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Cressida Cowell's Top Book Recommendations

Want to know what books Cressida Cowell recommends? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of Cressida Cowell's favorite book recommendations of all time. At Shortform, we know books. Our book guides are the best in the world. Learn why.

1

The Sword in the Stone

T. H. White

4.2
"Learn. That is the only thing that never fails."--Merlyn the Wizard

Before there was a famous king named Arthur, there was a curious boy named Wart and a kind old wizard named Merlyn. Transformed by Merlyn into the forms of his fantasy, Wart learns the value of history from a snake, of education from a badger, and of courage from a hawk--the lessons that help turn a boy into a man. Together, Wart
Atul Butte portraitCressida Cowell portrait Recommended by Atul Butte and Cressida Cowell.
Atul Butte portrait
Atul Butte

@ZachWeiner The Once and Future King. Awesome book, can't forget the lessons 35 years later. [source]

The Hobbit book cover2

The Hobbit

J. R. R. Tolkien

4.5
Bilbo Baggins is a hobbit who enjoys a comfortable, unambitious life, rarely traveling any farther than his pantry or cellar. But his contentment is disturbed when the wizard Gandalf and a company of dwarves arrive on his doorstep one day to whisk him away on an adventure. They have launched a plot to raid the treasure hoard guarded by Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon. Bilb
Richard Branson portraitCressida Cowell portraitLev Grossman portrait Recommended by Richard Branson, Cressida Cowell, Lev Grossman, and 5 others.
Cressida Cowell portrait
Cressida Cowell

The Hobbit is such a richly imagined fantasy that, especially as a child, you can live in it. It is so completely immersive. [source]

Richard Branson portrait
Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Lev Grossman portrait
Lev Grossman

First up, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again, by JRR Tolkien. But you knew I was going to say that. This one book, which was published in 1937, defined so many variables for the fantasy tradition that are still in place today. Tolkien’s extraordinary achievement was to recover the epic landscapes of Anglo-Saxon myth, bring them back to life, and then to take us through them on foot, so we could see the details up close, at human scale. The Hobbit is both mythic and relatable at the same time – The New Yorker writer Adam Gopnik recently called it “an arranged marriage between the Elder Edda and The Wind in the Willows”, and I think that’s entirely fair. Though I would give more credit to the bass register of Tolkien’s imagination, its abyssal depths. Mole never delved as deep as the Mines of Moria. [source]

A Wizard of Earthsea book cover3

A Wizard of Earthsea

Ursula K. Le Guin

4.2
Ged, the greatest sorcerer in all Earthsea, was called Sparrowhawk in his reckless youth.

Hungry for power and knowledge, Sparrowhawk tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance.
Cressida Cowell portraitLev Grossman portraitScott Perry portrait Recommended by Cressida Cowell, Lev Grossman, and Scott Perry.
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Cressida Cowell

The school on Roke, a school for magic where you can learn how to be a wizard, was such a glorious idea. [source]

Lev Grossman portrait
Lev Grossman

It was published in 1968 and it was a revelation for fantasy readers, and possibly a revolution…Le Guin brought fantasy back to its pagan roots. She used as the foundations of her story the building blocks of nature and sex and language. [source]

Scott Perry portrait
Scott Perry

I don’t read much fiction these days, but favorites from my past are A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin, Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, and The Razor’s Edge by Somerset Maugham. All three are well crafted tales of the struggle to find meaning and one’s place in the world. [source]

4

The Ogre Downstairs

Diana Wynne Jones

4.2
Diana Wynne Jones at her finest – family feuds and chaos, magic with hilarious results and some of the most original ideas ever to appear between the covers of a book.


Casper, Johnny and Gwinny get a big shock when their mother marries the Ogre. The Ogre is large and stern and not at all interested in children, although this doesn't prevent him from adding his own two awful sons, Douglas and Malcol
Cressida Cowell portrait Recommended by Cressida Cowell.
5

Five Children and It

E. Nesbit

4.1
"I love E. Nesbit -- I think she is great and I identify with the way that she writes. Her children are very real children and she was quite a groundbreaker in her day." --JK Rowling

'Don't you know a sand-fairy when you see one?'

I dare say you have often thought about what you would do if you were granted three wishes. The five children -- Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane and their baby brother -- had
Cressida Cowell portrait Recommended by Cressida Cowell.