There is something irresistible about England when it is viewed through the lens of magic. Perhaps it is the fog, which has always made the land itself feel a bit mysterious. Perhaps it is the ancient stones, the crumbling estates, the cobbled streets that seem to hum with secrets they are only too willing to share—if one knows how to listen.
Whatever the reason, writers have long understood what we have always suspected: that the real history of England was altogether more marvellous than the textbooks would have us believe. Magicians walked among the gentry. Vampires observed the strictest etiquette. Dragons fought alongside the Royal Navy. And in certain government offices, young women with very expressive eyebrows were tasked with defending the realm against threats that no ordinary soldier could hope to understand.
We have gathered here seventeen of the finest historical fantasy novels set in England—books that weave enchantment through the warp and weft of real British history, from the age of gunpowder plots to the twilight of the Edwardian era. If you have ever wished that the past came with a touch more wonder, you are, we assure you, in precisely the right place.
1. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
We begin where any honest survey of English historical fantasy must begin: with the book that set the entire modern tradition ablaze.
Set during the Napoleonic Wars, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell imagines a Regency England in which magic was once commonplace but has long since faded into mere academic debate. That changes when the reclusive, fussy Mr Norrell reveals himself as a practising magician and offers his services to the Crown. He is soon joined—and rivalled—by the younger, bolder Jonathan Strange, whose intuitive brilliance is matched only by his recklessness.
Clarke’s prose is a miracle of sustained wit, echoing Austen and Dickens while remaining entirely her own invention. The footnotes alone constitute a secondary novel of considerable charm. This is a book of extraordinary ambition and equally extraordinary achievement—a story about the return of English magic that itself feels like an act of magic. Winner of the Hugo Award and rightly regarded as one of the finest fantasy novels ever written.
2. The Wendy by Erin Michelle Sky & Steven Brown
Set in the 1780s and 1790s, The Wendy reimagines the Peter Pan story as a meticulously researched historical fantasy rooted in the real England of the Georgian era. Wendy Darling is an orphan with an impossible dream: she wants to captain her own ship in a time when such ambitions in a young woman were considered not merely impractical but positively scandalous.
When she joins England’s secret Home Office—a covert force mobilised against a magical threat known as the Everlost—she finds herself navigating London, Dover, and the English countryside alongside reimagined versions of Captain Hook, Peter Pan, Tinker Bell, John, Michael, and the ever-loyal Nana. What makes this book remarkable is not merely its premise but the quality of its execution. The narration carries a warm, knowing wit that echoes the storytelling tradition of Barrie himself, managing to feel both timeless and thoroughly fresh. The historical detail is impeccable, the characters are vivid and surprising, and Wendy is the kind of heroine one finishes the book wishing one could befriend.
This is the first book in the now-complete Tales of the Wendy trilogy, followed by The Navigator and The Captain.
3. His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik
What if the Napoleonic Wars had been fought with dragons?
That is the glorious premise of Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series, which opens with Captain Will Laurence of the Royal Navy capturing a French ship and discovering aboard it a dragon egg. When the hatchling bonds with Laurence, the captain is compelled to leave his naval career behind and join Britain’s Aerial Corps—a branch of the military that is rather less genteel than he is accustomed to.
Novik renders the military culture of Regency England with tremendous care, and her dragons are magnificent creations: intelligent, loyal, and possessed of rather more personality than most officers. The partnership between Laurence and Temeraire is one of the great relationships in modern fantasy. This is historical fiction and high adventure fused together with uncommon skill, and the series spans nine novels’ worth of globe-trotting, dragon-flying splendour.
4. Babel by R.F. Kuang
Babel, or The Necessity of Violence is set in the 1830s at Oxford University, where the Royal Institute of Translation—known as Babel—houses England’s greatest secret: that the British Empire’s power is fuelled by enchanted silver bars. The magic of these bars is generated by the untranslatable gaps between languages, the meanings that are lost when one tongue attempts to capture what another says.
Robin Swift, an orphan brought from Canton to Oxford by a mysterious benefactor, discovers that his gift for languages makes him invaluable to an institution whose power depends upon exploiting the very cultures it pillages. Kuang’s novel is ferociously intelligent and deeply felt, a story about the cost of empire told through one of the most original magic systems in contemporary fantasy. The Oxford setting is rendered with a scholar’s precision and a novelist’s eye for beauty, and the result is a book that lodges itself firmly in the mind and refuses to leave.
5. Sorcerer to the Crown by Zen Cho
In Regency England, the Royal Society of Unnatural Philosophers oversees all matters magical—and all matters magical are in a terrible state. England’s supply of magic is dwindling, and many suspect the cause is the new Sorcerer Royal: Zacharias Wythe, a man whose origins as a formerly enslaved person make him a target of relentless prejudice within the Society’s genteel ranks.
When Zacharias encounters Prunella Gentleman, a young woman of formidable magical talent and even more formidable ambition, the two form an unlikely alliance. Zen Cho writes with sparkling wit and impeccable period detail, and her exploration of who is permitted to wield power in a society that jealously guards its privileges gives the novel a resonance that extends well beyond its Regency setting. This is a book that makes magic feel both wondrous and politically urgent.
6. A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry
In the late eighteenth century, magic in England is real, regulated, and restricted to the aristocracy. Commoners who manifest magical abilities are fitted with iron bracelets to suppress their powers, and the entire system is maintained by those who benefit most from its inequities. Into this powder keg step two of England’s most consequential politicians: William Pitt the Younger, who becomes the youngest Prime Minister in British history, and William Wilberforce, whose campaign to abolish the slave trade carries implications both mundane and magical.
Parry weaves genuine fantasy through the fabric of real political history with remarkable assurance. The magic system illuminates the period’s actual anxieties about power and liberty, and the parallel struggles for freedom—magical, political, and human—give the novel a resonance that feels both historically grounded and urgently contemporary. This is the first book of the Shadow Histories duology, and it will appeal enormously to readers who loved the political intelligence of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and the moral urgency of Babel.
7. Soulless by Gail Carriger
In Gail Carriger’s delightful vision of Victorian London, vampires and werewolves are not merely tolerated but are integrated into polite society, complete with parliamentary representation and strict social protocols. Into this world strides Alexia Tarabotti: half-Italian, entirely opinionated, and possessed of no soul whatsoever—a condition that allows her to neutralise the supernatural with a single touch.
When Alexia accidentally stakes a vampire at a ball (a terrible breach of etiquette), she is drawn into an investigation alongside the infuriating Lord Maccon, a Scottish werewolf with no manners and considerable charm. Soulless is the first book in the Parasol Protectorate series, and it is a confection of wit, steam-powered gadgetry, and beautifully observed social comedy. One reads it with a constant smile.
8. The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley
In 1883, Thaniel Steepleton returns to his modest London lodgings to find a gold pocket watch on his pillow—with no indication of how it got there or who left it. The mysterious timepiece draws him into the orbit of Keita Mori, a gentle, enigmatic Japanese immigrant whose clockwork creations are uncanny in their beauty and whose quiet, knowing manner raises troubling questions about free will and fate.
Pulley’s prose is atmospheric and precise, her Victorian London rendered in gaslight and fog, and the relationship between Thaniel and Mori is drawn with exquisite tenderness. A clockwork octopus that steals socks is only one of many reasons to adore this novel, which is ultimately a philosophical meditation on destiny disguised as the most elegant of mysteries.
9. Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Imagine Pride and Prejudice, but with magic. That is both the simplest and most accurate description of Kowal’s enchanting novel, set in a Regency England where the manipulation of glamour—the art of weaving light and sound into beautiful illusions—is considered an essential accomplishment for any young lady of quality.
Jane Ellsworth is twenty-eight, plain, and uncommonly gifted with glamour. Her younger sister Melody is beautiful, vivacious, and possessed of considerably less talent. As the social season unfolds and suitors circle, Jane must navigate the treacherous currents of courtship while discovering that her artistic gifts may be worth rather more than mere decoration. Kowal captures the Austen cadence with real affection and skill, and the addition of a magic system that feels like a natural extension of Regency society is inspired. The Glamourist Histories series that follows is a pleasure from first page to last.
10. A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske
When a bureaucratic error assigns Robin Blyth—an impoverished baronet with no knowledge of magic—to serve as the civil liaison to a hidden magical society in Edwardian England, he is understandably bewildered. His bewilderment deepens considerably when he finds himself cursed, entangled in a conspiracy, and forced to work alongside Edwin Courcey, his prickly and reclusive magical counterpart.
Marske’s magic system is wonderfully tactile—spells are cast through string figures, not unlike cat’s cradle—and her Edwardian setting glows with period detail. The growing attraction between Robin and Edwin is handled with both warmth and wit, and the conspiracy driving the plot proves deeper and more dangerous than either of them expects. This is the first book in the Hugo-nominated Last Binding trilogy, and it is a thoroughly captivating start.
11. Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater
Since the day a faerie lord stole half her soul, Theodora Ettings has been unable to feel embarrassment or fear—a condition that makes her prone to scandal and renders her something of a wallflower during the London Season. When the Lord Sorcier, an ill-mannered but brilliant magician named Elias Wilder, discovers her condition, Dora is drawn into the dangerous world of faerie politics.
Atwater blends Regency romance with cozy fantasy and genuine social conscience—a sleeping plague ravaging the workhouses provides the story’s stakes, and Dora’s quiet determination to help those less fortunate than herself provides its heart. Half a Soul has the warmth of a cup of tea on a cold afternoon and the sharpness of a well-aimed observation at a society dinner. It is the first in the Regency Faerie Tales series, and each instalment is a delight.
12. Dark Rise by C.S. Pacat
In 1821 London, sixteen-year-old Will Kempen has been running for his life ever since the men who killed his mother turned their sights on him. Captured and imprisoned aboard a ship on the Thames, Will is rescued by warriors from a secret ancient order called the Stewards—guardians who have protected humanity for centuries against the return of the Dark King, an immortal force of devastating power.
As ancient heroes and villains begin to reawaken in new bodies, Will is drawn into a war between Light and Dark that has been fought across millennia. Pacat renders the gritty, class-divided London of the early nineteenth century with atmospheric precision—the docks, the warehouses, the fog-shrouded Thames—and weaves through it a mythology of reincarnation and prophecy that gives the historical setting genuine weight. The result is a breathless, propulsive fantasy that uses its Regency backdrop not as mere decoration but as a world worth fighting for. An instant New York Times bestseller, Dark Rise is the first in a duology completed by Dark Heir.
13. Fawkes by Nadine Brandes
In a 1605 England divided by a magical plague that turns its victims to stone, Thomas Fawkes is dying. The only cure, his father Guy Fawkes insists, lies in the success of a plot to assassinate the king. Brandes reimagines the Gunpowder Plot with a fantasy layer that feels both inventive and historically grounded: in this world, people can control elements of a single colour, and the conflict between rival magical factions mirrors the religious tensions of the Jacobean era.
As the conspiracy tightens its grip, Thomas must navigate a world where loyalty, faith, and survival pull in irreconcilable directions. Fawkes is a taut, atmospheric novel that takes one of the most dramatic episodes in English history and enriches it with a magic system that illuminates the period’s real anxieties about power, faith, and allegiance.
14. Things in Jars by Jess Kidd
Bridie Devine is a pipe-smoking, flame-haired detective in Victorian London, and she has been tasked with finding a kidnapped child who may or may not be a supernatural creature. Sir Edmund Berwick believes his secret daughter Christabel is a merrow—a being from folklore with sharp teeth, colour-changing eyes, and the alleged ability to drown people on dry land.
Kidd’s novel is a Gothic delight, blending the fog-choked streets of Victorian London with Irish folklore and a cast of characters that includes a tattooed ghost and a seven-foot housemaid. The prose is rich and atmospheric without ever becoming ponderous, and the mystery at the story’s heart is both genuinely surprising and deeply moving. Things in Jars collapses the boundary between history and fairy tale in the most enchanting fashion.
15. Spellbreaker by Charlie N. Holmberg
In an 1885 England where magic is commonplace but strictly regulated by the upper classes, Elsie Camden has been operating as an unlicensed spellbreaker—someone who can see and unravel magical enchantments. She has been using her gifts like a magical Robin Hood, breaking spells that oppress the poor at the behest of a mysterious underground organisation.
When the elite magical practitioner Bacchus Kelsey catches Elsie in the act, she strikes a bargain: she will help him with his unruly enchantments if he keeps her secret. Holmberg uses her magic system to explore Victorian class divisions with real intelligence, and the growing partnership between Elsie and Bacchus provides both romantic tension and genuine suspense. The duology is completed by Spellmaker, and both are thoroughly satisfying.
16. The Familiars by Stacey Halls
It is 1612, and Fleetwood Shuttleworth, the young mistress of Gawthorpe Hall in Lancashire, is pregnant for the fourth time—and terrified. Her previous pregnancies have ended in loss, and a hidden letter from her physician suggests this one may cost her life. When Fleetwood encounters Alice Gray, a young midwife with an uncanny knowledge of herbs and healing, she believes she may have found her salvation.
But Alice is one of the accused in the Pendle witch trials—the most famous witch hunt in English history—and Fleetwood must decide whether the woman she trusts with her life is a healer or something altogether more dangerous. Halls draws upon the real historical record with impressive care: many of the characters, including the accused witches and the magistrate Roger Nowell, were real people. The Lancashire countryside is vividly rendered, and the question of what constitutes genuine magic in a world gripped by superstition gives the novel an unsettling power that lingers well beyond its final pages.
17. The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman
In the years following the fall of Camelot, a young knight named Collum arrives at the great castle only to find King Arthur dead, the Round Table broken, and the surviving knights scattered and diminished. What follows is not the familiar legend but something stranger and more historically grounded: a story set in the post-Roman Britain of the sixth century, where Saxon invaders press at the borders, Christianity and the old pagan ways contend for the soul of the land, and magic is retreating from the world like a tide going out.
Grossman brings the same literary intelligence he brought to The Magicians to the Arthurian tradition, but here the wit is tempered by genuine melancholy and a deep engagement with what Dark Ages England might actually have looked and felt like. The result was named one of the best books of 2024 by the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and TIME, and it earned its place: The Bright Sword is a novel that makes you feel the weight of a vanishing age of wonders, set in an England so ancient it is almost unrecognisable—and yet unmistakably, hauntingly itself.
How to Choose Your Next Historical Fantasy Set in England
With seventeen novels to choose from, the question of where to begin depends entirely upon your particular appetite:
If you want wit and warmth: The Wendy, Soulless, and Half a Soul will charm you thoroughly. Each delivers a heroine worth cheering for, wrapped in prose that sparkles.
If you want grand scope and ambition: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Babel, and His Majesty’s Dragon are your novels. These are books that reimagine entire eras of English history with breathtaking confidence.
If you want mystery and atmosphere: The Watchmaker of Filigree Street, Things in Jars, and The Familiars will satisfy your taste for fog, secrets, and the uncanny.
If you want Regency elegance with magic: Shades of Milk and Honey, Sorcerer to the Crown, and A Marvellous Light offer the pleasures of period romance elevated by wonderfully inventive magic systems.
If you want magic entangled with real politics: Babel and A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians are set against the great political upheavals of their eras and will make you think as deeply as they make you feel.
Every book on this list transports you to an England that is both historically grounded and enchantingly impossible. We envy you the experience of discovering them for the first time.
