Shopping seems like a fairly innocuous task for a character in a book to undertake. After all, how tough could it be to get some milk, bread, and a bit of cheese? But the truth is, markets—whether of the goblin, faerie, night, or miscellaneous varieties—are more likely to be eldritch pits of danger, filled with challenges and some truly ugly (as well as breathtakingly magical) moments.
Authors rarely set an entire book within the confines of a market experience (though stories like Fran Wilde’s “Unseelie Brothers, Ltd.” might center around a particular fey-run shop), but the fantasy markets their characters encounter are often critical inflection points where heroes, villains, and sidekicks collide. Journey with us to nine unique, fantastical fictional locales to buy and sell your wares—and maybe learn a few things about yourself, and your world, in the process.
(Note: light spoilers for some of the tales below)
Goblin Market – Christina Rossetti
Rossetti’s 1862 narrative poem “Goblin Market” (which you can read here) set the standard for uncanny shopping experiences in fantasy. But while this is about two young sisters who live alone, don’t be fooled into thinking it’s for kids. After being lured by goblin merchants into trading a lock of her hair for some fantastic fruit, Laura becomes obsessed with the delicious food and begins to waste away (her affliction has been read as a metaphor for opium addiction, among many other possibilities). While trying to purchase more fruit to feed to her dying sister, Lizzie is attacked by the goblins, who try to forcibly feed her the fruit—but she remains steadfast and eventually returns home covered in juice and pulp, and is able to save Laura. The evocative language and strangeness of the story, along with the emphasis on transgressive behavior, felt mature for most audiences, and Rossetti stated more than once that it was no children’s fairytale.
In an Absent Dream and Lost in the Moment and Found – Seanan McGuire
Things come with a cost in a Seanan McGuire story, and payment may not always be rendered in coins, bills, gold, or jewels. That’s what young Katherine Lundy discovers in the fourth book of the Wayward Children series, In an Absent Dream (2019), when she walks through a doorway into the Goblin Market. The Market is a place humans can visit, but only until they’re 18—after which they have to decide to leave, or stay, forever. While at the Market, Katherine makes dear friends—an Archivist takes her under her wing, she fights against the Wasp Queen and Bone Wraiths, and discovers pies sold by a unicorn centaur! But none of that comes without tragedy and loss, along with the looming curfew.
Thinking she can game the system, Katherine tries to buy herself more time…and discovers that she must pay the highest of costs for her mistake. McGuire returns to the world of magical shops in Lost in the Moment and Found (the eighth book in the series, published in 2023) where Antsy discovers a junk shop where lost things go and visitors step through doors to reclaim them. Antsy gets a job there—but again, pays a very high price to stay: Time moves differently inside the shop than out of it, and she goes home a much older person than when she left.
The Iron Dragon’s Mother – Michael Swanwick
The only place more enticing than a faerie market is, undoubtedly, one that takes place after the sun goes down. In Swanwick’s 2019 novel, you can find the usual attractions (roasted chestnuts, cotton candy) at Avernus’ goblin night market—but also some very special ones: pedigreed bats, dreams on clotheslines, and a Wonder Wand that can transform pasta from firm to soft and back again (and yes, other things, too…). But the Avernus night market is also a demarcating line—it’s impossible to go from the public face of the city to the seamy darker side without taking a stroll through the market. That’s what Cat and her supposed friends have to do in order to have their adventure, get a little too close to Death, and learn some things about themselves along the way. Swanwick also throws in a reference to Ned the dancer and his hobgoblin pimp as they work at the market—fans may recognize the pair from his 2006 short “The Bordello in Faerie.”
Neverwhere, The Books of Magic, and Stardust – Neil Gaiman
Whimsy is the main thing on offer at the various markets created by Gaiman, along with a side helping of duality. The Floating Market of Neverwhere (1996) is particularly charming, as it not only features every kind of item or service you might imagine being rendered, it also appears in random locations around London Below—including Harrods and the HMS Belfast. The Gaiman-penned ongoing (since 1991) comic book miniseries The Books of Magic features a faerie market that will feel familiar to those who later read his novel Stardust (1999), where a wall in the town of Wall leads to a special shopping experience every nine years. Humans may cross over, but sometimes they get more than they bargained for—as when Dunstan Thorn falls for the faerie Una, leading to the story’s half-fae Tristran. He’ll ultimately have to decide on which side of the wall his heart truly belongs—because falling for a fallen star named Yvaine comes with the tricky complication that if she crosses into Wall, she’ll turn into a stone.
Return to Nevèrÿon – Samuel R. Delany
Delany’s collection of eleven stories, novellas, and novels comprising Return to Nevèrÿon (a phrase that, according to the author, more or less rhymes with “octogenarian”) were first published between 1979 and 1987. Frequently they refer to the old market, and we’re even given a tour of it in the full-length novel Neveryóna, or: The Tale of Signs and Cities. It’s a reasonably ordinary, if very old, market that sells items like food, pottery, and tools. But there’s also a section that functions as a slave market. The narratives in the books invert racial expectations by having brown- and black-skinned characters as the dominant, well-off majority and the lower class as lighter-skinned barbarians with light eyes moving into the city from the south.
In the second volume, a rich merchant named Madame Keyne helps finance a new market she hopes will replace the old one. Keyne thinks money is a wonderful invention—but not everyone agrees. And no surprise: a poor neighborhood has to be torn down to build the new market. Bonus: Look for the introduction to the first volume, Tales of Nevèrÿon, written by K. Leslie Steiner, who’s both a character in the ninth story (“The Tale of Plagues and Carnivals”)—as well as Delany’s alter ego.
Unraveller – Frances Hardinge
Hardinge’s 2022 novel Unraveller also dives into the notion of selling sentient beings—humans and non-humans alike—at its creepy Moonlit Market, which nods at Rossetti’s Goblin Market. In the story, Kellen, increasingly puzzled over his strange, unique talent, ends up at the market, which sells nearly everything. Looking for a cure for a magically wounded companion, Kellen then finds the cursed bird/human Yannick and buys his freedom, and things get even more complicated from there. The Moonlit Market ends up being a central location in the tale, where Kellen eventually finds himself on the auction block, others end up violating the market’s extremely strict rules, and various echoes and references to classic faerie folklore and legends are woven together in new and often sinister ways.
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What other fantasy stories do you know that feature magical marketplaces? Let us know in the comments!
Randee Dawn is the author of the funny, fantastical pop culture novel Tune in Tomorrow, which was a finalist in the 2023 Next Generation Indie Awards. She’s also the co-editor of The Law & Order: SVU Unofficial Companion and co-edited the anthology Across the Universe: Tales of Alternative Beatles. An entertainment journalist who writes for The Los Angeles Times, Variety, Today.com and many other publications, Randee is working on her follow-up to Tune in Tomorrow and lives in Brooklyn with her spouse and a fluffy, sleepy Westie.
