Ransom Riggs is an American young adult author best known for beginning the fantasy series Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, a distinctive blend of mystery, the supernatural, and haunting vintage photography.
If you love Riggs’ eerie atmosphere, unusual characters, and imaginative worlds, these authors are well worth exploring next:
If Ransom Riggs' creepy charm and offbeat sensibility appeal to you, Lemony Snicket is a natural next pick. His work mixes dark comedy, strange predicaments, and a playful narrative voice that makes even the bleakest moments entertaining.
In his series, A Series of Unfortunate Events, three resourceful siblings endure one bizarre disaster after another while trying to outwit the villainous Count Olaf. The books are packed with clever wordplay, mystery, and a delightfully gloomy tone.
Neil Gaiman excels at turning the ordinary into something uncanny. Like Riggs, he brings together wonder and unease, creating stories that feel magical one moment and deeply unsettling the next.
In the novel Coraline, a curious girl discovers a hidden doorway leading to a disturbing parallel world. It’s a compact, memorable fantasy with a chilling atmosphere that Riggs fans often appreciate.
Jonathan Stroud writes smart, fast-paced supernatural fiction with sharp humor and memorable characters. His books balance suspense and wit especially well, making them a strong fit for readers who enjoy inventive, eerie adventures.
Readers drawn to Riggs' ghostly mysteries may want to start with Stroud's The Screaming Staircase, the opening novel in the Lockwood & Co. series. Set in a haunted England, it follows teenage investigators confronting dangerous spirits and dark secrets.
Holly Black is a great choice for readers who enjoy fantasy threaded through contemporary or recognizable settings. Her stories are often moody, sharp-edged, and full of characters making difficult choices in dangerous magical worlds.
In The Cruel Prince, readers enter a treacherous faerie court filled with deception, political games, and morally complicated characters. It’s a strong recommendation if you like fantasy with darkness and tension.
Tahereh Mafi combines emotional intensity with suspenseful plotting and striking prose. Like Riggs, she builds stories around unusual young characters trying to understand their power, identity, and place in a threatening world.
Her novel Shatter Me follows a girl whose touch is lethal, turning her into both a weapon and an outcast. The story blends dystopian tension with romance, danger, and personal transformation.
V.E. Schwab writes immersive fantasy marked by dark undertones, imaginative settings, and layered characters. Her books often explore the cost of power and the blurry line between heroism and selfishness.
If you enjoyed Riggs' eerie fantasy and unusual world-building, you'll probably like Schwab's A Darker Shade of Magic, a vivid adventure set across multiple Londons, each shaped by a different relationship to magic.
Leigh Bardugo is known for atmospheric fantasy filled with danger, secrets, and emotionally compelling characters. Her work shares with Riggs a love of shadowy settings and stories that mix wonder with menace.
Try Bardugo's Shadow and Bone, which introduces the Grishaverse. With magic, political tension, and high-stakes relationships, it offers the same kind of immersive escapism many Riggs readers enjoy.
Madeleine Roux writes YA horror with a strong sense of place and plenty of creeping dread. Her stories are especially appealing if what you love most about Riggs is the unsettling atmosphere.
Fans of his spooky, mysterious style may enjoy Roux's Asylum, in which teens attending a summer program uncover disturbing secrets inside a former psychiatric hospital. It blends psychological unease, supernatural hints, and thriller pacing.
Scott Westerfeld has a talent for mixing speculative ideas with rich settings and adventurous plots. Like Riggs, he often uses historical influences to create stories that feel imaginative, strange, and slightly off-kilter.
You'll likely enjoy his novel Leviathan, an alternate-history tale set during World War I, complete with mechanical war machines, fabricated beasts, and nonstop momentum.
Cornelia Funke writes lush, imaginative fantasy with a strong sense of wonder. Her work often explores the meeting point between reality and the impossible, making her a good match for readers who enjoy Riggs' inventiveness.
Try her novel Inkheart, an enchanting story about books, adventure, and characters who can cross from fiction into the real world. It’s warm, magical, and full of possibility.
If Riggs' strangest and most imaginative elements are what keep you reading, China Miéville may be worth trying. His fiction leans more complex and surreal, blending fantasy, horror, and speculative ideas into unforgettable settings.
A strong place to begin is Perdido Street Station, set in the bizarre city of New Crobuzon. It’s dense, inventive, and packed with creatures, mysteries, and unsettling surprises.
Catherynne M. Valente writes lyrical, whimsical fantasy with an undercurrent of darkness. Her storytelling has a fairy-tale quality that should appeal to readers who like Riggs' mix of beauty, oddness, and emotional resonance.
Try her novel The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.
It follows a girl named September on a strange and marvelous journey through Fairyland, combining humor, imagination, and genuine emotional depth.
Stefan Bachmann writes atmospheric fantasy steeped in history, folklore, and the supernatural. His work carries the same kind of eerie fascination that makes Riggs' worlds so memorable.
His novel The Peculiar is set in an alternate Victorian England inhabited by both humans and magical beings, exploring prejudice, identity, and the bravery of young protagonists facing impossible odds.
If you enjoy Riggs' imaginative storytelling and youthful sense of adventure, Kenneth Oppel is another strong option. His books are accessible yet layered, often pairing historical settings with suspense, fantasy, or science-gone-wrong intrigue.
His stories frequently center on brave, believable young characters caught up in extraordinary circumstances.
Check out his novel This Dark Endeavor, which offers a dark and inventive prequel to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, exploring ambition, friendship, and the dangerous lure of forbidden discovery.
Readers who like Riggs' unconventional heroes and genre-blending ideas may enjoy Marissa Meyer. She refreshes familiar stories by weaving together fairy tale, science fiction, and fast-moving adventure.
Her book Cinder, the first in The Lunar Chronicles, reimagines Cinderella in a futuristic setting. With a cyborg heroine, hidden secrets, and rising danger, it delivers a fun twist on a classic tale.
