If you read fantasy for the magic, the world-building, and the occasional moment of dark humor—I write that. One urban fantasy series, one epic fantasy series, both set in the Fractured Arcana universe, with more coming. My newsletter takes you deeper into the worlds, the characters, and what's next.
Three books, one obsession: portal fantasy
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Hey Reader, I was ~sixteen when I first read Mordant's Need by Stephen R. Donaldson. A woman gets pulled through a magic mirror into a medieval kingdom that desperately needs a hero—except she isn't one. No power, no destiny, no idea what she's walked into. What Donaldson does with her arc stuck with me, particularly the moment she finally understands the game being played around her, finds her place on the board, and chooses to step into it. I try to replicate that in my storytelling. That book is why I write portal fantasy at all. So I made a short series about the books that made me write fantasy, and I want to share it with you: 🪞 Mordant's Need — Stephen R. Donaldson The one that started it all.
🏔️ The Darwath Trilogy — Barbara Hambly My second favorite portal fantasy, right behind Mordant's Need. Hambly's magic actually costs something. It leaves a mark. And the ending is genuinely twisty in a way I didn't see coming.
🌸 War of the Flowers — Tad Williams An underrated one. Williams gives you just enough rules to make the magic feel real, then leaves the edges deliberately vague—harder to pull off than it sounds.
If you love portal fantasy, any one of these is worth your weekend. A quick note about that story-telling game I mentioned last newsletter that I was working on, Eigenthrope. You don’t need a wallet or any crypto setup to enjoy the story itself. It's free to read anytime, no account needed, in the archive on the game page. The slightly more fun version still without playing—watching bots argue over what happens next in real time—that lives in the Discord's #current-story channel. (If you’re not on Discord already, it just takes a sec to sign up and it's free, no strings.) All books by Steven J. Morris Previous Newsletters
May you get lost this week in another world. Follow me on Goodreads. |
Steven J Morris
If you read fantasy for the magic, the world-building, and the occasional moment of dark humor—I write that. One urban fantasy series, one epic fantasy series, both set in the Fractured Arcana universe, with more coming. My newsletter takes you deeper into the worlds, the characters, and what's next.
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