Top 16 Fantasy Books For Teens Updated 04 /2024

A lot of great fantasy books have been written for young adults in the last decade alone. But there are so many good stories out there that you might have missed some of the best.

Here are 25 of the best fantasy books for people of all ages to read. They're both new and old, and they have everything from love triangles to mythical creatures, fantastical worlds to magic that lives in our own world.

The Wrath & the Dawn

by Renée Ahdieh

During the night, Khalid, the 18-year-old ruler of Khorasan, takes a new wife. At dawn, he kills her and moves on to the next one. As long as 16-year-old Shahrzad is willing to marry Khalid, the caliph will keep killing women, including Shahrzad's best friend. The Rose and the Dagger is the next book in the series.

The Kingdom of Back

by Marie Lu

For some people, Marie Lu is best known for her sci-fi series Legend, but she's just as good with this fantasy book about a real person: Nannerl, the older sister of Amadeus Mozart, who has been forgotten by history. It will be over for Nannerl's career as soon as she's old enough to get married unless she accepts the pricey deal from a mysterious stranger.

Born Wicked

by Jessica Spotswood

 

Born Wicked, the first book in Spotswood's three-book Cahill Witch Chronicles, is set in an alternate history of the United States. It brings the witch hunts of early colonial America into turn-of-the-20th-century New England, where witches work together to protect themselves and each other from the Brotherhood, an anti-witchcraft group. Cate has sisterhood bonds with many of the girls and young women she meets, even though the story is about the Cahill sisters. Magic is used in Born Wicked to look at these bonds of sisterhood and all of their ups and downs.

The Guinevere Deception

by Kiersten White

King Arthur and Princess Guinevere get married in the first book in the Camelot Rising series. Merlin made the marriage happen to keep King Arthur and the kingdom of Camelot safe. The people of Camelot want a new way of life, but Guinevere is a changeling who has to deal with the rigid rules of royalty while they want a new way of life, too.

Half Bad

by Sally Green

Nathan is a strange person. He is both a white and black witch, the illegitimate son of the most dangerous witch in the world, and has a power that isn't like the magic most people know. Nathan is in a cage and being hunted by everyone. He knows he must get out before his 17th birthday, when he can get three gifts from his powerful and dangerous father. That's why Nathan has to find his father and stay away from people who want to keep him locked up for good. There is more of Nathan's story in The Half Bad Trilogy, which is for people who like this one.

Seraphina

by Rachel Hartman

This is Rachel Hartman's first book for teenagers, and it won an award. It takes them into a world where dragons and humans live together, even as tensions between them grow. There are two people in this story: a dragon mother who can take on human form and a human father who doesn't like dragons. Seraphina is a mix of both of these people. Seraphina was asked to help investigate the death of a member of the royal family with a very smart prince. If she doesn't keep her ancestry a secret, she could lose her own life. With themes that are relevant today, Seraphina is a great book for young people who want to read about magic and fairy tales. Fans can buy the next book, Shadow Scale.

Wicked Fox

by Kat Cho

As an 18-year-old, Miyoung looks like any other girl in Seoul, but she's a gumiho: a nine-tailed fox that lives off the energy of men. During the night, Miyoung meets a human boy named Jihoon in the forest. The encounter costs Miyoung her fox bead, which means that she will never die. When Jihoon and Miyoung become more close, their world is threatened by powerful forces from the past. This threat grows even bigger in the sequel, Vicious Spirits.

Squire

by Tamora Pierce

If you are a big fan of Tamora Pierce, you should read her books all the time. I especially like the Protector of the Small series for teenagers. Keladry of Mindelan is the first girl to try to become a knight after the laws of Tortall changed to allow it. In Squire, she's passed the trials of a probationary year and the final exam for pages, and now she can become a knight. Even more obstacles await her as she moves on to becoming a knight: finding a knight who will take her on as his squire, facing the people who don't want her to succeed, and following her heart to become a lady knight.

A Phoenix First Must Burn

edited by Patrice Caldwell

Sixteen powerful authors follow in the footsteps of Octavia Butler in this fantastical, otherworldly anthology that looks at "Black girl magic, resistance, and hope." Whether the stories are set in the past or the future, in magical worlds or right here at home, they all have a lot of energy.

The Reader

by Traci Chee

After Sefia's father was killed in a brutal way, she and her aunt ran away into the wild. Then, when her aunt disappears, Sefia has only a mysterious rectangular object from her father to point out that they both went to the same place, and she doesn't know where they went. Sefia soon finds out what the object is: It's a book, the first one she's ever seen in her whole life. When she finds out that her father was killed, she goes on a journey to find out why and to find out what her own fate will be, too.

Rebel of the Sands

by Alwyn Hamilton

As a talented gunslinger, Amani has no desire more than to get out of the backwater town of Dustwalk, where her status and poverty keep her in a never-ending loop. But when a foreigner named Jin shows up in Dustwalk, Amani's world explodes, giving her a way to get out on the back of a mythical horse. Amani had no idea that magic still existed in the world, and that magic might be a part of her, too. Starts a three-books-long series. Rebel of the Sands is the first.

Fireborne

by Rosaria Munda

Annie and Lee were both orphaned by the same uprising that overthrew the aristocracy. They are now training to join the governing body of dragonriders, which is made up of dragonriders. But when members of the old regime try to get back in power, the friends have to make big decisions about their lives. Will Lee betray his new family and go back to his aristocratic roots? It also doesn't say whether Annie will take care of him. In book two of the Aurelian Cycle series, the high-flying war is still going on.

Rebel Belle

by Rachel Hawkins

Harper Price was born to wear a crown at her homecoming party because she was meant to. Then, this Southern belle becomes a Paladin, a member of a long line of guardians who have superhuman fighting skills. When Harper finds out that she has to protect one of her least favorite students at school, things get a little more complicated. In Rebel Belle, the first book in a young-adult series that blends Buffy the Vampire Slayer's supernatural charm with a dash of the South.

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