Lud-in-the-Mist
A town that has decided Faerie does not exist, and the fruit being smuggled across the border to its children.
Published in 1926, before fantasy was a genre with rules, and read at the time simply as a novel. The prosperous burghers of Lud-in-the-Mist have spent generations pretending the neighbouring land of Faerie does not exist and that fairy fruit is not being smuggled to their children. Mirrlees, a classicist and friend of T. S. Eliot, writes the suppression of the irrational as comedy that curdles. Neil Gaiman calls it the single most beautiful fantasy novel of the century.
Recommended by 1 Person
Jo Walton
Lud-in-the-Mist is a very interesting book, because it occurred before genre-fantasy was a thing. There was not yet a genre that was fantasy. There weren’t fantasy readers. It was being read by ordinary people. Mirrlees was a friend of TS Eliot’s, and a modernist, but she wrote this very unusual novel in 1926.
Interview · March 2026
As an Amazon Associate, bookstoread.org earns from qualifying purchases. Links to Amazon on this page may earn us a commission at no extra cost to you. Spotted an error on this page? Tell us and we will fix it.