Bodleian Magic

"The new display, ‘Magical Books: from the Middle Ages to Middle-earth’, focuses on five celebrated children’s fantasy authors. As well as Tolkien, it will include work by CS Lewis, Susan Cooper, Alan Garner and Philip Pullman.
     Delving into its collection of authors’ papers, the Bodleian display includes some of the original artwork for The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, as well as the manuscript of The Fall of Arthur, a little known Tolkien poem that was unfinished when he died. It is published for the first time today [May 23, 2013] to coincide with the opening of the exhibition.
     Other 'magical' objects on show include Philip Pullman’s alethiometer (the golden compass from His Dark Materials trilogy), and one of Alan Garner’s original 'owl service' plates from the book of the same name."
— Jolyon Attwooll, The Telegraph
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"A new JRR Tolkien epic is being published today. The Oxford University professor wrote The Fall of Arthur in the 1930s, before he started work on The Hobbit.
     The story starts with the legendary King Arthur going to war in ‘Saxon lands’ before returning home.
     Its existence was revealed in the 1970s but its publication was then overtaken by other posthumous releases.
     Shaun Gunner, chairman of the Tolkien Society, said: 'We’re all used to seeing Tolkien’s stories set in Middle Earth, but this is the first time we’ve ever seen Tolkien write about legendary Britain.'"
— Oxford Mail
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Buy books by all the authors mentioned in this post here...

Spells success...

"It’s Game of Thrones week here at Flavorwire, and while much of our excitement is based upon the return of the TV series, we’re not forgetting George R. R. Martin’s books, either. The A Song of Ice and Fire series has done a great deal in legitimizing fantasy as a Serious Genre — a welcome development, given that a lot of people tend to disparage fantasy novels as a homogenous lump of sword-and-sorcery clichés with little literary merit.
     That’s not the case at all, so if you’re one of those starting to explore the genre — or if you’re a fan looking for some new books to read — check out our selection of the best fantasy novels you haven’t read. And, of course, let us know your favorites!"
— Tom Hawking, Flavorwire
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Two fine fantasy series come to mind right off the bat: The Dark is Rising Sequence, by Susan Cooper, and The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay, one of the Elora Writers' Festival's alumni of readers (no relation to Ailsa Kay, who will be reading at this year's Festival).

Beyond Grey

"Susan Cooper's sequence of five children's stories, The Dark Is Rising, is, you'll have guessed, all about the dark. The dark as velvety, blanketing night. The dark as the keeper of mysteries, ineffable and unknowable. Above all, the dark as counterpoint to the light; as one side of the great battle between evil and good.
     The Dark Is Rising is a Christmas ritual for me. The story starts on 20 December, and it is on 20 December each year that I start reading it. It is the night before Will Stanton's 11th birthday. All is happy anticipation and the busy, noisy stuff of a family coming together for the Christmas holiday. Will goes to bed with not much on his mind except a hope that his dearest birthday wish might be granted: deep, white, enfolding snow. He puts out the light. And then the terror comes."
— Charlotte Higgins, The Guardian
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Get all of Susan Cooper's books here…