9 Children's Books Filled With Fantasy
I was an only child until days before my seventh birthday, so I learned the companionship of a magic land from early on. There was the coat cupboard in the hallway of our Arts and Crafts house, which extended way past the slithering coats, and could take you to the snowy wilds of Narnia if you closed your eyes hard enough. There was my grandmother’s painting studio, above her garage, where we sailed on ocean liners, attended balls, she, often lady-in-waiting to my bossy, six-year-old queen. There were fairies nestling in the rock thyme by her house, the sea whispering secrets.
Much of this formative fantasy and only child-ness found its way into my first book for children, Madame Badobedah, along with a friendship that transcends age. I realize now, as a grownup, that when I was a little girl, out of circumstance, my playmates were most often compelling old ladies, our playground: imagined lands. And, how my book became an unwitting celebration of both. “Children’s books,” writes the author Katherine Rundell, “are not a hiding place, they are a seeking place.” And so, in the spirit of seeking, of fierce dames and enchanted cupboards, I give you some books that stoked my fire as a child and today as a parent, with magical lands at their heart.
Picture Books
Where The Wild Things Are(opens in new window)
Sendak’s classic, which so brilliantly captures how your room can turn into a strange place on your imagination’s watch, how you can be King of the Wild Things, but still be lonely, and sail through days and weeks, yet return home, to where someone loves you best of all.
Another(opens in new window)
A wordless dreamy beauty in which parallel lives are lived, with gorgeous illustrations bringing this vivid adventure to life.
Pool(opens in new window)
Another picture book with no words, featuring a rich fantastical underwater world nonetheless. With real life sea creatures, passing deities, and expansive use of space, this delight is like a folkloric episode of Blue Planet!
Comet in Moominland(opens in new window)
I love the utter fantasy of Moomin, and the maverick spirit of Tove Jansson who created these graphic novels, originally a comic strip, in the 1940s.
Julián is a Mermaid(opens in new window)
I couldn’t love this book more — it’s so clever, breathtakingly illustrated and one of the most tender portrayals of acceptance and love I’ve come across. I cry every time I read it to my kids! Jessica Love’s illustrations dance off the page, and I want to be in Julián’s (and the mermaids!) world.
The Truth Pixie(opens in new window)
A totally enchanting long form picture book about being yourself. Matt Haig always get to the heart of it.
Young Readers
The Wolves of Willoughby Chase(opens in new window)
Aiken’s book, set in a fictional Georgian Britain, is dark, menacing and wondrous. It tells of two cousins, their wicked governess Miss Slighcarp, and their quest to right her villainy.
Tom’s Midnight Garden(opens in new window)
When his brother is ill, Tom is sent away to his aunt and uncle’s for the summer, and he knows he’ll be bored silly. But then the grandfather clock strikes thirteen and he finds himself in a garden that everyone has said doesn’t exist….
The Dark is Rising series(opens in new window)
“Expect nothing and fear nothing, here or anywhere. That’s your first lesson,” wrote Susan Cooper, in her epic tale of good and evil, where magic and fantasy collide with the familiar. Cooper is the Don of fantasy fiction, and this series is captivating.
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