The Land of Stories by Chris Colfer is a popular children/middle-grade fantasy where we see many fairy tales and magic. There are six books in this series, and all of them are related to each other, but you can read standalone.
We follow Alex and Conner, who are siblings, and one day their grandmother gives them a book, this book being The Land of Stories. To their surprise, they find that this book that their grandmother gave them is a portal to a world made up of fairy tales. Here they find themselves constantly in trouble and taking on lots of adventures.
It’s full of fairy tale references, comedy, and lots of action. Alex and Conner end up climbing up the beanstalk in book two, and what they find at the top is a giant cat. They achieve magic (shooting star) by teaming up and using it as a signal and transportation. Also, they are constantly finding themselves in trouble, and they could use some helping hand. You are on the way to reading the books with ‘The Land Of Stories’ vibe.
10 Books Like The Land Of Stories Series
The Land Of Stories is about two 11-year-old twins, Alex and Conner, having a bad time in their lives. Their dad recently died in the accident, and they had to sell their old house. Their mom has to work every hour she can as a nurse to keep them afloat. On their 12th birthday, their grandmother turned up, and she gave them a book called The Land of Stories. It is about their journey of finding a way home, and they have to find some items to use the wishing spell, which is the way to get back home.
Also, it’s a book that she read them when they were little. So they take this book, and Alex is reading it one night. Then she lays down to go to sleep, and she hears humming, and the book starts to grow. Her brother, Conner, jumps in after her, and they end up in the land of stories, which is all the fairy tales we know Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Goldilocks, Jack, and the Beanstalk. Do you want to read more? I will review 10 magic/fairy-tale books like The Land Of Stories series. Let’s fly!
1. The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories
This novel was published in 1974, and it is the book that Angela Carter is well known for. It is effectively a compilation of short stories, and often it gets called a retelling or a modernization of older fairy stories. These are entirely new stories, but they’re grounded in the fairy tale archetypes. The author is so strong in short stories, and she can paint a small picture into a big one.
The Bloody Chamba is a retelling of Bluebeard. It’s quite large compared to this book. Then there’s a couple of retellings of Red Riding Hood, The Land of Stories, and Beauty And The Beast. Moreover, there’s a funny one about Puss in Boots and the Old King. If you’re into gothic fairy tales or things that are a bit darker, then this book is for you.
Author: Angela Carter
Average Customer Review: (4.4 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fantasy Anthologies
Number Of Pages: 128
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
2. Spinning Silver
This is a story set in Magical Poland. It’s a fairy tale world, which is beautifully constructed and inspired by the Polish fairy tales author Naomi Novik’s childhood. There’s a fairy king who’s called Staryk. It’s a beautiful fantasy story reminiscent of fairy tales and feels very fairy tale esque to me after The Land Of Stories. Also, it’s based loosely on the tale of Rumpelstiltskin.
The main character in the story is named Miryem, and she is the daughter of a very unsuccessful moneylender. There are two more major points of view characters in this as well. Then there’s also Irina, who is betrothed to the Staryk of this land, and he’s a very dark, scary man. So, this is an excellent story to read at Christmas time or to read as you’re going into the winter.
Author: Naomi Novik
Average Customer Review: (4.6 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Mythology & Folk Tales
Number Of Pages: 465
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
3. The Buried Giant
This book was published in 2015, two years before author Kazuo Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Ishiguro is an amazing author, and he has written a lot of brilliant books. The Buried Giant is the unique thing he’s written, a literary fantasy story. Also, it’s very much inspired by myth and pre-medieval English history. So it’s got these lovely little fairy tale esque bits where you could sit in two different camps of being inspired by fairy tale and myth.
The book is not a fast-paced plot, but it’s about these two older people named Axl and Beatrice, who live in a closed-off community in Britain in premedieval post-Arthurian time. It’s a period when the Saxons and Britons are fighting, and a literal giant is buried in the ground.
So, they live in this situation where there’s this collective forgetfulness. Axl and Beatrice remember that they had a son at some point and go on this journey to find their son. Kazuo Ishiguro is amazing at these plots where you can’t say too much without giving it away. It’s the unique fantasy story I’ve ever read after “The Land of Stories.”
Author: Kazuo Ishiguro
Average Customer Review: (4.1 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Metaphysical & Visionary Fiction
Number Of Pages: 317
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Spiral-bound
4. The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making (Fairyland)
It’s related to fairy tales like The Land of Stories, but this is a lovely, beautiful, absurd, whimsical middle-grade story. The story is about a young girl named September. She’s 12, and she’s washing dishes in her kitchen at home. Her dad is off in the war, and her mother is a mechanical engineer who is spirited off to fairyland.
September meets a wyvern whose father thinks it is a library, so he considers himself a cross between the library and the wyvern. His name is A-Through-L because those are the books he represents in the library. It’s like Alice in Wonderland. So that’s what this feels like, but it’s very colorful and magical.
Author: Catherynne M. Valente
Average Customer Review: (4.5 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Teen & Young Adult Fantasy Action & Adventure
Number Of Pages: 247
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
5. Tolkien On Fairy-stories
It is a non-fiction book/essay, depending on how it’s published. This is essentially Tolkien diving into fairy stories as a literary form and looking at how we use these fairy stories. He spells it inconsistently. The title is on fairy stories, and then he calls it very odd that as an interesting way to look at the genre. In addition, he looks at how we use fairy stories to hold up a mirror to society.
Reading this particular essay is enlightening for looking into Tolkien’s works because you see his perspective and opinions on fantasy in this league. I enjoyed reading this for my research. This particular essay came out of a presentation he was going to do. It was published in the late nineteen-thirties. If you’re interested in Tolkien and like non-fiction, I recommend checking this out.
Author: Douglas A. Flieger Verlyn
Average Customer Review: (4.7 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Science Fiction History & Criticism
Number Of Pages: 128
Available: Paperback | Hardcover
6. House of Salt and Sorrows
It’s a retelling that gets creepy. So it took a classic story, and then it made it scary, which is great for Halloween. We follow 12 Dancing Princesses, a particularly familiar story, but apparently, there was a Barbie movie about the 12 Dancing Princesses. This is nothing like the Barbie movie, but I can guarantee you they’re very different.
This book has a lot of tropes in it, and there are so many different things that make it almost chaotic. I felt it contributed to its creepiness because it is a family with 12 people, many daughters, and the main character. A bunch of her sisters keeps dying. The family, everyone thinks they’re cursed.
So everybody avoids them out of respect. They’re supposed to be this mourning period that lasts a long time, but they all keep on dying. Is there a curse on them? One of her youngest sisters starts seeing creepy stuff then talks about it. So there are a lot of atmospheres similar to The Land of Stories.
Author: Erin A. Craig
Average Customer Review: (4.5 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fairy Tales & Folklore Adaptations
Number Of Pages: 406
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
7. Cinder (The Lunar Chronicles)
This is a story that is science fiction retellings within each book. So the first one is Cinder, a retelling of Cinderella, but sci-fi. Then you have characters like Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, Alex, and Conner. They pop up throughout the series. Cinder adds on top of the previous book for this one arc throughout the story. These are great for people who enjoy young adults and in general.
If you have a sibling, a child, somebody in your life who is younger and they’re transitioning into the young adult age range, this one feels like a great transition out of middle grade. It is slightly more youthful like The Land Of Stories, but the stakes are pretty high. That is how Marissa Mayer takes some of these traditional fairy tales and then makes them science fiction. She does it in a way that’s creative and fun.
Author: Marissa Meyer
Average Customer Review: (4.6 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Literature & Fiction & Folklore Adaptations
Number Of Pages: 448
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
8. Uprooted
This one is good for fall because it’s very atmospheric and has a creepy forest setting. It is central-eastern European folklore. Also, you’re dealing with this forest. It takes a lot for me to find a forest scary that I found in The Land Of Stories. But this forest was legitimately scary because usually, I love the trees. Also, there’s weird stuff in the forest that affects people. Then those people try to kill other people.
The setup is a wizard, a magic-user who lives in a tower, and he protects this little village from the scary forest. To pay him back, he gets to have one of the village girls live with him in the tower, which is weird, and nobody knows what happens. But the girls came out of it eventually, and everything was fine.
Then they dip, and the main character is somebody who gets selected because she’s not the usual pretty face that tends to get selected, and the guy is mean to her. You follow her around as they’re trying to figure out how to deal with this forest and some political things that are affected by what happens in this forest.
Author: Naomi Novik
Average Customer Review: (4.6 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Mythology & Folk Tales
Number Of Pages: 438
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
9. Spin the Dawn (The Blood of Stars)
This is a completed duology, and it is very loosely based on a folklore story. Also, it is a traveling love story. When I heard it spoken of in the past, I didn’t realize how much romance would be at the forefront. So, it’s not a steamy superstar romance. This character is witnessing a lot of very whimsical types of things. If you’re a fan of The Land of Stories, you’ll like this story.
The main character has a mole on a setup where her dad is supposed to be selected for something. He’s not able to do it. So she describes herself as a boy because only boys can fulfill this particular role. Then she disguised herself as a boy and went in his place, and she had to keep up this image as a boy the entire time she was competing in this particular competition. Moreover, she’s competing to become the emperor’s tailor, airy, fairy tale esque, very whimsical.
Author: Elizabeth Lim
Average Customer Review: (4.5 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fantasy Romance
Number Of Pages: 392
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle
10. Fables: Legends in Exile
It’s a comic book series that has a fun setup. The story takes a bunch of fairy tale characters. So it’s not a direct retelling, but it takes many traditional fairy tale characters. Then something is going on in the homeland, which is where they’re from their fantasy worlds, and it forces them to live in our world, glamour to look like people.
The main characters would be Big B, the big bad wolf. He’s their sheriff and then snow from Snow White. She has an administrative type of position. They often work together like Alex and Conner, the main characters of The Land of Stories. So, it’s also a little dark at times, which is very reminiscent of the more Grimm fairy tale feel.
Author: Bill Willingham
Average Customer Review: (4.7 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Mystery Graphic Novels
Number Of Pages: 144
Available: Kindle & Comixology | School & Library Binding | Paperback | Comics
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