- In All the Birds in the Sky, when Patricia the Child Mage finally unlocks her powers and transforms into a bird, she leaves her empty school uniform behind. When her pursuers find the discarded clothing, they assume this is just another symptom of mental illness and spread the word that a naked tween is running about the forest; needless to say, they don't find her.
- Animorphs:
- Originally true for the main characters, but they quickly figured out how to morph skintight clothing, though looser, baggier clothes remain beyond them (they improve over the course of the series). The kids have to wear leotards and bike shorts under their regular clothes and can't morph shoes. This limitation is because the Andalities, who invented morphing tech, don't wear clothes and so didn't take them into account. It's considered a sign of one's talent when a visiting Andalite is able to morph clothes when turning into a human.
- This significant piece of the story was completely and absolutely ignored on the cover art (which featured the book's narrator transforming into an animal featured in the story.) The creators readily admitted that this was done simply to make the covers more interesting since they now had various colors and fabric textures to incorporate.
- In Baccano!, the only thing that can kill immortals is being absorbed by each other. This makes their body disappear, but their clothes are left behind.
- The titular character from Bisclavret must take off his clothes to change into a wolf and can't change back without them. Not for reasons of modesty, mind you — they somehow act as a Transformation Trinket.
- Vampires that get staked in Black Blood Brothers usually leave behind a small pile of dust and a pile of clothing.
- Bone Chillers: The second book, Little Pet Shop of Horrors, has a girl who's turned into a dog by a potion. When she regains human form, she realizes she's naked.
- Books of the Raksura: Referenced regarding the Raksura, who can shift at will between a human-looking form and a larger, spikier, scaled one. Adults can make their clothes and accessories disappear when they shift and reappear when they revert, but it's a trick of Utility Magic that they have to learn in childhood.
- The titular protagonist of "The Compleat Werewolf" by Anthony Boucher discovers this little *ahem* wrinkle the second time he transforms (the first time having been when he was drunk, and also being coached through it).
The pang was sharper and stronger than he’d remembered. Alcohol numbs you to pain. It tore him for a moment with an anguish like the descriptions of childbirth. Then it was gone, and he flexed his limbs in happy amazement. But he was not a lithe, fleet, free beast. He was a helplessly trapped wolf, irrevocably entangled in a conservative single-breasted gray suit.
He gets rescued, fortunately, but later on has to deal with the repercussions of being naked when he changes back.
- In a book titled The Demon in Me by Michelle Rowen, Dark Witches are dissolved to nothingness very quickly when killed leaving only a pile of clothes.
- In the Deverry novels, transformation spells can only affect living matter, so shapeshifters have to carry a bag with their clothing around with them if they don't plan on changing back in the place where they started.
- Discworld:
- This applies to werewolves, as demonstrated in Men at Arms when Angua suffers Gone Swimming, Clothes Stolen and has to stay in wolf shape until she can get back to the watch house and improvise some clothing (in later books she keeps a bag with a dress when in wolf form). It also applies to female vampires, but not male ones, because the Discworld runs on tropes including the Rule of Sexy.
- Vampire constable Sally in Thud! resists turning into a bat unless absolutely necessary, since, as she confesses to werewolf constable Angua, female vampires' clothes disappear when they shapechange. Male vampires, on the other hand, have their clothes transform with them. It's something to do with the stereotype of sexy female vampires, apparently...
- In The Last Continent, ambient magic begins playing merry hell with the UU faculty's temporal glands when they arrive in early XXXX, resulting in several of the wizards aging or regressing at random; their robes do not change to match their new ages, especially noticeable when Archchancellor Ridcully becomes a toddler.
- The Dresden Files:
- Zig-zagged in Fool Moon with the various werewolf transformations.
- The loup-garou (who transform due to a curse on his bloodline) and the Alphas (who transform under their own power) play this trope straight.
- Later books mention the Alphas, who are people who use a magical spell to transform themselves into wolves, routinely donning clothes that are extremely easy to shed. The reverse, a wolfwere (a wolf who uses magic to turn into a human), also cannot change clothes upon transformation.
- The hexenwolves (who transform by the power of magical belts) avert this, and their clothes apparently transform with them. The description of the hexenwolves transformation doesn't include details on exactly how their clothes (and any other objects on their person) transform into fur and flesh, but it doesn't describe them tearing their clothes during transformations, or stripping beforehand, so it can be assumed that the belts' spell also covers things that are not part of the human's organic body.
- Senior Council member Listens-to-Winds is a Native American wizard and master shapeshifter. He can change his clothes to the forms he takes, from bus-sized bear, to falcons, to a turtle.
- Skinwalkers subvert this because when they look like humans, they can make the clothes to match as part of their disguises.
- Most Denarians, people who carry a coin binding a Fallen Angel and can shift into another form (like one short woman becoming a giant praying mantis monster), can change their clothes with them.
- For Love of Evil features a sorcerer's apprentice learning how to shapeshift but not knowing how to take his clothing along with him during the change.
- Zig-zagged in the Gwendalavir Universe. Several characters have a shapeshifting ability,note and it's heavily implied that it's the same power: They must turn into an animal that has roughly the same size as theirs and they all have either only one animal form or just a few into which they can easily turn. but it seems to work differently depending on the user.
- Salim from In Ewilan's Quest can turn into a wolf, but his clothes vanish every time. He starts as Reluctant Fanservice Boy, but Ellana's influence, and not least getting used to ending up naked among people any time the situation gets tense eventually make him grow into Shameless Fanservice Boy. note He also learns how to bypass the problem: In case he'd need his clothes after turning back into a human, he puts them off first, secures them inside a backpack, turns into a wolf, and simply carries the bag. Though said operation is done shamelessly, even if people can see. Ewilan is used to it, and probably doesn't mind anyway.
- Hoever, Shaé from The Other (as well as her son Elio) can retain her clothes when she turns back into her human form even if they disappear when she's in animal form. It isn't exactly explained why in-Universe, although Shaé assumes that it's because they are somehow part of her, and thus are included into her animal form. Or she simply has better control over her power than Salim has.
- Harry Potter:
- When using the Polyjuice Potion, the drinkers have to prepare a set of clothes fitted to their new form, since the older clothes will either be torn off if the drinker becames bigger or be too large if the drinker becomes smaller.
- Likewise, metamorphing werewolves tear their clothes.
- In Heralds of Valdemar, the god Vkandis decides to show his displeasure with his priesthood by (among other things) incinerating the high priest with a Bolt of Divine Retribution; a witness says that nothing was left but the man's smoking vestments and boots.
- In The Incredible Adventures of Karik and Valya, the eponymous siblings shrink to insect size, leaving their clothes behind. The girl is very unhappy about not having her clothes on. Also happens in the Soviet film of the book, where the shrinking scene shows their clothes falling to the floor. Underwear is included. Of course, by the time the movie switches from First-Person Perspective a few minutes later, they have managed to fashion themselves some kind of loinclothes.
- In The Indian in the Cupboard, when the person who would have been sent through time and space to the cupboard is dead, all that gets sent back is a neatly folded pile of clothing. This is the fate of Tommy, the WWI-era medic from the first book.
- In The Licanius Trilogy, Nethgalla makes Davian strip before allowing him to use the dar'gai'thin transformation Vessel. She outright invokes this trope, stating that she has no desire to get him another outfit.
- In Loyal Enemies, the werewolf Shelena has to strip and stash her clothes away before shifting forms because they'd otherwise get torn in the process. When at one point she is magically forced to shift forms while clothed, she finds herself in the situation of having to cross the village while holding it all together with just two hands. As she puts it, the less is said about the incident, the better and she really hates the fact that Gloom the dragon has Magic Pants.
- The first Magic Shop book involves a ring that can turn you into a monster. When protagonist Russell breaks the rules about how to use it properly, he actually bursts into flames and winds up temporarily Shapeshifter Mode Locked. Mr. Elives manages to turn him back but doesn't care that Russell has to run home naked as a result.
- In Mercy Thompson, clothing is not kept during shifting — and for werewolves, who become larger when they shift, it is torn. Werewolves and other shapeshifters will therefore discard their clothing prior to shifting if there is time to do so. As a side effect, shapeshifters (and those who live with them) tend to be comfortable with casual nudity. The exception is Charles, who can make clothes magically appear on his body due to his background.
- The Mortal Instruments:
- The vampires invert it. When they change, their clothes do not.
- Even if fairies or witches use magic, clothes change.
- The werewolves play it straight. When they transform, their clothes tear and they are left naked.
- Helene from Mouse (2017) turns into a tanuki to search Mouse's room. When she transforms back, he finds her naked in his bed.
- Murder for the Modern Girl: Guy Rosewood is only able to change his physical body and can't change the clothes he wears. This is why he prefers shapeshifting into male forms rather than female forms because he can't afford women's clothes.
- Steven Matuchek from Operation Chaos takes off his clothes to shift. This is simply because a large wolf inside a man's clothes is very awkward — and doesn't automatically tear the clothes.
- Werewolves in The Parasol Protectorate (and The Finishing School Series, related) routinely strip before transforming. One novel suggests that "cloakrooms" became popular for the benefit of the werewolf members of society; they could undress and don a cloak if there was going to be a delay in transforming or collect a cloak if they'd arrived in wolf form.
- Rain of the Ghosts: Aycayia (basically a manatee selkie) is naked when she takes off her magic skin, though she often uses seaweed as Improvised Clothes. Also implied with the Kim kids, to explain why they're naked after spending two days turning to dolphins and back.
- The Rising of the Shield Hero: When Filo, a magical flightless bird called a filolial, gets old enough to shapeshift into a human form, she does not simultaneously shapeshift clothes. Naofumi ends up having to spend a good chunk of time questing for special materials to make thread that can transform with her.
- Anyone who shifts Aspect in Runemarks and its sequel and prequel invariably end up naked after shifting back. Loki in particular spends a lot of time starkers.
- In the book Samantha Slade — Confession of a Teenage Frog, a girl tests a "formula for greatness" created by a small boy she babysits to help her win an election at school. It turns out that the stuff randomly turns her into a frog, so she is constantly having to crawl out of a pile of her clothes.
- In Shadow of the Conqueror, Daylen runs into this problem when experimenting with binding Light to his mass, which also causes his feet to explode due to them getting stuck in the ground.
- In the book series Soul Guardians by Kim Richardson, when the Oracles wanted to de-angel-fy someone they forced them to take a cold shower in a special chamber where the water disintegrated their body into a shiny foamy substance that was washed away down the drain by the water leaving a free-floating soul and a pile of clothes.
- Werewolves in Lisa Shearin's SPI Files series have to strip or else suffer Clothing Damage when they transform. Most spend the hours prior to the full moon in cheap track clothes and flip-flops. Luckily for Yasha, the series' primary werewolf character, he works for a Crazy-Prepared secret organization that protects the Masquerade, so when he has to dress formally during an undercover mission, he's issued the perfect outfit for this trope: a male stripper's tuxedo that's held together by snaps so as to be shed with ease.
- In Spirit Hunters, animal spirits have to drop their clothes when they change into their four-legged forms. Which results in a few awkward situations for Kitsune Sura and Nezumi Chiri.
- Used in The Time Traveler's Wife when the titular time traveler... time-travels.
- In Touch (2017), James' powers allow him to change his whole body into air. The first time this happens he's flying and feels the odd sensation of his clothes passing through him as they flutter to the ground. (He recovers the hoodie but has to fly home without any pants, thankfully too high to be seen.) He's a lot more powerful in this form, but the fact that he reforms naked means that he tries to avoid using it.
- In the book True Angel Hero by Laura Amy O'Hanlon, Kennedy kills her mother Ocran, who is a bad woman. When she dies, she vanishes instantly leaving her empty clothes to fall to the ground.
- Les Voyageurs Sans Souci: When Séraphine Alavolette, Queen of All Birds, decides to return to her realm, her body floats and she appears to vanish as her human disguise is ditched. Her discarded clothes fall to the ground, and the main characters believe to see "something" big and translucent cutting through the clouds.
- The Werewolf of Fever Swamp: Implied in the cover, which shows a wolf howling at the moon with a set of clothes laid out at its feet. The TV adaptation shows the half-transformed werewolf is at least shirtless, but the book itself doesn't address the issue at all.
