My Top 5 Favorite Books with Fairytale Vibes ✨🧚Book Recommendations
Anyone who knows me well (and those of you that don’t, buckle up buttercups!) knows how much I absolutely adore fairytales. Anything that has even the slightest hint that it might by some stretch of the imagination might be able to be construed into a fairytale, I like. This applies, of course, to some of my favorite reads. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I was a Disney kid growing up or maybe its because Alice in Wonderland is the basis for my entire existence. Either way, I love me a good fairytale / fairytale retelling. My thesis novel, Land of Shadow and Thorn, is actually a retelling mixture of Sleeping Beauty and Rapunzel!
But some of my favorites are ones that you wouldn’t think of as being fairytale retellings unless you really put it under the magnifying glass. Only one of them on this list follows that particular definition, while all the others are simply stories unrelated to fairytales but still give off the vibe that they could be fairytales if they wanted to. Either way, I’m a happy camper.
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable and quiet life. His contentment is disturbed one day when the wizard, Gandalf, and the dwarves arrive to take him away on an adventure.
Smaug certainly looked fast asleep, when Bilbo peeped once more from the entrance. He was just about to step out on to the floor when he caught a sudden thin ray of red from under the drooping lid of Smaug’s left eye. He was only pretending to sleep! He was watching the tunnel entrance!
Whisked from his comfortable hobbit-hole by Gandalf the wizard and a band of dwarves. Bilbo Baggins finds himself caught up in a plot to raid the treasure hoard of Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon.
What I really enjoy about the Hobbit is the complete and absolute vibes. When you read it, it feels like you’re sitting in an old room with a fireplace roaring in the background, casting a dim light across the floor. Someone is in the kitchen preparing a nice, warm meal and J.R.R. Tolkien is sitting in a rocking chair in the room with you. He’s holding a long pipe and leisurely smokes as he tells you this fantastical story about Bilbo Baggins.
The Hobbit isn’t a fairytale, but Jesus Christ it really could be. It has that decadent, whimsical feeling that I personally love in my not-fairytale fairytale-vibed books. Tolkien also fleshed out Middle Earth so absolutely that it feels like you could easily just step into the world and walk right beside Bilbo as he goes on his fantastical journey.
“There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”
Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
Speaking to us with the wisdom of age and in a voice at once haunting and startlingly immediate, Nitta Sayuri tells the story of her life as a geisha. It begins in a poor fishing village in 1929, when, as a nine-year-old girl with unusual blue-gray eyes, she is taken from her home and sold into slavery to a renowned geisha house. We witness her transformation as she learns the rigorous arts of the geisha: dance and music; wearing kimono, elaborate makeup, and hair; pouring sake to reveal just a touch of inner wrist; competing with a jealous rival for men's solicitude and the money that goes with it.
Memoirs of a Geisha is the blueprint for what I hope to achieve in my own writing.
Book reviews don’t get much better than that, do they? (lol)
Seriously though, the way Arthur Golden writes Memoirs of a Geisha is phenomenal. It’s haunting, its lyrical, and best of all: it’s a Cinderella retelling! And, honestly, probably the only Cinderella retelling that I actually fully enjoy. Now, I don’t know if Golden intended it to be a Cinderella retelling—but if you look at all the pieces in the novel, methinks he probably did. There’s a fairy godmother who, though she’s not a fairy, still fufills the role of the character. There’s a Prince Charming, there’s Cinderella (Sayuri), evil stepsisters who (though they aren’t blood-related sisters) try to block our Cinderella from achieving her goals at every turn. I could go on and on about this. Seriously.
But the best part about it is that he doesn’t throw the retelling in your face. You only understand that’s what it is if you understand the character archetypes, themes, and motifs found in the original fairytale. That’s my favorite kind of retelling—one that definitely is, but doesn’t come at you ham-fistedly about it. Let me think, let me learn, and let me figure it out for myself.
“Adversity is like a strong wind. I don’t mean just that it holds us back from places we might otherwise go. It also tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that afterward we see ourselves as we really are, and not merely as we might like to be.”
Kamikaze Girls by Novala Takemoto
Meet Momoko, a "Lolita" decked out to the nines in the finest (and frilliest) of Victorian haute couture. The only scion of a drunken interlude between a cowardly yakuza and an inebriated bar-hostess, Momoko's mom has since split the scene, and, after various ill-fated scams that involve imitation brand name merchandise, Momoko's dad relocates them to the boondocks of rural Ibaraki prefecture. To escape her humdrum existence, Momoko fanaticizes about French rococo, dreams of living in the palace of Versailles, and buys all her extremely lacy clothes from an expensive Tokyo boutique.
Meet Ichiko, a tough-talking motorcycle girl in a ladies-only biker gang known as the Ponytails. Together, this unlikeliest of duos strike out on a quest to find a legendary embroiderer, a journey on which they encounter conniving pachinko parlor managers, legendary street-punks, and anemic costumers. Who knows, they might just make it big...if only Ichiko would stop head butting Momoko in the forehead.
I first found out about Kamikaze Girls and Novala Takemoto when I was a sophomore in high school and my mom got me the movie for Christmas. I think I must’ve read about the movie in Gothic and Lolita Bible or something, I can’t really remember, but all I know is that from the moment I first pressed “play” on that DVD, my life was forever changed.
Kamikaze Girls dictated a lot of my personality for years, and is still one of my favorite go-to movies. I nearly died of happiness when I found out that Barnes and Noble had the novel version on their website—at that point, I had no choice but to order it and I’m so glad I did. Kamikaze Girls is my favorite coming-of-age story about female friendships (since I think most of them are pretty dang boring) and I really adore Momoko and Ichiko as our main characters. Takemoto does such a wonderful job here and it’s such a crime that this book isn’t in print anymore. One time I thought I lost my copy and I had an absolute fit, terrified that I’d never be able to replace it. I tore the house apart looking for it . . . only to remember, randomly one day, that I had put it in a bag I don’t usually carry. I checked and lo and behold, there it was!
The story is written in first-person from Momoko’s perspective, and the way she flits between her actual life in Ibaraki and her dream life in Rococo-era France is so decadent that I can’t get enough. It’s like listening to a fantasy character talk, even though she’s in (though it’s not technically modern anymore I guess because this book is 22 years old) modern Japan.
“I am a Lolita. I do not believe in growing up. No matter how old I get, I shall remain devoted to ruffles and frills.”
The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern
Zachary Ezra Rawlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a mysterious book hidden in the stacks. As he turns the pages, entranced by tales of lovelorn prisoners, key collectors, and nameless acolytes, he reads something strange: a story from his own childhood. Bewildered by this inexplicable book and desperate to make sense of how his own life came to be recorded, Zachary uncovers a series of clues—a bee, a key, and a sword—that lead him to a masquerade party in New York, to a secret club, and through a doorway to an ancient library hidden far below the surface of the earth.
What Zachary finds in this curious place is more than just a buried home for books and their guardians—it is a place of lost cities and seas, lovers who pass notes under doors and across time, and of stories whispered by the dead. Zachary learns of those who have sacrificed much to protect this realm, relinquishing their sight and their tongues to preserve this archive, and also of those who are intent on its destruction. Together with Mirabel, a fierce, pink-haired protector of the place, and Dorian, a handsome, barefoot man with shifting alliances, Zachary travels the twisting tunnels, darkened stairwells, crowded ballrooms, and sweetly soaked shores of this magical world, discovering his purpose—in both the mysterious book and in his own life.
I got The Starless Sea a couple of years ago when I went on a total Erin Morgenstern binge, and now it’s my new favorite thing to read in the dead of winter. Actually, fun fact, Erin Morgenstern dubbed this her “winter book,” which makes sense considering how much snow there is in it. The Starless Sea is so enchanting and the ambiance of the book is exactly what I look for when I’m all snuggled in with my fluffy blankets and my space heater that looks like a wood stove, listening to the howl of winter winds outside my windows.
I really liked this because it interlaces little fairytale snippets that Morgenstern herself wrote for this book. Another fun fact: I heard Morgenstern sayin a podcast that her editor actually asked her to “tone down” the fairytale elements, to which she responded by putting in more fairytale elements!
“We are all stardust and stories.”
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.
But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.
True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.
I really hadn’t intended to put two Erin Morgenstern books on this list in a row, but I couldn’t in good conscience leave either of them out. Morgenstern is a master of rich, whimsical prose and is exactly what I mean when I say “books with fairytale vibes.”
When I first read The Night Circus, I think it was 2011 and I was participating in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and I think Morgenstern did the Pep Talk thing that year. She said that she’d written The Night Circus for NaNoWriMo in a past year and I found that endlessly inspiring. So I went to my Barnes and Noble, picked up a copy, and had unwittingly been introduced to my favorite comfort read. Whenever I don’t know what I want to read next I always go to The Night Circus to fill the space until I decide what next novel I want to hyperfixate on.
Like how I said Morgenstern considered The Starless Sea her “winter book,” she also said in that same interview that The Night Circus was her “Autumn book” which I totally see. The way she describes popcorn and cider and the entire vibe of the circus just screams going to a circus on a cool night in October. I really want to re-read this right now, but its only July and this is my “lets celebrate the weather finally getting cold” book.
“I couldn’t tell the difference between what was real and what I wanted to be real.”
I hope you guys enjoyed my Top 5 Favorite Books with Fairytale Vibes list! What books have you read that give you the biggest fairytale vibes? Do you have any favorite fairytale retellings? Let me know! I love talking about books and will do it endlessly (obviously. I mean, look at this post lol).
I’ll see you guys in the next post!
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