The 30 Best World Fantasy Award-Winning Novels

Half a century of prize-winning fantasy, with quiet literary oddities set against doorstop epics, gothic horror and the odd crime story.

1. 1
   Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

   Susanna Clarke's alternate history of two rival magicians reviving English magic during the Napoleonic Wars.
   1000pts
2. 2
   Alif the Unseen

   G. Willow Wilson's techno-thriller about a Gulf hacker who finds a book written by the jinn.
   897pts
3. 3
   The City & the City

   China Miéville's crime novel set in two cities that share the same space and must 'unsee' each other.
   787pts
4. 4
   The Chimes

   Anna Smaill's dystopia set in a London where music has replaced written language and memory.
   787pts
5. 5
   The Forgotten Beasts of Eld

   Patricia A. McKillip's 1974 tale of a sorceress and her menagerie of legendary beasts, the award's first winner.
   718pts
6. 6
   A Stranger in Olondria

   Sofia Samatar's lyrical debut about a pepper merchant's son haunted by a ghost in the land of Olondria.
   718pts
7. 7
   Boy's Life

   Robert R. McCammon's coming-of-age novel about a boy in 1964 Alabama, mixing small-town life with the uncanny.
   636pts
8. 8
   Tender Morsels

   Margo Lanagan's dark fairy-tale novel about a young woman given a private heaven to escape her abuse.
   636pts
9. 9
   Thomas the Rhymer

   Ellen Kushner's retelling of the Scottish ballad of a harper carried off to the land of the fairy queen.
   636pts
10. 10
    The Dragon Waiting

    John M. Ford's alternate-history Wars of the Roses fantasy with vampires, wizards and Byzantine intrigue.
    636pts
11. 11
    Mythago Wood

    Robert Holdstock's tale of an English wood that conjures living versions of myths and legends.
    636pts
12. 12
    The Jasmine Throne

    Tasha Suri's epic fantasy about an imprisoned princess and a maidservant with a hidden power.
    538pts
13. 13
    Osama

    Lavie Tidhar's noir novel about a detective hired to find the author of pulp thrillers about Osama bin Laden.
    538pts
14. 14
    Gloriana

    Michael Moorcock's baroque reimagining of an Elizabethan court ruled by a troubled queen.
    418pts
15. 15
    Declare

    Tim Powers' Cold War spy novel in which the secret services are fighting over supernatural beings.
    418pts
16. 16
    Ombria in Shadow

    Patricia A. McKillip's court-intrigue fantasy set in the shadowed city of Ombria.
    418pts
17. 17
    Tooth and Claw

    Jo Walton's Victorian novel of manners with a twist: every character is a dragon.
    418pts
18. 18
    Who Fears Death

    Nnedi Okorafor's post-apocalyptic African fantasy about a young sorceress born of violence.
    418pts
19. 19
    The Sudden Appearance of Hope

    Claire North's thriller about a woman whom everyone forgets the moment she leaves their sight.
    418pts
20. 20
    The Changeling

    Victor LaValle's modern fairy tale about a New York father whose wife commits an unthinkable act.
    418pts
21. 21
    Saint Death's Daughter

    C. S. E. Cooney's comic gothic fantasy about a young necromancer left to save her family's estate.
    418pts
22. 22
    The Reformatory

    Tananarive Due's historical horror novel about a boy sent to a haunted segregated reform school in 1950 Florida.
    418pts
23. 23
    The Other Wind

    Ursula K. Le Guin's final Earthsea novel, in which the dead begin calling out to the living.
    0pts
24. 24
    Song of Kali

    Dan Simmons' debut, a horror novel set in Calcutta around a cult of the goddess Kali.
    0pts
25. 25
    Perfume

    Patrick Süskind's story of an 18th-century perfumer with no scent of his own and a murderous obsession.
    0pts
26. 26
    The Prestige

    Christopher Priest's novel of two rival Victorian stage magicians, later adapted by Christopher Nolan.
    0pts
27. 27
    Kafka on the Shore

    Haruki Murakami's dreamlike novel weaving a runaway teenager's story with that of an old man who talks to cats.
    0pts
28. 28
    The Bone Clocks

    David Mitchell's decades-spanning novel about a woman caught up in a secret war between immortals.
    0pts
29. 29
    Witchmark

    C. L. Polk's Edwardian-flavoured fantasy about a doctor hiding his magic after a brutal war.
    0pts
30. 30
    The Tainted Cup

    Robert Jackson Bennett's fantasy mystery introducing the eccentric detective Ana Dolabra and her assistant Din.
    0pts

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