Sometimes it’s nice to ease into a story one toe at a time. Like a warm bath, or a chilly swimming pond, we can absorb the setting slowly, ponder over the themes, skip word by word through verdant sentences.
Sometimes, though, it’s hard to shake the restless, or listless, feeling of needing something to tug us up and out of the comfortable world we’re in. Sometimes we want an adventure to take us by both hands, and, with a grin, pull.
These are stories in the latter category. Not only do they drag you right in to a world of fantasy, peril, and mayhem, they bring their main characters in with as little preparation—it’s nice to have some company in bewilderment.
From gravesides to outer space, evil unicorns to swamp monsters, here are six different worlds that will grab you by the hand and not let go. Tread with care, and make sure you pack a good lunch!
1. Only You Can Save Mankind, by Terry Pratchett
What if the video game you were playing had intergalactic consequences?
Johnny Maxwell only wanted to lose himself in a simple game of shooting aliens, but finds that he’s in over his head when those very aliens start surrendering and attempting diplomacy.
The shift from shopping mall conversations to spaceship battles in this tale is as subtle and full of wonder as it is laden with consequence and far-reaching questions of conscience. In spite of some heavy themes, though, this is an integrally fun book.
2. Skulduggery Pleasant, by Derek Landy
It’s not every day an ancient and skeletal sorcerer sweeps into your life and pulls you into a world of magic and mystery. When Stephanie Edgley goes to her late uncle’s estate to hear the reading of his will, her family is perplexed by the appearance of a total stranger who always hides his face. Stephanie herself is drawn into the mystery when she realizes that her uncle has been murdered–and for reasons bridging the gap between the magical and the mundane.
I’ve only read the first two books in this (very long) series, but they’ve both been simmering with wit and excitement. There’s a vivacious joy of adventure in this story that just sweeps you up and holds you close through the entire wild ride.
3. Nightbooks, by J. A. White
Scary stories are young Alex’s life’s work. Notebooks upon notebooks of them, every one unique.
But scary stories aren’t something other people are prone to understand. They’re what makes him different, what makes him weird. Alex is heading down to the boiler room of his parent’s apartment complex, ready to burn every last one.
He’s interrupted by the elevator landing on the wrong floor, and a strange invitation that he can’t help but accept. Lured into a witch’s lair, Alex finds himself kidnapped and forced to tell stories for his keep while he frantically searches for a way out of the trap.
One of the darker stories on this list, this is also one of the softer and more compassionate. This book tells the tale of why we love stories, why we need them, and of why we need one another.
4. The Grave-Robber’s Apprentice, by Allan Stratton
Hans washed ashore in a wooden box and found himself adopted by an aged, crotchety grave-robber. That’s not a beginning in life anyone would envy, or one that should really be expected to lead to someone, say—aiding a young countess as she flees an evil archduke, or running from your life from an undead necromancer. But that’s just life, isn’t it?
This story holds all the wild delight of a book of fairy tales, with enough mortal peril to keep anyone glued to the page.
5. Alcatraz vs the Evil Librarians, by Brandon Sanderson
Alcatraz Smedry has thought of himself as being under a curse his whole life. He breaks things by touching them—not the most desirable trait in a foster child. No home keeps him for very long.
But when an old man in a tuxedo arrives and claims to be Alcatraz’s grandfather on the other side of a war over magic and information, Alcatraz finds himself caught up in an adventure.
The deeply funny and emotional start to an amazing series, this book pulls you into a world of magical sand, talking dinosaurs, and flying penguins, and is a complete and utter delight.
6. Boys of Blur, by N.D. Wilson
In the thick muck and sugar cane fields of the Florida everglades, young Charlie Reynolds has enough problems on his plate. The move to a new state, a burgeoning relationship with his step-father, and a new friend in the form of his step-cousin. But adventure and danger don’t wait for anyone, and the thing that lurks in the wetlands has a hold of Charlie’s scent, now. It won’t let him go.
This book makes you feel the humid haze of its setting in a way that makes the whole story seem as solid and inescapable as the mud underfoot. The fantastical elements of the story are brought into vivid, haunting life, and it’s a story that will not let you go.
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