The fantasy written by women is in a boom, with authors such as Holly Black, Cassandra Clare, Marissa Meyer, Leigh Bardugo, Maggie Stiefvater, Victoria Aveyard … In the youth field, the greatest success of all time has also been the work of an author, the English JK Rowling.
It has just appeared in Spanish "A darker magic", first part of the long awaited trilogy "Sombras de magia" by V. E. Schwab. It describes a world in which there are different versions of London, distinguished by colorful names. Kell has the ability to travel between parallel cities, but he makes the mistake of letting himself be robbed of a powerful magical item by the thief Delilah …
With the excuse of this spectacular launch, take the opportunity to review the situation in our country. The national fantasy written by women probably begins in the nineteenth century with Emilia Pardo Bazán, since his broad work includes spectral legends of romantic flavor, and Fernan Caballero or Cecilia Bohl de Faber, the Spanish "sister Grimm", who picked up with much grace suggestive and terrible legends of Andalusian folklore.
From those beginnings until now, the author with the greatest number of readers has been Laura Gallego, faithful to the fantasy genre in most of her work, and to the youth throughout her. The strengths of this are the quality of the characters and the narrative agility. Among his books he would highlight "The collector of extraordinary watches".
The most important genre authors of the 20th century, who was not too rich in fantasy works written by women, were Ana María Matute and Carmen Martín Gaite. Already in the XXI, the award Minotauro, of great endowment for an unpublished work of sort, has only rewarded two novels of feminine authorship: 'Gothika' of Clara Tahoces and 'City without stars', of Montse de Paz. The prize Celsius of the Black Week, published novel, has fallen on women in the same number of occasions: 'Children of the Red Clan' by Elia Barceló, and "Róndola", who subscribes to this article.
Fantasy is a very broad genre in which all kinds of postures fit regarding the approach with which the genre is approached. We will start with the authors who, in one way or another, embrace the labels of the genre and are integrated into their assets fandom. Most of them have combined writing for adult readers with juvenile novels.
Elia Barceló has developed one of the most important and consciously fantastic works of the national panorama with her work for both adults and youth. It has a rationalist style but not exempt of emotion and very visual and environmental without neglecting the rhythm. His list of works, many of them translated into several languages, is as long as this article. Personally I recommend "The Flight of the Hippogriff", "Terrible Disguises", and the youth novel "Cordeluna", Edebé Award. Also received this distinction Susana Vallejo, narrator delivered to the fantasy genre and fond of ghostly presences and an emotional characterization of the characters without forgetting their dark sides. Another one of the authors of greater repercussion is the writer and scriptwriter Maite Carranza, whose trilogy "The war of las brujas" has reached international success; He has also written a funny novel about the faerie world, "Magic of a Summer Night". Nerea Riesco moves in a line close to the thriller, but sometimes including fantastic elements. I would also like to highlight the curious novel Götterdämerung by Mariela González. Regarding the epic fantasy of medieval court, the works of greater impact have been "Aranmanoth" and "Forgotten King Gudú" by Ana María Matute. Among the active authors include Virginia Perez de la Puente, a great connoisseur of the genre, with its powerful female characters, and Aránzazu Serrano, whose Neimhaim catalog has managed to enter the bestseller lists.
Within the fantasy, in general, youth titles reach better sales, so it is important to take into account this reading level when it comes to understanding the panorama. Among the voices awarded in the recent youth fantasy are Patricia García Rojo, winner of the Gran Angular prize, and Ledicia Costas, who won the National prize with her charming work "Escarlatina", in the Galician language. Among the most read and valued authors are Selene Pascual and Iria G. Parente, whose prolific joint career includes period, urban and steampunk fantasy; in it highlights "Red and Gold", which is probably the first national novel that includes a generic female. The well-known work of Victoria Álvarez, of high literary quality and careful documentation, also includes fantastic elements. Other authors to follow are Gabriella Campbell, Alba Quintas, Gemma Bonin, Ana González Duque, Laura López Alfranca …
Next, we talk about all those texts that, incorporating magical or non-mimetic elements, do not fall exactly within what has been traditionally published in the gender editorials. The authors named below write with the freedom of not necessarily adhering to a pre-established genre, but with the drawback that publishers and booksellers sometimes do not know where to locate their works. Some of the most interesting voices, for my taste, are developed in these hybrid genres.
Regarding the critical recognition achieved, the position of honor belongs to Cristina Fernandez-Cubas, winner of the National Literature Prize. His work is borderline, and incorporates disturbing elements, sometimes close to terror. Who does not know their stories is already taking a long time to get a copy. The other great national author of literary and dark fantasy is Pilar Pedraza, with a varied and hybrid work between fiction and document, equally essential.
Fernández-Cubas has a personal voice, of a literary nature, which sometimes borders magical realism. She would also place in this frame the works of Patricia Esteban Erlés, Espido Freire and María Zaragoza. The latter, in addition, has written fantasy crossover, that is to say, that can be read as much by adults as by adolescents, with "Sortilegio".
A little beyond magical realism is the weird fiction. The most relevant and translated voices within this subgenre of what disturbs and what removes the guts are Cristina Jurado and Marian Womack. This is also the case of Laura Fernández, author of "Connerland", about surprise in which supernatural elements and winks to science fiction coexist happily, and Tamara Romero, the Catalan David Lynch, independent author and cult able to surprise to his fans with each one of his works without ever losing his unmistakable style. Other authors in this line are Beatriz García Guirado, So Blonde and Ana Llurba.
Recently, a good amount of doubly gender anthologies are emerging that allow us to discover authors with much to say. Among them are "Insólitas", which shows a broad panorama of Spanish-speaking speculative genre writers, "Terroríficas", dedicated to fantasy and terror, "Vuelo de brujas", centered on this cultural figure, "Iridescence", from the point of sight LGTB and "Empotradoras", of erotic fantasy. Hopefully they serve as a quarry so that the number of women and non-binary people who decide to cultivate the fantastic narrative will only grow.
Sofia Rhei,
Author of Rondola
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The recommended second reading is the self-help book 
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