Through the Wardrobe: Award-Winning Fantasy Books for Beginners

Why it’s here: Winner of the Women's Prize, and shortlisted for the Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. Piranesi lives in a house of endless halls lined with thousands of statues, where an ocean is imprisoned and tides thunder up the staircases. The only other person he knows is the Other, who visits twice a week. Susanna Clarke's short, strange and beautiful novel feels like nothing else you've read.

Perfect for: Readers who like short, atmospheric novels and a mystery that unfolds slowly.

Why it’s here: Shortlisted for the Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. New York, 1899: a golem made of clay arrives on a ship and is taken in by a rabbi on the Lower East Side, while a few streets away a tinsmith accidentally frees a jinni, a being of fire trapped in a flask for a thousand years. Helene Wecker's novel is as much about immigrant life in old New York as it is about magic.

Perfect for: Readers who love historical fiction and stories about outsiders finding their place.

Why it’s here: Shortlisted for the Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. A man returns to the lane where he grew up and sits by a pond that his childhood friend Lettie Hempstock once claimed was an ocean - and the strange events of one long-ago summer come flooding back. Neil Gaiman's short novel is about memory, childhood fear and the magic that adults forget.

Perfect for: Readers who like coming-of-age stories and can finish a book in one sitting.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Nebula Award, and shortlisted for the Hugo and World Fantasy Awards. Agnieszka's village lies beside the corrupted Wood, and its only protection is a cold wizard called the Dragon - who, every ten years, takes one young woman from the valley to serve him. Naomi Novik's novel draws on Polish folklore and has the pull of a fairy tale you half remember from childhood.

Perfect for: Readers who grew up on Grimm and want a story with dark woods and real stakes.

Why it’s here: Shortlisted for the Hugo and Nebula Awards. A retelling of Rumpelstiltskin: Miryem, a moneylender's daughter, is so good at her work that a rumour spreads she can turn silver into gold - and it reaches the king of the winter fairies, who sets her an impossible challenge. Naomi Novik weaves several women's stories together into a rich, wintry tale that stands entirely on its own.

Perfect for: Readers who like retellings and stories told from several sides.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Hugo Award. Marra, the shy, convent-raised third daughter, realises that no one is coming to rescue her sisters from the prince who mistreats them - so she sets out to do it herself. A gravewitch offers her the means, if she can complete three impossible tasks. T. Kingfisher's fairy tale is dark and very funny, with a reluctant fairy godmother and a demon-possessed chicken.

Perfect for: Readers who want a fairy tale with a sharp sense of humour and an unlikely heroine.

Why it’s here: Shortlisted for the Hugo and Nebula Awards. After decades of adventuring, Viv the orc barbarian hangs up her sword to open the first coffee shop in the city of Thune, with a gruff hob carpenter and a shy baker whose cinnamon rolls are to die for. Travis Baldree's short, cosy novel is low on danger and high on comfort - a perfect first taste of a fantasy world.

Perfect for: Readers who love feel-good novels about found family and starting over.

Why it’s here: Shortlisted for the Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. The half-goblin youngest son of the Emperor, has spent his whole life in exile - until his father and three half-brothers die in an 'accident' and he must take the throne, with no friends, no allies and no idea how court politics work. Katherine Addison's novel is about a kind young man trying to stay kind in a palace full of intrigue.

Perfect for: Readers who enjoy court dramas and a hero you can't help rooting for.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Hugo Award. When a baby escapes the man who has come to kill his family, he finds safety in the local graveyard and is brought up by its ghosts. Neil Gaiman follows Bod from babyhood to adolescence, one chapter every two years - a book written for younger readers that adults love just as much.

Perfect for: Readers who want something gentle and spooky - and a book to share with older children.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Hugo, Nebula and Bram Stoker Awards. Hours before he is released from prison, Shadow Moon learns that his wife has been killed. On the flight home he meets a stranger who seems to know him, claims to be an ancient god - and offers him a job. Neil Gaiman sends them on a road trip across America, where the old gods brought over by immigrants are still living among us.

Perfect for: Readers who like road novels and mythology, and don't mind a little darkness.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Hugo and World Fantasy Awards, and longlisted for the Booker Prize. In nineteenth-century England, the reclusive Mr Norrell sets out to bring back English magic - until a younger rival, Jonathan Strange, appears and becomes his pupil. Susanna Clarke writes like a fantasy Jane Austen, footnotes and all. A big book to settle into for the winter.

Perfect for: Readers who love classic English novels and long books with wit and footnotes.

Why it’s here: Winner of the Nebula Award. In 1828, Robin Swift, orphaned in Canton, is brought to London and trained for years to study at Oxford's Royal Institute of Translation - Babel - where the meaning lost in translation powers magic silver bars that make the British Empire unstoppable. R. F. Kuang's novel is a dark academia story about language, colonialism and loyalty.

Perfect for: Readers who loved The Secret History and want a novel of ideas with real anger in it.