“What are the best books about Fairies?” We looked at 299 of the top Fairy books, aggregating and ranking them so we could answer that very question!

The top 11 titles, all appearing on 2 or more “Best Fairy” book lists, are ranked below by how many lists they appear on. The remaining 250+ titles, as well as the lists we used are in alphabetical order at the bottom of the page.

Happy Scrolling!

Top 11 Books About Or Featuring Fairies

11 .) Whatever After by Sarah Mlynowski:

Lists It Appears On:

• Books My Kids Read
• Pennies And Playdough

Once upon a time my brother and I were normal kids. The next minute? The mirror in our basement slurped us up and magically transported us inside Snow White’s fairy tale.

10 .) Troublesome Things: A History of Fairies and Fairy Stories

Lists It Appears On:

• Fairyist
• Strange History

At the Bottom of the Garden is a history of fairies from the ancient world to the present. Steeped in folklore and fantasy, it is a rich and diverse account of the part that fairies and fairy stories have played in culture and society.” “Dianne Purkiss explains in this engrossing history that ancient fairies were born of fear: fear of the dark, of death, and of other great rites of passage, birth and sex. To understand the importance of these early fairies to pre-industrial peoples, we need to recover that sense of dread.

9 .) The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff

Lists It Appears On:

• Goodreads
• Penguin Teen

Mackie Doyle is not one of us. Though he lives in the small town of Gentry, he comes from a world of tunnels and black murky water, a world of living dead girls ruled by a little tattooed princess. He is a Replacement, left in the crib of a human baby sixteen years ago. Now, because of fatal allergies to iron, blood, and consecrated ground, Mackie is fighting to survive in the human world. Mackie would give anything to live among us, to practice on his bass or spend time with his crush, Tate. But when Tate’s baby sister goes missing, Mackie is drawn irrevocably into the underworld of Gentry, known as Mayhem. He must face the dark creatures of the Slag Heaps and find his rightful place, in our world, or theirs.

8 .) The Middle Kingdom: The Faerie World of Ireland

Lists It Appears On:

• Fairyist
• Strange History

No matter what one doubts, wrote Yeats, one never doubts the faeries for…they stand to reason. The author, a friend of both Yeats and the great folklorist Douglas Hyde, is a staunch believer in the ancient and continuing spirit life of the countryside. Writing not as folklorist but as an historian, he records many manifestations of the Irish fairy world in recent years. Strikingly persuasive, this tackles in a serious and intelligent manner a subject that has a strong romantic appeal.

7 .) The Complete Book of the Flower Fairies

Lists It Appears On:

• Fairyist
• Read Brightly

Enjoy the classic, complete collection of Cicely Mary Barker’s original Flower Fairies books in this brand-new edition. This collector’s favorite has been redesigned and now features a lavish, eye-catching jacket with silver foil. The interior still includes all of the well-loved illustrations and poems from Barker’s eight original books, as well as a selection of fairy rhymes.

6 .) Rainbow Magic Fairies by Daisy Meadows

Lists It Appears On:

• Pennies And Playdough
• Read Brightly

The seven Rainbow Fairies are missing! Rachel and Kirsty search for one in each RAINBOW MAGIC book. Read all seven books to help rescue the fairies and bring the sparkle back to Fairyland!

5 .) Fairy Tale by Cyn Balog

Lists It Appears On:

• Goodreads
• Fairyist

Morgan Sparks has always known that she and her boyfriend, Cam, are made for each other. But when Cam’s cousin Pip comes to stay with the family, Cam seems depressed. Finally Cam confesses to Morgan what’s going on: Cam is a fairy. The night he was born, fairies came down and switched him with a healthy human boy. Nobody expected Cam to live, and nobody expected his biological brother, heir to the fairy throne, to die. But both things happened, and now the fairies want Cam back to take his rightful place as Fairy King. Even as Cam physically changes, becoming more miserable each day, he and Morgan pledge to fool the fairies and stay together forever. But by the time Cam has to decide once and for all what to do, Morgan’s no longer sure what’s best for everyone, or whether her and Cam’s love can weather an uncertain future.

4 .) Faery Tale: One Woman’s Search for Enchantment in a Modern World

Lists It Appears On:

• Strange History
• Fairyist

In search of something to believe in once more, Signe Pike left behind a career in Manhattan to undertake a magical journey-literally. In a sweeping tour through Mexico, England, Ireland, Scotland, and beyond, she takes readers to dark glens and abandoned forests, ancient sacred sites, and local pubs, seeking people who might still believe in the elusive beings we call faeries. As Pike attempts to connect with the spirit world-and reconnect with her sense of wonder and purpose-she comes to view both herself and the world around her in a profoundly new light. Captivating, full of heart, and unabashedly whimsical, Faery Tale is more than a memoir-it’s the story of rekindling that spark of belief that makes even the most skeptical among us feel like a child again.

3 .) Explore Fairy Traditions

Lists It Appears On:

• Strange History
• Fairyist

2 .) Elves in Anglo-Saxon England: Matters of Belief, Health, Gender and Identity

Lists It Appears On:

• Strange History
• Fairyist

Anglo-Saxon elves are one of the best attested non-Christian beliefs in early medieval Europe, but current interpretations of the evidence derive directly from outdated nineteenth- and early twentieth-century scholarship. Integrating linguistic and textual approaches into an anthropologically-inspired framework, this book reassesses the full range of evidence. It traces continuities and changes in medieval non-Christian beliefs with a new degree of reliability, from pre-conversion times to the eleventh century and beyond, and uses comparative material from medieval Ireland and Scandinavia to argue for a dynamic relationship between beliefs and society. In particular, it interprets the cultural significance of elves as a cause of illness in medical texts, and provides new insights into the much-discussed Scandinavian magic of seidr. Elf-beliefs, moreover, were connected with Anglo-Saxon constructions of sex and gender; their changing nature provides a rare insight into a fascinating area of early medieval European culture.

1 .) Spirits, Fairies, Leprechauns and Goblins: An Encylopedia by Carol Rose

Lists It Appears On:

• Anathema Books
• Fairyist

In more than 2,000 alphabetically arranged entries, readers will meet angels, demons, elves, encantados, fairies, familiars, keremets, nats, nymphs, and many other strange beings from around the world. Carol Rose introduces the reader to the little–and not so little–folk, delightfully various and, at the same time, strikingly similar from country to country. Wherever humans have lived, the supernatural beings have dwelt alongside us. People serve to explain the unexplainable–the strange disappearance of a traveler in a dark wood, that odd thumping in the attic, the fresh cream turned sour overnight. Often they reveal the stoic humor with which human societies have faced their difficulties. But whatever their source, our guilts, fears, dreams, or imaginations, the spirits have fascinated and enchanted us through the millennia.

The 250+ Additional Best Books About Mythical Fairies

13 Best Fairy Book Sources/Lists