A Reading Guide
Best Sapphic Fantasy Books
Empires, magic systems, and women who choose each other over the crown.
Sapphic fantasy has quietly become one of the strongest currents in speculative fiction. The best books in the genre aren't just fantasy novels with a queer romance grafted on — they use magic, empire, and invented worlds to tell love stories that couldn't have been told anywhere else.
This is a curated entry point for readers looking for lesbian fantasy novels — from epic secondary-world politics to intimate cottage magic, and where the more speculative Laura and Maya books fit on the shelf.
Start here
Epic sapphic fantasy
- Tasha Suri — The Jasmine Throne (2021). The touchstone modern sapphic epic fantasy. An exiled princess and a maidservant with forbidden magic meet in a temple prison — and the empire never recovers. Rich, political, and unmistakably queer.Find The Jasmine Throne on Amazon →
- C.L. Clark — The Unbroken (2021). A colonial soldier and the princess she's meant to serve, on opposite sides of a rebellion. The sapphic military fantasy that takes empire seriously.Find The Unbroken on Amazon →
- Samantha Shannon — The Priory of the Orange Tree (2019). A standalone doorstopper with dragons, queens, and a slow-burn sapphic romance at the center. The go-to recommendation for readers who want scope.Find Priory on Amazon →
Character-Driven
Quieter, sharper, stranger
- Freya Marske — A Marvellous Light (2021). Edwardian magic, a civil servant, and a curse — with a central m/m romance, but Marske's sapphic-led follow-ups (A Restless Truth, A Power Unbound) belong on any sapphic fantasy shelf.Find A Restless Truth on Amazon →
- T. Kingfisher — Nettle & Bone (2022). A fairy-tale quest with a middle sister, a bone dog, and a queer found family. Sapphic elements woven through — perfect for readers who want warmth and weirdness.Find Nettle & Bone on Amazon →
- Alix E. Harrow — The Once and Future Witches (2020). Three sisters and the return of witchcraft in a suffragist-era America. Not marketed as sapphic first, but one of the central romances is — and the whole book reads queer.Find Once and Future Witches on Amazon →
Romantic & Cozy
Sapphic romantasy with soft edges
- Sangu Mandanna — The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches (2022). Not a lead sapphic romance, but a cornerstone cozy-fantasy title fans of the genre reach for. Read it for the tone, then step across to the sapphic titles below.Find Irregular Witches on Amazon →
- Sarah Beth Durst — The Spellshop (2024). A librarian, a stolen collection of spellbooks, and a jam-making island neighbour. Cozy sapphic-adjacent fantasy at its most comforting.Find The Spellshop on Amazon →
- Rebecca Thorne — Can't Spell Treason Without Tea (2022). A runaway queensguard and her mage girlfriend open a teashop. Low-stakes, HEA, and enormously popular with the romantasy crowd.Find Treason & Tea on Amazon →
If You Want Speculative Sapphic
Laura Chambers Is the Apocalypse in a Sweater
Not epic fantasy — but if you like your speculative fiction sapphic, strange, and firmly on the side of the women at the center of it, this is the door in. Laura Chambers wakes up as the accidental end of the world; Maya Novak is the only person willing to argue with her about it. The tone sits closer to Kingfisher and Harrow than to empire fantasy — small-scale, character-first, and unmistakably queer.
Laura Chambers Is the Apocalypse in a Sweater
A quiet archaeology student, a disruptive urban planner, and a library table that becomes the beginning of everything.
Laura Chambers Is the Apocalypse in a Sweater
by Aaron D. Stott
A quiet archaeology student, a disruptive urban planner, and a library table that becomes the beginning of everything.
View all books →"The world was ending. She still wanted to argue about it."
— Aaron D. Stott