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Built on ISFDB, Wikipedia, Wikidata and Open Library. Curated reading orders carry their reasoning on the page; the rest follow publication order. Data sources & licenses

© Loreful · data: ISFDB · CC BY

More like Day Off

anchored on:urban fantasynorth americacontemporaryfirst personmystery & detectivewizards+2 more

but

Mood

The mood the book leaves you in.

  • The reading experience is propelled by journeys, exploration, and physical risk; excitement and forward momentum dominate over dread or introspection.
  • Joy and loss are deliberately mixed; the resolution grants characters something real while taking something else away, leaving warmth and sorrow together.
  • The book demands work from the reader — dense prose, difficult structure, unfamiliar ideas, or morally uncomfortable material — as part of its intended effect.
  • Grim events, cruelty, or despair dominate the atmosphere, and the book does not soften them with comfort or comic relief.
  • The atmosphere is quietly unsettling — wrongness, unease, and the uncanny pervade the book without necessarily escalating into overt horror.
  • The book is built to move the reader; character feeling is foregrounded and major scenes aim at a strong emotional response.
  • Humor is a primary aim and the prose plays for laughs — comic situations, wit, or dialogue produce sustained comedy, not occasional levity.
  • The book insists that things can improve; effort and decency are shown to matter, and the arc bends toward better outcomes even through hardship.
  • The book teaches as it goes — real facts, history, science, or craft are conveyed in enough depth that learning is part of the reading experience.
  • The book is designed to uplift and motivate, presenting perseverance or achievement in a way that invites the reader to aspire or act.
  • The overall register is cheerful and easygoing; stakes are kept gentle and the book avoids dwelling on pain or dread.
  • Withheld information drives the experience; the book sustains enigmas and secrets the reader wants resolved, whatever its genre.
  • The book is contemplative and inward-looking, giving more weight to thought, memory, and meaning than to external events.
  • The book works as comfort reading — low tension, a soothing pace, and an atmosphere the reader can unwind in.
  • Grief, loss, or melancholy set the dominant register, and the book lets sorrow stand rather than resolving it into comfort.
  • Sustained suspense is the point; the book keeps the reader braced for what happens next through danger, pressure, or impending revelation.
  • Playful invention and charm define the register — fanciful conceits, light absurdity, and a narration that delights in its own oddity.

About

What the story runs on.

  • Stories in which extraterrestrial beings are central — as characters, cultures, or the object of the plot.
  • Stories structured as a quest — a journey undertaken to find, deliver, or destroy something of great import.
  • Stories in which staying alive against nature, catastrophe, or scarcity is the central problem.
  • Stories of lovers kept apart by law, family, faith, or station, where the obstacle to love is the plot.
  • Stories in which a friendship — its making, testing, or loss — is the emotional center.
  • Stories of growing up — a young protagonist crossing from childhood into adult knowledge and responsibility.
  • Stories about who a character truly is — self-discovery, doubled lives, and the search for a self.
  • Stories about mourning — living through the death of a loved one and what loss does to the survivors.
  • Stories in which a buried family truth — hidden parentage, crimes, or shames — surfaces and reorders the present.
  • Stories driven by maneuvering for power — factions, conspiracies, and statecraft conducted in shadow.
  • Stories in which war itself is the subject — combat, occupation, and what warfare does to soldiers and civilians.
  • Stories organized around investigating a killing — the case, the clues, and the pursuit of the killer, in any genre's clothing.

Shelf

Where it sits in the library.

    • Fiction built on magic or other supernatural elements that have no scientific explanation.
    • Secondary-world fantasy at large scale, where the fate of nations or the world turns on the protagonists' struggle.
    • Fantasy set in a recognizably modern city or contemporary world where the supernatural intrudes on everyday life.
    • Fantasy that blends in horror's atmosphere and imagery, keeping a fantastical frame around grim or frightening material.
    • Action-driven fantasy following warriors or rogues with personal stakes against sorcerous threats, rather than world-spanning conflicts.
    • Fantasy set in a real historical period or a close analogue of one, with magic woven into the era.
    • Fantasy in which protagonists cross from the ordinary world into another world through a portal or similar passage.
    • Fiction that retells or reworks a traditional fairy tale in a new form or setting.
    • Fantasy drawing directly on myths, legends, and folklore, retelling them or building on their figures and logic.
    • Fantasy of ghosts, vampires, shapeshifters, psychics, and similar phenomena, usually set in an otherwise ordinary world.
    • Fiction mixing science-fictional trappings with overtly magical or impossible elements in one setting.
    • Low-stakes fantasy emphasizing comfort, community, and everyday pleasures over conflict and peril.
    • Speculative fiction of pervasive moral ambiguity, violence, and cynicism that rejects heroic conventions — fantasy and SF alike.
      • Fiction that extrapolates from science and technology — future societies, space travel, or speculative inventions — within at least nominally natural laws.
      • Science fiction of interstellar scope — starships, galactic polities, and adventure across star systems.
      • Science fiction committed to scientific rigor, where technical plausibility constrains the story.
      • Science fiction centered on armed forces and warfare, told largely from a military point of view.
      • Science fiction of networked, corporate-dominated near futures, pairing high technology with social decay.
      • Science fiction styled on nineteenth-century steam-powered technology, often in a Victorian or pseudo-Victorian setting.
      • Fiction depicting an oppressive or catastrophic society, presented as a warning.
      • Fiction set after civilization's collapse, following survivors in the ruins of the old world.
      • Fiction in which characters move between past and future, and the mechanics or consequences of that travel drive the plot.
      • Fiction exploring a world where a historical event went differently and history diverged from ours.
      • Science fiction about humanity's first encounter and communication with an alien intelligence.
      • Science fiction in which extraterrestrial forces attack or occupy Earth and humanity resists.
      • Fiction whose primary aim is to frighten or unsettle the reader through dread, menace, or the monstrous.
      • Horror of vast, indifferent, incomprehensible entities before which humanity is insignificant, in the Lovecraft tradition.
      • Horror of decaying houses, buried family secrets, and oppressive atmosphere in the Gothic literary tradition.
      • Horror centered on hauntings and the returning dead.
      • Horror located in the mind — paranoia, obsession, and unreliable perception rather than external monsters.
      • Horror built around the reanimated dead and survival amid their outbreaks.
      • Horror defined by explicit, transgressive gore that refuses to cut away from violence.
      • Speculative fiction of the strange and uncanny that resists both natural explanation and standard genre categories.
      • Fiction organized around solving a crime or puzzle, typically following an investigator toward the identification of a culprit.
      • A puzzle-first mystery that lays out clues so the culprit's identity can be deduced before the reveal.
      • Crime fiction of moral ambiguity, fatalism, and hard-edged style, set among the corrupt and the doomed.
      • A mystery following the realistic routines of police work — forensics, interviews, and case-building.
      • A gentle mystery with an amateur sleuth, a small community, and violence kept off the page.
      • A mystery set in a past era, where the investigation works within that period's methods and society.
      • Fast-paced fiction driven by imminent danger, pursuit, or high-stakes conspiracy, built to sustain tension.
      • A thriller of espionage — agents, tradecraft, and intelligence services in conflict.
      • A thriller centered on lawyers and the courtroom, where litigation carries the suspense.
      • A thriller driven by detailed contemporary or near-future technology, often military or scientific.
      • A thriller whose tension comes from mental states and manipulation between characters rather than external action.
      • Fiction whose central plot is a romantic relationship and its development toward an emotionally satisfying resolution.
      • Romance in which one or both partners are supernatural beings, blending fantasy elements into the love story.
      • A fantasy-romance hybrid in which the romantic arc and the fantasy plot carry equal weight.
      • Romance set in a past era, with courtship shaped by the period's society and manners.
      • Romance set in the present day, without supernatural or historical elements.
      • Fiction set in a real past period, where the historical setting materially shapes characters and events.
        • General and literary fiction emphasizing prose style, character interiority, or formal ambition over genre plot conventions.
        • Fiction in a realistic world where magical events occur and are treated as ordinary, in the tradition of Latin American literature.
        • Fiction that ridicules people, institutions, or society in order to criticize them.
        • Fiction of dreamlike, irrational imagery and logic that breaks from realistic representation.
        • Fiction that plays with narrative convention through metafiction, fragmentation, and self-reference.
        • Fiction propelled by journeys, exploration, and physical peril, where action and survival carry the plot.
        • Adventure fiction of ships and seafaring — naval engagements, voyages, and life at sea.
        • Fiction of the American frontier West — gunmen, ranchers, and lawmen, typically in the late nineteenth century.
        • Fiction centered on soldiers, campaigns, and the experience of warfare, historical or imagined.
          • Fiction written primarily to amuse, using comedic situations, wit, or parody as its organizing principle.
            • Multi-generational fiction following a family or dynasty across decades, with inheritance and kinship as the through-line.
              • Fiction whose world runs on explicit game mechanics — levels, stats, and skills that characters can see and exploit.
                • Fiction about costumed or superpowered heroes and their conflicts with comparable villains.

                Practical

                How long a commitment, whether it stands alone, and whether it has finished.

                Tap a chip to ask for it · tap again to rule it out · once more to clear. Numbers show what would be left.

                • Cover of The Dresden Files
                  The Dresden Files

                  series · 56 books · 2000

                  similar bywizardscontemporaryurban fantasynorth americafirst personbig city+3 more

                  The Dresden Files is an urban fantasy series written by American author Jim Butcher. The novels are narrated from the first-person perspective of Harry Dresden, a private detective and wizard, as he investigates supernatural disturbances in contemporary Chicago. The first entry, Storm Front, was published in 2000 by Roc Books.

                • Cover of The Iron Druid Chronicles
                  The Iron Druid Chronicles

                  series · 70 books · 2011

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasy+7 more

                  The Iron Druid Chronicles is a series of urban fantasy novels, novellas, novelettes and short stories, written by Kevin Hearne and published by Del Rey Books. All the books, including short stories, have recorded audiobooks narrated by Luke Daniels and Christopher Ragland

                • Cover of The Detective & The Unicorn
                  The Detective & The Unicorn

                  Michael Angel · standalone novel · 2011

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryurban fantasymystery & detectivenorth americabig cityfantasy

                  When a warlock from the magical world of the Morning Land murders Derek Ridder's friend, the LAPD detective gets a new partner. Her name's Tavia, and she's a brash, driven unicorn filly. She identifies the killer as Sir William Teach, the one man she's sworn to capture or kill at all cost. Together, Derek and Tavia race to uncover Teach's dark plans to unleash an ancient evil in order to conquer both of their worlds. Their path takes them through Los Angeles and deep into the fantasy realm of the Morning Land. Along the way, they discover what can break a mythical creature's heart, what can heal death itself, and whether or not one needs to be virgin-pure in order to touch a unicorn.

                • Cover of Rivers of London
                  Rivers of London

                  series · 32 books · 2011

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasymystery & detectivebig city+4 more

                  The Rivers of London series is a series of urban fantasy novels by English author Ben Aaronovitch, and comics/graphic novels by Aaronovitch and Andrew Cartmel, illustrated by Lee Sullivan.

                • Cover of Sorcery Hall
                  Sorcery Hall

                  series · 3 books · 1985

                  completed

                  similar bywizardscontemporaryadventurousurban fantasynorth americabig cityfantasy

                • Cover of Young Wizards
                  Young Wizards

                  series · 24 books · 1983

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryfantasy

                  Diane Duane's Young Wizards series begins with thirteen-year-old Nita, bullied and friendless, who borrows a library book on wizardry and discovers it's the real thing: an apprenticeship into a covert order that fights entropy, alongside a classmate named Kit. Across fifteen books published between 1983 and 2019, the two age forward in something close to real time as their missions escalate from New York streets to alien worlds and beyond. The series centers on the wizard's Oath and the idea that magic is a responsibility taken on to slow the universe's decay, not a power to be enjoyed for its own sake.

                • Cover of The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel
                  The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel

                  series · 15 books · 2007

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryfantasy+1 more

                  The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel is a series of six fantasy novels written by Irish author Michael Scott, completed in 2012. The first book in the series, The Alchemyst, was released in 2007, and the sequels were released at the rate of one per year, concluding with The Enchantress in 2012. The cover artist for the series is Michael Wagner.

                • Cover of Bartimaeus
                  Bartimaeus

                  series · 4 books · 2003

                  similar bywizardsadventurousfantasy+3 more

                  The Bartimaeus Sequence is a series of young adult novels of alternate history, fantasy and magic. It was written by British writer Jonathan Stroud and consists of a trilogy published from 2003 to 2005 and a prequel novel published in 2010. The story follows the career of a teenage magician Nathaniel and a five-thousand-year-old djinni Bartimaeus, whom he has summoned and nominally controls, through the alternate history of the peak of London's domination as a magical oligarchy.

                • Cover of Heir Chronicles
                  Heir Chronicles

                  series · 5 books · 2006

                  similar bywizardscontemporaryurban fantasynorth americafantasy+1 more

                  Cinda Williams Chima's Heir Chronicles begins with The Warrior Heir, in which sixteen-year-old Jack learns he has hidden magical, warrior ancestry and is drawn into training to fight enemy wizards he didn't know existed. The following books widen the cast to other magical bloodlines — wizards, dragons, enchanters, sorcerers — each heir navigating the same hidden system of guilds and rival houses operating alongside the ordinary world. It's a contemporary-set YA fantasy about inherited power and the factions that police it.

                • Cover of The Eldest Curses
                  The Eldest Curses

                  series · 2 books · 2019

                  part of The Mortal Instruments

                  similar bywizardscontemporaryurban fantasyfantasy+1 more

                • Cover of Wizard for Hire
                  Wizard for Hire

                  series · 3 books · 2018

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporarynorth americafantasy+2 more

                • Cover of Drusilla Jaco / Sentinels of New Orleans
                  Drusilla Jaco / Sentinels of New Orleans

                  series · 8 books · 2012

                  similar bycontemporaryurban fantasynorth americabig city+2 more

                • Cover of Magnus Bane
                  Magnus Bane

                  series · 14 books · 2013

                  part of The Mortal Instruments

                  similar bywizardsnorth america+5 more

                  The Bane Chronicles is a series of connected novellas featuring the character of Magnus Bane from Cassandra Clare's The Mortal Instruments series. The novellas are co-written by Clare, Maureen Johnson, and Sarah Rees Brennan. Release of the novellas began in April 2013 in e-book and audio versions, and were released in a combined print edition in November 2014. The Bane Chronicles has appeared on the New York Times Bestsellers list for Children's Books a number of times beginning in July 2013.

                • Cover of Archer's Goon
                  Archer's Goon

                  Diana Wynne Jones · standalone novel · 1984

                  similar bywizardscontemporaryurban fantasyfantasy

                  After the Goon moves into Sykes' house and refuses to budge, thirteen-year-old Howard learns some startling information about his family, including the fact that he is adopted and that his father is connected with seven wizards who run their town.

                • Cover of InCryptid
                  InCryptid

                  series · 53 books · 2012

                  similar bycontemporaryadventurousurban fantasynorth america+2 more

                  InCryptid is a series of urban fantasy novels by American author Seanan McGuire, published by DAW Books. They follow multiple generations of a family of cryptozoologists who protect supernatural beings from discovery by humankind.

                • Cover of War for the Oaks
                  War for the Oaks

                  series · 2 books · 1987

                  similar byadventurouscontemporaryurban fantasynorth americabig cityfantasy

                  Emma Bull's 1987 urban fantasy debut follows Minneapolis rock singer Eddi McCandry after a faerie noble conscripts her into the ancient war between the Seelie and Unseelie Courts, forcing her to keep her band and her life together while fighting a battle she never asked for in her own city. Widely credited with helping found the urban fantasy genre, it won the Locus Award for Best First Novel.

                • Cover of Randy Wolf and the Dropout Magicians
                  Randy Wolf and the Dropout Magicians

                  series · 1 book · 2018

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryurban fantasyfantasy+1 more

                • Cover of Eccentric Circles
                  Eccentric Circles

                  Rebecca Lickiss · standalone novel · 2001

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryurban fantasynorth americafantasy

                  She inherited a home. And she inherited a world. Piper Dickerson's grandmother has passed away, leaving her Victorian cottage and acre of land as an inheritance. Piper and her grandmother shared a passion for words, and the house full of books and manuscripts is the perfect place to pursue her writing aspirations. But what the will doesn't specify is that the back door leads to an endless forest with a brook, populated by an extremely handsome elf, a mischievous dwarf, and a crotchety old wizard, among other fantastical creatures. Piper's home is the gateway to a magical adventure beyond her wildest dreams. And it is also a gateway to something darker - as Piper discovers the truth about her grandmother's death and the evil she must face to save two worlds. (from the back cover)

                • Cover of Shadowland
                  Shadowland

                  Peter Straub · standalone novel · 1980

                  similar bywizardscontemporarynorth america+1 more

                  WorldCat: Two apprentices studying under a master magician spend a season residing in a dark house located in the deep recesses of the Vermont forest. Learning secrets best left unlearned, they enter a world of incalculable evil and terror. Only one of them will survive the ordeal.

                • Cover of Wizards of the Game
                  Wizards of the Game

                  David Lubar · standalone novel · 2003

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryfantasy+1 more

                  Eighth grader Mercer, whose passion is the fantasy role-playing game Wizards of the Warrior World, hopes to use a fund raiser to bring a gaming convention to his middle school, but instead he attracts four genuine wizards who are trapped on Earth and want his help in returning to their own world.

                • Cover of Blackwing Saga
                  Blackwing Saga

                  series · 1 book · 2017

                  similar bywizardsadventurousnorth america+1 more

                • Cover of Alchemist's Son
                  Alchemist's Son

                  series · 2 books · 2003

                  completed

                  similar bywizardsadventurouscontemporaryfantasy

                • Cover of The Wizard's Apprentice
                  The Wizard's Apprentice

                  S. P. Somtow · standalone novel · 1993

                  similar bywizardscontemporarynorth americafantasy+2 more

                  A wizard recruits a rich teenager from Los Angeles to be his next apprentice.

                • Cover of Marla Mason
                  Marla Mason

                  series · 16 books · 2007

                  similar bycontemporaryadventurousurban fantasybig cityfantasy+2 more

                  The Marla Mason series is a series of ten main sequence novels and various prequels and short stories written by American author Tim Pratt under the pseudonym of T.A. Pratt. The books are told mostly through the third person perspective of Marla Mason, the head sorceress of the fictional United States East Coast city of Felport.