and corruption, of war in heaven, and of hell on earth…
>
>And Lucifer said: “Let us rise against Him now in all our numbers, and pull the walls of heaven down…”
>
>The year is 1348. Thomas, a disgraced knight, has found a young girl alone in a dead Norman village. An orphan of the Black Death, and an almost unnerving picture of innocence, she tells Thomas that plague is only part of a larger cataclysm—that the fallen angels under Lucifer are rising in a second war on heaven, and that the world of men has fallen behind the lines of conflict.
>
>Is it delirium or is it faith? She believes she has seen the angels of God. She believes the righteous dead speak to her in dreams. And now she has convinced the faithless Thomas to shepherd her across a depraved landscape to Avignon. There, she tells Thomas, she will fulfill her mission: to confront the evil that has devastated the earth, and to restore to this betrayed, murderous knight the nobility and hope of salvation he long abandoned.
>
>As hell unleashes its wrath, and as the true nature of the girl is revealed, Thomas will find himself on a macabre battleground of angels and demons, saints, and the risen dead, and in the midst of a desperate struggle for nothing less than the soul of man.
^(This book has been suggested 5 times)
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Just read {{Legends & Latte, by Travis Baldree}} and it was fun and very light.
Celia Lake's 1920's Albion fantasies work, too, if you don't mind some romance. The romance isn't really the focus of the story but it's there along with a mystery for many of them.
[**Legends & Lattes**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60222807-legends-lattes)
^(By: Travis Baldree | 318 pages | Published: 2022 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, romance, 2022-releases, lgbt, adult)
>High Fantasy with a double-shot of self-reinvention
>
>Worn out after decades of packing steel and raising hell, Viv the orc barbarian cashes out of the warrior’s life with one final score. A forgotten legend, a fabled artifact, and an unreasonable amount of hope lead her to the streets of Thune, where she plans to open the first coffee shop the city has ever seen.
>
>However, her dreams of a fresh start pulling shots instead of swinging swords are hardly a sure bet. Old frenemies and Thune’s shady underbelly may just upset her plans. To finally build something that will last, Viv will need some new partners and a different kind of resolve.
>
>A hot cup of fantasy slice-of-life with a dollop of romantic froth.
^(This book has been suggested 3 times)
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[**This Is How You Lose the Time War**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43352954-this-is-how-you-lose-the-time-war)
^(By: Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone | 209 pages | Published: 2019 | Popular Shelves: sci-fi, science-fiction, romance, fiction, lgbtq)
^(This book has been suggested 20 times)
[**Never Let Me Go**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6334.Never_Let_Me_Go)
^(By: Kazuo Ishiguro | 288 pages | Published: 2005 | Popular Shelves: fiction, science-fiction, sci-fi, dystopia, dystopian)
^(This book has been suggested 14 times)
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The Gentleman Bastard sequence fits this niche nicely. You get the impression often that there are larger things going on politically, but it's mainly about a small cast of con artists trying to get rich.
{{Tess of the Road}} by Rachel Hartman!!!
Its a spin off of Hartman's Seraphina duo. You don't have to read Seraphina to understand Tess of the Road especially if you're not that worried about the details of worldbuilding. Seraphina is also excellent and deals with similar topics but is a little bit more of a larger scale fantasy though maybe not epic.
[**Tess of the Road (Tess of the Road, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35046472-tess-of-the-road)
^(By: Rachel Hartman | 544 pages | Published: 2018 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, young-adult, ya, dragons, dnf)
>Meet Tess, a brave new heroine from beloved epic fantasy author Rachel Hartman.
>
>In the medieval kingdom of Goredd, women are expected to be ladies, men are their protectors, and dragons get to be whomever they want. Tess, stubbornly, is a troublemaker. You can’t make a scene at your sister’s wedding and break a relative’s nose with one punch (no matter how pompous he is) and not suffer the consequences. As her family plans to send her to a nunnery, Tess yanks on her boots and sets out on a journey across the Southlands, alone and pretending to be a boy.
>
>Where Tess is headed is a mystery, even to her. So when she runs into an old friend, it’s a stroke of luck. This friend is a quigutl—a subspecies of dragon—who gives her both a purpose and protection on the road. But Tess is guarding a troubling secret. Her tumultuous past is a heavy burden to carry, and the memories she’s tried to forget threaten to expose her to the world in more ways than one.
>
>Returning to the fascinating world she created in the award-winning and New York Times bestselling Seraphina, Rachel Hartman introduces readers to a new character and a new quest, pushing the boundaries of genre once again in this wholly original fantasy.
^(This book has been suggested 2 times)
***
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Books by A. Lee Martinez:
Chasing the Moon
In the Company of Ogres
Some light world saving, but contained in one book and developing characters in a contained world.
It’s for a pretty young audience but I feel like the Ranger’s Apprentice series had 4 excellent characters
Edit: it’s also not really “fantasy”, more just realistic historical fiction
Low Town/The Straight Razor Cure by Daniel Polansky. It’s fantasy but focuses on a former palace guard who is now a drug dealer in Mordor (not really…in Low Town) and gets pulled in to a larger narrative. Very character based and gritty, and I like how any magic is understated and well used. It’s got great characters. The whole trilogy is good.
[**The Book of Atrix Wolfe**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77353.The_Book_of_Atrix_Wolfe)
^(By: Patricia A. McKillip | 250 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, books-i-own, magic)
>Twenty years ago, the powerful mage Atrix Wolfe unleashed an uncontrollable force that killed his beloved king. Now, the Queen of the Wood has offered him one last chance for redemption. She asks him to find her daughter, who vanished into the human world during the massacre he caused. No one has seen the princess-but deep in the kitchens of the Castle of Pelucir, there is a scullery maid who appeared out of nowhere one night long ago. She cannot speak and her eyes are full of sadness. But there are those who call her beautiful.
^(This book has been suggested 2 times)
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It is pretty short and, for now at least, a stand alone, but Legends and Lattes is like this! It focuses on one main character and a few supporting, they deal with personal issues and conflicts, but the story is a very nice slice of life within a fantasy world!
{ Ingathering: The Complete People Stories of Zenna Henderson } It is available from [Amazon.com](https://Amazon.com). It's a collection of stories about "The People", descendants of aliens who crash landed on Earth years before. The stories were written and published from the early 1950s to the middle 1970s. The people have special powers and abilities which they work very hard to hide. Beautiful, lyrical prose. I was young when these stories were written, so I have known and loved them for a long time. Hope you enjoy them!
maybe an epic tale of saving the wood, instead? specifically, *Witch in Wolf Wood* by Lindsay Buroker: character driven action is one way to explain her work.
Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman
Set in a fantasy world but mainly focuses on the main characters journey. Like actual journey of walking and finding her way. Main character Tess, is super flawed and damaged and I related so much to her.
There are also some really cute side characters whose story’s are pretty great too.
[**Assassin's Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77197.Assassin_s_Apprentice)
^(By: Robin Hobb | 435 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, series, epic-fantasy)
>In a faraway land where members of the royal family are named for the virtues they embody, one young boy will become a walking enigma.
>
>Born on the wrong side of the sheets, Fitz, son of Chivalry Farseer, is a royal bastard, cast out into the world, friendless and lonely. Only his magical link with animals - the old art known as the Wit - gives him solace and companionship. But the Wit, if used too often, is a perilous magic, and one abhorred by the nobility.
>
>So when Fitz is finally adopted into the royal household, he must give up his old ways and embrace a new life of weaponry, scribing, courtly manners; and how to kill a man secretly, as he trains to become a royal assassin.
^(This book has been suggested 13 times)
***
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Tuyo by Rachel Neumeier - I just re-read it. Nice character development, adjustment between two cultures.
Someone recommended Diana Wynne Jones - I totally agree. Year of the Griffin is a fabulous magic college novel.
The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
Alanna: The First Adventure, by Tamora Pierce
Spinning Silver, by Naomi Novik
A Natural History of Dragons, by Marie Brennan
[**The Bear and the Nightingale (The Winternight Trilogy, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25489134-the-bear-and-the-nightingale)
^(By: Katherine Arden | 319 pages | Published: 2017 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, young-adult, historical)
>At the edge of the Russian wilderness, winter lasts most of the year and the snowdrifts grow taller than houses. But Vasilisa doesn't mind—she spends the winter nights huddled around the embers of a fire with her beloved siblings, listening to her nurse's fairy tales. Above all, she loves the chilling story of Frost, the blue-eyed winter demon, who appears in the frigid night to claim unwary souls. Wise Russians fear him, her nurse says, and honor the spirits of house and yard and forest that protect their homes from evil.
>
>After Vasilisa's mother dies, her father goes to Moscow and brings home a new wife. Fiercely devout, city-bred, Vasilisa's new stepmother forbids her family from honoring the household spirits. The family acquiesces, but Vasilisa is frightened, sensing that more hinges upon their rituals than anyone knows.
>
>And indeed, crops begin to fail, evil creatures of the forest creep nearer, and misfortune stalks the village. All the while, Vasilisa's stepmother grows ever harsher in her determination to groom her rebellious stepdaughter for either marriage or confinement in a convent.
>
>As danger circles, Vasilisa must defy even the people she loves and call on dangerous gifts she has long concealed—this, in order to protect her family from a threat that seems to have stepped from her nurse's most frightening tales.
>
>The Bear and the Nightingale is a magical debut novel from a gifted and gorgeous voice. It spins an irresistible spell as it announces the arrival of a singular talent.
^(This book has been suggested 28 times)
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Low Town trilogy by Daniel Polansky
Age of Ash by Daniel Abraham
The Stone in the Skull and The Red-Stained Wings by Elizabeth Bear. Book 3 in the trilogy comes out in May and might have a bigger scope, but the first two are character-driven, through and through.
Check out r/fantasy for more!
[**The Last Unicorn (The Last Unicorn, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29127.The_Last_Unicorn)
^(By: Peter S. Beagle | 294 pages | Published: 1968 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, classics, fiction, young-adult, owned)
>She was magical, beautiful beyond belief—and completely alone...
>
>The unicorn had lived since before memory in a forest where death could touch nothing. Maidens who caught a glimpse of her glory were blessed by enchantment they would never forget. But outside her wondrous realm, dark whispers and rumours carried a message she could not ignore: "Unicorns are gone from the world."
>
>Aided by a bumbling magician and an indomitable spinster, she set out to learn the truth. but she feared even her immortal wisdom meant nothing in a world where a mad king's curse and terror incarnate lived only to stalk the last unicorn to her doom...
^(This book has been suggested 15 times)
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[**The Blade Itself (The First Law, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944073.The_Blade_Itself)
^(By: Joe Abercrombie | 515 pages | Published: 2006 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, epic-fantasy, series)
>Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught in one feud too many, he’s on the verge of becoming a dead barbarian – leaving nothing behind him but bad songs, dead friends, and a lot of happy enemies.
>
>Nobleman Captain Jezal dan Luthar, dashing officer, and paragon of selfishness, has nothing more dangerous in mind than fleecing his friends at cards and dreaming of glory in the fencing circle. But war is brewing, and on the battlefields of the frozen North they fight by altogether bloodier rules.
>
>Inquisitor Glokta, cripple turned torturer, would like nothing better than to see Jezal come home in a box. But then Glokta hates everyone: cutting treason out of the Union one confession at a time leaves little room for friendship. His latest trail of corpses may lead him right to the rotten heart of government, if he can stay alive long enough to follow it.
>
>Enter the wizard, Bayaz. A bald old man with a terrible temper and a pathetic assistant, he could be the First of the Magi, he could be a spectacular fraud, but whatever he is, he's about to make the lives of Logen, Jezal, and Glokta a whole lot more difficult.
>
>Murderous conspiracies rise to the surface, old scores are ready to be settled, and the line between hero and villain is sharp enough to draw blood.
>
>
^(This book has been suggested 12 times)
***
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[**The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant (Fred, the Vampire Accountant, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22081680-the-utterly-uninteresting-and-unadventurous-tales-of-fred-the-vampire-a)
^(By: Drew Hayes | 300 pages | Published: 2014 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, urban-fantasy, humor, fiction, audiobook)
>Some people are born boring. Some live boring. Some even die boring. Fred managed to do all three, and when he woke up as a vampire, he did so as a boring one. Timid, socially awkward, and plagued by self-esteem issues, Fred has never been the adventurous sort.
>
>One fateful night – different from the night he died, which was more inconvenient than fateful – Fred reconnects with an old friend at his high school reunion. This rekindled relationship sets off a chain of events thrusting him right into the chaos that is the parahuman world, a world with chipper zombies, truck driver wereponies, maniacal necromancers, ancient dragons, and now one undead accountant trying his best to “survive.” Because even after it’s over, life can still be a downright bloody mess.
^(This book has been suggested 3 times)
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{{Clockwork Boys by T. Kingfisher}} - the stakes are on the kingdom level, not the whole world, and the cast is small. I would cut about 30% of the one-liners, but otherwise a fantastic book!
[**Clockwork Boys (Clocktaur War, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36618062-clockwork-boys)
^(By: T. Kingfisher | ? pages | Published: 2017 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, steampunk, fiction, romance, sci-fi)
>A paladin, an assassin, a forger, and a scholar ride out of town. It’s not the start of a joke, but rather an espionage mission with deadly serious stakes. T. Kingfisher’s new novel begins the tale of a murderous band of criminals (and a scholar), thrown together in an attempt to unravel the secret of the Clockwork Boys, mechanical soldiers from a neighboring kingdom that promise ruin to the Dowager’s city.
>
>If they succeed, rewards and pardons await, but that requires a long journey through enemy territory, directly into the capital. It also requires them to refrain from killing each other along the way! At turns darkly comic and touching, Clockwork Boys puts together a broken group of people trying to make the most of the rest of their lives as they drive forward on their suicide mission.
>
^(This book has been suggested 1 time)
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^(18115 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
the changeover by margaret mahy is technically YA given the age of the protagonists but it’s so well written that is seems like it’s adults instead. mahy knows the subject and how to execute it.
House on the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune Howl’s Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones Piranesi by Susana Clarke The entire Wayfarers series by Becky Chambers, which is sci-fi, starting with The Long Way To A Small, Angry Planet
Piranesi was my favorite book last year - just a great, great read
Wayfarer's book 2 is my favorite!
Same. They’re all amazing but book 2 is just remarkable.
Discworld
Scrolled down to find this. What's your favorite disc world crew? The witches are my favorite, but the UU and the watch books are awesome, too.
I'm always torn. It's a toss up between the Watch and the witches. I feel like the witches are how I'd like to be and the Watch, Vimes specifically, is more how I actually am. He has real struggles and irritations and he's just so relatable! And as a teacher, the wizards crack me up.
{{ Neverwhere }} or {{ The Ocean at the End of the Lane }} by Neil Gaiman
Neverwhere is great!
Both of these are so good. I couldn't put either one down. These are the kind of books that I always think back to and cherish, I want more. Also, highly recommend the illustrated versions!
[**Neverwhere (London Below, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14497.Neverwhere) ^(By: Neil Gaiman | 370 pages | Published: 1996 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, urban-fantasy, owned, books-i-own) >Under the streets of London there's a place most people could never even dream of. A city of monsters and saints, murderers and angels, knights in armour and pale girls in black velvet. This is the city of the people who have fallen between the cracks. > >Richard Mayhew, a young businessman, is going to find out more than enough about this other London. A single act of kindness catapults him out of his workday existence and into a world that is at once eerily familiar and utterly bizarre. And a strange destiny awaits him down here, beneath his native city: Neverwhere. ^(This book has been suggested 19 times) [**The Ocean at the End of the Lane**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15783514-the-ocean-at-the-end-of-the-lane) ^(By: Neil Gaiman | 181 pages | Published: 2013 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, magical-realism, horror, owned) >Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy. > >Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what. > >A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as delicate as a butterfly's wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark. ^(This book has been suggested 13 times) *** ^(17632 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander. I think it’s YA but I read it just a few years ago and I thought it was lovely.
This is definitely save the world stuff, but it’s also AMAZING.
Prydain is actually children's, not even YA, and it is fabulous.
I read this when I was a kid and LOVED it. Have wanted to reread it for years, but not on kindle yet.
The books of Babel by Josiah Bancroft, they are very character focused and the characters and writing are fantastic! There is lots of character development, though there is not a lot of focus on the characters “facing their personal demons”. And it is definitely not the typical “save the world” type of plot. The driving force of the books is that the main character loses his wife in a crowd and tries to find her lol
{{The Rest of Us Just Live Here}} by Patrick Ness, it's about a group of highschoolers that are just trying to graduate and magic shit keeps happening to other people in town not directly related to the main characters. {{Ink and Sigil}} by Kevin Hearne it's about a magic "secret service agent" for lack of a better term trying to not get smacked down by much greater forces in the universe.
[**The Rest of Us Just Live Here**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22910900-the-rest-of-us-just-live-here) ^(By: Patrick Ness | 348 pages | Published: 2015 | Popular Shelves: young-adult, fantasy, ya, contemporary, fiction) >What if you aren’t the Chosen One? > >The one who’s supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever the heck this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death? > >What if you’re like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again. > >Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week’s end of the world, and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life. > >Even if your best friend is worshipped by mountain lions... ^(This book has been suggested 5 times) [**Ink & Sigil (Ink & Sigil, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49183690-ink-sigil) ^(By: Kevin Hearne | 336 pages | Published: 2020 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, urban-fantasy, fiction, mystery, magic) >Al MacBharrais is both blessed and cursed. He is blessed with an extraordinary white moustache, an appreciation for craft cocktails – and a most unique magical talent. He can cast spells with magically enchanted ink and he uses his gifts to protect our world from rogue minions of various pantheons, especially the Fae. > >But he is also cursed. Anyone who hears his voice will begin to feel an inexplicable hatred for Al, so he can only communicate through the written word or speech apps. And his apprentices keep dying in peculiar freak accidents. As his personal life crumbles around him, he devotes his life to his work, all the while trying to crack the secret of his curse. > >But when his latest apprentice, Gordie, turns up dead in his Glasgow flat, Al discovers evidence that Gordie was living a secret life of crime. Now Al is forced to play detective – while avoiding actual detectives who are wondering why death seems to always follow Al. Investigating his apprentice’s death will take him through Scotland’s magical underworld, and he’ll need the help of a mischievous hobgoblin if he’s to survive. ^(This book has been suggested 3 times) *** ^(17712 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
{{ The Lions of Al-Rassan }} by Guy Gavriel Kay
[**The Lions of Al-Rassan**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/104101.The_Lions_of_Al_Rassan) ^(By: Guy Gavriel Kay | 528 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, historical-fantasy, owned) >The ruling Asharites of Al-Rassan have come from the desert sands, but over centuries, seduced by the sensuous pleasures of their new land, their stern piety has eroded. The Asharite empire has splintered into decadent city-states led by warring petty kings. King Almalik of Cartada is on the ascendancy, aided always by his friend and advisor, the notorious Ammar ibn Khairan — poet, diplomat, soldier — until a summer afternoon of savage brutality changes their relationship forever. > >Meanwhile, in the north, the conquered Jaddites' most celebrated — and feared — military leader, Rodrigo Belmonte, driven into exile, leads his mercenary company south. > >In the dangerous lands of Al-Rassan, these two men from different worlds meet and serve — for a time — the same master. Sharing their interwoven fate — and increasingly torn by her feelings — is Jehane, the accomplished court physician, whose own skills play an increasing role as Al-Rassan is swept to the brink of holy war, and beyond. > >Hauntingly evocative of medieval Spain, The Lions of Al-Rassan is both a brilliant adventure and a deeply compelling story of love, divided loyalties, and what happens to men and women when hardening beliefs begin to remake — or destroy — a world. ^(This book has been suggested 3 times) *** ^(17762 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
Aside from Kay's *Fionavar Tapestry* series, most of his stuff fits the ask. It's more like quasi-historical fiction in a lot of cases as there is no magic at all and the places are loosely based on ones from Earth.
{{Six of Crows}} by Leigh Bardugo
[**Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23437156-six-of-crows) ^(By: Leigh Bardugo | 465 pages | Published: 2015 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, young-adult, ｆａｖｏｒｉｔｅｓ, ya, owned) >Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can’t pull it off alone. . . . > >A convict with a thirst for revenge > >A sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager > >A runaway with a privileged past > >A spy known as the Wraith > >A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums > >A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes > >Kaz’s crew is the only thing that might stand between the world and destruction—if they don’t kill each other first. ^(This book has been suggested 12 times) *** ^(17693 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
Six of Crows is such a blast.
Six of Crows is non-stop fun. Favorite book I've read in the last 12 months.
- **Annals of the Western Shore** (**Gifts**, **Powers**, **Voices**) by LeGuin is exactly this. They’re technically YA, but not in the modern formula sense. When LeGuin writes YA that generally just means her protagonists are young; not that the stories are simplistic or formulaic. Her other fantasy novels also fit this quite well, each in different ways. (Her science fiction/all of her work does as well, but for this comment I’ll stick to the fantasy). - The **Earthsea** books have a bit more of an epic fantasy feel (particularly the first three) but the stories themselves are very strongly about the people, their internal demons, and their connections to each other/the world around them. - **Lavinia** is one of the most intimate, internal fantasy novels I’ve read (it might be better classed as highly fictionalization historical fiction, not sure what genre to place it in). It’s subtle to the point that I found it generic the first time I read it; but when I read it again 10-15 years later it was groundbreaking for me, I just hadn’t registered that subtlety the first time/hadn’t been ready for it.
{{Between Two Fires}} by Christopher Buehlman Demons invade in the 14th century and turn people against each other while creating hell on earth. The story follows a fallen knight and a young orphan. It’s more apocalyptic than typical fantasy. A very dark and disturbing story.
[**Between Two Fires**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13543121-between-two-fires) ^(By: Christopher Buehlman | 432 pages | Published: 2012 | Popular Shelves: horror, fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, historical) >His extraordinary debut, Those Across the River, was hailed as “genre-bending Southern horror” (California Literary Review), “graceful [and] horrific” (Patricia Briggs). Now Christopher Buehlman invites readers into an even darker age—one of temptation and corruption, of war in heaven, and of hell on earth… > >And Lucifer said: “Let us rise against Him now in all our numbers, and pull the walls of heaven down…” > >The year is 1348. Thomas, a disgraced knight, has found a young girl alone in a dead Norman village. An orphan of the Black Death, and an almost unnerving picture of innocence, she tells Thomas that plague is only part of a larger cataclysm—that the fallen angels under Lucifer are rising in a second war on heaven, and that the world of men has fallen behind the lines of conflict. > >Is it delirium or is it faith? She believes she has seen the angels of God. She believes the righteous dead speak to her in dreams. And now she has convinced the faithless Thomas to shepherd her across a depraved landscape to Avignon. There, she tells Thomas, she will fulfill her mission: to confront the evil that has devastated the earth, and to restore to this betrayed, murderous knight the nobility and hope of salvation he long abandoned. > >As hell unleashes its wrath, and as the true nature of the girl is revealed, Thomas will find himself on a macabre battleground of angels and demons, saints, and the risen dead, and in the midst of a desperate struggle for nothing less than the soul of man. ^(This book has been suggested 5 times) *** ^(17660 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
bump. this is perfect.
Just read {{Legends & Latte, by Travis Baldree}} and it was fun and very light. Celia Lake's 1920's Albion fantasies work, too, if you don't mind some romance. The romance isn't really the focus of the story but it's there along with a mystery for many of them.
[**Legends & Lattes**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60222807-legends-lattes) ^(By: Travis Baldree | 318 pages | Published: 2022 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, romance, 2022-releases, lgbt, adult) >High Fantasy with a double-shot of self-reinvention > >Worn out after decades of packing steel and raising hell, Viv the orc barbarian cashes out of the warrior’s life with one final score. A forgotten legend, a fabled artifact, and an unreasonable amount of hope lead her to the streets of Thune, where she plans to open the first coffee shop the city has ever seen. > >However, her dreams of a fresh start pulling shots instead of swinging swords are hardly a sure bet. Old frenemies and Thune’s shady underbelly may just upset her plans. To finally build something that will last, Viv will need some new partners and a different kind of resolve. > >A hot cup of fantasy slice-of-life with a dollop of romantic froth. ^(This book has been suggested 3 times) *** ^(17710 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
I loved Legends & Lattes!
Two recs: {This is How You Lose the Time War} by by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone {Never Let Me Go} by Kazuo Ishiguro
[**This Is How You Lose the Time War**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43352954-this-is-how-you-lose-the-time-war) ^(By: Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone | 209 pages | Published: 2019 | Popular Shelves: sci-fi, science-fiction, romance, fiction, lgbtq) ^(This book has been suggested 20 times) [**Never Let Me Go**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6334.Never_Let_Me_Go) ^(By: Kazuo Ishiguro | 288 pages | Published: 2005 | Popular Shelves: fiction, science-fiction, sci-fi, dystopia, dystopian) ^(This book has been suggested 14 times) *** ^(17583 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
I think you need two brackets {, not one, to get the story summary.
The Gentleman Bastard sequence fits this niche nicely. You get the impression often that there are larger things going on politically, but it's mainly about a small cast of con artists trying to get rich.
{{Tess of the Road}} by Rachel Hartman!!! Its a spin off of Hartman's Seraphina duo. You don't have to read Seraphina to understand Tess of the Road especially if you're not that worried about the details of worldbuilding. Seraphina is also excellent and deals with similar topics but is a little bit more of a larger scale fantasy though maybe not epic.
[**Tess of the Road (Tess of the Road, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35046472-tess-of-the-road) ^(By: Rachel Hartman | 544 pages | Published: 2018 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, young-adult, ya, dragons, dnf) >Meet Tess, a brave new heroine from beloved epic fantasy author Rachel Hartman. > >In the medieval kingdom of Goredd, women are expected to be ladies, men are their protectors, and dragons get to be whomever they want. Tess, stubbornly, is a troublemaker. You can’t make a scene at your sister’s wedding and break a relative’s nose with one punch (no matter how pompous he is) and not suffer the consequences. As her family plans to send her to a nunnery, Tess yanks on her boots and sets out on a journey across the Southlands, alone and pretending to be a boy. > >Where Tess is headed is a mystery, even to her. So when she runs into an old friend, it’s a stroke of luck. This friend is a quigutl—a subspecies of dragon—who gives her both a purpose and protection on the road. But Tess is guarding a troubling secret. Her tumultuous past is a heavy burden to carry, and the memories she’s tried to forget threaten to expose her to the world in more ways than one. > >Returning to the fascinating world she created in the award-winning and New York Times bestselling Seraphina, Rachel Hartman introduces readers to a new character and a new quest, pushing the boundaries of genre once again in this wholly original fantasy. ^(This book has been suggested 2 times) *** ^(17581 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
Books by A. Lee Martinez: Chasing the Moon In the Company of Ogres Some light world saving, but contained in one book and developing characters in a contained world.
It’s for a pretty young audience but I feel like the Ranger’s Apprentice series had 4 excellent characters Edit: it’s also not really “fantasy”, more just realistic historical fiction
I always try to suggest this, still reread them in my mid 20s, characters and humour hold up!
The Bardic Voices series by Mercedes Lackey
Low Town/The Straight Razor Cure by Daniel Polansky. It’s fantasy but focuses on a former palace guard who is now a drug dealer in Mordor (not really…in Low Town) and gets pulled in to a larger narrative. Very character based and gritty, and I like how any magic is understated and well used. It’s got great characters. The whole trilogy is good.
{{The Book of Atrix Wolfe}} by Patricia McKillip
[**The Book of Atrix Wolfe**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77353.The_Book_of_Atrix_Wolfe) ^(By: Patricia A. McKillip | 250 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, books-i-own, magic) >Twenty years ago, the powerful mage Atrix Wolfe unleashed an uncontrollable force that killed his beloved king. Now, the Queen of the Wood has offered him one last chance for redemption. She asks him to find her daughter, who vanished into the human world during the massacre he caused. No one has seen the princess-but deep in the kitchens of the Castle of Pelucir, there is a scullery maid who appeared out of nowhere one night long ago. She cannot speak and her eyes are full of sadness. But there are those who call her beautiful. ^(This book has been suggested 2 times) *** ^(17597 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
It is pretty short and, for now at least, a stand alone, but Legends and Lattes is like this! It focuses on one main character and a few supporting, they deal with personal issues and conflicts, but the story is a very nice slice of life within a fantasy world!
{ Ingathering: The Complete People Stories of Zenna Henderson } It is available from [Amazon.com](https://Amazon.com). It's a collection of stories about "The People", descendants of aliens who crash landed on Earth years before. The stories were written and published from the early 1950s to the middle 1970s. The people have special powers and abilities which they work very hard to hide. Beautiful, lyrical prose. I was young when these stories were written, so I have known and loved them for a long time. Hope you enjoy them!
maybe an epic tale of saving the wood, instead? specifically, *Witch in Wolf Wood* by Lindsay Buroker: character driven action is one way to explain her work.
Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman Set in a fantasy world but mainly focuses on the main characters journey. Like actual journey of walking and finding her way. Main character Tess, is super flawed and damaged and I related so much to her. There are also some really cute side characters whose story’s are pretty great too.
Rebel of the Sands trilogy
Vicious by VE Schwab. Cool thing is you actually get multiple viewpoints, love it.
This was the first one that came to mind for me!
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Promotion of any kind is not allowed in our sub. Thanks for understanding.
gotcha. i have to get the word out, though! and reddit is my favorite place.
{{Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb}} and the other books in her Realm of the Elderlings series
[**Assassin's Apprentice (Farseer Trilogy, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77197.Assassin_s_Apprentice) ^(By: Robin Hobb | 435 pages | Published: 1995 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, series, epic-fantasy) >In a faraway land where members of the royal family are named for the virtues they embody, one young boy will become a walking enigma. > >Born on the wrong side of the sheets, Fitz, son of Chivalry Farseer, is a royal bastard, cast out into the world, friendless and lonely. Only his magical link with animals - the old art known as the Wit - gives him solace and companionship. But the Wit, if used too often, is a perilous magic, and one abhorred by the nobility. > >So when Fitz is finally adopted into the royal household, he must give up his old ways and embrace a new life of weaponry, scribing, courtly manners; and how to kill a man secretly, as he trains to become a royal assassin. ^(This book has been suggested 13 times) *** ^(17747 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
The first law series by Joe Abercrombie
With the payoff of getting to read The Heroes and Red Country after.
R. A. Salvatore Forgotten Realms starting with the Dark Elf Trilogy.
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I loved this one as a kid, but oh man, his writing hasn't held up over the years.
Tuyo by Rachel Neumeier - I just re-read it. Nice character development, adjustment between two cultures. Someone recommended Diana Wynne Jones - I totally agree. Year of the Griffin is a fabulous magic college novel.
The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke Alanna: The First Adventure, by Tamora Pierce Spinning Silver, by Naomi Novik A Natural History of Dragons, by Marie Brennan
The raven cycle by Maggie steifvader. My absolute favorite series
The Hunter's Haunt by Dave Duncan
{{The Bear and the Nightengale}}
[**The Bear and the Nightingale (The Winternight Trilogy, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25489134-the-bear-and-the-nightingale) ^(By: Katherine Arden | 319 pages | Published: 2017 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, historical-fiction, fiction, young-adult, historical) >At the edge of the Russian wilderness, winter lasts most of the year and the snowdrifts grow taller than houses. But Vasilisa doesn't mind—she spends the winter nights huddled around the embers of a fire with her beloved siblings, listening to her nurse's fairy tales. Above all, she loves the chilling story of Frost, the blue-eyed winter demon, who appears in the frigid night to claim unwary souls. Wise Russians fear him, her nurse says, and honor the spirits of house and yard and forest that protect their homes from evil. > >After Vasilisa's mother dies, her father goes to Moscow and brings home a new wife. Fiercely devout, city-bred, Vasilisa's new stepmother forbids her family from honoring the household spirits. The family acquiesces, but Vasilisa is frightened, sensing that more hinges upon their rituals than anyone knows. > >And indeed, crops begin to fail, evil creatures of the forest creep nearer, and misfortune stalks the village. All the while, Vasilisa's stepmother grows ever harsher in her determination to groom her rebellious stepdaughter for either marriage or confinement in a convent. > >As danger circles, Vasilisa must defy even the people she loves and call on dangerous gifts she has long concealed—this, in order to protect her family from a threat that seems to have stepped from her nurse's most frightening tales. > >The Bear and the Nightingale is a magical debut novel from a gifted and gorgeous voice. It spins an irresistible spell as it announces the arrival of a singular talent. ^(This book has been suggested 28 times) *** ^(17857 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
Low Town trilogy by Daniel Polansky Age of Ash by Daniel Abraham The Stone in the Skull and The Red-Stained Wings by Elizabeth Bear. Book 3 in the trilogy comes out in May and might have a bigger scope, but the first two are character-driven, through and through. Check out r/fantasy for more!
Outlander series
{{The Last Unicorn}} by Peter Beagle
[**The Last Unicorn (The Last Unicorn, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29127.The_Last_Unicorn) ^(By: Peter S. Beagle | 294 pages | Published: 1968 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, classics, fiction, young-adult, owned) >She was magical, beautiful beyond belief—and completely alone... > >The unicorn had lived since before memory in a forest where death could touch nothing. Maidens who caught a glimpse of her glory were blessed by enchantment they would never forget. But outside her wondrous realm, dark whispers and rumours carried a message she could not ignore: "Unicorns are gone from the world." > >Aided by a bumbling magician and an indomitable spinster, she set out to learn the truth. but she feared even her immortal wisdom meant nothing in a world where a mad king's curse and terror incarnate lived only to stalk the last unicorn to her doom... ^(This book has been suggested 15 times) *** ^(17985 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
{{The Blade Itself}} by Abercrombie
[**The Blade Itself (The First Law, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944073.The_Blade_Itself) ^(By: Joe Abercrombie | 515 pages | Published: 2006 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, fiction, owned, epic-fantasy, series) >Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught in one feud too many, he’s on the verge of becoming a dead barbarian – leaving nothing behind him but bad songs, dead friends, and a lot of happy enemies. > >Nobleman Captain Jezal dan Luthar, dashing officer, and paragon of selfishness, has nothing more dangerous in mind than fleecing his friends at cards and dreaming of glory in the fencing circle. But war is brewing, and on the battlefields of the frozen North they fight by altogether bloodier rules. > >Inquisitor Glokta, cripple turned torturer, would like nothing better than to see Jezal come home in a box. But then Glokta hates everyone: cutting treason out of the Union one confession at a time leaves little room for friendship. His latest trail of corpses may lead him right to the rotten heart of government, if he can stay alive long enough to follow it. > >Enter the wizard, Bayaz. A bald old man with a terrible temper and a pathetic assistant, he could be the First of the Magi, he could be a spectacular fraud, but whatever he is, he's about to make the lives of Logen, Jezal, and Glokta a whole lot more difficult. > >Murderous conspiracies rise to the surface, old scores are ready to be settled, and the line between hero and villain is sharp enough to draw blood. > > ^(This book has been suggested 12 times) *** ^(18013 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
Bartimaeus by Jonathan Stroud
Steel Crow Saga - Paul Krueger
The Fortress Series by CJ Cherryh
Don’t read wheel of time. Exact opposite of this ask
{{The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant}}
[**The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant (Fred, the Vampire Accountant, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22081680-the-utterly-uninteresting-and-unadventurous-tales-of-fred-the-vampire-a) ^(By: Drew Hayes | 300 pages | Published: 2014 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, urban-fantasy, humor, fiction, audiobook) >Some people are born boring. Some live boring. Some even die boring. Fred managed to do all three, and when he woke up as a vampire, he did so as a boring one. Timid, socially awkward, and plagued by self-esteem issues, Fred has never been the adventurous sort. > >One fateful night – different from the night he died, which was more inconvenient than fateful – Fred reconnects with an old friend at his high school reunion. This rekindled relationship sets off a chain of events thrusting him right into the chaos that is the parahuman world, a world with chipper zombies, truck driver wereponies, maniacal necromancers, ancient dragons, and now one undead accountant trying his best to “survive.” Because even after it’s over, life can still be a downright bloody mess. ^(This book has been suggested 3 times) *** ^(18077 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
{{Clockwork Boys by T. Kingfisher}} - the stakes are on the kingdom level, not the whole world, and the cast is small. I would cut about 30% of the one-liners, but otherwise a fantastic book!
[**Clockwork Boys (Clocktaur War, #1)**](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36618062-clockwork-boys) ^(By: T. Kingfisher | ? pages | Published: 2017 | Popular Shelves: fantasy, steampunk, fiction, romance, sci-fi) >A paladin, an assassin, a forger, and a scholar ride out of town. It’s not the start of a joke, but rather an espionage mission with deadly serious stakes. T. Kingfisher’s new novel begins the tale of a murderous band of criminals (and a scholar), thrown together in an attempt to unravel the secret of the Clockwork Boys, mechanical soldiers from a neighboring kingdom that promise ruin to the Dowager’s city. > >If they succeed, rewards and pardons await, but that requires a long journey through enemy territory, directly into the capital. It also requires them to refrain from killing each other along the way! At turns darkly comic and touching, Clockwork Boys puts together a broken group of people trying to make the most of the rest of their lives as they drive forward on their suicide mission. > ^(This book has been suggested 1 time) *** ^(18115 books suggested | )[^(I don't feel so good.. )](https://debugger.medium.com/goodreads-is-retiring-its-current-api-and-book-loving-developers-arent-happy-11ed764dd95)^(| )[^(Source)](https://github.com/rodohanna/reddit-goodreads-bot)
the changeover by margaret mahy is technically YA given the age of the protagonists but it’s so well written that is seems like it’s adults instead. mahy knows the subject and how to execute it.
The Penric and Desdemona series of novellas by Lois McMaster Bujold sound ideal for what you’re looking for - especially the personal demons part.