Fantasy

The Alchemyst (series) / Michael Scott

Having discovered the secret to eternal youth, 14th-century alchemist Nicholas Flamel and his wife are alive and well in present-day San Francisco, California. But they won’t stay well if 15-year-old twins Sophie and Josh Newman don’t fulfill their prophesied role of either saving or destroying the world, starting by getting back an ancient text stolen from Flamel’s bookstore. (The stolen volume contains the key to the Flamels’ immortality, which they must renew every month.)

A Corner of White (series) / Jaclyn Moriarty

Fourteen-year-old Madeleine of Cambridge, England, struggling to cope with poverty and her mother’s illness, and fifteen-year-old Elliot of the Kingdom of Cello in a parallel world where colors are villainous and his father is missing, begin exchanging notes through a crack between their worlds and find they can be of great help to each other.

Dreamwood / Heather Mackey

12-year-old Lucy Darrington goes on a quest to find her missing father in a remote, magical territory in the Pacific Northwest.

 

The Eighth Day / Dianne K. Salerni

Orphan Jax Aubrey doesn’t expect much on his thirteenth birthday, but when he discovers there’s an extra day squeezed between Wednesday and Thursday whose origins are rooted in Arthurian legend, it’s clear his life will never be the same.

 

Ella Enchanted / Gail Carson Levine

In this novel based on the story of Cinderella, Ella struggles against the childhood curse that forces her to obey any order given to her.

 

Elsewhere / Gabrielle Zevin

After fifteen-year-old Liz Hall is hit by a taxi and killed, she finds herself in a place that is both like and unlike Earth, where she must adjust to her new status and figure out how to “live.”

 

The Goose Girl / Shannon Hale

On her way to marry a prince she’s never met, Princess Anidori is betrayed by her guards and her lady-in-waiting and must become a goose girl to survive until she can reveal her true identity and reclaim the crown that is rightfully hers.

 

Jackaby / William Ritter

Newly arrived in 1892 New England, Abigail Rook becomes assistant to R. F. Jackaby, an investigator of the unexplained with the ability to see supernatural beings, and she helps him delve into a case of serial murder which, Jackaby is convinced, is due to a nonhuman creature.

 

Plain Kate / Erin Bow

Plain Kate’s odd appearance and expertise as a woodcarver cause some to think her a witch, but friendship with a talking cat and, later, with humans help her to survive and even thrive in a world of magic, charms, and fear.

 

The Red Necklace / Sally Gardner

In the late eighteenth-century, Sido, the twelve-year-old daughter of a self-indulgent marquis, and Yann, a fourteen-year-old Gypsy orphan raised to perform in a magic show, face a common enemy at the start of the French Revolution.

 

Saving Lucas Biggs / Marisa de los Santos

When thirteen-year-old Margaret’s father is sentenced to death for a crime he didn’t commit, she knows the only way to save him is to use the forbidden family power of time travel.

 

The Sea of Trolls (series) / Nancy Farmer

After Jack becomes apprenticed to a Druid bard, he and his little sister Lucy are captured by Viking Berserkers and taken to the home of King Ivar the Boneless and his half-troll queen, leading Jack to undertake a vital quest to Jotunheim, home of the trolls.

 

Seraphina (series) / Rachel Hartman

In a world where dragons and humans coexist in an uneasy truce and dragons can assume human form, Seraphina, whose mother died giving birth to her, grapples with her own identity amid magical secrets and royal scandals, while she struggles to accept and develop her extraordinary musical talents.

Stravaganza: City of Masks (series) / Mary Hoffman

While sick in bed with cancer, Lucien begins making journeys to a place in a parallel world that resembles Venice, Italy, and he becomes caught up in the political intrigues surrounding the Duchessa who rules the city.

 

Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow / Jessica Day George

A girl travels east of the sun and west of the moon to free her beloved prince from a magic spell.

 

 

A Wrinkle in Time / Madeleine L’Engle

Meg and Charles Wallace set out with their friend Calvin in a search for their father. His top secret job as a physicist for the government has taken him away and the children search through time and space to find him.

 

Young Wizards: So You Want to be a Wizard (series) / Diane Duane

Thirteen-year-old Nita, tormented by a gang of bullies because she won’t fight back, finds the help she needs in a library book on wizardry which guides her into another dimension.