Summary

• Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn series introduces magic with clear rules and characters with unique abilities.
• R. F. Kuang's Babel features linguistic magic and impeccable world-building in what is currently a standalone story.
• Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunters series combines supernatural beings with established and broken rules in a well-structured world.

A strong magic system is a key part of any successful fantasy book series. However, some lengthy fantasy book series worth committing to demonstrate more unique magic systems than others. Book series such as these involve magic systems that are often dependent upon a certain gimmick that, out of context, is incredibly strange. However, the author builds a complex system and world around that idea and captures readers with a riveting story about magic. In most examples, the measure of an effective magic system is that it comprises hard rules that are not contradicted.

However, authors have been known to effectively explain how their main characters can break the rules of the magic system. In other cases, the mystery surrounding magic in a setting means that the details of how it works are never clear to the reader. It might make for a good story, but the author will be hard-pressed to convince people that they even know how their magic system works. However, some of the best examples simply introduce a version of magic that is fun to read about and has never been seen before in literature.

10 Mistborn

By Brandon Sanderson

Despite continuing to add to the magic system, Sanderson organically presents new ways that magic can be combined and adapted.

The primary type of magic used by the characters in the Mistborn books is Allomancy, wherein a genetically gifted can swallow and "burn" a specific type of metal to temporarily gain a specific supernatural ability. There are 16 different types of metal Allomancers can use, each of which grants a certain power. Most Allomancers can only burn one kind of metal, and are known as "Mistings." However, the rare "Mistborn" can burn all types of metals, making them some of the most powerful characters in the Mistborn series. These titles are derived from the supernatural mists that cover the Final Empire.

Therefore, Sanderson sets up a stratified, comprehensible magic system with clear rules. However, he then introduces two more magical disciplines: Feruchemy and Hemalurgy. The former is based on drawing magical power from oneself (after storing it over time) while the second, more dangerous type is drawing power from someone else. At the start of the second part of the Mistborn series, Sanderson introduces Twinborn characters, who can use Allomancy and Feruchemy together. Despite continuing to add to the magic system, Sanderson organically presents new ways that magic can be combined and adapted.

9 Babel, Or The Necessity Of Violence

By R. F. Kuang

Babel is currently merely an amazing standalone fantasy book, with it being unclear if Kuang will write more stories set in this world. However, it is fairly extensive with the feel of an epic fantasy series and a brilliant magic system suited to its 19th-century academic setting. In Babel, a fictional institute based at the University of Oxford teaches and practices a linguistic magic where scholars engrave a word in one language and its translation into another on different sides of a silver bar to produce a specific effect (light, explosion, structural reinforcement, etc.).

Different magical results are dependent upon the slightly different connotations each word has in its respective language. However, the catch is that the practitioner must be a native speaker of one of the languages. Because of increased communications between European countries at the time the novel is set, European languages have evolved to become closer to their words meaning exactly the same thing. Therefore, the institute colloquially known as "Babel" turns to the British Empire's colonies to recruit speakers of other languages who can produce more word combinations.

Babel's story is about the young people brought from the colonies to Oxford to learn a magic that is only used to further British imperialism. Kuang, an Oxford graduate herself, designed an impressive magic system like no other. Babel's magic is incredibly intriguing and serves the purpose of its story.

8 The Bone Season

By Samantha Shannon

The Bone Season is Shannon's still-in-progress epic saga that blends dystopian sci-fi with fantasy. The first book, The Bone Season, introduces readers to teenage Paige Mahoney, a clairvoyant and a dreamwalker who works in the criminal underworld of 2059 London by using her power to retrieve information from people's minds. In this future, most of Europe is ruled by the Republic of Scion, which has declared all clairvoyants unnatural. Clairvoyants are individuals who can connect to the aether and draw upon the spirits of the dead, sourcing their specific magical abilities.

Paige's telepathic abilities make her one of the rarest types of clairvoyants. Meanwhile, the Rephaim are an immortal race of clairvoyant beings from an interdimensional otherworld who drain the aura of clairvoyant humans, hunting them on behalf of Scion. From these established world-building elements, Shannon does not push the boundaries of her magic system that much but focuses on the ongoing conflict between the different groups. While it is an interesting magic system, its exploration is not the point of the story.

7 The Shadowhunters Chronicles

By Cassandra Clare

The world of Clare's is populated by a variety of supernatural beings whose heritage is fairly well-explained, constituting tidy world-building. The Shadowhunters are part human and part angel, warlocks are human and demon, and faeries are angel and demon. Vampires and werewolves are individuals who are affected by magical viruses, granting them certain abilities and weaknesses. Each group possesses inherent magical abilities that one would typically associate with them, based on other works of fiction. This is except for the Shadowhunters, who are Clare's creation and the focus of the series.

While they are naturally more adept warriors, trained to fight demons who leak into the mundane world from their own dimension, the Shadowhunters can also draw runes on themselves that temporarily give them advanced speed, strength, etc. After establishing the rules of her world, Clare constantly breaks them but manages to effectively explain how this works. Clary, Jace, and Sebastian have slightly different abilities due to Valentine giving their mothers elixirs while they were pregnant. Clare creates a loophole for warlocks and Shadowhunters not being able to have children together with Tessa Gray, who has her own set of powers.

Additionally, regular humans can be turned into Shadowhunters by drinking from the Mortal Cup (one of the Mortal Instruments). The world also includes a complex creation mythology and many enchanted artifacts. Overall, everything makes sense within Clare's world-building. She is impressively able to create rules and then break them while convincing readers that it all still works.

6 The Kingkiller Chronicle

By Patrick Rothfuss

Rothfuss' planned trilogy takes place in a medieval world where magic does exist, but due to its scarcity, most people are skeptical and treat stories of supernatural beings as myths. The Kingkiller Chronicle is primarily about Kvothe's training and education to become a renowned warrior and magician, which he recounts to the character known only as the Chronicler within the framing device of the story. In Temerant, the fictional continent where the story takes place, magic has a scientific characterization where only those who have been extensively educated can use it effectively, creating the conditions of Kvothe's narrative.

Temerant includes some other magical elements that aren't extensively explained. There is a parallel Fae realm, which leads to the definition of the series' two types of magic: the academic kind taught at universities and the more enigmatic kind that is only practiced by the Fae. There are also the Chandrian, completely undefined entities whose only true characteristics are that they are powerful, evil, and of unknown origins. Certain parts of the magic system in The Kingkiller Chronicle are shrouded in mystery, but this works in the context of a reclusive magician recounting his life story.

5 The Alex Stern Series

By Leigh Bardugo

Throughout Bardugo's Ninth House and Hell Bent, the characters accomplish various magic through complicated and incredibly disturbing rituals. One of the earliest examples is prognostication, where the of the Skull & Bones house examine a (unconscious) person's insides to predict the future. The implication is that there are extensive guidelines for accomplishing almost anything and that the characters will explain if it is relevant to the plot. It seems like almost anything can appear to cause a problem for Alex — vampires, ghosts, etc. — but the story will provide an academic explanation for why this can happen.

Ultimately, Bardugo makes magic disgusting in the Alex Stern books because she is illustrating a system where magic is only another tool of the elite to maintain their power at the expense of others. The world-building also includes explanations for why magic is at its strongest in New Haven, as the secret societies are based out of Yale. Ninth House does not have the strictest magic system because it will usually justify any and all supernatural plot twists, but it is still morbidly fascinating.

4 Daughter Of Smoke And Bone

By Laini Taylor

By the time of Dreams of Gods and Monsters, the final book in the main trilogy, Taylor has captured the minds of readers with one creative magical stipulation after another.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone introduces a lot of apparently random supernatural elements that come together into a great story. The protagonist Karou is an art student in Prague who was secretly raised by four chimeras. Karou collects teeth for the chimeras for an unknown purpose, aided by portal doors that can take her anywhere in the world. Soon after the start of the story, Karou discovers an ongoing war between the chimera and seraphim races and the true purpose of the teeth she has been collecting.

The magic system of Daughter of Smoke and Bone is dependent upon the existence of various magical beings and resurrection; these things exist in this world without justification, as one isn't really needed. The later books introduce other magical races and the ability to steal souls and place them into different bodies, as well as some origin myths. By the time of Dreams of Gods and Monsters, the final book in the main trilogy, Taylor has captured the minds of readers with one creative magical stipulation after another.

3 The Earthsea Cycle

By Ursula K. Le Guin

The milestone Earthsea Cycle also subscribes to a magic system defined by extensive training necessary for individuals to be able to wield magic properly. However, many people still have natural magical talent. Le Guin also introduced the concept of magic being controlled by a true language, which has been repurposed in other fantasy series. Practioners learn to use the Old Language, specializing in different disciplines of magic.

The Earthsea Cycle includes some other types of magic governed by a different set of rules, including the Old Powers of the Earth, Female Magic, and Enigmatic Magic. The rich world of Earthsea also features mythological creatures such as dragons who have their own powers. Overall, Earthsea is another example of a series that stresses the importance of not taking magic lightly, illustrated by the protagonist accidentally inciting catastrophe.

2 Lightbringer Series

By Brent Weeks

The title "Lightbringer" conveys the most essential part of Weeks' series' magic system. Certain characters, called Drafters, can harness light and create the substance Luxin, the properties of which vary depending on its color. Drafters who can only wield one color of Luxin are called Monochromes, while those who can use two are Bichromes, and those who can use many are Polychromes. Gavin Guile, the protagonist of the series, is known as "the Prism" because he can wield every color on the spectrum.

This constitutes a very interesting system because it is based on a simple scientific concept that most people reading the novel can understand without trouble. However, it is then presented through a fantasy lens. Weeks develops different facets of this structure with shades of magic not on the official spectrum of the setting's government, as well as how people with color blindness and people who can see colors ever more clearly practice Chromaturgy.

1 Shades Of Magic

By V. E. Schwab

The essentials of Shades of Magic's system are also conveyed in the title itself. In one of Schwab's best fantasy series, magic inhabits everything and everyone. Certain locations serve as the sources of magic, which magicians learn to harness. Magical abilities crop up randomly (it is not hereditary), and most magicians can wield only one of five elements (with rare cases of those who can wield more, recalling other book series with a similar system).

However, what makes Shades of Magic truly distinctive is its setting of several parallel worlds, each with a different relationship with magic. The protagonist is one of the few magicians powerful enough to travel between worlds. As he visits Red London, Grey London, White London, and Black London, the reader is exposed to malevolent and neutral forms of magic, as well as the different ways it is harnessed and treated by the human population. Shades of Magic's overlapping categorizations are slightly confusing, but it is doubtlessly also one of the most unique magic systems in fantasy literature.