In case it isn’t totally obvious from all of our cozy content, our team is obsessed with all things cottagecore-adjacent. From slow mornings and gingham dresses, to romanticizing our favorite cozy corner of the house—if it whispers “I make my own sourdough and also love rainy day crafts,” consider us fully invested. So when we’re picking up a new book to keep atop our nightstands, it seems only natural that we’d crave a fictional escape that gallops through whimsical magic shops, secret forests, and English villages.
From spellbound mysteries to cozy fantasies, these 20 books capture everything we love about the cottagecore aesthetic. Yes, they feel like Jane Austen’s house (no really, we have that plot in here) or a Martha Stewart garden party if all the guests were Fae—but they also remind us of the magic of slowing down. These reads have incredible world-building and fantastical enchantments that will have you clinging to your copy until the final chapter. Read on for the cottagecore books we can’t put down.
Sera Swan, once one of Britain’s most powerful witches, has lost her magic and been exiled from her Guild. Now, she is helping her great-aunt Jasmine run an enchanted inn in Lancashire. She deals with her quirky guests’ shenanigans and tries to keep a talking fox in check, but she longs to reclaim her magic. When she learns of an old spell that might restore her power, she turns to a handsome magical historian guest who might know how to help her. As Sera juggles the inn, the spell, and the watchful Guild, she is about to discover that she doesn’t have to do it all alone.
Lady Augusta “Gus” Colebrook is 42, unmarried, and thoroughly bored with society—so when she and her grieving twin sister get the chance to rescue their friend’s goddaughter from a violent husband, they leap at the distraction. They set out with a plan, but their carriage is accosted along the way. In the scuffle, Gus accidentally shoots and injures Lord Evan Belford, an acquaintance from their past who was charged with murder and exiled 20 years ago. What follows is an adventure full of danger, heart-racing near misses, and a little help from a revived and rather charming Lord Evan.
Belladonna Blackthorn hasn’t lost her magical spark, precisely… but she hasn’t seen it in a while either. She’s struggling to make it through the day and keep her beloved Lunar Books afloat. The last thing she has time for is perfecting her magic. So when her 30th birthday brings a summons from her coven and a trial that tests her worthiness as a witch, Belle fears the worst. With only the month of October to prove herself or risk losing her magic forever, Belle will need all the help she can get—from the women in her life, an unlikely mentor figure, and even an infuriating coven watchman who’s sworn to protect her.
June Farrow has always known the mysterious curse haunting the Farrow women would one day find her. It’s been a year after she began seeing things. Faint wind chimes, a voice calling her name, and a mysterious door appearing out of nowhere. After her grandmother’s death, June uncovers cryptic clues about her mother’s decades-old disappearance. And when the strange door reappears, she steps through—embarking on a journey that could change her past, her future, and her heart.
Kiela has always had trouble dealing with people. Thankfully, as a librarian at the Great Library of Alyssium, she and her assistant, Caz—a magically sentient spider plant—have spent the last decade sequestered among the empire’s most precious spellbooks. But when a revolution sets the library on fire, Kiela and Caz flee and take refuge on the remote island she once called home. In need of income, Kiela turns to an old recipe book and a bit of illegal magic. Risking the consequences of using unsanctioned spells, Kiela opens the island’s first-ever, secret spellshop.
Cambridge professor, Emily Wilde, is a genius scholar, working on the world’s first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She prefers books, her dog Shadow, and the Fair Folk. So when she arrives in the village of Hrafnsvik, she has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk or spending time with her insufferably handsome rival, Wendell Bambleby. But as she uncovers the secrets of the Hidden Ones, another mystery emerges: Who is Wendell Bambleby, and what does he really want?
Marigold Claude has always preferred the company of the spirits of the meadow to any of the suitors who’ve tried to woo her. So when her grandmother whisks her away to the family cottage with an offer to train her as the next Honey Witch, she accepts immediately. But her newfound magic comes with a price: No one can fall in love with the Honey Witch. When Lottie Burke, a notoriously grumpy magic skeptic, shows up on her doorstep, Marigold can’t resist the challenge to prove to her that magic is real. But soon, Marigold begins to care for Lottie, in ways she never expected.
Grace has never been good at anything except magic—not that anyone believes her. Unwanted at the orphanage, she runs away to offer herself as apprentice to the witch in the woods. Surely the witch can’t be that bad. But the witch is that bad—she steals souls and eats hearts. Grace offers a deal: if she can learn all 100½ spells, she’ll become the apprentice; if she fails, the witch can take her magic. The witch agrees, and an unexpected bond forms. But when a monster from the witch’s past returns, Grace may have to sacrifice more than her magic to save the home she’s built.
Lovely Sorcha is the seventh child and only daughter of Lord Colum of Sevenwaters. Bereft of a mother, she is comforted by her six brothers who love and protect her. But Sorcha’s joy is shattered when her father is bewitched by his new wife, an evil enchantress who binds her brothers with a terrible spell—one only Sorcha can lift by staying silent. If she speaks before completing a quest, she will lose her brothers forever. And when Sorcha is later kidnapped by the enemies of Sevenwaters, she is torn between the desire to save her beloved brothers and a love that comes only once.
Miss Marple encounters a compelling murder mystery in the sleepy little village of St. Mary Mead, where under the seemingly peaceful exterior of an English country village lurks intrigue, guilt, deception and death. Colonel Protheroe, local magistrate and overbearing land-owner is the most detested man in the village. Everyone—even in the vicar—wishes he were dead. And very soon he is—shot in the head in the vicar’s own study. Faced with a surfeit of suspects, only the inscrutable Miss Marple can unravel the tangled web of clues that will lead to the unmasking of the killer.
Agnieszka loves her valley home, her quiet village, the forests, and the bright shining river. But her people rely on the cold wizard known as the Dragon to keep the corrupted Wood’s powers at bay. But he demands a price for his help: one young woman handed over to serve him for 10 years, a fate almost as terrible as falling to the Wood. The next choosing is approaching, and everyone knows the Dragon will take Kasia, Agnieszka’s dearest friend in the world. But Agnieszka fears the wrong things. For when the Dragon comes, it is not Kasia he will choose.
Fay Merryweather runs her cake shop from her beautiful garden. Looking after the shop, the garden, and her cantankerous mother means Fay is always busy. But she accepts her responsibilities because if she doesn’t do it, who will? Then, Danny Wilde walks into her life and makes Fay question every decision she’s ever made. When a sudden tragedy strikes, Fay’s entire world is thrown off balance even further, and she doesn’t know which way to turn. Life, love, and family are all about to collide in The Cake Shop in the Garden.
10 years after being sent away to become a bard, Jack Tamerlaine is summoned home to Cadence where girls are going missing and Adaira—his childhood nemesis and future clan leader—believes he’s the only one who can find them. A bard’s music is the only way to summon the elemental spirits and ask that the girls be returned. Yet as Jack and Adaira get closer to solving the mystery, it becomes apparent that an older, darker secret about Cadence lurks beneath the surface, and no harp song may be strong enough to stop it.
In a land ruled by ruthless Fae, Lore Alemeyu’s village is trapped in a forested prison. Lore knows that any escape attempt is futile, but when her home is threatened, she makes a desperate deal with a Fae lord. She will leave to catalog an enchanted library untouched for 1,000 years—a place no Fae can enter… but a human might. She convinces him she wants wealth, but what she truly seeks is a magic of her own. As Lore navigates the hostile world outside, she must rely on two very different, very dangerous, and very attractive Fae males—risking her life and her heart in the process.
Tana Fairchild’s fate has never been in question: marry the governor’s son, and secure an alliance between the witches of her island and the fearful mainlanders. Her coven keeps peace by releasing their magic into the sea during the full moon—but when Tana misses the ritual (a fatal mistake), she has no one to turn to… until she meets Wolfe. Wolfe practices forbidden dark magic and refuses to let her power go to the sea, instead teaching her a magic that makes her feel powerful. Alive. As the sea grows more violent, Tana must choose between duty to her people, or her heart.
Just after the Second World War, in the small village of Chawton, once home to Jane Austen, a group of unlikely but like-minded people come together to preserve her threatened legacy. These people―a laborer, a young widow, the local doctor, and a movie star, among others―could not be more different and yet they are united in their love for the works and words of Austen. As each of them endures their own quiet struggle with loss and trauma, some from the recent war and others from more distant tragedies, they rally together to create the Jane Austen Society.
Mel Smith’s life is shattered after the sudden death of her best friend, Sarah Ross. In an effort to fulfill a final promise to Sarah and find herself again, Mel travels to a small town nestled in the Appalachian Mountains. But Morgan’s Gap is more than she ever expected. There are secrets that call to Mel, from a salvaged remedy book filled with mountain traditions to the connection she feels to the Ross homestead and the wildwood around it. But a threat lingers in the woods—one that may have something to do with Sarah’s death, and has now set its sights on Mel.
When a secret message turns up hidden in a book in the Cinnamon Bun Bookstore, Hazel can’t understand it. But as more secret codes appear between the pages, she decides to follow the clues… she just needs someone to help her out. Gorgeous and outgoing fisherman, Noah, is always up for an adventure. Even better that the cute bookseller he’s crushing on is the one who wants his help! Hazel didn’t go looking for romance, but as the treasure hunt grows, so does their undeniable chemistry.
Meet Linus Baker: a by-the-book case worker in the Department in Charge of Magical Youth. He’s tasked with determining whether six dangerous magical children are likely to bring about the end of the world. Arthur Parnassus is the master of the orphanage who would do anything to keep the children safe, even if it means the world will burn. An enchanting love story, masterfully told, about the profound experience of discovering an unlikely family―and realizing that family is yours.
When two young cousins, Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright claim to have photographed fairies at the bottom of the garden, their parents are astonished. But when one of the great novelists of the time, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, becomes convinced of the photographs’ authenticity, the girls become a national sensation. 100 years later, when Olivia Kavanagh finds an old manuscript and a photograph in her late grandfather’s bookshop, she becomes fascinated by the story of the two young girls who mystified the world. But the girls’ lives intertwine with Olivia’s more than she thinks.
Madigan Will, Assistant Editor
As an Assistant Editor for The Everygirl, Madigan writes and edits content for every topic under the digital media sun. As the oldest of four siblings, she enjoys utilizing her big sister persona to connect and inspire readers—helping them discover new ways to maximize their everyday.
