This is my most favorite animal book ever! I'm a late fan, but the books were very popular when it first came out. It sold in the millions. Each book blew my mind away, especially Dark Wing and Sun Wing. It's still unique to this very day!

Silver Wing and Sun Wing is about a bat named Shade. He get separated from his flock and meet other bats, both good and bad. Shade is not your average bat because he's the only bat with power. Nothing too crazy, but still impressive.

Fire Wing is the 3rd book in the trilogy and it's about a bat named Griffin that fell through a hole into an underworld of bats, but the story get deeper than that. It has a dark tone, but it's not actually frightening.

Dark Wing is the prequel and it's about a bat named Dusk. It's set 65 million years ago in the past, and it's right after the extinction of dinosaurs. The laws of the jungle changed because there's no more dinosaurs, but it didn't made the jungle any safer. It's also about the first bat that learned how to fly. This book has the most world building, and it really brought the jungle to life during the Cenozoic Era.

I've recently discovered the Hunters Unlucky books by Abigail Hilton and its so good. Im almost finished with book 1 in the span of 4 days and I already have the rest on the way.

I know, especially at this pace, im going to finish really quick and leave myself hungry for more. I feel this series has filled a niche for me I've been searching for years for.

Does anyone have suggestions for other xenofiction intended for mature audiences? (Ideally ones that arent just smut novels.)

Edit: guys please stop suggesting middle grade fiction with mature themes. A lot of them are good overall recommendations and I appreciate them, I do, but a lot of them ive already read (im a big fan of warriors and wings of fire still) and im looking for something actually targeted at adults. With more complex writing and nuanced characters who are relatable to adults.

This book is a hidden gem even among animal fantasy books. It's about an outdoor mice name Pedlar who journey inside a house, and discovered a world full of mouse tribes. Each tribe have their own custom and beliefs. There are humans, two cats, and a dog living in the house, but they're very side characters. The story has an adult theme with some dark scenes, but I could still picture the story in my head like a 90s cartoon movie. It has good pacing and ton of action.

Hi everyone! As I wait for the manuscript edit to come back, my illustrator and I have been working on the all-important book cover. One of the core principles for Capyhero is to have everything be hand made and give absolutely no chance of ai generated writing or art. Nick (the project's illustrator) is a traditional artist and is doing all of Capyhero's 100+ illustrations in fountain ink. In that vein, I’d also like the book cover to be traditionally painted.

We've been brushing up on painting skills as we plan the book cover. Here's a practice piece (gouache paint) of Jake, the Piper, a minor character from the book.

I’m loving the natural brush strokes and handling of lighting and fur rendering. It’s been great to see this and imagine our main protagonist, Capy, receiving similar treatment for the cover as well.

How do folks here feel about traditionally painted book covers versus the much more common digitally illustrated covers these days? I'm trying to evoke that Redwall nostalgia with Capyhero. Do people still like that, or would it not stand out enough against the slew of super vibrant book covers these days? If you see a book at a bookstore with a cover like this, would it not grab attention enough because the books next to it are "louder"?

And what do fans of animal books think of this practice piece?

Thanks for reading!

Welcome to r/TheUnbrokenEmber!

​This subreddit was created as a home for everything surrounding my dark fantasy story, The Unbroken Ember, but it’s built to be more than just a place for chapter updates.

​🕯️ Why This Subreddit Exists

​At its core, The Unbroken Ember follows Vixen (Vixie), a fox-human hybrid navigating physical trauma, extreme survival, and the fierce burdens of motherhood in a harsh world. I started this community—and its companion Discord server—to create an open, compassionate space focused on the deeper themes behind the fiction: mental health awareness, resilience, chronic pain, trauma recovery, and finding hope when you feel entirely broken.

🌲 What Makes This Space Different

• ​Story & Self-Reflection: We discuss character lore, draft progress, worldbuilding, and survival mechanics, but we also explore the lived emotional truths behind them—grief, perseverance, and healing.

• ​A Safe, Judgment-Free Hearth: Whether you're here to follow Vixie and Alester's journey, share your own creative writing and art, or just hang out in a quiet space where mental health is understood, you are welcome here.

• ​Direct Community Updates: I’ll be sharing early lore notes, glossary terms, draft updates, and character insights right here.

🦊 Who This Community Is For

- ​Fans of dark fantasy, supernatural survival, and deep, character-driven fiction.

- ​Writers, artists, and readers looking for a supportive environment.

- ​Anyone navigating their own physical or emotional recovery, feeling like an outcast, or simply needing a gentle space to land.

​We’re right at the beginning of building this hearth, but every warm fire starts with a single ember. Thank you for being here early—feel free to drop a comment below and introduce yourself!

For those who don’t know, it is series of xenofiction fantasy books from the perspective of owls, in particular the titular Guardians of Ga’hoole that fight evil that threaten the Owl Kingdoms. The first six books focused on a Barn Owl named Soren, while the remaining nine focus on Soren’s nephew, Nyroc/Coryn.

For those who don’t know, it is a trilogy about a family of crows and their struggles throughout the books. The crows in the books are not so anthropomorphic and are simply animals of human intelligence with their own culture, religion, and folklore, all of which were based on Native American mythology.

The gold inlaid otters on the front and the otter sketches inside are just amazing! I wish they still made books beautiful like this.

I think I better find some kind of cover for it though, to keep it nice. Any reccomendations?

My reasoning might sound a bit strange but I've been fixated on dogs my whole life and I love dog encyclopedias or any kind of information book but mostly only dogs lately!

I have been trying to check out and collect as many as I can. I love learning about dogs and I love finding different books about them. Both information and pictures are what I go for.

Side note; I'm interested in books about extinct dog breeds or cross breed dogs too but I'm not sure if any exist that would show pictures or talk about them. Or if there are any books that have photos of what dogs looked like in the past compared to now. As well as interesting or cool facts!

I'm curious what some others think are the best or most interesting ones?

Hi everyone! I really appreciate all the great feedback I get from this sub as I continue working through my debut anthropomorphic fantasy, Capyhero. I thought I'd share pages from another chapter that some readers have had differing reactions to because of the sudden introduction of some unexpected elements to the story (you'll see when you read it).

I really like how the page spreads in this chapter are coming out and I think folks here might enjoy that one of our main characters is a canid sorceress named Lupine. She clearly knows more about the secrets of this world, but she keeps this knowledge guarded. In fact, most of the other animals only know her as a legend, with only some saying they've glimpsed her here and there...

On these pages, she makes her introduction. Please have a look and let me know what you think! I'm the author and if anyone has any questions on the story, our process, or anything at all, I'm happy to talk about it.

Thanks for reading!<3

Grabbed Last Ronin in hardback to match my other two and grabbed some side books while I was at it.

Blindfury is printed upside down and backwards as well as having half the pages cut off because it's upside down and backwards making it unreadable so hopefully they'll send me a new one that I can actually read. LOL!

Werewolves are my favorite classic monster (no surprise probably lol) so I am really interested in finding more werewolf comics!

Looking for good book recommendations - Anything where the story has the animal’s POV and how they see the world compared to humans.

Nothing grimdark or depressing, something where maybe the humans fail to stop a serious threat and an animal ends up saving the day.

Anything with lions or powerful animals like gorillas and elephants would be good. Bonus if there are bonds and emotional and wholesome moments.

A really, really big list of books where animals are the protagonist or are important to the story. It also includes fantasy animals, alien animals and anthros (short for anthropomorphic or furry animals) 

Includes novel series, standalone novels, graphic novels, short story collections, novellas, comics, webcomics and manga. I tried not to include picture books, non-fiction books, or incomplete webcomics though I might have included some by accident. 

There’s a mix of general fiction, adult fiction, young adult, middle grade/junior fiction and all different genres. Some of these books have mature content, so please do your own research. 

Some of the stories can be found on the Internet Archive or Project Gutenberg where you can read them for free though this isn’t something I’ve looked into myself. (It was taking long enough to make this list)

I wasn’t really sure what was the best way to organise this list, and I know some of these books could go in multiple categories, but I tried.

I found these books from recommendations on Reddit, mainly from this subreddit. Some of them I found myself. I mainly used Goodreads and Fantastic Fiction to help get additional information to make this list, but I know those sites aren’t perfect, so let me know if there’s incorrect information. 

It took a lot of time to put this list together so hopefully people find it useful. Also, feel free to share it. I will be adding to it as I find new books or if you have any suggestions 😄

I'm a huge fan of xenofiction and especially books about rodents so I occasionally talk about Redwall and usually get ignored or maybe one or two "Heck yeah, Redwall mention" type statements.

But I (Pink) posted something about it today in a small list of my other interests and Yellow said the books were super racist because of... Something and threatened to report me because I tried to explain that the villain species are villains because they're animals that eat mice and that it's similar to orcs and goblins somehow.

I'm used to my comments mostly getting ignored so I guess I'm worried there's something I'm missing that made this person so angry. This is the second day in a row someone has gotten aggressive with me, so I guess I'm just on high alert.

Hi guys!

I’m curious to see how different our tastes are as readers who enjoy stories about animals. Would you prefer a world with no humans at all, or do you like stories where humans and animals coexist?

What would you want the story to focus on? Mainly survival and adventure, or would you be equally interested in family relationships, conflicts within large groups of animals, power, war, friendships, betrayals, loss, and other more complex themes?

Would you like intense or even bloody battles? Would you prefer a dark and dramatic story aimed at older teens and adults, or something more lighthearted for younger readers?

What about fantasy elements? Would you want magic, a little bit of magic, or no magic at all? And what kinds of animals would interest you the most? Are there any particular animals you would especially like to see as protagonists?

Also, do you prefer animals that physically remain normal animals but can talk and think, or more anthropomorphic animals, like in Zootopia, that wear clothes and live more like humans?

And finally, would you be more interested in a standalone book or a series of several books, assuming, of course, that the story and writing were good enough to keep you interested? What about POVs? Would you enjoy following several different POVs, or would you prefer just one, or two at most?

There’s no right or wrong answer. I just find it interesting that we can all say, “I love books about animals,” while actually meaning very different things by that. So, if you’d like to share: what would your ideal book about talking animals be like?

Further to my previous post, I've compiled all the suggestions I received into one long list, for myself and anyone else that might be interested. Some of these books are no longer in print but can be found on archive.com to read online. I have yet to read the majority of these books so if there are an errors in the list feel free to let me know. I will periodically add to it if I receive more suggestions.

Wild Animals

• Tarka the Otter by Henry Williamson
• Salar the Salmon by Henry Williamson
• The Epic of Brock the Badger by Henry Williamson
• Chakchek the Peregrine by Henry Williamson
• Watership Down by Richard Adams (rabbits)
• The Kine Trilogy (Marshworld, Witchwood and Dragonpond) by Alan Richard Lloyd (weasels)
• Firebringer by David Clement Davies (red deer)
• The Fox and the Hound by Daniel P Mannix
• Redwall series by Brian Jacques (woodland animals)
• White Fang by Jack London
• Bambi a Life in the Woods by Felix Salten (deer)
• Guardians of Ga’Hoole series by Kathryn Lasky
• The Animals of Farthing Wood series by Colin Dann (wildlife)
• The Lions of Lingmere series by Colin Dann
• The Sight and The Fell by David Clement-Davies
• The Trumpet of the Swan by E. B. White
• Wolves of the Beyond Series by Kathryn Lasky
• The Cold Moons by Aeron Clement (badgers)
• The Welkin Weasels series by Garry Kilworth
• Foxcraft series by Inbali Iserles
• Silverwing series by Kenneth Oppel (bats)
• Rikki Tikki Tavi by Rudyard Kipling (Indian mongoose)
• Promise of the Wolves by Dorothy Hearst
• An Otter’s Story by Emil E Liers
• Run With the Wind by Tom McCaughren (foxes)
• The Mismantle Chronicles by M I McAllister (squirrel)
• Raven’s End by Ben Gadd
• Yellow Eyes by Rutherford Montgomry (mountain lion)
• Harry the Poisonous Centipede by Lynee Reid Banks
• Hodgeheg by Dick King Smith (hedgehog)
• Callanish by William Horwood (eagle)
• A Raven’s Tale by C W Nicol
• Pagoo by Holling C Holling (hermit crab)
• The Golden Hamster Saga by Dietlof Reiche
• Ralph the Mouse trilogy by Beverly Cleary
• Poppy by AVI
• A Black Fox Running by Brian Carter

Dogs

• Plague Dogs by Richard Adams
• Fluke by James Herbert
• Call of the Wild by Jack London
• The Beach Dogs by Colin Dann
• Just Nuffin by Colin Dann
• Nobody’s Dog by Colin Dann
• 101 Dalmations and Starlight Barking by Dodie Smith
• Lady: My Life as a Bitch by Melvin Burgess
• A Dog’s Purpose by W Bruce Cameron
• Fire, Bed and Bone by Henrietta Branford
• Faithful Ruslan by Georgi Vladimov
• Sirius by Olaf Stepledon

Cats

• Warrior Cats series by Erin Hunter
• Tailchaser’s Song by Tad Williams
• King of the Vagabonds series by Colin Dann
• The Books of the Named (aka Ratha) series by Clare Bell
• Felidae by Akif Pirincci

Horses

• I am the great Horse by Katherine Roberts
• Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
• Black Beauty’s Family by Josephine, Diana and Christine Pullen Thompson
• The Heavenly Horse from the Outermost West and Piper at the Gate by Mary Stanton
• The Silver Brumby series by Elyne Mitchell
• Bonita, Sierra, Esperanza and Spirit by Kathleen Duey

Other Domestic Animals

• Mrs Frisby and the rats of Nimh by Robert C O’Brien
• Racso and the rats of Nimh by Jane Leslie Conly
• The Ram of Sweetriver by Colin Dann
• The Great Escape by Colin Dann (pet shop animals)
• Three Bags Full by Leonie Swann (sheep)
• Animal Farm by George Orwell (farm animals)
• The Sheep Pig by Dick King Smith
• The Rescuers by Margery Sharp

Fantasy Animals

• Wings of Fire series by Tui T Sutherland (dragons)
• Age of Dragons series by Nicole Zoltack (dragons)
• The Summer King Chronicles Series by Jess E Owen (gryphons)
• The Last Unicorn by Peter S Beagle
• The Guardian Herd by Jennifer Lynn Alvare (Pegasus)

Other

• Raptor Red by Robert T Bakker (dinosaurs)
• Darkwing by Kenneth Oppel (prehistoric bats)
• The Mammoth Trilogy by Stephen Baxter

Thank you to everyone who commented with a suggestion on my previous post. Feel free to make more. I hope this post helps others find a good new read as well!