The best books featuring monsters, magic, and mysteries to unravel

The Rook is one of the most original books I’ve ever read. In this world, magic and monsters are kept in line by a supernatural organization: the Chequy. Our main character, Myfanwy, keeps this organization running. It doesn’t sound unique—except Myfanwy can’t remember who she is. Someone in the Chequy has betrayed her, erasing her memory, and that person is still trying to kill her. Myfanwy is a fantastic protagonist, uncovering a conspiracy while following the instructions left by her past self, and though aspects of this book have certainly been done before, Daniel O’Malley makes the story unpredictable, immersive, and wildly entertaining. I loved it so much that it influenced my first novel, and The Rook has never left my list of favorite books.

If you prefer your mysteries with a side of sci-fi, you can’t go wrong with Gideon the Ninth. There’s a lot going on here— deadly trials, spooky settings, competing necromancers, and secrets upon secrets—but in this dark, imaginative world, the characters are what make this book amazing. Gideon Nav (sarcastic swordswoman and reader of dirty magazines) is cool, funny, and somehow very relatable, and her relationship with her nemesis, Harrowhark (horrible little bone witch) is the heart of the story. This isn’t an easy read, and the book is one people either love or hate, but it’s unique, original, and the mystery kept me guessing until the very end. There are few books I’ve become totally obsessed with, but this is one of them.

It’s not often that a book keeps me awake until 3 am, but this one did. The mystery in House of Hollow is straightforward: Iris Hollow’s sister, Grey, has gone missing under strange circumstances, echoing the way Iris and her sisters disappeared when they were children. Although this book is for young adults, there’s nothing childish about it. House of Hollow is beautifully written and totally unpredictable, the magic sinister and unnerving. As the mystery unfolds, it creates more questions for the reader, and by the end I was no longer sure I wanted to know the answers. This book was a 10/10 for me, and I’m sure the stunning prose influenced my own work.

I love zombies. They’ve always captured my imagination, but they’re rarely portrayed as originally and thoughtfully as they are here. In this book, the walking dead are known as bone houses, and the mystery is why they’ve suddenly started leaving the woods and attacking the village of Colbren. The Bone Houses is heavily influenced by Welsh mythology, and I’m an enormous fan of mythology in general, so that drew me in. But while I expected to enjoy this book, the unexpected emotional moments made me fall in love with it. And as someone who suffers from chronic pain, I really appreciated the way Lloyd-Jones handled the subject, as it’s rarely represented so well.

The Bear and the Nightingale takes place in a fantasy version of medieval Russia, and it’s one of the most atmospheric, well-written fantasy novels I’ve had the pleasure of reading. Magic is deeply embedded in this book, and creatures veer between monstrous and mundane depending on the views of the character who sees them. Religion and mythology are combined and wrapped in a riveting, emotional story, filled with characters I fell in love with, or loved to hate. While it might contain less mystery than the other books on this list, I couldn’t guess the way it would end, and I wasn’t disappointed when I reached the final page.