Grimdark is fantasy with the heroism stripped out. Its worlds are violent and unfair, its people are compromised, and its wars are fought in mud by men who will not be remembered. Good does not reliably win. Sometimes there is no good to win.
The name comes from a tagline for the tabletop game Warhammer 40,000: “In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war.” By the late 2000s readers were using “grimdark” first as an insult and then, increasingly, as a badge for a particular kind of fantasy. This list gathers the books that define it, from the founders to the writers carrying it on now.
Each entry has a darkness note. Grimdark varies a lot. Some of it is bleakly funny; some of it is genuinely hard to read.
Where to start: The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie. It is the most readable, the funniest and the best introduction to what the subgenre does.
What makes a book grimdark?
- Moral greyness, or worse. The point-of-view characters do terrible things, often for understandable reasons.
- Realistic violence. Battles are chaos, wounds are permanent, and death is sudden and undignified.
- Cynicism about power. Kings, churches and wizards are self-interested. Prophecies are lies or traps.
- No promise of a happy ending. The story may end in victory, but it is rarely clean.
It is not the same as dark fantasy, which is about horror and the supernatural. Our guide to the subgenres of fantasy explains the difference.
The founders
1. The Black Company, Glen Cook (1984)
A company of mercenaries serves a sorceress called the Lady, and the annals are kept by their physician, Croaker. Soldiers’ talk, dirty jobs and a war seen from the ranks. Almost every grimdark writer since has named it as an influence. Darkness: moderate. Grim, but more weary than cruel.
2. A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin (1996)
The book that taught a mainstream audience that the honourable lead could die. Not always called grimdark, but the subgenre would not exist in its current form without it. A Song of Ice and Fire remains unfinished. Darkness: high, especially from book three.
3. Gardens of the Moon, Steven Erikson (1999)
The first of the ten-book Malazan Book of the Fallen, an enormous, complex war epic told largely from soldiers’ eyes, with gods who meddle and die. Famously hard to get into, and complete. Darkness: high, with real compassion running underneath.
4. The Darkness That Comes Before, R. Scott Bakker (2003)
A holy war in a world modelled loosely on the Crusades, and a monk who can read and manipulate everyone. Philosophically dense and extremely violent, including sexual violence. Not for everyone. Darkness: very high.
The canon
5. The Blade Itself, Joe Abercrombie (2006)
A torturer with a ruined body, a barbarian trying to be a better man and a vain young officer are drawn into a war by an ancient wizard. Funny, fast and savage. The First Law trilogy and its standalones (Best Served Cold, The Heroes, Red Country) are the heart of the subgenre. Darkness: high, leavened by black comedy.
6. Prince of Thorns, Mark Lawrence (2011)
Jorg Ancrath, thirteen years old, leads a band of murderers on the road. The narrator is a monster and knows it, and the book asks whether you can understand him anyway. A trilogy. Lawrence’s later Red Sister is far gentler. Darkness: very high in book one.
7. The Lies of Locke Lamora, Scott Lynch (2006)
Not always called grimdark, but its city of thieves is violent and its revenge plot brutal. A good bridge for readers coming from The Name of the Wind; see our list of books like The Name of the Wind. Darkness: moderate, with lots of wit.
8. The Last Wish, Andrzej Sapkowski (1993 in Polish; English 2007)
Stories of Geralt, a monster-hunter for hire in a world where the humans are often worse than the monsters. The Witcher saga is Slavic, sardonic and morally sharp. Darkness: moderate.
9. Best Served Cold, Joe Abercrombie (2009)
A standalone revenge story in the First Law world, built like a revenge tragedy: a betrayed mercenary general and a list of seven men to kill. A good test of whether you want more. Darkness: high.
The new wave
Since the mid-2010s grimdark has widened beyond its first models, drawing on history and cultures far beyond medieval Europe.
10. The Poppy War, R. F. Kuang (2018)
A war orphan wins a place at an elite military academy in a fantasy China, and the Second Sino-Japanese War arrives in fantasy form. Starts like a school story and becomes one of the harshest books on this list. A complete trilogy. Darkness: very high, including depictions of atrocity.
11. The Traitor Baru Cormorant, Seth Dickinson (2015)
An island girl taken by an empire becomes its accountant and plans to destroy it from inside. Violence of a different kind: economics, colonisation and the cost of complicity. Darkness: high.
12. The Court of Broken Knives, Anna Smith Spark (2017)
An ancient empire in decay, a band of mercenaries hired to kill its emperor, and a strange young man who may be a god. Written in feverish, poetic prose. Darkness: very high.
13. The Shadow of the Gods, John Gwynne (2021)
A Norse-inspired saga set after the gods killed each other, following a mother hunting her son, a slave, and a warband of the cursed. Huge battles and a complete trilogy (The Bloodsworn Saga). Darkness: high but heroic in feel.
14. The Blacktongue Thief, Christopher Buehlman (2021)
A foul-mouthed thief in debt to a thieves’ guild joins a quest he wants no part of. Bleak, funny and full of sharp detail, from a writer known for horror. Darkness: moderate to high.
15. The Sword of Kaigen, M. L. Wang (2019)
A mother and her son in a warrior village face an invasion. A standalone that is less cynical than most grimdark but just as harrowing in its violence. Darkness: high.
16. Age of Assassins, RJ Barker (2017)
A young assassin’s apprentice is hired to find out who is trying to kill a prince. Gentler than its title, and an easy way in. Darkness: moderate.
17. The Library at Mount Char, Scott Hawkins (2015)
Grimdark meets horror in modern America: a group of adopted children trained by a godlike father in terrible disciplines. Disturbing and blackly comic. Darkness: very high.
18. The Fifth Season, N. K. Jemisin (2015)
Rarely shelved as grimdark, but its world of recurring apocalypses and enslaved magic users is as unflinching as any book here. Each book of the Broken Earth trilogy won the Hugo Award. Darkness: high.
Grimdark for readers who aren’t sure
If you want to test the waters, try The Blade Itself, Age of Assassins or The Last Wish. All have humour and a little warmth. If you want the deep end, Prince of Thorns, The Poppy War and The Darkness That Comes Before will tell you quickly whether grimdark is for you.
If it isn’t, the opposite end of the shelf is cozy fantasy.
For writers
Grimdark is often written badly, as violence piled on violence. The best of it is about consequence. Characters do terrible things and the story follows the damage. If you are writing in this mode, our guide on how to write a villain applies doubly: when everyone is compromised, each person’s reason has to be clear.
Frequently asked questions
What is the first grimdark book? Most readers point to Glen Cook’s The Black Company (1984) as the first book in the modern grimdark style. Earlier influences include Michael Moorcock’s Elric stories and Robert E. Howard’s Conan.
Who is the “Lord of Grimdark”? Joe Abercrombie, whose Twitter handle “LordGrimdark” stuck. Anna Smith Spark is often called the “Queen of Grimdark”.
Is grimdark the same as dark fantasy? No. Dark fantasy is about horror and supernatural dread. Grimdark is about moral bleakness and realistic violence. Some books are both.
Is The Witcher grimdark? It is often counted as grimdark because of its morally grey world and its cynicism about power. It is gentler than Prince of Thorns or The Poppy War.