Most Beautiful Fantasy & Science Fiction Books of 2025 – A Holiday Gift Guide
A Holiday Gift Guide
Prettiest Fantasy & Science Fiction Books of 2025
On this page:
I’ve been doing “Most Beautiful Books of the Year” annual holiday gift guides for eight years now, and until now they’ve always been one giant, sprawling monster of a post. Which is fun, but… can be a lot. So for this ninth annual edition, I’m changing things up and sharing my favourites in separate genre round-ups instead. I hope this makes things more manageable for both of us (feedback always welcomed)!
My picks for the best fantasy and science fiction books of 2025 are listed below, loosely sorted by genre, and any book with a star (★) next to it is also visually reviewed in the video. If I recommend a book in this list, you can rest assured it's not just the physical beauty that counts – I do also read the books I recommend on this site, and I only include books where I think the contents are beautiful too ツ . Most of my fantasy picks tend towards low spice (i.e romance scenes are usually behind closed doors), but where the books are a bit graphic I've included a 🌶️ spice warning.
Bookshop links are included below if you are interested in buying any of the books for yourself. Some of the links are affiliate links (and thank you if you use them!) but please do support your local bookstore as a priority if you can. If you're new here, and you'd like more regular recommendations, you might also like to check out my regularly updated lists of special editions, pre-order offers, and/or subscribe to my very occasional newsletter.
And now, on to the books!
Video Overview
Fantasy & Science Fiction
Cozy & Folkloric
★ The Amber Owl - Juliet Marillier
Juliet Marillier crafts her gentle folkloric fantasies from hidden forest moss and whispered songs. You should read everything she writes. This story centres on Stasya, who lives in an isolated village on the edge of a vast forest called Heartwood, with a gift for communing with animals and an unusual pet for company. Until soldiers and outside powers start pushing into her world.
Special Features. Australian special edition with gold sprayed edges, foil decorated boards, and mapped endpapers.
➤ Find it at New Dawn
(Standard paperback US/AU at Amazon | UK at Amazon | Waterstones)
★ Swordheart - T. Kingfisher
Halla inherits an estate and her awful relatives immediately start circling like sharks in a shallow pond. She accidentally frees a warrior named Sarkis, who is literally bound to a sword. The ensuing roadtrip showcases an awkward, tender, and funny relationship between our practical heroine and her grumpy immortal swordsman.
Special Features. US hardback first printings with turquoise sprayed page edges, a foiled sword stamped on the boards, and illustrated endpapers.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
★ Hemlock & Silver - T. Kingfisher
I've read this is marketed as a Snow White reimagining, but it doesn’t feel too much like that. Our main character is Anja, a healer who regularly drinks poison in controlled doses. She's co-opted to investigate a mysterious illness being suffered by the king's daughter, and her adventures follow on from there, leaning hard into unravelling mysteries and surviving creepy magic, with a light touch of romance. And of course, it’s a dark fairy tale so there’s also a talking cat.
Special Features. US hardback first printings with poison green sprayed page edges, a foiled mirror and quote on the boards, and illustrated endpapers.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
★ The Enchanted Greenhouse - Sarah Beth Durst
This is a standalone follow-up to last year’s Spellshop – it’s set in the same world, but follows a different character. It’s a warm, friendly hug of a book. At the center is Terlu Perna, a lonely anxious librarian who breaks the rules and is banished to a magical island filled with lots of greenhouses and one grumpy gardener. It sets readers up well for her upcoming third book in this series, Sea of Charms. US first printings of the hardback have mint green sprayed page edges.
Special Features. US hardback with mint green sprayed page edges.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
The River Has Roots - Amal El-Mohtar
The story follows two sisters who live on the border of Faerie, where they tend to enchanted willows and sing to the trees. I loved the central magical conceit of the novel, which uses grammar as a kind of sorcery, the texture of tradition, and also the special bond of sisterhood. It’s a short novella and quick cozy read.
Special Features. US hardback first printings have a foiled case design and interior illustrations; UK editions have the illustrations. The Waterstones special edition has decorative endpapers.
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
➤ Buy exclusive edition from Waterstones
★ Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil - Oliver Darkshire
Isabella lives in a miserable medieval village, on a tiny farm, eking out her tiny existence just trying survive the day-to-day grind until a magic spellbook arrives to unleash some weird creatures, social satire, and emotional chaos. despite the cute title and the cozy-sounding village setting, I would put this in a dark quirky folklore-inspired bucket as it’s more parody horror than cozy. And there are a lot of footnotes.
Special Features. 12 black and white illustrations are included in the first edition.
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
★ Hekate - Nikita Gill
Nikita reimagines Hekate as a girl born into war and a divine Titan vs. Olympian conflict. She grows into her power through trauma, isolation, and the dangerous beauty of the underworld. It's a classic myth retold in verse through a modern feminist lens.
Special Features. US hardback/Waterstones exclusive with gold foiled cover, wolves sprayed on black page edges, illustrated endpapers and a foil stamped design on the boards under the dust jacket.
➤ Buy (plain) UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
➤ Buy exclusive hardback ed from Waterstones
➤ Buy exclusive paperback ed from Waterstones
A Forgery of Fate - Elizabeth Lim
“Beauty and the Beast meets Six of Crows in this romantic fantasy about a girl who paints the future and a cursed dragon lord, bound by love and deception in a plot to bring down the gods.”
Deluxe Edition (1st US printings). US hardback with gold gilded page edges, decorative page edges, and stenciled boards under the dust jacket.
Waterstones Exclusive. UK hardback with exclusive edge and end papers TBC.
➤ Buy US ed from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
➤ Buy from Waterstones
The Changeling Queen - Kimberly Bea
A retelling of the Scottish Ballad of Tam Lin retelling through the eyes of Faery Queen. The story unfolds across Samhain in medieval Scotland as Janet wrests her lover Tam Lin from the Wild Hunt and the Queen refuses to let him go without a fight. We learn the Queen’s origin story through flashbacks, and it’s a mythic and reflective sort of story that’s perfect for folklore lovers.
Special Features. The deluxe edition has decorative sprayed page edges, foil stamped boards, foiled and embossed dust jacket, and illustrated endpapers.
➤ Find it at Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Assistant to the Villain - Hannah Nicole Maehrer
The Assistant to the Villain series by Hannah Maehrer is basically a workplace romcom that takes place in a fairytale villain’s lair. The protagonist is earnest and bubbly, and the villain is used to fear and obedience.
Special Features. The deluxe edition has a gilded cover, decorative sprayed page edges, illustrated endpapers and a map.
Paranormal Romance / Romantasy / Courtly Intrigue
★ The Wicked King - Holly Black
This is book two of “The Folk of the Air.” Jude is in Faerie, where the rules are cruel, the etiquette is weaponized, and the romance is a high-stakes chess match conducted via insults and poor decisions. The political intrigue in this series provides constant tension, and the story twists are great.
Special Features. Bound in embossed black velvet with black sprayed page edges, a bound-in ribbon bookmark, slipcase, the front and back endpapers have different illustrations, and they have bonus content with an alternate first chapter.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Wild Reverence — Rebecca Ross
Wild Reverence — Rebecca Ross (Divine Rivals universe)
Page: https://beautifulbooks.info/special-editions/2025-09/
“xxx.“
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
The Songbird and the Heart of Stone - Carissa Broadbent
Wild Reverence — Rebecca Ross (Divine Rivals universe)
Page: https://beautifulbooks.info/special-editions/2025-09/
“xxx.“
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Powerless Universe - Lauren Roberts
The Powerless series is about an “ordinary” girl in a power-stratified kingdom, forced into dangerous trials and political games where romance is complicated by status, survival, and what people are willing to do for control.
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Shield of Sparrows - Devney Perry
“A swoon-worthy romantic fantasy filled with legends and monsters – it's The Witcher meets Cinderella.”
Deluxe Limited Edition (US first printings). US hardback with decorative stenciled page edges.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
➤ Buy Waterstones exclusive edition from Waterstones
★ Grim & Oro - Alex Aster
This is a companion to the Lightlark series, and it binds two novel-length stories into one book tete-beche style, so you have to flip the book over to read each one. They share stories from two different points of view, and if you haven't read the rest of the series this would probably spoil earlier events for you. It's called the ‘duelling crowns' edition, and it's beautifully put together with a slipcase, foiling, decorative sprayed page edges and illustrated endpapers.
Special Features. Slipcase, foiling, decorative sprayed page edges and illustrated endpapers.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
★ The Things Gods Break - Abigail Owen
“xxx.“ 🌶️🌶️
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
★ The Robin on the Oak Throne - K. A. Linde
Book 2 in an urban fantasy-romance series where magical politics and monster lore collide with messy relationships, layered over an alternate New York. The romance follows an intense enemies-to-lovers tension. 🌶️🌶️
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Warrior Princess Assassin - Bridget Kemmerer
“xxx.“ 🌶️
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
★ Three Shattered Souls - Mai Corland
The final volume in the Broken Blade trilogy with dangerous liars and fighters on a high-stakes mission in a world of crowns, relics, and political violence. It’s adventurous, twisty, and emotionally bruising.
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
★ Alchemised - SenlinYu
“xxx.“
Special Edition. xxx.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Better in Black - Cassandra Clare
A collection of 10 original love stories featuring fan-favorite couples from the bestselling Shadowhunter Chronicles
Special Features. First editions of the US hardback have foiled boards and illustrated endpapers.
➤ Buy US ed from Amazon | B&N | Exclusive B&N Edition
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones | Exclusive Waterstones Edition
★ Shepherd King series - Rachel Gillig
The Shepherd King duology is a moody, gothic-leaning fantasy built around the idea of Providence Cards as the basis of the magic system – powerful, cursed objects tied to rhyme, cost, and consequence. In the mist-locked kingdom of Blunder, that magic comes with rot in its roots: there’s a dangerous infection in the population, and the only real hope of changing the kingdom’s fate lies in completing a full deck of cards.
Special Features. Decorative sprayed page edges, foiled boards and illustrated endpapers.
One Dark Window
➤ Buy US edition from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
➤ Buy UK edition from Amazon | Waterstones | Blackwells
Two Twisted Crowns
➤ Buy US ed from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones | Blackwells
★ Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
This special edition is one of several 20th anniversary books celebrating the first volume in The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer, and whatever you think of it—love it, hate it, or love to hate it—it’s hard to deny how much it shaped modern YA romance. This edition is truly spectacular with two-way hidden fore-edge artworks hidden under the gilded page edges. I have always wanted a book with a hidden fore-edge but it’s been outside my budget. I am beyond thrilled to own this one!
Special Features. Foiled slipcase, illustrated endpapers, interior art, ribbon bookmark and spectacular two-way hidden fore-edge illustrations under the gilded page edges.
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
The sequel is coming out next year with the same fantastic edge treatments.
➤ Buy New Moon US ed from Amazon | B&N
➤ Buy New Moon UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
High / Epic Fantasy
★ The Rose Field (Book of Dust, 3) - Philip Pullman
The Book of Dust books explore Lyra’s world from different angles and at different points in her life, with a tone that’s more adult than the original trilogy. This is the final book in the trilogy, and in it Lyra encounters spies and thieves, gryphons and witches, old friends and new, learning all the while the depth and surprising truths of the alethiometer.
Special Features. The Waterstones exclusive has a slipcase, foiled cover design, illustrated endpapers, and beautiful design details. The standard US hardback is also nice, with a foiled cover design on yellow boards and illustrated endpapers, while the UK hardback has foiled stars on black boards, illustrated chapter headings, and a quote on the spine.
➤ Find the slipcase exclusive at Waterstones
➤ Find the US ed at Amazon | B&N
➤ Find the UK ed at Amazon | Waterstones
★ A Theory of Dreaming - Ava Reid
The sequel to A Study in Drowning that continues the blend of literary gothic mood, folklore-soaked horror, and magical romance. The story expands beyond the personal, with sharpening political conflict and questions about how stories are used by nations, institutions, and ambitious men.
Deluxe Limited Edition. US hardback with foiled case design, antique-style paisley patterned endpapers, and gorgeous bookshelf-decorated page edges.
➤ Buy Waterstones exclusive edition from Waterstones
★ Demon Daughter - Lois McMaster Bujold
A novella in the Penric & Desdemona series, which sits inside her World of the Five Gods – this is a setting where gods can nudge and guide, but humans still have to do the messy work. The Penric stories are mostly novella-length, episodic adventures following a sorcerer whose magic comes with a permanent companion: Desdemona, the demon sharing his body, who carries the memories of multiple previous lives. The books are wry, humane, and cleverly explore ethics, bureaucracy and faith. This particular title puts Penric and his demon at odds with each other as they have to decide the fate of a 6 year old girl.
Sub Press Limited Edition. US hardback signed by the author
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Subterranean Press
★ The Inheritance - Ilona Andrews
This is the first book in a new Breach Wars series. It's a fast-paced high-stakes fantasy where a future interdimensional invasion brought monsters and awakened “Talents” in humanity – people who can fight back, raid breaches for resources and keep civilisation standing. Ada is a Talent who's also a working mother who gets trapped in a labyrinth of alien caves with only a German Shepherd to keep her company. Like all Ilona Andrews books, it's compulsively readable – the sort of book you stay up until 3am reading ‘just one more chapter'.
Special Features. Okay – so this is a self-published paperback, and the glorious original color artwork is rendered in tiny disappointing black & white pics. So it really shouldn't be in a “most beautiful” list – BUT it was such an excellent read I'm including it anyway. Fascinating world-building, compelling characters, and the dog doesn't die.
➤ Find it at Amazon
★ The City of Brass - S. A. Chakraborty
Book one of The Daevabad Trilogy, deeply rooted in Middle Eastern and Islamic folklore. We start in eighteenth-century Cairo with Nahri, a clever con artist who survives by reading people, swindling the powerful, and keeping her head down. When she accidentally summons a djinn warrior she's dragged into the reality of Daevabad: a legendary city of brass where ancient grudges, court politics, and magical bloodlines can be deadlier than any blade. When you fall in love with the world there are two more books waiting for you, so I hope they continue to give the later volumes deluxe treatment as well.
Special Features. A reversible jacket, foil stamped boards, illustrated endpapers, and decorative sprayed page edges.
Magical Mysteries
Silvercloak - L. K. Steven
A new fantasy series where magic is fueled by pleasure and pain and an obsessive detective must infiltrate a brutal gang of dark mages—knowing that one wrong move will get her killed. 🌶️
Special Features. US hardback first printings have teal stained page edges, a designed case stamp, and full-color endpaper maps.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Blackwells
★ A Drop of Corruption - Robert Jackson Bennett
This is the second book in the fantastic Shadow of the Leviathan magical murder mystery series. The investigative duo Ana and Din have a Holmes and Watson rhythm in a world where the magic system is essentially monster biology turned into tools and drugs. It’s a clever combination of sharp, political, fantasy and imaginative police procedural.
Special Features. Very pretty covers for both the standard US and UK editions, but nothing else really, I just wanted to recommend the book!
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
★ Alchemy of Secrets - Stephanie Garber
The book opens with our main character sitting in a folklore class taught by ‘the Professor’ in an old movie theatre. As she investigates some urban myths and magical prophecies you just know they are going to turn real, and the story gives a lovely sense of old Hollywood, with secret societies and magic that hides in plain sight. It’s a mystery quest story at heart, and overall a great mix of romance, folklore and urban fantasy.
Special Features. UK first printings have illustrated endpapers and one of four hidden foiled case cover designs, and US first printings have an art deco foiled case stamp and black sprayed page edges. The Waterstones exclusive has decorative sprayed page edges as well.
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
➤ Buy exclusive edition from Waterstones
★ Turns of Fate - Anne Bishop
A dark-leaning urban fantasy that starts like a straightforward police inquiry – Detective Beth Fahey is sent to Destiny Park on the edge of the Isle of Wyrd to ask the paranormal Arcana questions about a “ghost gun” – and then steadily deepens into something stranger. Anne brilliantly characterises the thinking of magical species with such compellingly different worldviews – her Others series is also fantastic.
Special Features. No special features really, it's just another great read!
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Science Fiction & Dystopias
★ Red Rising - Pierce Brown
Set in a class-stratified future where the lowborn Darrow gets thrown into the elite class as a weapon from the inside. It’s brutal, fast, and very intense “Hunger Games” dystopian. It’s the first in a sweeping space opera rebellion that keeps escalating as the series continues.
Special Features. A foiled illustrated slipcase, wraparound book case art, decorative sprayed page edges, full color endpapers with a new map, and a foldout poster.
★ Isles of the Emberdark - Brandon Sanderson
Sanderson does his “mythic adventure science fantasy” magic, with warring galactic superpowers set in the far-future of his Cosmere world. It’s readable as a standalone, but will probably be more deeply enjoyed by someone familiar with the Cosmere.
Special Features. Sanderson sells a ‘premium’ edition in his own shop, which matches the rest of his special kickstarter editions. But the standard edition will be out soon, and it looks like that one will be illustrated too. Waterstones has an exclusive edition with sprayed page edges.
➤ Buy premium ed from Dragonsteel Books
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
➤ Buy exclusive edition from Waterstones
★ This Is How You Lose the Time War - Amal El-Mohtar
A novella that’s best described as a time-travel war story told through love letters. Two elite agents, Red and Blue, work for opposing powers across branching timelines, sabotaging each other’s victories and reshaping history in mutually exclusive ways. They begin leaving messages for one another: first as taunts, then as flirtation, and eventually as something far more dangerous. It won major awards including the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus for Best Novella.
Special Features. Deluxe edition with decorative sprayed page edges, illustrated endpapers and printed & debossed case art.
★ Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins, illustrated by Nico Delort
The second oversized volume of her popular Hunger Games series to be illustrated by Nico Delort. It’s tense and traumatic, and if you haven’t read it in a while, you might find it’s politically sharper than you remember.
Special Features. Oversized and illustrated.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
Sunrise on the Reaping - Suzanne Collins
This is a brilliantly done prequel for the Hunger Games. Although we know the ultimate outcome of Haymitch’s Hunger Games, Suzanne still manages to keep us on the edge of our seats as we read.
Special Features. A metallic foiled cover, decorative sprayed page edges, illustrated endpapers, and bonust material.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
LitRPG
★ Dungeon Crawler Carl
The basic setup of this series is that the Earth is invaded and the only way to survive is to win a televised dungeon-crawl game show. It’s chaotic, addictively paced, and hilarious in a completely unhinged sort of way. This is the 7th volume of the series.
Special Features. The Ace hardback editions each contain an exclusive chapter of a long-running behind-the-scenes novella set inside the Dungeon called Backstage at the Pineapple café, which is an awesome bonus.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones
☞ See the Dungeon Crawler Carl page for more in this series.
★ Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain - Ian Livingstone
“Step up, hero, it's time to fight!”
Collector's Edition. UK hardback with new cover art by Karl Kopinski, iconic interior illustrations by Russ Nicholson, and 1898 map of Allansia, along with an updated History of Fighting Fantasy and the Qatlas map of Firetop Mountain. Limited to 2000 copies.
➤ Buy from Amazon | Waterstones | Blackwells
Art & Design
★ The Art and Making of Arcane: League of Legends
This book is filled with incredible illustrations and concept art from the Netflix series set in the world of League of Legends. It includes the art development process, setting art, and interviews with creators.
Special Features. A bright pink acetate dust jacket and heaps of fantastic removable pieces including posters, maps, blueprints, letters, and fold-out spreads as well.
➤ Buy UK ed from Amazon | Waterstones
The Book of Bill - Alex Hirsch
This is a Gravity Fall's companion tale, where demon Bill Cipher returns from beyond to share his origin story, influence on human history, and guide to world domination.
Limited Collector's Edition. US hardback with a glow in the dark slipcase, variant cover, douible-sided poster, sticker sheet of Bill tattoos and four keepsake postcards.
➤ Buy from Amazon | B&N | Waterstones | Blackwells
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