Best Fantasy Books to Read This Year

“When you compare the sorrows of real life to the pleasures of the imaginary one, you will never want to live again, only to dream forever.”

This statement of Alexandre Dumas, a 19th-century French novelist and playwright, and the author of The Count of Monte Cristo, concisely summarises why human beings need fantasy books. Fantasy and fiction books provide a portal to another world, full of imagination and creativity, which allows people to escape for a brief period of time from the mundane reality of the empirical world. These books enhance our imagination and stretch our creative thinking beyond its general horizons. Besides that, popular fantasy novels help readers learn new terms and phrases, enriching their vocabulary. In this piece of writing, we, BooksWagon UAE, have provided a thoroughly researched enumeration of fantasy books, ranging from fantasy crime thrillers to historical fantasy books and fantasy and romance books. But before that, it is pertinent to understand what one will get by perusing these imaginary masterpieces.

Benefits of Reading Fantasy Books

Other than providing a window to look into the world of imaginary beings and beasts, Fantasy books have other immense and empirical benefits, such as improved comprehension skills, enriched vocabulary, enhanced creative and critical thinking, and many more. The following bullets can be skimmed to learn about why we should read fantasy books:

• Enhanced Creativity: While reading fantasy books, one needs to engage in a complex world-building process to understand them thoroughly. In this way, these imagination-based worlds of fiction enhance our creative thinking and expand the horizons of our imagination.
• Critical Thinking: Other than creativity, fantasy books also help readers to improve their critical thinking by immersing them in an imaginary but logical way and keep the nuances of the story in mind to connect them at necessary points.
• Escape From Reality: These books of make-believe things and events provide an escape from the mundane reality of this tangible world, which is, often, necessary and inevitable to keep the mind sane and active. Thus, they offer a safe ‘psychic’ distance to overcome the anxiety of the real world.
• Social Understanding: Fantasy books often reflect the realities of the tangible world, such as authoritarianism, fascism, religious bigotry, gender bias, and so on. In this way, these ephemeral manuscripts enhance our societal understanding and provide solutions to such real-world problems.

Other than these genre-specific gains, fantasy books also provide other generic benefits, such as enhanced vocabulary, improved reading and comprehension skills, better pronunciation, and so on. Now, after understanding their benefits, let us move to the list of the best fantasy books to order online in the UAE.

A Game of Thrones

Written by the American author and screenwriter George R.R. Martin and published in 1996, this popular fantasy book is the first in the series named ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ and narrates the story of a fictional world with two continents, viz., Westeros and Essos. This is an ongoing series in which five books – ‘A Game of Thrones’; ‘A Clash of Kings’; ‘A Storm of Swords’; ‘A Feast for Crows’; and ‘A Dance With Dragons’ – have been released, as of July 2026, and the last two books – ‘The Winds of Winter’ and ‘A Dream of Spring’ – are currently under-development. The first book of the series can be summarised under the following headings:

• Political Turmoil and the Royal Progress: This fantasy begins with the introduction of Ned Stark and his family, who rule the northern part of Westeros with their capital at Winterfell. After the death of his hand, Lord Arryn, King Robert Baratheon comes to Winterfell to offer the position of ‘Hand of the King’ to his friend Ned Stark. Ned accepts this offer and decides to move to King’s Landing with his two daughters – Arya and Sansa – out of whom, the elder daughter, Sansa Stark, is betrothed to the eldest son of King Robert, Joffrey Baratheon.
• Threat Beyond the Wall: There is a big wall of ice, protected by magic, in the north of Winterfell that divides the north into two parts – ‘The North’ and ‘Beyond the Wall’. North of the Wall, there are some outlaws called the ‘Freefolk’ and various supernatural beings, the most dangerous ones being the ‘White Walkers’, led by the ‘Night King’.
• The Essos and the Dragon: Across the narrow sea, there are two Targaryen siblings, Daenerys and Viserys. Boy Viserys is planning to take over the Iron Throne using the wild ‘Dothraki’ army, after marrying his sister to the Dothraki leader ‘Khal Drogo’.

The story is followed by further books, viz., ‘A Clash of Kings’; ‘A Storm of Swords’; ‘A Feast for Crows’, and so on.

A Monsoon Rising

Written by Thea Guanzon, this book is a follow-up to the book ‘The Hurricane Wars’. The book follows a couple, named Talasyn and Alaric, who are navigating through their lives after their forced marriage. The couple has to overcome their differences and fight against the burgeoning internal dissension and the ‘Moonless Dark’. The whole story can be understood through the following points:

• A Political Alliance: Talasyn, the heir to the Nenavarene Throne, is married to Alaric, the Emperor of shadow-wielding Kesathenese, intending to establish a perpetual peace between the two kingdoms. The two harbour no positive feelings for each other, thus making it more difficult to establish and maintain tranquillity.
• Dissensions and Betrayal: Alaric’s father, Regent King Gaheris, is plotting to end the light-weaving magic of Talasyn and keep her as a prisoner. Meanwhile, Talasyn’s comrades are also planning to overthrow Alaric from the throne of Kesathenese.
• The Moonless Dark: A forthcoming catastrophic supernatural event which requires the merger of the two opposing magical powers – the Lightweaving and the Shadow-wielding – harboured by Talasyn and Alaric, respectively.

The book ends with a cliffhanger wherein the two ‘enemies-to-lovers’, as the monsoon arrives, are trying to figure out their synergised magical powers and getting ready to face their enemy.

The Six of Crows

Published in 2015 and written by Leigh Bardugo, ‘The Six of Crows’ is one of the best contemporary fiction books, narrating about Kaz Brekker, a young man and the owner of a gambling club named the ‘Crow Club’, who is hired by a merchant, Van Eck, to rescue a scientist named Bo Yul-Bayur, who has recently discovered a new drug – Jurda Parem – to enhance the powers of magic-wielding people called Grishas. The following pointers can be read to understand the plot briefly:

• The Six: To complete the mission, Kaz gathers a team of five others, namely Inej, aka the ‘Wraith’, Jesper, a skilled marksman; Nina, a Grisha Heartrender, Matthias, a former Fjerdan soldier, and Wylan, an explosive expert and the son of Van Eck.
• The Rescue: The six teammates began their journey to sneak into the Ice Court, the fortress of Fjerda. There, they also met Kaz’s long-time nemesis, Pekka Rollins, who also came to free Bo but got caught by the Ice Court. Kaz first frees them, then goes back to his teammates to rescue the scientist.
• The Betrayal: Over time, Kaz comes to know about the plots of Van Eck, who, after learning that Kaz has handed over his son, Wylan, instead of Kuwei, the son of scientist Bo, takes Inej hostage.

The story culminates with a meeting between Kaz and Pekka Rollins. Rollins gives a large sum of money to Kaz in exchange for his shares in the Crows Club. After that, Kaz began his new adventure to rescue Inej.

When the Moon Hatched

Written by Sarah A. Parker, this romantic fiction book is the story of a deadly assassin, named Raeve, who is suffering from amnesia and also has some magical abilities underneath the memories of her present life of being a part of a rebel group. The detailed summary of the books can be understood by the following headlines:

• The Capture: Raeve works with a group of rebels called ‘Fiur du Ath’ and is living as a ‘null’ (magicless people) using an iron ring. While on a mission, things go slightly south, and Raeve is captured by a bounty hunter and imprisoned in the realm of Gore. There, she is joined by the king of the Burn realm – Kaan Vaegar – with whom she has a shared past.
• The Revelations: King Kaan, who was also on a covert mission to find out the ‘moonsherds’, is also captured and detained in the same prison as the Raeve. There, he identifies her and reveals that she harbours a strong magical power and that her real name is ‘Elluin Nevan ’-his lost wife.
• The Climax: As the story progresses, Raeve comes to know more about herself, her connection with Kaan, and her magical prowess. The story culminates with her moving ahead of her past, after killing Rekk, the bounty hunter who killed her friend Essi, and leaves Kaan and Dhoom, fearing emotional vulnerability she might face while living with them.

Fourth Wing

This fantasy fiction book is the story of a physically fragile scribe named Violet Sorrengail, who is forced by her war-general mother, Lilith Sorrengail, to join the Basgaith War College, a place where she has to train brutally, bond with a dragon, and overcome the treacheries of her classmates, all at once. Rebecca Yarros’ book can be understood by the following points:

• The Threshing: Threshing day is the day on which cadets have to bond with their dragon. Before that, Violet learned combat from her friend Rhiannon and the marked cadets at the instructions of her wing commander Xaden. Then, on threshing, she bonded with two dragons – a black dragon, Tairn and a golden dragon, Andrana.
• The War Games: As time progresses, Violet learns a lot of new things about her dragons and her nation, Navarre. The 2nd half of the treatise narrates the ‘War Games’-a deadly battle scenario against the magical beasts called Venin, in which Violet lost her close friend, Liam Mairi and got herself gravely wounded.
• The Climax: The book discloses some unsettling truths about Naverre: Her mother is hiding things from the public, and she executed the rebels who were fighting for their freedom instead of revolting against the nation. Also, her older brother, Brennen, is alive and fighting alongside Xaden. The book culminates with a cliffhanger wherein Violent is standing against the army of Venin at the gates of the college.

Some Honourable Mentions

Other than the five aforementioned books, there are various fantasy novels which you can refer to in order to broaden your imagination:- The series of ‘Harry Potter’ by J.K. Rowling; ‘The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings’ by J.R.R. Tolkien; ‘The Name of the Wind’ by Patrick Rothfuss; and ‘A Wizard of Earthsea’ by Ursula K. Le Guin are some of them.

Final Remarks

The genre of fantasy books is full of imagination and creativity, which are filled with logical and critical world-building. For those who are looking for some popular fantasy books, BooksWagon UAE is the one-stop solution. Here, you will get all the bestselling fiction books in the UAE at the most affordable rates with attractive discounts. We provide home delivery of books across Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, and other emirates with guaranteed quality assurances. There are books from all genres and categories, ranging from horror and romance to comedy and crime thriller books, from fiction and fantasy to historical novels. So, if you are also looking for some novels to quench your thirst for imagination and creativity, bookswagon.ae is the best online bookstore in the UAE for you to visit now.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1) What are the top 10 fiction books in the UAE?

Ans) ‘A Monsoon Rising’; ‘One Dark Window’; ‘A Game of Thrones’; ‘Circe’; ‘Fourth Wing’; ‘Starside’; When the Moon Hatched’; ‘Never Flinch’ by Stephen King; ‘The Six of Crows’; and ‘The Jasad Heir’ are the top 10 fiction books in the UAE.

Q2) Are fiction books relevant to the real world?

Ans) Well, yes, they are. They not only provide readers an escape from their mundane realities but also teach them to think creatively and critically, along with increasing their reading, writing, comprehension, and vocabulary skills.

Q3) Where can I order fantasy books online in Dubai?

Ans) BooksWagon UAE is one of the most trusted online bookstores in Dubai to order any kind of book online, be it fantasy books or horror novels, be it comics and manga or romantic novels, sci-fi books or historical adventure books.