6 Fantasy Books I Knew Would Be Masterpieces From the First Chapter

Published Sep 20, 2026, 2:49 PM EDT

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Knowing a book is considered a masterpiece before reading it can sometimes make that first chapter harder to appreciate. What’s more interesting is going back to the beginning and seeing how early on one can tell the story is something special. Fantasy novels usually ask for more patience than most books. They place the readers in complicated worlds, ask them to learn decades of history, and remember an influx of eccentric characters.

More often than not, all of that happens before the actual narrative even comes into play. This means that the beginning of a fantasy novel can either make or break it. The six fantasy books on this list take completely different approaches to how they open their epic stories, but all of them give the readers a reason to believe that what lies ahead is going to be nothing short of extraordinary.

1 ‘The Priory of the Orange Tree’

Image via Bloomsbury Publishing

The Priory of the Orange Tree is nearly 850 pages long, but Samantha Shannon’s brilliant writing justifies every single chapter. The novel begins in Inys with Queen Sabran Berethnet receiving yet another marriage proposal, and almost immediately, the reader understands that marriage for Sabran has very little to do with love. Her entire kingdom is built around the belief that the Berethnet bloodline keeps the terrifying Nameless One imprisoned. Unfortunately, this also means that Sabran is expected to produce a daughter and continue a dynasty that has supposedly protected the West for generations. She has to deal with assassins threatening her life, religious beliefs shaping practically every political decision around her, and an entire court obsessed with what will happen if she dies without an heir.

What’s interesting, though, is that the author reveals Ead Duryan, one of Sabran’s ladies-in-waiting, has been secretly protecting her from threats she doesn't even know about. That detail immediately adds emotional weight and makes every interaction between the two characters feel even more intriguing. In fact, it’s why The Priory of the Orange Tree is so easy to get lost in despite its intimidating size. The novel keeps getting bigger, introducing different kingdoms, beliefs, characters, and dragons without ever losing the personal stories at its center. By the end of the first chapter, there are already enough secrets to make the reader want more.

2 ‘Babel’

Image via Harper Voyager

Babel is R.F. Kuang’s most influential and viral work, but it’s more than just the BookTok reviews. The story begins in 1828 Canton, where a young boy later named Robin Swift is the only person in his house to survive a cholera outbreak. Professor Richard Lovell arrives to find him barely alive and uses a mysterious silver bar to heal him. Lovell then takes Robin to England, where he begins preparing him for Oxford with an intense education in Latin, Greek, and other languages. It is a strange beginning to a new life, especially since Robin quickly realizes that Lovell’s interest in him is not entirely selfless. The audience then finds out that in this version of history, Britain’s power is built around silver bars that can create magical effects using the differences in meaning between words in different languages. That makes people like Robin incredibly valuable.

His knowledge of Chinese gives him access to meanings that English speakers cannot reproduce themselves. Suddenly, studying translation at Oxford becomes every bit as important as learning magic at a fantasy school. That is where Babel becomes difficult to put down. The deeper Robin enters Oxford’s beautiful, privileged world, the more he learns about the Empire’s exploitation of other countries for the languages and resources that keep its magic working. The series provides biting social commentary on imperialism and perfectly sets up its conflict in the very first chapter. The book’s huge idea begins with one frightened child being given what he believes is the opportunity of a lifetime, and those emotional stakes are just as important to Babel as the novel’s complex magic system.

Collider Exclusive · Game of Thrones Personality Quiz Which Game of Thrones House Do You Belong To? Stark · Lannister · Targaryen · Baratheon · Tyrell

Five great houses. Five completely different answers to the same question: how do you hold power in a world that will take it from you the moment you stop paying attention? Eight questions will determine where your loyalties — and your nature — truly lie.

🐺Stark

🦁Lannister

🐉Targaryen

🦌Baratheon

🌹Tyrell

FIND YOUR HOUSE →

01

Someone powerful is acting dishonourably and everyone knows it. What do you do? In Westeros, the answer to this question has ended more than one great house.

ACall it out, openly and on the record. If honour means anything, it has to mean something when it's costly. BUse it. Information about someone else's dishonour is leverage — and leverage is power. CAct decisively to correct it — with or without the approval of those around me. DChallenge them directly. Strength settles disputes more honestly than courtroom manoeuvring. ENavigate carefully — build alliances, apply quiet pressure, and create a situation where the right outcome becomes inevitable.

NEXT QUESTION →

02

What is the source of your power? Every house endures because of something. What is it for yours?

AThe loyalty of people who trust me — earned over generations, not bought with gold. BWealth, intelligence, and the willingness to use both without sentiment. CA legacy so fearsome and a vision so total that opposition becomes unthinkable. DPhysical strength, military force, and the respect that comes from being the kind of person nobody wants to fight. ECharm, connection, and the ability to make powerful people feel that my success is also theirs.

NEXT QUESTION →

03

Who do you truly fight for? Strip away the banners and the words. The honest answer tells you everything.

AMy family and my people — those who depend on me and have kept faith with me through everything. BMy family — the ones who share my blood, even when they exhaust me, even when they disappoint me. CMy cause — a vision larger than any single person, including me. DMyself, and those few who've proven themselves worth fighting beside. EMy house — its name, its future, the position I intend to leave it in when I'm gone.

NEXT QUESTION →

04

How do you deal with your enemies? A house's method reveals its character as clearly as its words ever could.

AHonestly — I face them directly, and I give quarter when it's warranted. BThoroughly — I don't leave loose ends, and I don't make the same enemy twice. CDecisively — fire answers questions that diplomacy only delays. DHead-on — I'd rather meet a threat on the battlefield than behind closed doors. EElegantly — I prefer to make former enemies into allies, or at least into people who owe me something.

NEXT QUESTION →

05

What kind of ruler do you believe in? Westeros is full of answers to this question. Most of them end badly.

AA just one — someone who serves the realm rather than using it, who leads by example rather than fear. BA capable one — someone smart enough to navigate the game, ruthless enough to win it, and realistic about what winning costs. CA transformative one — someone who doesn't just rule what exists but reshapes what's possible. DA strong one — someone whose authority is beyond question because the alternative is obviously worse. EA wise one — someone who understands that the realm is fed by more than armies, and that a full stomach keeps more peace than a sharp sword.

NEXT QUESTION →

06

You suffer a devastating loss. How does your house respond? How a house handles defeat tells you more about it than how it handles victory.

AWe grieve, properly and together — and then we endure, because endurance is what we do. BWe adapt. We reassess. And we ensure that whoever caused this loss comes to regret it completely. CWe burn hotter. Setbacks don't soften us — they clarify what needs to happen next. DWe hit back. Grief and revenge are the same motion in our house. EWe regroup quietly, rebuild our position, and return when we're ready — on our terms, not theirs.

NEXT QUESTION →

07

Which of these truths about Westeros do you most believe? Every house has a philosophy. This is yours.

AThe lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Nothing matters more than the people you protect. BA Lannister always pays their debts — in gold or in kind. Reputation is built on consistency. CI am the blood of the dragon. Some destinies are written before the person who carries them is born. DOurs is the fury. When we move, we move completely — and we don't stop until it's done. EGrowing strong means knowing when to bloom and when to wait. Patience is its own kind of power.

NEXT QUESTION →

08

The Iron Throne is within reach. What do you do? The answer reveals not just your ambition — but your character.

AClaim it only if the realm needs me to — and rule in a way that makes it worth having. BEnsure someone who owes us sits in it. The power behind the throne is safer than the throne itself. CTake it. It was always meant to be mine — I feel that in my bones and in my blood. DSeize it — with both hands, without hesitation. Opportunity in Westeros does not wait to be asked. EPosition my house to be indispensable to whoever sits there — influence outlasts any single reign.

REVEAL MY HOUSE →

The Maester Has Spoken Your House Is…

Your answers point to the great house whose words, values, and way of surviving in Westeros match your own. Bend the knee — or don't. That's very much up to you.

🐺 House Stark

Winter is Coming — and you have always known it. You prepare not out of fear but out of duty, because the people who depend on you deserve someone who takes the long view.

• You lead with honour even when it costs you, because you understand that a reputation built on integrity is the only one worth having.
• Your loyalty to family and people runs deep — not as sentiment but as a code that doesn't bend when things get difficult.
• The North endures because Starks endure — not by being the cleverest players in the game, but by being the kind of people others are willing to follow into the cold.
• You are that kind of person. The pack survives. The lone wolf dies. You already know which one you are.

🦁 House Lannister

You understand the game — its rules, its exceptions, and exactly when the rules become the exception. You play it without illusions and without apology.

• You are sharper than most people realise, and you have learned to use that gap to your advantage.
• A Lannister always pays their debts — and you always keep your word, because your word is an instrument of power, and instruments must be kept in working order.
• You love your family with a ferocity that sometimes blinds you, and you know it, and you do it anyway.
• The lion doesn't concern itself with the opinion of sheep. Neither, in the end, do you.

🐉 House Targaryen

You carry a sense of destiny that is difficult to explain and impossible to ignore — the feeling that you are not simply participating in the world but meant to reshape it.

• You are capable of extraordinary things, and you know it, and that knowledge is both your greatest strength and your most dangerous quality.
• Fire and blood are not just words to you — they are a philosophy about what change requires and what it costs.
• The Targaryens at their best were transformative rulers who broke chains and defied the limits of what anyone thought possible.
• At your best, so are you. The dragon has three heads. You are one of them.

🦌 House Baratheon

You are a force — direct, powerful, and difficult to ignore when you enter a room or a conflict. You do not negotiate with challenges. You meet them.

• Ours is the fury — and yours is a kind of intensity that commands attention, respect, and occasionally fear from those who underestimate what's behind it.
• You value strength and straight dealing. You'd rather know where you stand in a fight than navigate a web of courtly whispers.
• The Baratheons built their house on the back of one of the greatest military victories in Westerosi history — and then struggled with what came after.
• The lesson of your house is that winning is not the end of the story. Governing is. You are learning that too.

🌹 House Tyrell

You understand that power does not always announce itself — that sometimes it arrives with flowers, good wine, and a smile that doesn't quite reach the eyes.

• Growing strong is your house's motto, and you live it: patiently, strategically, always investing in the relationships and resources that will matter most when it counts.
• You are charming by choice and calculating by nature — a combination that makes you one of the most effective players in any room you enter.
• The Tyrells fed King's Landing and shaped its politics without ever sitting on the Iron Throne — and they were arguably more powerful for it.
• You know that the person who controls the food controls the kingdom. And you always know where the food is.

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3 ‘American Gods’

Image via William Morrow, Headline

Neil Gaiman’s American Gods begins with Shadow Moon counting down the final days of a three-year prison sentence. Shadow has kept himself out of trouble and spent most of his time thinking about returning home to his wife, Laura. However, things take a turn right before his release. When Laura is killed in an unfortunate car accident, Shadow is released early for her funeral, and the future he has spent three years imagining disappears before he can even reach it. This is just the beginning, though, because on his journey home, Shadow meets the mysterious Mr. Wednesday, who somehow knows far more than a stranger should. Wednesday offers him a job as his bodyguard, and Shadow eventually accepts, which pulls him into a hidden America populated by gods and mythological figures who arrived with the immigrants who once worshipped them.

The book’s biggest revelation is that Wednesday is actually Odin, and the old gods are slowly being forgotten as Americans devote their attention to newer gods built around technology, media, and modern life. That gives the novel its central conflict. Gaiman doesn’t rush toward any of that, though. Instead, he takes his time to set up Shadow’s ordinary life so that by the time Wednesday enters the story, both he and the reader are ready to move from the completely ordinary into the deeply strange.

4 ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’

Image via Scholastic Press

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone was a defining moment in literature and pop culture, and the book’s first chapter does a great job of setting up the grand adventure that readers are about to embark on. J.K. Rowling doesn’t begin with Harry learning that he is a wizard. Instead, the story opens with Vernon Dursley going to work and becoming increasingly annoyed by all the strange things happening around him. He has absolutely no idea what any of it means, but the reader immediately wants to find out. It isn’t until much later that the story reveals what is actually happening, who Harry really is, and why everyone in the Wizarding World is celebrating him.

At the end of the first chapter, the reader learns that a baby named Harry Potter has somehow defeated the dark lord, Voldemort. It ends with Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, and Hagrid leaving the orphaned Harry outside the Dursleys’ home, where he will spend the next decade completely unaware that an entire magical world already knows his name. It is such a clever way to begin the series because the chapter gives readers a taste of almost everything that is to come: magic, adventure, humor, and even some hardships along the way. By the time Harry finally discovers Hogwarts himself, readers have already spent chapters waiting for him to catch up with something they learned on the very first night. Few fantasy novels make discovering their world feel quite as exciting, and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone starts creating that feeling from page one.

5 ‘A Game of Thrones’

Image via Bantam Spectra

A Game of Thrones tells the reader almost immediately that this fantasy story is much bigger than the fight for a throne. George R.R. Martin opens the novel beyond the Wall, where three members of the Night’s Watch are investigating reports of dead wildlings. The experienced Gared senses that something is wrong and wants to turn back, but the arrogant Ser Waymar Royce refuses. They soon discover that the wildlings have disappeared, and then something far more frightening emerges from the forest. Waymar encounters one of the Others, creatures that most people in Westeros consider old legend. He is killed after his sword shatters during the fight, and then his dead body rises again. There is no better way to begin a fantasy story because Martin immediately lets the reader in on a secret that most of his characters do not know.

The story then moves south, where Ned Stark executes Gared for deserting the Night’s Watch because, from his perspective, the man simply abandoned his duty. The reader, however, knows exactly what terrified him enough to run. Soon, Ned is pulled into King Robert Baratheon’s court after becoming Hand of the King, while the Starks, Lannisters, and other powerful families become caught in a dangerous struggle over who really controls Westeros. Across the Narrow Sea, Daenerys Targaryen is beginning a completely different journey that will eventually bring dragons back into the world. That contrast is what makes A Game of Thrones feel special so quickly. Martin gives the readers a completely different story in the novel’s opening pages and then confidently leaves them behind to make political marriages, family rivalries, secret affairs, and questions of succession just as exciting. Yet the prologue never completely leaves your mind. While everyone else is fighting over titles and territory, the reader always knows that something ancient is waking beyond the Wall, and it’s so much more terrifying than the characters can even comprehend.

6 ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’

Image via George Allen & Unwin

The Fellowship of the Ring is the beginning of an epic fantasy adventure, but it doesn’t really begin like one. J.R.R. Tolkien opens the story in the Shire, where Bilbo Baggins is preparing to celebrate his eleventy-first birthday alongside Frodo’s thirty-third. Now, Tolkien spends plenty of time on Hobbiton gossip, troublesome relatives, extravagant presents, and the curiosity surrounding the famously strange Baggins family. Then Bilbo gives his speech, puts on his mysterious ring, and disappears in front of everyone. Now, readers of The Hobbit already know what the ring is capable of, but Tolkien raises the stakes more than ever this time. After the party, Bilbo leaves the Shire and passes the ring on to Frodo.

At first, it still seems like the same useful magical object Bilbo found years earlier. That changes when Gandalf discovers the truth. Turns out the ring once belonged to Sauron, and if he gets it back, he could regain enough power to threaten all of Middle-earth. Suddenly, Frodo’s quiet life in the Shire becomes connected to something much bigger than he ever imagined. This beginning works so well because Tolkien starts with a place that feels warm, funny, and completely safe before slowly showing the danger lurking outside. The first chapter does not need a battle or a giant fantasy set piece to feel important. Tolkien makes the reader feel like they are leaving home alongside Frodo when the real adventure finally begins, and that is what sets things up for the rest of this magical story.