Best Fantasy Series to Get Lost In This Year.
Sometimes you don't want a single book — you want a world you can disappear into for months, with thousands of pages, political intrigue, and characters you'll be thinking about long after you finish. Here are ten fantasy series worth the commitment, from sprawling epics to tighter, faster trilogies, and a couple of the genre's biggest current obsessions.
1. A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin
The series that redefined modern epic fantasy — a sprawling, morally gray war for the Iron Throne of Westeros, told across shifting points of view where no character, however important, is guaranteed to survive the next chapter. Five volumes exist so far (A Game of Thrones through A Dance with Dragons), with the long-awaited sixth, The Winds of Winter, still unfinished. Start here if you want the series that basically created the current appetite for morally complicated, politically dense fantasy.
2. The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson
An ongoing epic (five volumes so far, planned for ten) set on the storm-ravaged world of Roshar, following multiple point-of-view characters — a slave-turned-soldier, a scholar-scientist, and a disgraced nobleman among them — as ancient magic and an ancient war resurface. Sanderson is famous for meticulously constructed "hard magic systems" with clear rules, and this is his most ambitious. A serious commitment (each book runs 1,000+ pages), but consistently ranked among the best epic fantasy being written today.
3. The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan
Fourteen volumes following Rand al'Thor, a young man revealed to be the prophesied reincarnation of a savior-or-destroyer figure, as an ancient evil stirs. Jordan died before finishing the series, and Brandon Sanderson completed the final three books from his notes. It's one of the most influential fantasy series of the last fifty years, and a genuinely massive world to get lost in — expect to be reading for a long time.
4. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling
Seven books following Harry Potter's education at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and his gradual confrontation with the dark wizard who killed his parents. It remains one of the most widely read series in the world, and one of the gentler entries on this list — a good pick if you want a fantasy series that starts light and grows darker and more complex as it goes.
5. The Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothfuss
Two volumes so far (The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man's Fear), following Kvothe, a legendary figure telling his own life story — from a childhood in a traveling troupe, through the death of his family, to his education at a university for magic — to an innkeeper recording it for posterity. Beautifully written and beloved for its prose, though be aware the long-promised third book has not yet been released.
6. The First Law by Joe Abercrombie
A grimdark trilogy (with several follow-up books set in the same world) following a washed-up torturer, a barbarian warrior, and a vain nobleman-turned-soldier, in a world where heroism rarely pays off the way it does in more traditional fantasy. Abercrombie is known for sharp, cynical humor and genuinely surprising plotting — a good pick if A Song of Ice and Fire's moral complexity is what you're after, in a tighter package.
7. Six of Crows and the wider Grishaverse by Leigh Bardugo
A duology (Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom) following a crew of six teenage criminals pulling off an impossible heist in a Amsterdam-inspired fantasy city, part of Bardugo's larger Grishaverse setting. Faster and more plot-driven than most epic fantasy, with a genuinely great ensemble cast — a good entry point if you want something fantasy-adjacent to a heist movie.
8. The Broken Earth Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin
A trilogy following Essun, a woman with the power to control earthquakes in a world regularly devastated by continent-shattering catastrophes, as she searches for her missing daughter. Each of the three books won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in consecutive years — the first time that's ever happened — and the trilogy is widely considered one of the most inventive works of fantasy of the last decade, both structurally and thematically.
9. The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang
A trilogy following Rin, a war orphan who tests into an elite military academy and is drawn into a devastating war, loosely inspired by twentieth-century Chinese history including the Second Sino-Japanese War. It starts as a fairly traditional school-and-magic story before turning into one of the darkest, most morally uncompromising fantasy series being written today.
10. The Empyrean by Rebecca Yarros
The series (starting with Fourth Wing) currently dominating fantasy sales and BookTok, following Violet Sorrengail, who's forced into a brutal dragon-rider academy where the mortality rate is jaw-droppingly high. It blends fast-paced action, dragon-riding fantasy, and romance in roughly equal measure — the series to pick up if you want to know what everyone on social media is currently obsessed with.
Where to Find These Books in Kenya
All the titles above are in stock at Readers' Republik, with delivery across Nairobi and the rest of Kenya. Explore more in these collections:
Frequently Asked Questions.
Which of these fantasy series is completed and won't leave me on a cliffhanger? Harry Potter, The Broken Earth Trilogy, The Poppy War, and the Six of Crows duology are all fully completed. A Song of Ice and Fire, The Stormlight Archive, The Kingkiller Chronicle, and The Empyrean are all still ongoing.
Which series is the biggest commitment? The Wheel of Time, at fourteen volumes, and The Stormlight Archive, with five 1,000-plus-page books so far and five more planned, are the longest commitments on this list.
What's a good fantasy series to start with if I've never read the genre before? Harry Potter remains the gentlest on-ramp, while Six of Crows is a good option for readers who want something fast and plot-driven rather than sprawling and slow-building.
Is The Empyrean appropriate for younger readers? No — despite its YA-adjacent premise, Fourth Wing and its sequels contain explicit sexual content and graphic violence, and are marketed as adult fantasy.
Which of these series is most similar to Game of Thrones? The First Law is the closest match in tone — morally gray characters, political scheming, and a similarly cynical view of heroism — while being a shorter commitment than A Song of Ice and Fire itself.