Before we begin, let me be painfully honest: this is a completely biased article. This is a love letter to the wild worlds, unhinged characters, emotional damage, late-night reading, and life-altering plot twists that fiction has gifted us. Nonfiction is great as well but today, it can sit in the corner and sip water because this spotlight isn’t for it.
There’s a special kind of magic in fiction—one that nonfiction, for all its facts and truths, simply cannot recreate. Yes, nonfiction can teach us things, show us reality, and keep us informed about the world we live in. But fiction? Fiction lets us breathe in a different universe. It lets us escape, feel, imagine, and believe. And honestly, in a world that’s already chaotic and loud, why would anyone want more reality than necessary?
Fiction is the ultimate playground for the human mind. It isn’t completely chained to rules, dates, events, or “what actually happened.” It can bend physics, rewrite history, or make dragons soar above cities, and we accept it happily because the point of fiction isn’t accuracy, it’s possibility. Through these stories, we get to explore dreams we didn’t even know we had. Think about it: we’ve lived in dystopian futures, walked through magical forests, fallen in love in alternate universes, and fought battles in galaxies millions of light years away, all without leaving our couches. That’s the power of fiction. It gives us worlds that reality never could.
But even beyond imagination, fiction does something beautifully human; it makes us feel. Nonfiction might make us smarter, but fiction makes us softer. It teaches empathy without ever sounding like a lecture. When you spend chapters, or even an entire series, walking through life with several different characters, you don’t just understand them, you feel them. Their heartbreak tightens your chest. Their victories feel like your own. Their flaws, their fears, their healing… you experience all of it. And funny enough, these characters aren’t even real, yet sometimes they stay with us longer than real people do. That says a lot about the emotional power of storytelling.
Fiction is also our safe escape hatch. When reality gets heavy—exams, deadlines, drama, heartbreak, pressure, whatever it is that you name—we can shut the door, lie on a bed, open a book, and disappear into a world where our problems don’t exist. A world where we get to pause our life and live someone else’s for a while. That escape isn’t “running away.” Sometimes it’s the breather that helps us survive the next day. Fiction doesn’t judge us for needing a break; it just quietly takes us somewhere better until we’re ready to return.
And let’s be honest: fiction is just… unforgettable. Nobody curls up on a rainy day craving a textbook. We don’t stay up until 3 a.m. because a biography has a “crazy plot twist”, or unless of course, we have a midterm the next day. But a good novel? A good novel can ruin our sleep, destroy our emotions, and still be the best part of our week. We quote fictional lines in real conversations. We fall in love with fictional people. We grieve worlds that never existed. That’s how deeply fiction sinks into us.
Another thing nonfiction can’t compete with is longevity. Facts change. What we call “truth” today might be outdated in ten years. But stories? Stories are timeless. We still read myths from thousands of years ago. We still obsess over fairy tales and epics written long before we were even born. Fiction doesn’t just survive time, it transcends it, because fiction isn’t tied to data or reality. It’s tied to emotion, imagination, and humanity itself.
At the end of the day, fiction is better not because reality is unimportant, but because reality is already everywhere. We live it 24/7. Fiction gives us something more; something brighter, deeper, and freer. It shows us who we are, who we could be, and who we’re afraid to become. It stretches our minds and softens our hearts. It makes life more bearable, more beautiful, and more meaningful.
Facts inform us. Fiction transforms us. And that’s why no matter how many nonfiction titles line my bookshelves, fiction will always hold the throne.