Strange, liminal, "not easily defined." These are the words New York Times bestselling author Victoria "V.E." Schwab uses when tasked with naming her favorite fantasy novels.

"They tend to capture my imagination both as a reader and impress me as a writer," she tells OprahMag.com. "Almost all of my favorite stories find ways to layer our world with another world, layer the magic and the mundane, or folklore with reality."

That blurred line between imagination and realism—something Schwab fell in love with as a Potterhead during childhood—can be seen in her work, too. To date, the accomplished fantasy novelist has published 14 books, 13 of which are a part of six distinct series, ranging from middle grade to adult stories.

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Her most recent novel, , became Goodreads's 2018 Best Science Fiction book. It's the second from her wildly popular Villains series, which explores the possibility that near-death experiences can result in super-human abilities.

"When I was growing up, I was enamored with the idea that there was magic in our world," she says, explaining what allowed her to find her niche. "It was just behind a door I hadn't found the key to. And I was convinced that if I looked hard enough I would find the access point."

In her work—and when reading that of others—Schwab looks to champion stories that emphasize the importance of inclusivity and representation in literature. Just two years ago, an excerpt from her trilogy featuring two gay characters was edited out for readers in Russia. A new Russian publisher eventually gained the rights to the books, keeping the original scene but marketing the story as adult.

"We have an obligation as readers and as writers to make sure that the canon we're discussing is as flexible as the writers and the audience," she says, adding that she wants readers to see themselves reflected in a book's pages. "We should be able to refer to the influences of past work but not the exclusion of present work."

In anticipation of the 2020 release of her next standalone adult novel, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, we asked Schwab to curate a list of books she says represent the best in fantasy.



Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell Shop Now by Susanna Clarke

"When I was 18 or 19, I was really adverse to large books—Harry Potter aside. I don't know what made me pick up Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, but it is essentially magic in the most mundane incarnation possible because the magic has been completely forgotten from the world and then it returns to two men. I was so captivated by the way the spectacular was conveyed in a totally realistic way. It is, in many ways, the exception to all of my rules in the kind of things that I gravitate towards. It is flawless."



The Devourers Shop Now The Devourers by Indra Das

"It's a memoir of a werewolf in India. It's a debut novel and it is fantasy executed exactly as realism. That is apparently my kink: Fantasy that is brought down to earth in such a way that the mundane elements of it lend to extraordinary believability."

"It's about alternate versions of London. (I have a series that's about alternate versions of London in a very different way). But it was one of those books that I read where that other version of a world set beneath our own made me, whenever I would travel, look for the idea, the access point, where I might be able to cross over the line between this world and another one."

"It is about a teenage girl necromancer in a fictional version of our world. She has the ability to cross over into this liminal land of the dead. It feels like it has one foot in reality and one foot in magic, in many ways like a Hayao Miyazaki film. I was a very morbid teenager—I still am a very morbid adult—so any story I can find which plays with the line between life and death is automatically entrancing."

The Tiger's Daughter (Ascendant Book 1) Shop Now

"It's also set in fictional Southeast Asia, and is essentially about demons and powerful princesses in warring lands. It also offers a queer love story, which you don't see enough of. It's told in an epistolary format in letters between the two princesses. Their queerness doesn't feel like a plot point, it just happens to be a queer love story, and I love that. My largest attraction when it comes to queer characters in fantasy is when they get to just be characters first—when we give them the same complexity that we give to their straight counterparts and not reduce them to their sexuality."

Certain Dark Things: A Novel Shop Now

"Certain Dark Things is a vampire story set in Mexico City, and I think it has one of the most refreshing takes on vampire culture. It had all of the strengths of the vampire canon, all of the sensuality, all of the physicality of them, while feeling so steeped and immersed in a culture that we rarely get to see in a major genre. I thought it was just absolutely delicious. It's a book I bring up every time I get a chance."

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, Book 1 Shop Now

"The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is so intricate and so elegant at the same time, and I think that's why I love it. It's essentially a three-way power grab for a kingdom. But it also has gods magic, and power and a wonderful scope and scale without ever feeling overwhelming. It is my favorite of all of Jemisin's work."

"One of my favorite books of all time is Deathless. It's a fusion of Russian folklore: the tale of Koschei the Deathless, set during and after the Russian Revolution. It's one of the strangest books I've ever read. I read it years ago, and I still remember that it opens with a girl staring out her window as birds fall from a tree and turn into men who are trying to court her. It starts from there and only gets stranger and more magical."

The Library at Mount Char Shop Now

"This one earns the actual award for the weirdest book I've ever read. It is the story of a disaster, which leaves 12 children abandoned. Those 12 children are adopted by a god-like figure named The Father who installs them in his library where they each become the master of a different art. Several years later, they are evicted from the library without any understanding. It is very dark, pretty violent, and a very ambitious debut. I have never read anything like it in my entire life. It's the kind of book that you will either love or hate."

Nevernight: Book One of the Nevernight Chronicle Shop Now

"Nevernight is a very, very dark, very violent fantasy series starring an incredible female protagonist named Mia. The thing that I love is it has that element of magical school that we all grew up loving because of Harry Potter. But instead of a magical school, it's school for budding assassins and it is brutal. Mia is the kind of main character that five years ago we would have only reserved for male characters. She is an anti-heroine, she is difficult, she is violent, she is absolutely Slytherin, and she gets to possess a lot of the complexities that historically were not given to women because it made them 'unlikable.'"

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Shop Now

"It is the most psychologically traumatizing of the Harry Potter series. So many of the books deal with external adventure and conflict. This is a hinge book because—spoiler—it comes right after Cedric's death, and not only are we dealing with the aftermath of that kind of trauma, but it's when we learn that Harry has the psychic connection to Voldemort. That on top of Dolores Umbridge, who is the best villain of any of those books because she's a human kind of evil—you have met people like Dolores Umbridge."

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