Thirteen Non-Arthurian-Themed Fantasy Novels & Their Authors

We're familiar with the medieval fantasy theme of knights in shining armor riding their horses with their lances, broadswords and shields. We're also familiar with the hobbits, elves, orcs, crown-wearing kings and queens with bearded wizards leaning against their magical quarterstaff wearing conical hats and long robes. Well, thanks to Arthurian legends, J.R.R. Tolkien, Dungeons & Dragons role-playing games and books, and more recently, George R.R. Martin, these fantasy images are now etched in popular culture especially to a broader audience beyond books and into television shows and film.

Yet, what about fantasy novels with secondary worlds that do not draw on these medieval Western European or Arthurian images? What about stories and myths that draw on the folklore of the Russian rusalka, the Polish story of Rokita and Boruta, the Middle-Eastern night hag or baxtak, the king of goats or takam, or the myriad of stories from Asia from the Chinese Jade Emperor and superstitions to the Japanese yokai. Well, thanks to the Chicago Public Library, they've compiled a list of 13 fantasy novels that draw on these inspirations here. Let's take a look at what they're about.

Black Leopard, Red Wolf
by Marlon James
Published on 5 February, 2019

The first in a planned trilogy called The Dark Star Trilogy, Black Leopard, Red Wolf got its inspiration from African myths with political tensions, warring states and enmity among city-states and tribes around them. Story centers on a man known as Tracker who's been engaged to trace down a mysterious boy who disappeared three years ago. While he used to work alone, Tracker defies convention by being part of a search party, which includes Leopard, a shape-shifter, and Nyka, a skin-shedder and many others.

The rights to produce a film adaptation has been purchased by actor Michael B. Jordan (aka Killmonger from Black Panther) prior to the release of the book. The follow-up to the series, Moon Witch, Night Devil, currently has no firm release date (most sites list it as 2020).

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Children of Blood & Bone
by Tomi Adeyemi
Published on 6 March 2018

Adeyemi's debut young adult novel is part of a planned trilogy known as Legacy of Orisha. It follows heroine Zélie Adebola who tries to restore magic to the kingdom of Orisha after a brutal suppression of magic by a ruling class. In her adventure, she is joined by Tzain, her brother and Amari, a princess of Saran the King.

The book was inspired by West African mythology and novels like Harry Potter and An Ember in the Ashes. Its film adaptation right was purchased by Fox 2000 with one observer calling it 'one of the biggest YA debut novel publishing deals ever'.

Adeyemi's follow-up to the series, Children of Virtue and Vengeance, is expected to be published on 3 December 2019.

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Everfair
by Nisi Shawl
Published on 6 September 2016

Everfair, Shawl's first novel, takes place in a Neo-Victorian steampunk alternate history universe modeled after the late nineteeth/early twentieth centuries of African Congo, Europe and the United States.

The story revolves around a land named Everfair, which has become a safe Utopian-like haven for the natives of Congo, mistreated African natives and escaped slaves from America. As citizens of Everfair discover about steam technology earlier than everyone else, setting the stage for some international and domestic in-fighting and conflicts, the story gets told from multiple protagonists' perspectives, including Africans, Europeans, East Asians and African-Americans.

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Jade City
by Fonda Lee
Published on 7 November 2017

The first in the Green Bone Saga trilogy, Jade City is the nickname of Janloon, the capital city of Kekon, an island world. Inspired by Asian themes, Lee has described it as 'The Godfather with magic and kung fu' with inspirations from wuxia and gangster films.

The story happens at the end of the Many Nations War where the One Mountain Society (a liberation movement) fought to end foreign occupation of Kekon. When the OMS was disintegrated into several rival clans due to a dispute over international trade, a series of crimes occur between rival crime families such as the Mountain and No Peak clans. Kekon is the only supplier of jade, which endows its wearer with special abilities and powers. 

Jade City was the co-winner of the 2018 World Fantasy Award (it was tied with Victor LaVelle's The Changeling). The series follow-up, Jade War, is expected to be out on 23 July 2019.

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The Bear and the Nightingale
by Katherine Arden
Published on 10 January 2017

​The first and debut novel of Arden's Winternight trilogy, The Bear and the Nightingale follows the story of a young girl, Vasya, who has the ability to communicate with creatures from traditional folklore. This setting is made ever more tumultuous as Christianity began to take hold in the remote Russian villages.

The story weaves Russian folklore and Slavic mythology, challenging conflicting beliefs when it comes to tradition versus religion, especially when the story includes a devout and ambitious Christian priest character like Konstantin Nikonovich. 

​The follow-ups in the Winternight trilogy - The Girl in the Tower and The Winter of the Witch are both out as well.

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The City of Brass
by S.A. Chakraborty
Published on 14 November 2017

Set in an alternative 18th century Middle-East, The City of Brass is the first book in a series called The Daevabad Trilogy. The story follows Nahri, a talented con woman who is not only skilled in palm reading and sleight of hand, but is able to summon mystical creatures, one of whom is a djinn warrior named Dara.

With imagery similar to One Thousand and One Arabian Nights, one reviewer summarizes by saying The City of Brass has plenty of djinnish magic, human loves and fears and Middle Eastern Machiavellianism. If you've always thought that Disney's Aladdin is the closest and most familiar you'll ever get to Middle-Eastern fables, expect The City of Brass to take you away and farther beyond that.

​Chakraborty's follow-up, The Kingdom of Copper, is currently out.

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The Fifth Season
by N. K. Jemisin
Published on 4 August 2015

Winner of the 2016 Hugo Award for Best Novel (and a first for an African-American to win), N. K. Jemisin's The Fifth Season is the first of the Broken Earth trilogy. Her follow-ups - The Obelisk Gate and The Stone Sky - won back-to-back Hugo Awards for Best Novel in 2017 and 2018 respectively.

The story happens on a major landmass called the Stillness where every few centuries, its population has to go through a "Fifth Season", or catastrophic climate change. The societies in the Stillness are separated into "comms" and "use-castes", such as the Orogenes - people who can control energy like the ground and temperature (think earthquakes and body heat) - and the Guardians - warriors, hunters tasked to hunt down and control the orogenes.

​The Fifth Season is currently being adapted for television by TNT. 

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The Grace of Kings
by Ken Liu
Published on 7 April 2015

Part of a series called The Dandelion Dynasty, The Grace of Kings is a story about two men who rebelled against tyranny only to become rivals. Kuni Garu, a charming bandit and Mata Zyndu, a fearless but deposed son of a duke, are friends on fighting adventures against large army conscripts, silk-draped airships and shapeshifting gods.

​When the emperor is overthrown, they find themselves leading separate factions with different ideologies and justice systems. The novel won the 2016 Locus Award for Best First Novel. Liu's follow-up to the series, The Wall of Storms, is currently out.

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The Poppy War
by Rebecca F. Kuang
Published on 1 May 2018

Inspired by the politics of mid-20th-century China, such as the Second Sino-Japanese War and atmosphere of the Song dynasty, The Poppy War is a story about a poor orphan called Rin who has to train in secret to join the elite Sinegard Academy.

Kuang had intended for Rin's life to mirror the life-path of China's former premiere Mao Zedong. With groundwork based on the history of wars in China and a fantasy drug based around the Opium Wars, this is one grimdark fantasy of nation conflicts, wars, shamanic powers and humanity.

Kuang sold the novel to Harper Voyager when she was only twenty-years old. Her sequel, The Dragon Republic, is expected to be released on 22 July 2019.

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Throne of the Crescent Moon
by Saladin Ahmed
Published on 7 February 2012

The first of The Crescent Moon Kingdoms series, Throne of the Crescent Moon won the Locus Award for Best First Novel in 2013. The book follows Doctor Adoulla Makhslood, an old and retiring 'ghul' hunter from the city of Dhamsawaat, who is forced out of it to face a dark sorcerer. With his assistant, a warrior sworn to the holy path, Raseed bas Rassed, the Doctor has to form a party to face the sorcerer, while political troubles in the city escalate.

​Ahmed's follow-up to the series, The Thousand and One, has been listed for release on 31 December 2019 on some sites.

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Uprooted
by Naomi Novik
Published on May 2015

Unlike Novik's other fantasy series (eg. Temeraire), Uprooted is a standalone young adult novel that focuses on the life of Agnieszka, who is born into a "tribute year", where every ten years, the local wizard called The Dragon, picks a teenage girl from the villages of the kingdom of Polnya as payment for protecting the valley from evil monsters from The Wood. When Agnieszka gets chosen, she begins to demonstrate an affinity to learning magic, forming a close but equally strained bond with The Dragon.

Uprooted won the 2016 Nebula Award for Best Novel, the 2016 Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel and the 2016 Mythopoeic Award in the category Adult Literature. The book owes much inspiration from Polish and Slavic folklore and culture, as Novik's mother is Polish. In 2015, Warner Brothers purchased the rights to the book with talkshow host Ellen DeGeneres to produce the movie adaptation.

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Vita Nostra
by Marina & Sergey Dyachenko
Published on 13 November 2018

First published in Ukraine in 2007, Vita Nostra follows Alexandra (Sasha) Samokhina as she is bribed and manipulated by a mysterious man named Farit Kozhennikov to do sinister and scandalous acts before enrolling her into the Institute of Special Technologies set in a remote village. In the university, Sasha learns that the school is not what she thinks it should be but somehow, feels that she is meant to be there, which comes at a terrible price.

The novel takes its title from the lyrics of a Latin song called the Gaudeamus igitur, where Vita Nostra means Our Life or The Brief Life. Vita Nostra is the first novel of a theme called the Metamorphosis Cycle. The cycle's follow-ups, Brevis Est, or Digital (2009) and the sci-fi novel Brevi Finietur, or Migrant (2010) are out (in Ukrainian and/or Russian, but we cannot confirm if there are translated English editions).

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Who Fears Death
by Nnedi Okorafor
Published on 1 June 2010

A science fantasy novel that won the 2011 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel and the 2010 Carl Brandon Kindred Award, Who Fears Death happens in a post-apocalyptic future version of Africa's Sudan, where light-skinned Nuru people oppresses the dark-skinned Okeke people.

Story follows Onyesonwu (her name translates as 'who fears death' in the Nigerian Igbo language), a child born of an Okeke woman raped by a Nuru man, as she embarks on her quest to defeat her sorcerer-father with her magical powers.

The novel is currently in early development for adaptation into a TV series at HBO with George R. R. Martin serving as executive producer and Selwyn Seyfu Hinds as scriptwriter.

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