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Books like The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger

Stephen King · 1982 · US · fantasy · western
Book 1 of 8 in The Dark Tower
★ 4.29 Goodreads · 196,380 ratings

A gunslinger pursues a mysterious Man in Black across an infinite desert, in the first chapter of King's epic that connects all his novels.

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12 books for readers of The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger

In the Distance

Hernan Diaz · 2017 · US 92% match ★ 4.10 Goodreads · 28,175 ratings
shares: western, desert, mythic, quest · earnest, unhurried

Håkan, a young Swedish emigrant separated from his brother on the way to America, lands in California during the gold rush and sets off on foot towards New York, against the tide of westward migration, through deserts and violence.

A Wizard of Earthsea

Ursula K. Le Guin · 1968 · US 92% match ★ 4.01 Goodreads · 378,902 ratings
Book 1 of 6 in Earthsea
shares: mythic, quest · earnest, speculative

A young wizard on an island archipelago unleashes a shadow from the land of the dead and must chase it across the world to make himself whole.

We Hunt the Flame

Hafsah Faizal · 2019 · US 91% match ★ 3.86 Goodreads · 112,102 ratings
Book 1 of 2 in Sands of Arawiya
shares: desert, quest · speculative, earnest

Zafira, who disguises herself as a man to hunt in the cursed Arz forest, and Nasir, the Prince of Death and the sultan's assassin, are sent after the same lost relic that could bring magic back to their kingdom.

The Pastel City

M. John Harrison · 1971 · UK 90% match ★ 3.77 Goodreads · 1,939 ratings
Book 1 of 4 in Viriconium
shares: quest, dying earth · speculative, cold

In the far future, on an Earth littered with the relics of forgotten civilisations, the ageing lord tegeus-Cromis, who thinks himself a better poet than swordsman, is called back to fight when the northmen invade the Pastel City of Viriconium.

The Knight and the Moth

Rachel Gillig · 2025 · US 90% match ★ 4.22 Goodreads · 315,961 ratings
shares: mysterious, quest · speculative, earnest

Sybil Delling is one of six Diviners raised in the cathedral of Aisling to prophesy for the kingdom, and when her sisters begin to disappear, she sets out with a surly knight, Rodrick Rook, to find them.

Rebel of the Sands

Alwyn Hamilton · 2016 · UK 90% match ★ 3.95 Goodreads · 67,295 ratings
Book 1 of 3 in Rebel of the Sands
shares: western, desert · earnest, speculative

Amani Al'Hiza, a sharpshooter stuck in the desert town of Dustwalk, enters a shooting contest disguised as a boy to win the money to escape, and meets Jin, a foreigner on the run, whose trouble carries her into a rebellion and a desert full of djinni.

Piranesi

Susanna Clarke · 2020 · UK 90% match ★ 4.19 Goodreads · 594,640 ratings
shares: mythic, mysterious, isolation · earnest, speculative

A gentle man lives alone in an endless house of marble halls and tidal seas, keeping meticulous journals, until signs of another visitor make him question who he is and how he got there.

Dreamsnake

Vonda N. McIntyre · 1978 · US 89% match ★ 3.88 Goodreads · 11,669 ratings
shares: desert, post apocalyptic, quest · earnest, speculative

A healer with bioengineered snakes traverses a post-apocalyptic landscape, seeking to help a radiation-damaged world recover.

Red Country

Joe Abercrombie · 2012 · UK 89% match ★ 4.32 Goodreads · 70,943 ratings
Book 3 of 4 in The First Law: standalones
shares: western, quest · cold, speculative

A wanted woman flees into the frontier, pursued by a legendary named man, in a western-tinged grimdark fantasy.

Who Fears Death

Nnedi Okorafor · 2010 · US 89% match ★ 3.93 Goodreads · 29,133 ratings
shares: post apocalyptic, quest · earnest, dark

In a post-apocalyptic Sudan, Onyesonwu, a girl born of violence, grows into a powerful sorcerer and sets out across the desert to confront the man who fathered her.

The Riddle-Master of Hed

Patricia A. McKillip · 1976 · US 88% match ★ 3.98 Goodreads · 13,373 ratings
Book 1 of 3 in Riddle-Master
shares: mysterious, quest · speculative, earnest

Morgon, the farmer-prince of the small island of Hed, wins a crown in a riddle game against a ghost, and finds that the three stars on his forehead mark him for something he does not understand.

The Sword of Shannara

Terry Brooks · 1977 · US 88% match ★ 3.77 Goodreads · 103,481 ratings
shares: post apocalyptic, quest · earnest, speculative

Shea Ohmsford, a half-elf in the quiet village of Shady Vale, learns from the druid Allanon that he is the last heir to the Sword of Shannara, the only weapon that can destroy the Warlock Lord.