10 Great Gothic Fantasy Books To Pick Up This Fall

A good gothic read can set the mood for the fall season if one sees it as a time of spooky activity and books that perfectly blend horror and fantasy. The gothic genre is generally defined by visions of gothic architecture — although when the set dressings don’t strictly adhere to this style, it’s still all about old buildings and dark academia. Yet “gothic” may be just the tone of the story, with enigmatic characterizations, a dark palette, and explorations of evil, knowledge, and power.

Readers eagerly await the biggest fantasy books coming out in October 2024, but atmospheric novels new and old will enable everyone to get into the seasonal spirit. A handful of classic novels inform nearly all modern gothic writing, defining the subgenre with dramatic monsters and period set pieces. Therefore, there is also some overlap between the best gothic books and the best historical fantasy books, often engaging with devastating historical events.

10 The Familiar

By Leigh Bardugo

Large parts of Leigh Bardugo’s career as a YA icon, penning multiple BookTok books that deserve the hype, demonstrate gothic undertones. Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom have more of an Industrial Revolution setting, but in a gritty city inhabited by criminal masterminds where crows abound, the subgenre is present. Ninth House exhibits all the trappings of a gothic, dark academia story, depicting the unethical supernatural activities of the elite societies at Yale University.

The Familiar will instantly intrigue Bardugo fans, set during the Spanish Golden Age. The new book follows a young woman who is used by aristocrats for her supernatural gifts until she jumps at the chance to increase her own power. Luzia Cotado meets with alchemists, seers, and the like in this historical fantasy dealing with the religious politics of the time. Walking the line between themes of survival and ambition, Bardugo creates another enthralling fantasy story.

9 Clockwork Angel

By Cassandra Clare

There are plenty of elegant characters, costumes, and set pieces throughout the prequel trilogy, plus shadowy monsters and tragic curses.

The first time Cassandra Clare moved her Shadowhunters society into a period setting, she instantly had another hit. Following Tessa Gray as she travels to London to find her brother, Clockwork Angel dives straight into a steampunk fantasy Victorian playground, with new and old faces. The stratified underground society of demon hunters introduced in The Mortal Instruments translates well into the Victorian era, a setting remembered for its strict rules.

The Infernal Devices is also a series that enjoyably solves the love triangle by not having the heroine caught between two suitors choose at all. There are plenty of elegant characters, costumes, and set pieces throughout the prequel trilogy, plus shadowy monsters and tragic curses. Clockwork Angel is the beginning of an indulgent gothic adventure, leading into the similarly-toned Edwardian era The Last Hours trilogy.

8 One Dark Window

By Rachel Gillig

Readers see the two staple settings of the gothic genre on the two covers of The Shepherd King duology: domineering castles and twisting forests. The two-installment structure has been gaining traction in the book industry, allowing some amazing fantasy book duologies to exist. One such duology is One Dark Window and Two Twisted Crows, the setting of which is a cursed kingdom shrouded in an ever-present mist, calling back to the foggy moors of The Secret Garden and the shadowy castle of Dracula.

One Dark Window features a unique magic system and monster. “Providence Cards” grant power to those who collect them, while the main character Elspeth hosts a being she calls the “Nightmare” in her head.One Dark Window plays with familiar themes of the cost of magic, as Elspeth’s monster grants her protection but consumes her mind, and she and a mysterious highwayman set out to save the kingdom of Blunder from dark magic.

7 Pantomime

By Laura Lam

Set in an alternative world that vaguely resembles Victorian England, Pantomime and its two sequels follow an intersex protagonist and a troupe of dynamic circus-inspired characters. Having been raised by affluent parents to be the perfect debutante, Gene runs away when she discovers that they are planning to have her undergo surgery without her consent. Adopting the name Micah Grey and going forward mostly using masculine pronouns, the hero of this story becomes an acrobat in a circus.

Micah is at home in these new circumstances but is haunted by visions of a lost civilization and has strange, growing powers. The Micah Grey trilogy features valuable LGBTQ+ representation and depictions of tensions between outsiders and their families that show how complicated such a situation can be. The characters find lovely bits of empowerment in stories and performances in a series defined by ephemeral things.

6 A Study In Drowning

By Ava Reid

A Study in Drowning digs its claws into the architectural aspects that are the traditional conception of the gothic genre when the protagonist is the only female architecture student at a famous college. Having gone through multiple traumatic experiences in life, Effy Sayre has always turned to the subverted fairy tale novel Angharad for comfort. This plot point is the basis for Ava Reid’s profound take on how art can save a person’s life.

The story takes off when Effy wins a once-in-a-lifetime chance to redesign Angharad‘s author’s crumbling estate. Finding herself at odds with a literary student who wants to expose the author as a fraud at this haunted house, Effy discovers the magical (not in a good way) truth behind her favorite book. A Study in Drowning leverages another alternative world and a story-within-a-story plot to support its main theme of brutal sexism.

5 Babel, Or The Necessity Of Violence

By Rebecca Kuang

Babel takes place at the beginning of the Victorian era, amid the medieval structures of Oxford University (many of which are showcased in Wonka). However, Babel is less about enjoying the visual splendor of this town, using fantasy as a means to expose the university’s imperialistic practices during the 19th and 20th centuries. A variety of students, several of whom come from England’s colonies, are recruited to study linguistic magic to further the empire’s power.

Babel is a recent fantasy book with one of the most unique magic systems, as how the magic the characters study works is intrinsically affected by modernization, prompting England to turn to the colonies for new languages. While Robin Swift and his classmates enjoy life as students, they are unable to ignore the truth about their education. Babel has a gothic tone with its dark academia and period setting but recounts a harshly enlightening narrative.

4 An Education In Malice

By S. T. Gibson

An Education in Malice is even more thought-provoking, heavily inspired by Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, the vampire novel that predates Dracula by 25 years.

S. T. Gibson’s career so far is an ambitious answer to classic vampire novels. Gibson’s debut novel A Dowry of Blood was the beloved reimagining of Dracula from long before Lucy Undying became one of the biggest fantasy books of September 2024. However, An Education in Malice is even more thought-provoking, heavily inspired by Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, the vampire novel that predates Dracula by 25 years. This forgotten book follows a young woman named Laura hunted by a vampire named Carmilla.

Meanwhile, An Education in Malice depicts Laura Sheridan developing a complicated relationship with her classmate Carmilla at Saint Perpetua’s College in 1960s Massachusetts. With a romance to rival some of the best enemies-to-lovers fantasy books ever and a hypothetical take on the power dynamics entwined with supernatural desires, An Education in Malice is an alluring read. Now that the Twilight-True Blood-Vampire Diaries phase is mostly in the past, novels like this are exploring the true potential of the vampire genre.

3 City Of Strife

By Claudie Arseneault

LGBTQ+ representation in fantasy literature has been steadily increasing for the past 20 years, but Claudie Arseneault’s writing is still hugely underrated in this regard. Set in the fantasy city Isandor, the “City of Spires,”City of Strife‘s cast covers a diverse range of queer characters grappling with identity and duty. Assassins, aristocrats, politicians, and emissaries harbor various hopes and prejudices, influenced by magical studies and an outside evil empire.

City of Strife is not a typical gothic fantasy book, but its covers and those of its three sequels are emblazoned with vignettes of the city’s architecture, the picture of a gothic setting. When the dark academia-primed location of Oxford is known as the “City of Dreaming Spires,” the genre connection comes naturally. City of Strife is only the first in a complex fantasy series of many perspectives, reminiscent of Game of Thrones’ structure (albeit focused on one setting).

2 Gallant

By V. E. Schwab

The bestselling author of an extensive list of fantasy titles claims several that might be considered gothic. The Shades of Magic series’ period London setting and dark supernatural plots come to mind; The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue lacks the subgenre’s typical trappings but might satisfy fans with its Faustian bargain storyline. However, Gallant has a mysteriously unclear setting, a haunted house, and a family secret to be uncovered by a shrewd outcast.

In Gallant, orphaned Olivia Prior has spent her entire life in a girls’ school until she is mysteriously invited to her fantastical family estate of Gallant, where she oddly feels at home. Ostracized by family members and reading through her mother’s diaries, Olivia sets out to piece together generations of family history. A girl who has only wanted a place to belong will soon have to take her place in a position of massive responsibility — with the world itself at stake.

1 Starling House

By Alix E. Harrow

The Southern gothic follow-up to The Once and Future Witches, Starling House gives gothic fans another haunted house with another brooding inhabitant and a newcomer who is right at home in the spooky setting. Opal has raised her brother in the mining town of Eden, Kentucky, struggling to make ends meet and hoping that he will find a life elsewhere. The town has a reprehensible history, but the present-day residents tend to blame their problems on the cursed Starling House.

However, Opal is drawn to the house and ends up getting a job there as a cleaner, where she finds out about the tragic life of the children’s author who once lived there. The house once again becomes a key part of the plot, as Opal is thrust into more responsibility of protecting the world from what lies there. Demonstrating themes of loneliness and hardship, Starling House is also an intriguing new read — yet only one option for those who love the enigmatic nature of the gothic.

Source: goodreads.com