1) a 2ndary world with a lot of weird stuff going on, that is fully worked into that world (i.e. not just middle ages and there are secret wizards somewhere)
2) a lot of everyday mundane detail interleaved and co-existing with this, and usually a cast of characters who are very low-power & ordinary
2) a lot of everyday mundane detail interleaved and co-existing with this, and usually a cast of characters who are very low-power & ordinary
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Also adding some mystery and intrigue and low powered characters: @erinmevans.bsky.social's Books of the Usurper
I have vague recollections of some stories trying to subvert said trope - Pratchett & Gaiman came close in Good Omens I think: (spoilers) where the 'prince', Adam stays 'hidden' at the end
Well fleshed out, very weird, highly recommended
Loving the Tyrant Philosophers series btw
👉👈
Maybe The Vorrh by Brian Catling (although not a secondary world.)
Also most of Mark Charan Newton's work; The Cemeteries of Amalo & Doctrine of Labyrinths (Addison/Monette).
I also distinctly remember a lot of stories from Thieves' World anthologies reading like this.
Oh, and another one: Archivist Wasp by Nicole Kornher-Stace. Technically SciFi, but can be easily read as fantasy (of the Dying Earth kind). And definitely weird.
The world isn’t highly weird, but it’s absolutely a fantasy world where weird things do happen.
Also, maybe, Erin M. Evans' "Empire of Exiles."
Fritz Leiber's "Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser"? Lots of character. Clever. Resourcefulness wins out.
Ombria in Shadow by Patricia McKillip
M. John Harrison's Viriconium books.
Like this?
Although short on good examples of novels.
Bex Levene's Smiler's Fair could go on the list, but there's a lost prince in amongst the ragtag. I'm trying to make the case for Ninth Rain as well but it's Epic.
Oddly I really like the kitchen-sink worldbuilding, though I can't write it myself (maybe because).
Sorcerer of the Wildeeps (but glimpses)?
Would The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson fit the brief?
https://www.goodreads.com/series/242525-commonweal
The second book is also possibly my favorite "going to sorcery school" book (speaking of sub-genres).
I'd suggest that if you can have "this world, but a couple of twists off" that much of Tim Powers falls into your category?
Especially in the sense that most Powers narratives could literally happen in front of you, and you wouldn't know it.
There's a very similar feel of a coherent, everyday world, probably with taxes and plumbing regardless of whether they are mentioned.
If there was an edgy name for it (and I may be tempting fate here) then surely it would be Plebpunk.
I also recall being really charmed by the worldbuilding in the Flora Segunda books by Ysabeau Wilce, but it’s been a while since I read those.
I wonder if Piers Anthony's On a Pale Horse would count here - a more modern setting where everyone knows of and can use magic.
Echo City by Tim Lebbon
Viriconium by M. John Harrison
Veniss Underground (Vandermeer again)
Can't really call her 'overlooked' given she won the Carnegie Medal, but people are sleeping on her stuff!
Really hoping you develop a marketing friendly name for this subgenre, since the book I just gave my agent is very consciously sitting on this shelf.
Same hesitation for Metal from Heaven, where the protag has magic-esque powers but isn't *in power*
Otherwise these both seem to fit