I have a lot of friends who recommended this to me as a book they would compare to THE SIX DEATHS OF THE SAINT, and sadly, I think this comp really ruI have a lot of friends who recommended this to me as a book they would compare to THE SIX DEATHS OF THE SAINT, and sadly, I think this comp really ruined the book for me, because I have to disagree.
Though this is a twisty knight tale, the thing that works so well about THE SIX DEATHS OF THE SAINT is that it stretches the capacity of its format with brilliant tact. It's the triumph of telling an epic tale in a couple dozen pages. And I think this story is far from a mastery of format. In fact, it feels confined by its length.
I understand why my friends made this comp, and I think it'll help bring some of the right people to this story but it didn't work for me. But comp aside, let's talk about this book.
I hate when I have this opinion because it's such an annoying opinion to have, but I do really think this would work better as a long epic novel that combines this plot and whatever happens in the sequel. It was obvious from the get go that there would be some big twist about the narrator being unreliable, and so these 170 pages are really just spent in wait for that reveal. I would've been far more interested in a story that takes its time to set up this world and this character and her backstory beyond the here and now. As it stands, the payoff of the twist is weak, because the author gave me like 100+ pages to come up with theories of my own and nothing else to occupy my attention.
The world-building, the politics, and other goings-on are SO interesting but because of the urgency of the task at hand, feel irrelevant and tangental, so that the shifts beyond the task (especially towards the end) are disorienting and lack impact. There is so much to praise about this world. It does feel really lived in, and I have so many curiosities I'd love to dig into: the naming system of the knights, the history of hunting dragons, the viewpoints of magic, etc. And I think it's fine and good when worlds have details that go unexplored to focus on the direct plot, but I think time spent in this world-building would've actually much better aided the end of the narrative.
I think my favorite element is the epistolary entries about dragon hunting, and honestly I could have done with even more of them, especially if they aided the story more than they do (which isn't much at all, Bond could've really made use of these and hidden some lore elements and foreshadowing into those instead of just using them as ambiance).
I did overall enjoy my reading experience of this, and I think many people will too, but my expectations were just placed wayyyyy too high.
Thank you to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
CW: animal death, death, dead body, emesis, violence, alcohol, amputation, fire, hallucinations, body horror, blood & gore, self harm (for magic), child death (past)...more
I have never felt so utterly betrayed, absolutely overjoyed, and unhingedly giddy with ego and adrenaline all at theHAHAHAHHAHAHAH I AM LOSING MY MIND
I have never felt so utterly betrayed, absolutely overjoyed, and unhingedly giddy with ego and adrenaline all at the same time. I need to mark this date in my diary.
Only one other person on planet Earth has ever felt this exact feeling and they likened it to the feeling Truman gets when he finds out about the Truman show. and yeah. it’s not unlike that.
Thank you to Melissa for sending me a finished copy in exchange for my raw reaction to your evil schemes over video call. I love and hate you for this.
CW: violence, alcoholism relapse, trauma, colonialism, grief, death of loved one, character death, self harm, blood & gore, dead bodies, fire, illness, electrocution, human experimentation, sexual content, kidnapping, death of parents, death of sibling, needles, infidelity, emesis...more
almost 350 pages of the characters talking about the hypotheticals of the mystery at hand, then having sex, then talking about their relationship despalmost 350 pages of the characters talking about the hypotheticals of the mystery at hand, then having sex, then talking about their relationship despite only knowing for each other for a few days, and repeating that over and over until the last few chapters of the book.
this story certainly wasn’t as low as my expectations for it were, considering the only things I had heard about it where in comparison to the first book in the trilogy, but it definitely had its shortcomings. I loooooved its characters and their personal journeys, but the pacing really struggled here, and I felt that Marske had a tough time balancing the moving parts of this mystery.
CW: death, murder, violence, sexual content, blood, drugging, dead body, death of parents (past), grief, emesis, alcohol consumption...more
This book was very sweet and I really enjoyed the woodsy fairytale atmosphere of it all. I do think it would have been more impactful as a middle gradThis book was very sweet and I really enjoyed the woodsy fairytale atmosphere of it all. I do think it would have been more impactful as a middle grade novel, rather than YA. The attempts to fit this story into a YA age range felt incompatible with the narrative, and it definitely should've been a solid 150 pages or so shorter.
Thank you to the publisher for sending me a finished copy in exchange for an honest review!
CW: death of father (past), grief, violence, fire, injury detail, blood, child death, self-harm (for magic), self-sacrifice, kidnapping, character death, loss of loved one (past), homophobia (mention), biphobia (mention) ...more
Thank you to the author for sending me a copy of this book!
"Imagine that these paper birds were me and you—I’d have folded us together"
Returning to thThank you to the author for sending me a copy of this book!
"Imagine that these paper birds were me and you—I’d have folded us together"
Returning to the world of Modern Divination from a new angle, Agajanian once again takes their readers on a journey of hope, love, and loss. In book two we have: less tea, less academia, and less banter, but more swords, more Catholic guilt, and lots more bird content.
CW: grief, emesis, suicide (past), alcohol consumption, death of mother, dead body, blood & gore, blood magic, violence, abusive parents, religious trauma, character death...more
I think (adult!) fans of Andrew Joseph White would probably be really drawn to this story due to its themes and atmosphelet’s go trans monster schlong
I think (adult!) fans of Andrew Joseph White would probably be really drawn to this story due to its themes and atmosphere.
Featuring terrifying religious bigotry, small town horror, trans rage, and gender euphoria through monstrous metamorphosis, this book has a lot of amazing and well-executed elements. I do think too much of the plot was saved for the very end, leaving some of the dropped pieces of candy in the earlier parts of this narrative tale to feel more confusing than impactful and causing a meandering and slow pace, but I overall really enjoyed this little novella.
Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
CW: religious bigotry, violence, blood & gore, sexual content, rape (off-page), sexual violence, pregnancy, abortion (offpage), death in childbirth, medical content, needles, gun violence, drowning, cannibalism, murder, transphobia, misgendering, misogyny, animal death, dismemberment, hallucinations, fire, eugenics, racism, war (past), insects, child death (mention), antisemitism (mention)...more
Thank you to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
“Please, do what she did to me and make it good. Make mThank you to the publisher for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
“Please, do what she did to me and make it good. Make me weak and willing, and let it be good in the glow of you. Make me need and make me weep and get to the truth of me, the meat of me, and show me that it isn’t rotten.”
A Long Time Dead is an expansive gothic vampire romance about change: the kind that happens so fast you have to struggle to catch up with it, the kind that comes along with growth that feels like stretching into a new skin, as well as the kind that happens slowly over time so that one day you look back and are slapped in the face with the realization of how different things have become.
I have INCREDIBLY mixed thoughts over this book, and find myself unable to rate it, torn between bits that shine brightly and confidently in the best ways, and others that are muddy and sticky in the worst ways.
Poppy is such a unique main character for a gothic story. Not only is she a fat sex worker, she is jovial, lively, a bit crass, and not at all like the sullen, dark vampire archetype we’re used to. In fact, for a vampire, she feels incredibly human. Her heart bleeds more than her victims do.
And Poppy’s love leaks throughout the text, pulling forward tropes and themes uncharacteristic of the genre, such as found family and happy endings. Despite being a historical vampire story, this book is first and foremost a romance about two people finding each other and crafting a world that brings them peace and warmth.
Though of course, this book isn’t without its gothic moments. It handles large conversations about abuse–as a lot of vampire novels do–and quite well, in my opinion. You can tell that the themes of abuse are very personal to the author, and were very carefully represented.
I also think this book had a lot of interesting things to say about desire and self restraint, particularly on moderating your desires so as to find the balance between keeping yourself from happiness and over-indulging.
Samara Breger has a background in theater, and this is very apparent in her writing style. I felt very much like the chapters are written like scenes, which I think was both beneficial and detrimental to the book. Each individual scene on its own was an absolute masterpiece. Distance covered in plot and in characters, check. Beginning, middle, end, check. Established point, check. And some of these scenes have such incredible interpersonal dialogue that I think would work SO well for acting classes/showcases. But I felt the scenes were not edited together well, and frankly, a lot of the chapters felt like filler episodes. I felt a lot of the story struggled to stay on its path, and with that I found myself lacking a forward motion to grasp onto.
I did reach a point where I found myself racing against time, attempting to beat my own urge to DNF this book. And though I did win and finish this book before I was consumed by the need to put it down, the fact that I took on that race isn’t the best sign, and the urge to DNF was still definitely there.
I think the part for me that really failed was the pacing (which I know is subjective and hard to pin down, but bear with me). The emotional arc mapping was not done well, and the gothic tones were often in conflict with the romance which was often in conflict with the main action of the story. At times, it was meandering and dragging (especially in its dialogue or stretches of inner monologue), causing it to become repetitive and/or boring. I’m usually one who asks authors to milk their moments more than they do, and would rather scenes go on too long than too short. But I found myself skimming whole pages at times just to finish a scene that could’ve ended way earlier. And especially in the Gothic genre, where the reader expects to infer a lot of plot and messaging through subtext, it felt even more jarring when we did hit those overdone moments.
I mostly found this boiled down to the fact that the readers’ emotional journey through the book is uncertain, and could use with a few more rounds of editing to solidify.
Though Breger’s theatrical writing style gave me a mixed impression, I was really a fan of her Jewish perspective. There’s quite a lot of Jewish influence in this book, which was really exciting to see, especially in a vampire novel. There’s a large history of vampire archetypes being used to push antisemitic rhetoric, and it was delightful instead to have Jewishness unabashedly featured (however briefly and subtly) in a vampire story. All of the harmful archetypes were easily avoided, and there was even a conversation about Jewish morals and how they apply to a vampirical lifestyle. (I geeked out a little bit at this part for SURE.) But I do want to make it clear: there isn’t any actual Jewish representation in this book, though for all you Catholics out there, it’s filled to the brim with that Catholic guilt rep.
And lastly, this is a very neutral element for me, but it’s something I’d like to prepare other readers for: this book has a looot of sexual over- and undertones. Of course, it IS spicy (and WOW those were some delicious spicy scenes!! Honestly, I don’t have very formal words about the romance in this book other than AHHHHHH ), but as a former sex worker, the MC has a lot of sexual experience and is constantly thinking about it and using it to inform her life. Moreover, her sexual desires are very tied into her vampirical urges. I actually found it a fascinating literary addition to the canon of the vampire experience, but I know it might catch some folks off-guard. Especially because it really is quite crass.
Okay I will quickly mention: the romance really was all that. In fact, despite the bits that DID drag, I do wish some of the more romantic moments were dragged out further.
But Breger’s prose is the absolute star of the show in this book. It’s enchanting and gut-wrenching and undeniably show-stopping. Each time I felt dragged down in this book, I found myself renewed, vibrant with the life injected into me by a new gorgeous quote to fall deeply in love with. It shone the most in expressing the love between the main characters, and I was constantly squealing with delight and reading lines over and over in utter adoration.
Overall: I think this book was sexy, confident, and brilliant in the conversations it added to the gothic genre and featured some iconic sapphic vampires, but was held back by poor structure and editing, as it lacked a strong, intentional hand to guide our journey through this story.
This isn’t a book I will likely be going out of my way to recommend, but if you’ve read through this whole review and are intrigued by this story, I think it could be worth a read.
CW: sexual content, abusive relationship, blood & gore, violence, gun violence, mind control, animal death, drugging, confinement, forced institutionalization, dead bodies, fatphobia (mention), character death...more
Oh. Wow. Tunneling right into the heart of the ouroborotic nature of storytelling–from ancient myth to small town legend, Harrow achieves a gothic triOh. Wow. Tunneling right into the heart of the ouroborotic nature of storytelling–from ancient myth to small town legend, Harrow achieves a gothic triumph between these pages. Riddled with complex symbolism and allusions, featuring a meddling sentient house, and centering two unbelievably lovable characters who carry each of their worlds on their backs, STARLING HOUSE is absolutely a new favorite story of mine.
Thank you to TOR for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review! I'm sorry it took me so long!
R.M. Romero is an absolute wizard with words and this book is no exception.
There are so many beautiful and hopeful messages in here that I think will R.M. Romero is an absolute wizard with words and this book is no exception.
There are so many beautiful and hopeful messages in here that I think will really make a major impact on so many young people who think the path to being loved involves sacrificing and hiding away the scary parts of yourself.
Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
CW: death, grief, drowning, car accident, hospitalization, suicide, eating disorder, violence, war (past), sibling loss (past), gun violence (mention), infidelity...more
SHADOW AND BONE meets FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST but make it Jewish and about sexual trauma in this new queer, Jewish, dark fantasy (NOT a romantasy!).
Our stSHADOW AND BONE meets FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST but make it Jewish and about sexual trauma in this new queer, Jewish, dark fantasy (NOT a romantasy!).
Our story takes place in a post-war world, like a sea after a rough storm, residual debris floating to the surface and now adrift. Dimitri, the self-exiled Tsar, is struggling as he copes with the loss of his husband, Alexey, in more ways than one. He's surrounded by his friends who all want to support and love him the best they can, but his violent past with Alexey makes it hard for him to accept tenderness. Alexey is now the acting Tsar, furious at his husband's betrayal and hungry for power. With the help of the Holy Science, he intends to remake the world as he remade himself, as the Chosen One of the Lord, a vessel between realms. Vasily watches Dimitri ache, determined to take down Alexey and provide Dimitri with the happiness and freedom he deserves. But in order to make that happen, he'll have to craft an elaborate plan. One that involves risking his life and getting incredibly close to the enemy.
This violent yet resilient story wonderfully explores the effects of trauma, especially from abusive relationships, and how we write our scars deep into the bones of our identity, carrying the blame of a fault that was not our own.
My only critique of this book is less of a critique, but more something that if I was editing this book, I would suggest as a way to elevate the narrative. The story begins in the aftermath of a war, with most of the present stakes and circumstances informed by a complex backstory. With that in mind, I wish information about what exactly occurred in the past was divulged slowly in small, intentional moments. This post-war environment could have had a stronger impact and helped with pacing if the audience had been kept stewing in obscurity for longer, gathering up the shattered pieces bit by bit to make a full picture. Especially if Alexey had been kept vague, with only hints at his POV up until a certain point in the story. These changes definitely would have allowed for a stronger balance of intrigue and drama.
But other than that, I really enjoyed this story and found it full of such vivid and nuanced commentary about trauma and abuse.
I don't recommend this book lightly, as I found myself often nauseous from the violence and gore or deeply upset by the graphic sexual abuse. A third of the narration is told from the mind of an abuser, and witnessing his cruelty in high definition is not the easiest feat, nor is that of witnessing the other characters sacrifice their all in the name of their country's freedom and safety. But if these contents are something you're able to handle, it really is all worth it in the end. I can't wait to see how the story continues in the sequel.
Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
CW: sexual violence, abusive relationship, blood & gore, violence, injury detail (graphic), body horror, human experimentation, trauma, sexual content, character death, gun violence, drug use, war (past), torture (mention), child death (mention), death of father (past), emesis, alcohol...more
This was an incredibly fascinating, prickly, messy read.
I'm not even quite sure how I feel about this now and I may come back to this review to tweakThis was an incredibly fascinating, prickly, messy read.
I'm not even quite sure how I feel about this now and I may come back to this review to tweak my thoughts.
I think ultimately, though it certainly had some faults and I certainly have some criticisms, I enjoyed this book. I don't know if I would recommend it widely, as it's incredibly specific, but for anyone who is looking to pick it up, I would highly recommend reading it on audiobook, as I didn't find myself bored for a SECOND despite many of my friends telling me that they found this book to drag. Dani Martineck was a brilliant choice for a narrator, fleshing out the characters and providing an extra layer of tone to the already quirky voice.
If I were to recommend this to someone, I would heavily express that this is an autobiographical vampire story that explores gender, sexuality, identity, fandom, societal ableism, and archiving ourselves in a way that is raw and tangled and disorderly.
Our main character Sol is given the arduous task of archiving the work of a writer whose work he used to follow, to sort through the traces she left on the world (pun intended) and detangle her life from her work, to pull apart the rhetoric she's imbued into her characters and storylines to figure out where the fiction ends and where she begins. To figure out what is inspired by other media or what is purposeful or unintentional residue from her own experiences and beliefs. Dead Collections asks us, the audience, to do the same, in turn, with Isaac Fellman and the way he has poured himself into this story, archived his experiences and beliefs into his own fiction. There's an incredible parallel between reader and character, having to pull apart metaphor from reality, trying to make sense of all the sticky meanings and the blurred line between art and artist.
Unfortunately, I think this work is not done justice by the publisher, who markets this as more of a fiction tale. And in doing so, I think that strips away much of the nuance to this story, which makes sense why so many reviewers find themselves feeling confused by its rhetoric. The conversational web Isaac Fellman has woven in this book is beautiful, but thick, and at times some spare bits of debris become ensnared in it, warping the defining commentary out of shape. And without imparting the reader with the knowledge that their job as the witness of this story is to define those boundaries and pull out the messy bits, I could see how that narrative debris could warp the story too far for an audience to appreciate its shape in the first place.
Honestly, as I type out this review, I think I'm becoming more appreciative of the book. There's truly nothing else out there quite like it, and though some of the messy bits are a little too messy, (I do have some critiques still about some of the messaging on ableism and transphobia and how it stretched a LITTLE too far. I also have some hot takes about the main couple and how I don't think they are entirely healthy.) I think it's a fascinating and creative piece of documentation of self.
CW: sexual content, transphobia, deadnaming (in-text), dysphoria, ableism, car accident, medical content, blood & gore, physical assault, abusive relationship, suicidal thoughts, infidelity (past), sexual assault (mention)...more
Thank you to the publisher and GetUnderlined for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
I absolutely adored the concept of this book. I Thank you to the publisher and GetUnderlined for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
I absolutely adored the concept of this book. I think there is an untapped well of potential for collaborative literature that makes me want to become an editor myself just to make it happen, and this book felt like a glimpse into that world.
But unfortunately, I think the execution fell a bit flat for me. The writing of each individual author and of the story itself wasn't bad at all, and I found some new (to me) authors I want to read more of, particularly Hafsah Faizal and Darcie Little Badger. But this format just held the story back. It was almost Sisyphean in the way we hit a narrative refresh at every hour of the story. With each new chapter, the boulder rolled back down the hill, as each author had to start from scratch with character introduction and explaining a corner of this world and a magic system. It was exhausting.
I think this could've worked MUCH better if there were maybe... a third of the amount of authors, each writing a few chapters from their characters' POVs. With 18 perspectives being introduced until the very tail end of the story, I was spending more of my mental energy trying to keep track of the characters and the world-building than figuring out the actual mystery at hand. Every 20 pages or so, we were given a new POV that had to establish a new character, a unique magic system, a backstory, their relationship to the dead professor, relationships with other students, and tell a concise story with a beginning, middle, and end. It was just too convoluted and kept my head swimming and overwhelmed with unnecessary information.
Besides melting my brain a bit, this continued introductory format also hurt the storytelling itself. With the way information was handed to us, it wasn’t woven together enough for a mystery, which caused the first half of the story to feel entirely obsolete, with many of the early plot threads either turning out to be red herrings or remaining entirely unresolved. I honestly had more questions than answers at the end.
Finally, this structure hurt the climax, making it still feel out of nowhere, despite the attempt at building a through-line, just because we were being still introduced to entirely new characters and plots in literally the last pages. And with that, it lacked an ability to give the audience a final button to weave together the thematic conversations of the story. What are we supposed to take away from this world? I’m still not quite sure.
If we had less authors and a few chapters from each character, I think the pay-off would have been much more satisfying, and the world-building would've shone much more. This school and its characters were really drew me in, but it was just sand slipping through my fingers with this many POVs and storylines. It was just too much to keep track of and so much fell through the cracks.
CW: (I'm just listing them all together because the stories are so intertwined) murder, death, dead body, injury detail, fire, violence (brief), panic attacks, mental illness, hallucinations, blood, poison, kidnapping, grief, mentions of: loss of loved one, ableism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, bullying, colonization, war, generational trauma, spiders...more
“If you combed through enough fairy tales, untangled their roots, and shook out their branches, you would find that they are infested with oaths. Oath“If you combed through enough fairy tales, untangled their roots, and shook out their branches, you would find that they are infested with oaths. Oaths are brittle things, not unlike an egg. Though they go by different names depending on the myth–troths and gets, vows and tynged–there is one thing they all share: they must be broken for there to be a story. Only a shattered promise yields a rich, glittering yoke of a tale.”
This is a book to pore over. A book that makes you want to trace your fingers along each line, coaxing the words into your fingertips, just to bring your digits up to puckered lips and suck the ink dry, savoring each flavorful drop of meaning.
It holds a power in its pages, one of enchanting intoxication. If it’s possible to get drunk on words alone, this book is the god’s nectar to your everyday literary watered-down wine. It’s simultaneously luxurious like a rose and sharp like a thorn, its wit as enscorcelling and impressive as its characters.
By thematically weaving together tales such as Bluebeard, Eros and Psyche, Catskins, Beauty and the Beast, and more, Chokshi explores a liminal unease found between reality and fantasy, truth and lie, promises bound and broken. This book is a catalog of ghost and story through gothic prose, and in its own way, a thesis on the lessons of fairytales and the danger of the power they hold. Or rather the power we have to hold them. What is love if not fear? What is devotion if not sacrifice? What is a fairytale if not a weapon and a warning in one?
This book utters itself like a secret. And though like all secrets, it is inevitably spilled, its knowledge, also like with all secrets, comes with a sacrifice. It is not given freely, but earned through the effort of reading it. This story is to me: fragile, intangible, a whisper declared to the heart. And to attempt to clumsily summarize it in words or break its spell with the utterance of its particulars seems to me nothing short of blasphemous.
But I can say: THE LAST TALE OF THE FLOWER BRIDE is a brand new favorite of mine and its praises will be living on the tip of my tongue for a VERY long time. I was absolutely captivated by its purple prose and drawn in by its deconstruction of fairytale motifs. I fell in love with its gothic atmosphere and haunting cast of characters (including a hair-raising house), and felt a little too seen in its depiction of homoerotic codependent friendships between young girls (I didn’t know In A Week by Hozier could be known like this). But mostly, I left it believing in just a little more magic than I did when my journey into its pages began. And isn’t that what the goal of reading is? To emerge in a cloud of bibliosmia, stretching our limbs and rubbing our eyes and upon reacquainting ourselves with our reality, to find that when we weren’t looking, some unnameable thing from the depths of the story has nuzzled its way into our soul, leaving the world looking (or perhaps feeling) just a little bit different than it was before? To be inexplicably, indefinably, but undeniably changed?
CW: loss of sibling (past), blood and gore, animal death, abusive relationship, abusive parent, bullying, alcohol consumption, drugging, self-harm (for magic), parental death (past), character death, dead body, cannibalism, tooth horror (light), sexual content...more
Thank you to the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
Now, I think this mayhaps have been a "right book, right time, right person" kiThank you to the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
Now, I think this mayhaps have been a "right book, right time, right person" kind of thing, but wow I fell in love with this book. I found myself absorbed in its pages and struggling to pull myself away even to sleep or eat. And upon closing it, I found myself disappointed to leave the world behind. That certainly is not an occurrence with everything I read. Lately, reading has felt like meandering through a thick forest, trudging along different paths looking for a sign that I'm heading in the right direction, but Ink Blood Sister Scribe felt like finally finding the perfect little spot to settle down in, like Celia in the forest of Arden: "I like this place and willingly could waste my time in it."
In a magical world not unlike our own, we follow three characters:
Joanna: a young woman protecting and caring for her late father's personal library of magical books. Though in her attempt to protect the books from the outside world, she's holed herself in as well. Yet despite her expertise on her own collection, she can't seem to figure out where these books come from. Especially the book that killed her father.
Esther: Joanna's older sister who has been on the run for 10 years, after her father commanded her to move to a new location every November. Estranged from her family, and in a constant state of motion, she has no ties. But after spending the past year in Antarctica, she's decided to stay another season. For the first time she has a reason to stay: a girlfriend she's really starting to feel something for. And besides, what could possibly go wrong?
Nicholas: who is absolutely sick of his life. He's been giving his blood, sweat, and tears (quite literally) to the Library since he was a child, creating new magical books. But as the world's last and only Scribe, he's reluctantly resigned to his fate. At least his uncle–the head of the Library–and his uncle's girlfriend care about him, and at least he lives in a mansion out of a fairytale. At least he's safe, or so it seems.
But when all three of these characters discover hidden secrets that redefine their lives, they're thrown together on an unexpected and emotional journey.
Emma Törzs has crafted a brilliant little sandbox. This story was filled with the type of magic often reserved for children. One of mystery and whimsy; one that feels graspable and close to the heart. This feels like a world I could dream in, and it made me want to play pretend again. Any fellow fantasy-loving adults wanna meet up and play Magical Library with me? We can pull up weeds and mix them together as the herbs for spells and use berry juice and leaves as we pretend to write magical books with our blood. And we could even set up sticks into little frames and pretend they're magic mirrors. It's incredible that any fantasy book, especially an adult anti-colonialist fabulism tale, could make me filled with such childhood joy and imagination. This is a huge testament to the author's accomplishments.
Because of myself and my audience, I have to mention the biggest surprise of this book: its Jewishness. In fact, I had no idea it had any Jewish characters, and was so pleasantly surprised to see the casual representation for most of the story, but even more so to see the characters' connection to Judaism emotionally move the story in a moment of need. It meant a whole lot to me. In general, I was really a fan of this book's diversity. Two of the three main characters were queer (likely bisexual), one of the characters was half-Mexican, and another was disabled, using a prosthetic eye.
I must say, this is not a story of twists and turns, but one of nooks and crannies. Rather than dramatic surprises and mind-blowing reveals, it felt more as though the plot of this story was a picture slowly coming into focus. Some of the "twists" were easily spotted, but never felt predictable in a way that disappointed. And I've always said that I'd rather read a well-written and obvious twist than a shocking one that feels out of nowhere. I don't need to be caught off guard, I just need to be caught up in a story. And I was certainly swept off my feet by this one.
(Though a note for the editor: there's no airport in Brattleboro, and NYC is a 3.5-5.5 hour drive from Vermont, not 8 hours.)
I'm so grateful to have found this story at this point in my life, when I needed to be convinced that just a sprinkle of imagination reveals so much magic in the mundane. I can't wait to dive back into these pages someday, and I can't wait to see what Törzs does next.
Content Warnings: violence, gun violence, blood, self-harm (for magic), dead body, death of parents (past), grief, alcohol consumption, fire, emesis, abusive guardian, character death, kidnapping (past, recounted), torture (past, recounted), hospitalization (past, recounted), antisemitism (brief mention)...more
She kissed me with a martyr's agonized desperation, like I was the only sword she ever wanted to fall on. I kissed her right back like the cutting edgShe kissed me with a martyr's agonized desperation, like I was the only sword she ever wanted to fall on. I kissed her right back like the cutting edge of a blade, trying to inflict as much damage as possible.
Thank you SO MUCH to the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
IF WE WERE VILLAINS meets A DOWRY OF BLOOD in this scrumptious sapphic dark academia novel by S.T. Gibson.
This is less of a retelling of Carmilla and more a reincarnation. Gibson takes these beloved characters and pumps fresh blood into them so that they can live a life anew. And in this incarnation, Laura and Carmilla find themselves in New England as poetry students under the fierce hand of Professor De Lefontaine, a vicious academic force with a dark past. De Lefontaine doles out her praise selectively, setting students at each others' throats as they vy for her attention. But Laura and Carmilla can't tell which they want more of: attention from their elusive professor, or attention from the talented and ferocious girl they've been set at the throat of.
There's a specific type of romance dynamic—often reserved for the tragic achilleans—that always captures my heart. The Hamlet and Horatio kind of vibe. The king and the poet kind of vibe. And it's something I've NEVER been able to find in sapphic romances. They always fall short, lacking that chemistry and tension and absolute world-shifting passion. And I think this book has FINALLY done it. It has finally replicated that absolutely soul-crushing romance dynamic that I live for but with sapphics. Thank you S.T. Gibson for blessing us.
I gorged myself on this book, sucking the ink from its pages with fervor and reckless abandon. I constantly had to remind myself to slow down and luxuriate in its prose. In all honesty, reading this book almost began to stress me out with its richness. I was reading it faster than I could process it, and I have a laundry list of scenes I want to illustrate burning a hole in my notes app. It's absolutely ripe with gorgeous prose, a rich dark academic atmosphere, sexual delicacies, and heart-wrenching romance.
My only issue with the book is with the second half, where that I found that a lot of the stakes were told rather than shown. It made the climax of the story feel a bit out of nowhere and unearned despite the time spent building up to it. I think the story deserved to be even longer (I think this could've easily been an absolutely tome) and that would've given more space to build that plot up.
But I'm absolutely OBSESSED with this book and its incredible characters, and will not be shutting up about it for quite some time. It contains so many literary rarities, some I knew I was starving for and others I didn't even know I was craving. S.T Gibson is out for blood with this story and she can have mine by the gallon.
CW: blood & gore, murder, sexual content, alcohol consumption, dead body, decapitation, death of mother (past)...more
In the assumed future of Earth, land is scarce. Those who live among water, also known as damplings, areA deeply underrated whimsical sapphic fantasy.
In the assumed future of Earth, land is scarce. Those who live among water, also known as damplings, are looked down upon by the privileged landlockers, safe on their steady land.
In The Gracekeepers, we primarily follow two characters: North, a dampling who lives on a circus boat, where every night she dances with a bear in front of landlockers for food. She is engaged to the ringmaster’s son, a self-entitled brat, and she carries a secret, ones she’s not sure anyone would even believe. Callendish, a gracekeeper, which is essentially a mortician who performs funerary rituals for damplings, though she herself is a landlocker. And like North, she harbors a secret of her own.
Though despite mainly following these two, this book features an eclectic ensemble cast, most of the characters having at least one chapter of POV throughout the story. Each character was so interesting, fully realized, and well-defined. It was a cast peppered with personality, and all tightly woven together like the ribbons of a maypole. I especially loved the members of the circus, and could tell that Kirsty Logan definitely has at least some clowning experience, if not further cirque experience. Circus performers such as clowns have a history of subverting societal standards and questioning authority, and it was really lovely to see that history honored here.
This book has a lovely underbelly of climate and class commentary, but applied in an open-ended, and thought-provoking way. It offered a fabulist-style approach to a dystopian literary trope, utilizing metaphor and ambiguity. Rather than seeking to solve problems or provide some sort of statement on these issues, The Gracekeepers simply provides questions and perspectives. This approach worked well for this story, using the narrative to show the initial drop in the water, and then using the audience to carry out the ripple effect. It caused a reflective and thoughtful tone to shine through the fun and whimsy.
The romance was sweet as well. Though it was most definitely a subplot at best, it held a lot of hope and tenderness and provided a balancing softness to the narrative.
I do wish we had a little bit more of a glimpse into the world of the mermaids (?), but I understand they were primarily meant to exist as a metaphor or idea, something intangible like a dream. I may have to check out some of Logan’s other work, as I think some of her other books are set in this world and I desperately want to know more.
Overall, I really enjoyed this sweet and whimsical story featuring punk clowns, a dancing bear, mysterious sea-people, sapphics, a circus boat, sea funerals, climate and class commentary, and lovely prose.
CW: classism, pregnancy, grief, character death, loss of loved one, drowning, animal death, amnesia, abusive parent, misogyny, imprisonment, fire, claustrophobia, parental death (past), alcohol, blood, religious bigotry & imperialism, child death (past), sexual content (implied)...more
Barbie and the Diamond Castle if it was actually sapphic, by the way of Moulin Rouge + a D&D quest, bThank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC!
Barbie and the Diamond Castle if it was actually sapphic, by the way of Moulin Rouge + a D&D quest, but make it a steampunk fantasy heist with fae.
THE ABSINTHE UNDERGROUND is a quick & thrilling read with a dazzlingly atmosphere, fascinating lore, and easy-to-love characters. For a heist story, this book is wonderfully cozy and sweet. I wanted to just curl up on my couch with a cup of mint tea and a beloved pet (or stuffed animal, if I'm being honest) and read the night away. And I often did.
Though unfortunately this book is more a showcase of potential than execution. There's a lot of telling rather than showing, especially when it comes to the emotional arcs and motivations of the characters. And the plot itself is really exciting but progresses too easily, made up of more conveniences than challenges. All the elements are absolutely BRILLIANT, but just need to be tossed into a pressure cooker in order for them to properly shine. (I have SO many ideas that would make this story just blossom in ways that it isn't right now. SO many ideas.)
But I also have to give kudos where it is due, and I must say that I was engaged and invested in this story the whole way through. I read it in just about 3 sittings, and kept itching to pick it back up in-between. I was never bored or incurious about these characters and their journey, and I had a really good time reading it. It also seems to be hinting at a sequel, as many threads are left wide open, and I'm so intrigued to see how Pacton continues to expand on this enticing and intoxicating world.
CW: alcohol consumption, death of mother (past), grief, blood, imprisonment, violence, fire
(Credit to Faye for the original comp to Barbie and the Diamond Castle. And also thank you for letting me send you too many audio messages with my too many ideas about the shape this book could've taken.)...more
A sugar-sweet cozy autumnal story featuring a family I desperately wish I could be a part of, a diverse cast of characters, and a heart-warming childhA sugar-sweet cozy autumnal story featuring a family I desperately wish I could be a part of, a diverse cast of characters, and a heart-warming childhood friends-to-lovers sapphic romance.
Thank you to the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
They must have convinced themselves they would never rot in the same dirt we doThank you to the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!
They must have convinced themselves they would never rot in the same dirt we do.
The Spirit Bares Its Teeth has carved me wide open and laid me bare, leaving me to gather up the pieces and stitch myself back together.
I can't remember the last time I read a book with this much ferocity but perhaps it would have been disrespectful to approach reading such a ferocious book in any other way. Through a gothic historical medical horror, White cleanly dissects the topic of “female hysteria,” making an incision right at the intersection of ableism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia in the body of capitalist patriarchy. This book is bleeding with precise commentary, certain to leave its readers with the scars of its haunting prose and unflinching rage.
I wouldn't say I'm usually one for medical horror, and upon hearing that the level of this book's gore includes a graphic, on-page, at-home Cesarian abortion, I wasn't sure that this story would be for me. But amidst all the guts and gore, this book has a beautiful beating heart. One filled with hope and solidarity. And it feels weird to say I found safety and comfort in this story–that it felt like a huge hug and that it held me in its blood-soaked arms and said: "I see you, and you've never been alone," but it did. Though I guess that's the point of this tale: that no matter what the world tries to tell you, you are perfect and whole and worthy of love, even if you've spent your whole life trying to amputate parts of yourself in order to fit an image the world has told you to be. And that sometimes, you'll find the truest reflection of yourself in the most unlikely places.
This book is for the rabbit-hearted kids who are sick of either having to tear themselves down or tear down the people around them in order to survive. For the kids who are sick of walking on broken glass, but are ready to rip those shards out of their feet and wield them like a knife instead. And for the kids who never got the chance to.
If Andrew Joseph White wasn't a favorite author of mine before this, he certainly is now.
CW: extensive medical gore, medical experimentation, eye horror, sexual assault/rape (implied, on-page), sexual harassment, abortion, forced institutionalization, confinement, conversion therapy, sexism, transphobia, deadnaming/misgendering, pedophilia, forced marriage character death, dead body, death of mother (past), death of father, abusive parents emesis, miscarriage (mention)...more
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