Neurodiversity in Cozy Fantasy
Cozy fantasy has become one of the more popular genres within the Booktok community over the past couple of years, with books like Legends & Lattes (Travis Baldree), Tress of the Emerald Sea (Brandon Sanderson) and The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches (Sangu Mandana) leading the charge. Fans of the genre are looking for low-stakes escapism to help them cope with whatever the outside world decides to throw their way that day - think The Princess Bride, with all its quirky characters, quick banter and all-around silliness. Among the more popular authors within the genre, T. Kingfisher, Sarah Beth Durst and Hannah Nicole Maehrer tend to always have a diverse cast of characters, with disabled and LGBQTI+ representation.
T. Kingfisher’s Saint of Steel series has an autistic couple casually meeting and awkwardly falling in love over a murder mystery in the first book (Paladin’s Grace), followed by a sequel (Paladin’s Strength) in which the two main characters are both very tall, traveling through a region with a very short population and how the local infrastructure cannot accommodate their needs as tall people (a very discreet way of showcasing ableism). The third book’s main characters are a gay couple (Paladin’s Hope), the plot explores how an immigrant minority within the community is discriminated against because of the way they look and talk. The fourth book in the series is the latest but not last of the unfinished seven part series (Paladin’s Faith), and portrays how different people internalise trauma in different, and sometime opposing, ways. The audiobook narration for this whole series is excellent and, best of all, done by the same narrator.
NOTE: before reading the series, please read the trigger warnings. T. Kingfisher tends towards slightly gory writing, horror-adjacent at times.
Sarah Beth Durst recently published the sequel for her novel, The Spellshop, both set in the same universe but sold as stand-alones. The Spellshop is quirky, cute and inclusive, with an autistic librarian and a talking spider plant who open a jam and spell shop in the middle of the woods on a remote island as the main characters. The type of book you’ll want to pick up on a cozy autumn afternoon, with a mug of hot cocoa and a warm cinnamon bun on hand. For those of us who struggle to only do one thing at a time, the audiobook is great! Finally we have the Assistant to the Villain series, by Hannah Nicole Maehrer. Reminiscent of Tangled (the Disney movie), the book has a quirky female main character (not yet recovering people pleaser), a “villainous” male main character and a frog with a crown who communicates with little hand-written signs. The first book is full of explicit examples of imposter syndrome and gaslighting (please consider before reading if these are triggering topics for you), which we love: the more media examples we have of this behaviour, the better we’ll be at recognising and reacting to it! The book also explores the power of labels and how we make assumptions based on names. Know that this is one of those books that, like coriander, you’ll either love or hate, the narration style is definitely not for everyone and is not audiobook-friendly. The cozy fantasy corner of the book world has become one of the more inclusive spaces for readers, where you’ll find positive representation of a diverse cast of characters and situations, always with a happily ever after. If you’re looking for a new genre to sink your teeth into this spring that will help you dissociate from the chaos of life and always leave you feeling warm and calm, give cozy fantasy a go!