Siavahda's Blog, page 26

The Books I Go To For Comfort

Artwork by Elena Zakharchuk

This year’s ‘comfort zone’-themed Wyrd & Wonder is almost over, so it’s about time to talk about my comfort reads!

Especially since most of them are a bit, uh, idiosyncratic???

When you hear ‘comfort reads’, you probably think of things like cosy fantasy. But very few of the readers I’ve talked to about the topic have perfectly light-hearted comfort reads. Which is interesting! Why is it that sometimes very dark books can be comforting? I’m not sure it’s as simple as, no matter how bad I feel right now, I’m better off than these fictional people! You know? And the opposite can be true; sometimes very light, fluffy reads can rub us COMPLETELY the wrong way.

I don’t know, but I find the psychology of it fascinating.

Shalador's Lady (The Black Jewels, #8) by Anne Bishop
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: MC with PTSD, brown MCs, secondary disabled character
Goodreads

Return to the "intense...erotic...and imaginative" world of the national bestselling Black Jewels novels with this sequel to The Shadow Queen. In Anne Bishop's "vividly painted" realm, witches and warlocks channel their power through magical jewels - and one Queen has emerged from the shadows to bring hope to an impoverished people.

For years the Shalador people suffered the cruelties of the corrupt Queens who ruled them, forbidding their traditions, punishing those who dared show defiance, and forcing many more into hiding. And even though the refugees have found sanctuary in Dena Nehele, they have never been able to call it home.

Now that Dena Nehele has been cleansed of tainted Blood, the Rose-Jeweled Queen, Lady Cassidy, makes it her duty to restore the land and prove her ability to rule. She knows that undertaking this task will require all her heat and courage as she summons the untested power within her, a power capable of consuming her if she cannot control it.

And eve if Lady Cassidy survives her trial by fire, other dangers await. For the Black Widows see within their tangled webs vision of something coming that will change the land - and Lady Cassidy - forever.

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Shalador’s Lady is not a good place to start reading the Black Jewel series; it’s book eight overall, and a direct sequel to book seven, The Shadow Queen, which sets up the characters, context, and overarching plot of the duology-within-a-series. You could read Shadow Queen without having read any earlier Black Jewels books if you wanted, but you’d miss a lot of Easter eggs, and the subplots featuring characters from the main series would make little sense.

This has been my go-to book when I’m depressed for years. Bishop’s prose is easy to read and very addictive, and Shalador’s Lady just makes me happy. It’s a book about rebuilding a broken community, about hope and resources and new opportunities flowing into a land and people that have been suffering for so long. It’s immensely about found-(or should that be made-?)family, about recovering from trauma, about joy. And learning how to be strong – even when you’re not strong in a typical way – so you can stand up for yourself, and protect the people who are yours to protect.

Also, LOTS of very funny, very adorable talking dogs. Insert heart-eyes here, please!

Cold Iron (Masters & Mages, #1) by Miles Cameron
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Epic Fantasy
Representation: MC from fictional oppressed/orastricized minority
Goodreads

Aranthur is a student. He showed a little magical talent, is studying at the local academy, and is nothing particularly special. Others are smarter. Others are more talented. Others are quicker to pick up techniques. But none of them are with him when he breaks his journey home for the holidays in an inn. None of them step in to help when a young woman is thrown off a passing stage coach into the deep snow at the side of the road. And none of them are drawn into a fight to protect her.

One of the others might have realised she was manipulating him all along . . .

A powerful story about beginnings, coming of age, and the way choosing to take one step towards violence can lead to a slippery and dangerous slope, this is an accomplished fantasy series driven by strong characters and fast-paced action.

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Unlike with Shalador’s Lady, I really can’t point to anything specific about this trilogy that makes it such a comfort read for me. I mean, I’ve always found Cameron’s writing bizarrely addictive (bizarre, because his fight scenes and such are so technical that they probably should be boring, and yet??? they’re not??? also the minor continuity errors make me twitch and I really want to know who the copy-editor assigned to him is because his books are always so full of typos, but??? I’m still completely addicted) but these books are literally a Good vs Evil war and nothing about them should work for me, but it all works for me. It’s so weird! I don’t even know, I just love these books.

Artifact Space (Arcana Imperii, #1) by Miles Cameron
Genres: Adult, Sci Fi
Representation: Black MC, secondary nonbinary character
Goodreads

Out in the darkness of space, something is targeting the Greatships.

With their vast cargo holds and a crew that could fill a city, the Greatships are the lifeblood of human-occupied space, transporting an unimaginable volume - and value - of goods from City, the greatest human orbital, all the way to Tradepoint at the other, to trade for xenoglas with an unknowable alien species.

It has always been Marca Nbaro's dream to achieve the near-impossible: escape her upbringing and venture into space.

All it took, to make her way onto the crew of the Greatship Athens was thousands of hours in simulators, dedication, and pawning or selling every scrap of her old life in order to forge a new one. But though she's made her way onboard with faked papers, leaving her old life - and scandals - behind isn't so easy.

She may have just combined all the dangers of her former life, with all the perils of the new . . .

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I feel like this makes much more sense as a comfort read than the Masters & Mages trilogy, despite both being written by the same author, because amongst all the space economics (which are absolutely fascinating, btw) Artifact Space is fundamentally a story about a traumatised young woman learning that Most People Are Good, Actually, while also being fully immersed into and embraced by the career and community she’s wanted so badly for her entire life. It’s all her dreams coming true! And she gets to make actual friends! And also have Things That Are Nice, because she finally has money!

I mean, there’s also this huge conspiracy to destroy the ship she’s on and destabilise the intergalactic economy, but that just makes it interesting as well as comforting!

Beguilement (The Sharing Knife, #1) by Lois McMaster Bujold
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: Amputee MC
Goodreads

“Bujold builds a better fantasy romance with compelling characters and the fascinating clash between their cultures, she a farmer’s daughter, he an adventurer on the trail of a deadly demon.”—Locus

One of the most respected writers in the field of speculative fiction, Lois McMaster Bujold has won numerous accolades and awards, including the Nebula and Locus Awards as well as the fantasy and science fiction genre’s most prestigious honor, the Hugo Award for Best Novel, four times (most recently for Paladin of Souls).

With The Sharing Knife series, Bujold creates a brand new world fraught with peril, and spins an extraordinary romance between a young farm girl and the brave sorcerer-soldier entrusted with the defense of the land against a plague of vicious malevolent beings.

Meet Fawn Bluefield and Dag Redwing Hickory in Beguilement, the first book in Bujold’s unforgettable four-volume fantasy saga, and witness the birth of their dangerous romance—a love threatened by prejudice and perilous magic, and by Dag’s sworn duty as Lakewalker patroller and necromancer.

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Honestly pretty much ANY book by Bujold works as a comfort read for me – her Vorkosigan saga is so compelling it really doesn’t matter WHAT’S going on in the real world, I get hooked back in every time I pick them up – but there’s something extra soft and sweet about the Sharing Knife quartet. For one thing, it’s a low-stakes series – although technically the Lakewalkers are hunting monsters, each of which could theoretically bring about the end of the world, that’s not really the main focus, and there’s a kind of tired but firm certainty that they will (almost-)always find the monsters before they become too big to stop.

Instead, this is a romance series – there’s adventure too, for sure, but mostly it’s about Dag and Fawn finding a way to be together in a place that accepts them, since their two cultures are not supposed to mix this way. It’s not exactly Romeo and Juliet…but the Lakewalkers, in particular, do just about everything they can think of to break them up. But these books are comforting because Fawn and Dag are rock-solid about each other, and have each other’s backs, and trust in their feelings for each other above everything else. There’s a big age difference between them, which I know some readers don’t like, but these two complement each other beautifully, and I’ll never stop treasuring this series for featuring a romantic relationship that encourages curiousity and asking questions and thinking outside-the-box for solutions to various quandaries. And, maybe best of all: Dag, the warrior and low-key magic-user, isn’t always the one saving the day; I love that Fawn and Dag get to save each other, over and over again, sometimes in obvious dramatic ways, and often in subtle emotional ones.

And it’s not just in the romance that curiousity is seen as a good thing; the whole series is a celebration of wonder, holding on to your sense of wonder about the world, learning to see and appreciate the small, beautiful, amazing things that are absolutely everywhere. A celebration of curiousity, too, how asking questions and learning and sharing ways of thinking and doing are never wrong.

Perfect books to curl up with somewhere cosy, tbh.

Point of Hopes (Astreiant, #1) by Melissa Scott, Lisa A. Barnett
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Queer MCs, queernorm world, matriarchal culture
Goodreads

Nicolas Rathe is a pointsman, a dedicated watchman in the great city of Astreiant. During the annual trade fair, with a city filled with travelers and merchants, someone is stealing children. The populace is getting angry and frightened and convinced that a foreigner must be to blame. Rathe calls on the aid of both an out-of-work soldier, the handsome Philip Eslingen, and the necromancer Istre b’Estorr.

The art of astrology is a very real power in the kingdom and plays as much a role in politics as greed and intrigue. Rathe finds himself struggling to find the children before a major astrological event brings about catastrophe. The first in a series of fantasy novels filled with adventure, intrigue and gay romance.

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I have read this series so many times I think I might have the first book entirely memorised. I think it’s something about the amount of detail in this series that makes it a comfort read; even while the main characters are investigating murders or disappearances (or both), we’re getting to explore this fascinating city, anchored not in the lofty heights of epic fantasy but in what’s being sold on the market stalls, the scent of the veggies being chopped by butchers’ apprentices, the texture of the broadsheets crowing their exaggerated ‘news’. All that description gives these books this kind of…calmly luxurious feeling? I don’t know how to put it better than that. It’s not like those cosy murder mystery series that I know exist – it doesn’t have the same feel-good undercurrent that those books usually do – but there’s just something lovely about reading about normal people existing in a fantasy world, I guess.

The Empress of Timbra (Hidden Histories, #1) by Karen Healey, Robyn Fleming
Genres: Fantasy, High Fantasy
Goodreads

Fourteen-year-old Taver didn't know he was a nobleman's bastard until his real father died. Eleven-year-old Elaku has always known she was the bastard daughter of the same nobleman - and the Empress's Witch. When the two siblings meet in the Empress of Timbra's palace, neither is aware that treachery and war threaten their home - and that they must rely on their magic, their wits, and each other to have any chance of victory.

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This is another book that just makes me HAPPY, despite the fact that there is plenty of Serious Stuff happening within its pages. Everyone I’ve ever recced it to – who has gone on to read it, anyway – has also found it a ridiculously Happy-Making book, though I’ve never yet run into someone who can articulate WHY. It’s told in dual-perspective first-person from two very young MCs – and yet it’s full-on High Fantasy, with politics and magic and issues of succession, and it’s more than complex enough for an adult reader to enjoy. (It’s one of those books that needed to be self-published, because I don’t think any trad-publisher would know what age-range to stick it in – it’s really not MG despite the age of the main characters, but maybe it’s not quite Adult either??? It’s complicated.)

It’s supposed to be the first in the series, but it works very well as a standalone. And something about it just ALWAYS puts me in a good mood. Some magical X factor that cannot be bottled.

Those Who Hunt the Night (James Asher, #1) by Barbara Hambly
Genres: Adult, Horror, Historical Fantasy
Goodreads

At the turn of the twentieth century, a former spy is called into service to hunt down a vampire killer...

Once a spy for Queen Victoria, James Asher has fought for Britain on every continent, using his quick wits to protect the Empire at all costs. After years of grueling service, he marries and retires to a simple academic’s life at Oxford. But his peace is shattered one night with the arrival of a Spanish vampire named Don Simon. Don Simon can disappear into fog, move faster than the eye can see, and immobilize Asher—and his young bride—with a wave of his hand. Asher is at his mercy, and has no choice but to give his help.

Because someone is killing the vampires of London, and James Asher must find out who—before he becomes a victim himself.

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This one is probably the oddest entry on my list, given that it’s a series about properly monstrous and unhuman vampires blackmailing a man and his wife into assisting them with their problems (generally some form of murder mystery) set pre-WW1 – aka, one of the time periods I find least interesting. AND YET. Hambly’s prose is just so damn beautiful, I can’t help be enchanted by whatever she writes. Why this series is my comfort read and not any of her others is hard to say… Maybe because my favourites among her series, apart from this one, are either unfinished (like the Sun-Cross books) or feature women dealing with a really awful patriarchy (Sisters of the Raven), or have very (to me) unsatisfying endings (Sunwolf and Starhawk, or the Winterlands series). I don’t love how the James Asher series ends, but I can accept it – and all the books leading up to it are pretty flawless. Again, these books feature a central couple (James and his wife Lydia) who consider each other perfect equals, save each other, contribute equally in solving the murders or dealing with whatever new vampire issue comes up… I’m a sucker for husbands who respect their wives, what can I say?

That’s a wrap! And probably my last Wyrd & Wonder post this year.

You can check out some of my less idiosyncratic comfort-read recs at the links below! (There may be some overlap…)

10 Books Sure to Make You Smile
Books That Make Me Smile
Gentle Books For Trying Times
10 Laugh-Out-Loud Reads

The post The Books I Go To For Comfort appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

I Can’t Wait For…Freakslaw by Jane Flett

Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted over at Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about but haven’t yet read. Most of the time they’re books that have yet to be released, but not always. It’s based on the Waiting on Wednesday meme, which was originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. 

This week my Can’t-Wait-For Book is Freakslaw by Jane Flett!

Freakslaw by Jane Flett
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Horror, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Queer cast
Published on: 20th June 2024
Goodreads

Discover the dazzling new queer literary horror novel about chosen family and the risks it takes to become the person you want to be.

‘The glittery punk offspring of Katherine Dunn’s Geek Love and Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus.’ Chelsea G. Summers, author of A Certain Hunger

A travelling funfair of seductive troublemakers arrive in a repressed Scottish town. What could possibly go wrong?

It’s the summer of ’97 and the Scottish town of Pitlaw is itching for change.

Enter the Freakslaw – a travelling funfair populated by deviant queers, a contortionist witch, the most powerful fortune teller, and other architects of mayhem. It doesn’t take long for the Freakslaw folk to infiltrate Pitlaw’s grey world, where the town’s teenagers – none more so than Ruth and Derek – are seduced by neon charms and the possibility of escape.

But beneath it all, these newcomers are harbouring a darker desire: revenge.

And as tensions reach fever pitch between the stoic locals and the dazzling intruders, a violence that’s been simmering for centuries is about to be unleashed…

Praise for Freakslaw:

‘A wild, fun house of horrors – whip smart, the sharpest writing, funny, visceral and filled with vengeance. I loved it!’ Rachelle Atalla, author of The Pharmacist

‘Delightful, delirious and transgressive… a queer punk masterpiece and we should all be so lucky to have our lives turned upside down by a visit to the Freakslaw.’ Leon Craig, author of Parallel Hells

‘Wild, raunchy, brutal – a madcap funhouse with heart.’ Liska Jacobs, author of The Pink Hotel

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Reviews for this one are incredibly mixed – it’s clearly a love-it-or-hate-it book – but sorry-not-sorry, I’m absolutely in love with everything about this. ‘Lock up your daughters: tie a horse rope round your sons’??? Please give whoever came up with that tagline a raise, because WOW AM I SOLD!

I’m not clear on whether the fantastical elements here will be outright fantasy or more in the magical realism line, but either way, who can resist the idea of a queer circus out for revenge?! And revenge for WHAT, dare I ask? I kind of dread to think, especially given the time and setting…

‘a queer punk masterpiece’, Leon Craig says. Yes, I’m worried about some of the content warnings and my low tolerance for horror – but I absolutely HAVE to read this!

I believe it’s only releasing in the UK for now, but I have my ways, that won’t stop me from getting a copy. So looking forward to it!!!

The post I Can’t Wait For…Freakslaw by Jane Flett appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

Must-Have Monday #188

Must-Have Monday is a feature highlighting which of the coming week’s new releases I’m excited for. It is not meant to be a comprehensive list of all books being published that week; only those I’m interested in out of those I’m aware of! The focus is diverse SFF, but other genres sneak in occasionally too.

SEVEN books this week!

(Books are listed in order of pub date, then Adult SFF, Adult Other, YA SFF, YA Other, MG SFF.)

Evocation (The Summoner’s Circle, #1) by S.T. Gibson
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Gay alcoholic MC, bisexual MC, Black MC, polyamory, minor trans character
Published on: 28th May 2024
Goodreads

The Devil knows your name, David Aristarkhov.

As a teen, David Aristarkhov was a psychic prodigy, operating under the shadow of his oppressive occultist father. Now, years after his father’s death and rapidly approaching his thirtieth birthday, he is content with the high-powered life he’s curated as a Boston attorney, moonlighting as a powerful medium for his secret society.

But with power comes a price, and the Devil has come to collect on an ancestral deal. David’s days are numbered, and death looms at his door.

Reluctantly, he reaches out to the only person he’s ever trusted, his ex-boyfriend and secret Society rival Rhys, for help. However, the only way to get to Rhys is through his wife, Moira. Thrust into each other’s care, emotions once buried deep resurface, and the trio race to figure out their feelings for one another before the Devil steals David away for good…

The first book in a spellbinding and vibrant new series from The Sunday Times bestselling author of A Dowry of Blood.

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Gibson won me over forever with Dowry of Blood, which is a top-tier fave of mine. Evocation is plenty different – no vampires here! – but it’s still plenty delicious, with lots of sumptuous aesthetics and a delicious tangle of emotions. It’s a bit more vibes than plot, but I still had a LOT of fun reading it!

My review!

The Paris Affair by Maureen Marshall
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Gay MC
Goodreads

A queer historical romantic suspense novel about a young engineer working for Gustave Eiffel caught in a web of deceit that could destroy both him and the famous tower.

Fin Tighe is clinging to respectability by his nail-bitten fingers. He may be the illegitimate son of an English earl, but he hasn’t spoken to his father in a decade, and his engineer’s salary is barely enough to support him and his cousin Aurelie. A dancer in the corps de ballet, Aurelie is at constant risk from groping, leering men who assume any dancer is a prostitute in training.  And Fin’s evenings spent in the clandestine gay community may be legal through a loophole in the Napoleonic Code, but they leave him vulnerable.

So, when Fin’s employer, Gustave Eiffel, announces that he needs additional investors to pay for his pet project, a 300-meter tower that will dominate the city’s skyline, Fin jumps at the chance. If he raises enough money, the commission will earn him a fortune, and hopefully, some protection. 

Capricious stranger Gilbert Duhais appears to be a boon from the gods. Gilbert is handsome, wealthy, connected, and somehow privy to Fin’s background. Gilbert persuades Fin to masquerade as his father’s heir—which couldn’t be further from the truth—and introduces him to every nouveau riche speculator in the city. Each provocative interaction heightens Fin's risk of exposure. But also brings Fin closer to his dream of financial security.

When a dear friend of Fin’s is murdered above a clandestine gay club, the stakes rise even higher. Fin must untangle the disparate threads of his past—and his current romantic gamble—before they become his noose. 

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A con to get the Eiffel tower funded? Why does that sound so bonkers, in an almost whimsical sort of way? And yet I don’t think this is going to be a funny/silly story. But it DOES sound like it could be great – I’ll have to check it out!

Don't Be a Drag by Skye Quinlan
Genres: Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Nonbinary bisexual MC with depression and clinical anxiety, major nonbinary lesbian character
Protagonist Age: 18
Published on: 28th May 2024
Goodreads

Two rival drag kings competing for a crown might just win each other's hearts.

When eighteen-year-old Briar Vincent's mental health takes a turn for the worst, her parents send her to spend the summer in New York City with her older brother, Beau, also known as the drag queen Bow Regard.

Backstage at the gay bar where Beau performs, Briar just wants to be a fly on the wall, but she can't stand by when the cute but conceited drag king Spencer Read tries to put down another up-and-coming performer. To prove to him that even a brand-new performer could knock him off his pedestal, Briar signs up for the annual drag king competition.

There's just one flaw in her plan: Briar has never done drag before.

With the help of her brother and a few new friends, Briar becomes Edgar Allan Foe, a drag king hellbent on taking Spencer down. But unless she can learn how to shake her anxiety and perform, she doesn't stand a chance of winning Drag King of the Year, overcoming her depression and inner demons, or avoiding falling for her enemy, who might not be so bad after all.

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Drag kings are those who take on a masculine persona when they do drag, as opposed to the more well-known drag queens, who take on feminine personas. Anyone of any gender can be either (or both, I guess, if you have the energy to keep up multiple drag personas!) Now you know that – this sounds very cute, and I’ve heard that the descriptions of the drag shows are fantastic! Definitely want to take a peek at it.

From the Belly by Emmett Nahil, Alex Woodroe, Chris Shehan, Megan Llewellyn
Genres: Adult, Horror, Queer Protagonists
Representation: M/M
Published on: 30th May 2024
Goodreads

The whaling vessel Merciful has just made its strangest catch yet: a massive whale containing a still-living man secreted within its stomach lining. Sailor Isaiah Chase is tasked with keeping the enigmatic man alive.

As their relationship grows, a series of accidents, injuries and deaths quickly befall the ship and its crew. Isaiah is plagued by strangely prophetic dreams, even as the crew continues their endless quest for whale oil under the command of an increasingly unhinged captain.

As events spiral further out of control, the mysterious man confesses what Isaiah has begun to suspect: the crew of The Merciful has fallen into a cycle of punishment for their greed and destruction. Isaiah must confront the sea's vengeance made flesh, and choose between this new, strange love and the fate of the ship itself.

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Spooky queer weirdness! I love the idea of whalers being punished for killing whales, and the idea of cutting open a whale and finding a living man inside? Who is possibly some kind of supernatural creature? A herald for the wrath of the sea? Yes PLEASE!

Any Human Power by Manda Scott
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
Representation: Queer MC
Published on: 30th May 2024
Goodreads

Sometimes it takes a revolution to change the world.
Sometimes it takes a relationship.
From acclaimed author Manda Scott comes a visionary thriller of a lifetime.

As Lan lies dying, she makes a promise that binds her long into the Beyond. A decade later her teenage granddaughter is caught up in an international storm of outrage that unleashes the rage of a whole, failed generation. For one shining fragment of time, the world is with her. But then the backlash begins, and soon she and her family are besieged by the press, facing the all-powerful wrath of the old establishment whose only understanding is power-over, not power-with.

Watching over the growing chaos is Lan, who taught them all to think independently, approach power sceptically and dream with clear intent. She knows that more than one generation’s hopes are on the line.

Weaving together myth, technology and radical compassion, this mytho-political novel breaks apart all we know of life, death and the routes to hope, asking us all to dream deeply and act boldly.

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The paper edition won’t be out until August, but you can grab the ebook this week! I’ve been so curious about this one – I read Scott’s Boudica waaaay back as a mini!Sia, and I remember it being excellent. The reviews for Any Human Power promise that it’s excellent too – mixing the sci fi with the mythic, and unlike most fiction that grapples with dystopias, presenting how humanity could move forward into a better future in a practical way. Scott wrote a bit about that here on her blog, which just made me more convinced that I need to read this book!!!

Of Stardust: A queer, fantastical anthology by Avrah C. Baren
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, Sci Fi
Representation: Queer MCs
Published on: 1st June 2024
Goodreads

An anthology of queer, speculative fiction with stories from distant galaxies and fantastical new worlds. Of Stardust brings you tales of knights and space travelers, love and resilience, and monsters who just might be heroes. Each story is unapologetically queer and shows us a world where we all belong (even the sea monsters).

Stories

Avrah C. Baren
Lillian Barry
Gabriella Buba
Talia Greer
P. H. Low
Alistair Reeves
Rose Regeant
Valo Wing
T. B. Wright

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A collection of queer SFF to kickstart Pride Month! I am on board with this plan.

Rare Birds (Hangfire Book 1) by L.B. Hazelthorn
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Queer MC
Published on: 1st June 2024
Goodreads

Alchemy meets Agatha Christie in this dazzling Jazz Age fantasy when an archaeology student faces myth and monsters to protect her family and break a blood curse.

As 1920s London swelters in the grip of Egyptomania, archaeology student Rom Godden wishes she was anywhere else. Lectures are dull, spring makes her restless, and the dog she inherited from her grandfather is acting stranger by the day. But when the dog saves her from a monstrous attack, Rom sets out to investigate—and uncovers a deadly family legacy.

Along with her dearest friend, Rom joins forces with her sceptical brother to navigate an underworld of shapeshifters and blood magic. Deception stalks them. Their precocious young stepbrother hides secrets of his own. If everyone plays for themselves, who can be trusted?

One wrong choice could threaten everyone she loves, and Rom will have to bargain for her freedom as she confronts the truth of her inheritance: every promise has its price.

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Opinions on this one seem VERY divided, but the mentions of a unique writing style have me intrigued. Also, who doesn’t love a story about a very good dog???

Will you be reading any of these? Did I miss any releases you think I should know about? Let me know!

The post Must-Have Monday #188 appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

(Still More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!

Artwork by Elena Zakharchuk

It is annual tradition that I make lists of interesting magic systems and magical abilities for Wyrd & Wonder, and 2024 will not be the year I break my streak! You can find this year’s magic systems list over here, and this post will spotlight ten different magic powers that intrigue and delight me!

(What’s the difference between a magic system and a magical ability? Well, I define a magic system as something that allows the practitioner to do many things, whereas an ability lets them do one thing – even if that one thing can be utilised in a lot of different ways!)

Thus, here is 2024’s list of some of the very coolest magical abilities!

The Tainted Cup (Shadow of the Leviathan, #1) by Robert Jackson Bennett
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Gay MC
Goodreads

In Daretana’s most opulent mansion, a high Imperial officer lies dead—killed, to all appearances, when a tree spontaneously erupted from his body. Even in this canton at the borders of the Empire, where contagions abound and the blood of the Leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death at once terrifying and impossible.

Called in to investigate this mystery is Ana Dolabra, an investigator whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities.

At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol. Din is an engraver, magically altered to possess a perfect memory. His job is to observe and report, and act as his superior’s eyes and ears--quite literally, in this case, as among Ana’s quirks are her insistence on wearing a blindfold at all times, and her refusal to step outside the walls of her home.

Din is most perplexed by Ana’s ravenous appetite for information and her mind’s frenzied leaps—not to mention her cheerful disregard for propriety and the apparent joy she takes in scandalizing her young counterpart. Yet as the case unfolds and Ana makes one startling deduction after the next, he finds it hard to deny that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.

As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the safety of the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra—and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.

Featuring an unforgettable Holmes-and-Watson style pairing, a gloriously labyrinthine plot, and a haunting and wholly original fantasy world, The Tainted Cup brilliantly reinvents the classic mystery tale.

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Most of the characters we meet in The Tainted Cup have magical enhancements – to their sense of smell or their size or even to their pheromones. But the main character, Kol, has a perfect memory, allowing him to remember every detail of a crime scene or suspect interview. In his world, this isn’t even an unusual power to have – it’s one many people choose, although not too many, as people are aware that being unable to ever forget anything will eventually become overwhelming and cause a dramatic burnout.

But we’re not talking about something as ‘simple’ as a photographic memory. Kol can also perfectly recall what he hears, smells, tastes – and does. Shown how to pick a lock, he can perfectly remember, and execute, what he was taught. Guided through a sword move, he can replicate it again perfectly every time. I mean??? That’s kind of objectively amazing. I definitely wouldn’t want to never be able to forget anything – but if I could just have that part? The doing-it-right-once-and-able-to-do-it-again-forever bit? Just imagine how incredible that would be!

Unraveller by Frances Hardinge
Genres: Fantasy, YA
Representation: Major gay character
Goodreads

In a world where anyone can cast a life-destroying curse, only one person has the power to unravel them.

Kellen does not fully understand his unique gift, but helps those who are cursed, like his friend Nettle who was trapped in the body of a bird for years. She is now Kellen's constant companion and his closest ally.

But the Unraveller carries a curse himself and, unless he and Nettle can remove it, Kellen is a danger to everything – and everyone – around him . . .

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Curses are a staple in fantasy, and so is breaking them – but never quite like this. Usually, breaking a curse requires a whole entire quest, and generally a character (or group of characters) only ever set out to break one curse. But Kellen has unravelled dozens and dozens of curses – it’s his magical gift, bestowed on him through a tragic accident. His whole life is travelling from place to place, undoing curses and (arguably just as important) identifying the people who cast them. This would be a big deal in plenty of magical settings, but Kellen lives in a country where everyone has the potential to become a curser – and although sometimes curses are a way of levelling the playing field between the misused and the upper classes – a way of getting justice when the person who’s done wrong is too rich to suffer consequences in court – usually it’s just spite and hate, and the curse is so completely disproportionate to the perceived ‘wrong’.

So it’s pretty gamechanging, to have someone around who can undo curses!

The wide-ranging ramifications of the existence of an unraveller is honestly just as excellent as the magical ability itself is. Yes, Unraveller is meant for younger readers, but like everything by Hardinge, there’s a lot here for grown-ups to enjoy too!

Magic, Lies, and Deadly Pies (Pies Before Guys Mystery, #1) by Misha Popp
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Bi/pansexual MC (possibly on the ace spectrum?), secondary gay hispanic character
Goodreads

Daisy Ellery’s pies have a secret ingredient: The magical ability to avenge women done wrong by men. But Daisy finds herself on the receiving end in Misha Popp’s cozy series debut, a sweet-as-buttercream treat for fans of Ellery Adams and Mary Maxwell.

The first time Daisy Ellery killed a man with a pie, it was an accident. Now, it’s her calling. Daisy bakes sweet vengeance into her pastries, which she and her dog Zoe deliver to the men who’ve done dirty deeds to the town’s women. But if she can’t solve the one crime that’s not of her own baking, she’ll be out of the pie pan and into the oven.

Parking her Pies Before Guys mobile bakery van outside the local diner, Daisy is informed by Frank, the crusty diner owner, that someone’s been prowling around the van—and not just to inhale the delectable aroma. Already on thin icing with Frank, she finds a letter on her door, threatening to reveal her unsavory secret sideline of pie a la murder.

Blackmail? But who whipped up this half-baked plot to cut a slice out of Daisy’s business? Purple-haired campus do-gooder Melly? Noel, the tender—if flaky—farm boy? Or one of the abusive men who prefer their pie without a deadly scoop of payback?

The upcoming statewide pie contest could be Daisy’s big chance to help wronged women everywhere…if she doesn’t meet a sticky end first. Because Daisy knows the blackmailer won’t stop until her business is in crumbles.

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This is probably the most ‘cute’ magical ability on this list, but only at first glance. Daisy can bake all sorts of things into her pies (although it’s not 100% clear if her power only applies to pies, or potentially any baked good); concentration and energy, for students studying for exams; happy vibes; courage; even forgiveness (although she can’t control what or who the person who eats her pie will forgive, only make them more inclined to forgiveness in general). It depends on what she’s thinking about and/or feeling as she bakes.

And then of course, there’s the murder pies she doles out to rapists and other abusers. I just think it’s objectively excellent to be able to murder people with pie magic, okay? That is both delightful and epic.

How the murder pies actually work is just *chef’s kiss*, but as it’s a minor spoiler, I’ll put it under a cut. [View post to see spoiler]

A Rational Arrangement by L. Rowyn
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
Representation: Autistic MC, brown bisexual MC, bisexual MC
Goodreads

“But these are vital aspects of marriage. If one cannot discuss them, what's the use in meeting at all? It's like trying to decide what you'll have for dinner without mentioning food.”

Wisteria Vasilver does wish to marry. Truly. But though she lives in Paradise, arranging a match is full of traps and pitfalls for the unwary ... or perhaps just for her.

Nikola Striker, Lord of Fireholt, expects he'll wed ... someday. But not now, and never to a rich icicle of a woman like Miss Vasilver. No matter how much his parents might want the match, or his house might need her dowry. Besides, he has his own problems -- most of them people who need his help as a mind-healer.

Lord Justin Comfrey, Viscount of Comfrey, would be more than happy to help Striker with his financial troubles, and not just to ensure that Miss Vasilver's dowry doesn't tempt Striker into marriage. If only he could find some way to make his proud, stubborn friend accept the money!

Can three people of such different temperaments ever find their way to a more perfect Paradise?

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Magical healers aren’t common enough in fiction, imo – more stories featuring them, please! – but A Rational Arrangement is literally the only time I’ve ever come across someone who can heal mental illnesses, injuries, and disorders!

I mean. !!!

A small part of what Nikola does is casting out demons – although that requires the consent of the patient/victim, which can be very difficult to get. But he’s also able to heal various mental illnesses, correct developmental disorders before they get too far, and repair ‘mind-shapes’ which are out-of-true – like shrinking the fear of someone with paranoia, whose ‘fear-shape’ has become ‘swollen’, so they no longer struggle with irrational fears.

But this healing ability doesn’t come with instructions; Nikola – and others with this power, he’s not the only one – must study, because they can only heal when they know what the problem is. If Nikola can’t identify it, he can’t fix it, which means the notes of other mind-healers are priceless, as is getting as much experience as possible in examining as wide an array of minds – healthy and unhealthy – as possible.

Makes sense to me! And gods, I can’t even imagine how different our world would look if we had people who could do this.

(An important note: when he examines the mind of the autistic love interest – who at one point does ask to be ‘fixed’ – his power says there’s nothing wrong with her. She’s different, but not ill or broken. One of many reasons I love this book so much!)

Hostage (The Change, # 2) by Rachel Manija Brown, Sherwood Smith
Genres: Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy, YA
Representation: Korean-descent demisexual MC, disabled brown MC, hispanic MC, minor F/F
Goodreads

Welcome back to Las Anclas, a frontier town in the post-apocalyptic Wild West. In Las Anclas, the skull-faced sheriff possesses superhuman strength, the doctor can speed up time, and the squirrels can teleport sandwiches out of your hands.

In book one, Stranger, teenage prospector Ross Juarez stumbled into town half-dead, bringing with him a precious artifact, a power no one has ever had before, and a whole lot of trouble— including an invasion by Voske, the king of Gold Point. The town defeated Voske’s army, with the deciding blow struck by Ross, but at a great cost.

In Hostage, a team sent by King Voske captures Ross and takes him to Gold Point. There he meets Kerry, Voske’s teenage daughter, who has been trained to be as ruthless as her father. While his friends in Las Anclas desperately try to rescue him, Ross is forced to engage in a battle of wills with the king himself.

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In the second book of the Change series, we meet Kerry, one of the royal family of Gold Point – so, the daughter of King Voske, aka the main villain of the series. Most of Voske’s children are Changed (possessing magical abilities, or superpowers, depending on if you consider this series fantasy or sci fi), but Kerry’s is hands-down the most interesting to me. She can create seemingly any object she pleases – but it only exists while she’s touching it, and no one, including herself, can see what she’s made.

What she makes has limits – she doesn’t seem to be able to create things with moving parts, for example, and she can’t create a key to a lock she doesn’t know (although she could probably copy a key if she got to see, and maybe handle, the original). But she can definitely make weapons, which – can you imagine trying to fight someone whose sword or whatever you CAN’T SEE???

The Bright and Breaking Sea (Captain Kit Brightling, #1) by Chloe Neill
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Goodreads

Chloe Neill brings her trademark wit and wild sense of adventure to a stunning seafaring fantasy starring a dauntless heroine in a world of magic and treachery.

Kit Brightling, rescued as a foundling and raised in a home for talented girls, has worked hard to rise through the ranks of the Isles' Crown Command and become one of the few female captains in Queen Charlotte's fleet. Her ship is small, but she's fast--in part because of Kit's magical affinity to the sea. But the waters become perilous when the queen sends Kit on a special mission with a partner she never asked for.

Rian Grant, Viscount Queenscliffe, may be a veteran of the Continental war, but Kit doesn't know him or his motives--and she's dealt with one too many members of the Beau Monde. But Kit has her orders, and the queen has commanded they journey to a dangerous pirate quay and rescue a spy who's been gathering intelligence on the exiled emperor of Gallia.

Kit can lead her ship and clever crew on her own, but with the fate of queen and country at stake, Kit and Rian must learn to trust each other, or else the Isles will fall....

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Kit’s world is criss-crossed with ley lines, veins of magic spread all over the planet – including through the sea. And the sea is just what Kit is Aligned to; she can sense, access and even manipulate the magic running through the ley lines that run through the ocean. You can do a lot with a powerful Alignment – but magic is so little understood that anything more than passively sensing ley lines (and the area around them) is incredibly dangerous.

Which is maybe why Kit’s the first person to figure out how to use her Alignment with the sea to speed her ship. It’s a little like pulling yourself along a rope to cover ground faster; Kit accesses the ley, and uses it to haul or shoot her ship forward. She has to be incredibly careful to do so without jepordising the safety of the ship and crew, and even so, it does her permanent damage. But the trade-off is very worth it in a world without engines – a ship that can move impossibly faster than its peers (and especially its enemies) is priceless when chasing down smugglers, delivering urgent, top-secret missives, or in naval warfare.

I’ve seen magic-users manipulating wind to speed ships before, but never anyone doing this. Kit’s not even controlling the actual currents and tides to push her ship along – it’s something much stranger, but also simpler, which gives this ability a kind of primordial feel that I like very much!

Blackheart Knights by Laure Eve
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: In book one: bisexual MC, secondary nonbinary character
Goodreads

Power always wins.

Imagine Camelot but in Gotham: a city where knights are the celebrities of the day, riding on motorbikes instead of horses and competing in televised fights for fame and money.

Imagine a city where a young, magic-touched bastard astonishes everyone by becoming king - albeit with extreme reluctance - and a girl with a secret past trains to become a knight for the sole purpose of vengeance.

Imagine a city where magic is illegal but everywhere, in its underground bars, its back-alley soothsayers - and in the people who have to hide what they are for fear of being tattooed and persecuted.

Imagine a city where electricity is money, power the only game worth playing, and violence the most fervently worshipped religion.

Welcome to a dark, chaotic, alluring place with a tumultuous history, where dreams come true if you want them hard enough - and are prepared to do some very, very bad things to get them . . .

"A riveting tragedy of blood and desire - and the coolest thing you'll read this year" ― Samantha Shannon, author of The Bone Season and The Priory of the Orange Tree

"The boldest, smartest, most adventurous fantasy I've read in ages - and it's really f**ing fun" ― Krystal Sutherland, author of Our Chemical Hearts

"Arthurian legend meets urban fantasy in a brilliant, bloody wild ride" ― Jay Kristoff, No.1 New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author

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How about making copies of yourself? Not illusions, but fully material, physically indistinguishable duplicates with all of your memories? Who are not puppets of the original, but fully independent, able to think and act on their own? Sounds more like the start of a horror story, but Eve’s version doesn’t have the copies turning evil! I think this is the only time I’ve ever seen this magical power, in a book or any other media, and I wish we’d gotten to see more of it. But what we did see was pretty amazing!

Elatsoe (Elatsoe, #1) by Darcie Little Badger, Rovina Cai
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Lipan Apache asexual MC
Goodreads

Imagine an America very similar to our own. It's got homework, best friends, and pistachio ice cream.

There are some differences. This America has been shaped dramatically by the magic, monsters, knowledge, and legends of its peoples, those Indigenous and those not. Some of these forces are charmingly everyday, like the ability to make an orb of light appear or travel across the world through rings of fungi. But other forces are less charming and should never see the light of day.

Elatsoe lives in this slightly stranger America. She can raise the ghosts of dead animals, a skill passed down through generations of her Lipan Apache family. Her beloved cousin has just been murdered in a town that wants no prying eyes. But she is going to do more than pry. The picture-perfect facade of Willowbee masks gruesome secrets, and she will rely on her wits, skills, and friends to tear off the mask and protect her family.

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I’ve seen lots of characters who can see and/or communicate with ghosts – but always human ghosts. Even more rarely, characters who can summon ghosts – but again, always human ones! Whereas the eponymous Elatsoe belongs to a maternal tradition of animal ghost-raisers – and ‘animal’ covers everything from insects to mammoths! If it’s dead – even long, LONG dead – Elatsoe can, in theory, summon them back to the living realm.

(I mean, in theory, she could also bring back humans. But as Lipan Apache, she and her family know that messing about with human ghosts will always, always end badly.)

One of the many incredible moments in the book is when Elatsoe interacts with pre-historic ghost beasties – brings back, or falls into, the ocean which used to cover the land she’s standing on. It’s amazing.

It’s something I’ve never seen before – all of it, not just the ocean scene – and I just… love that it’s animals for once. And how much of the way Elatsoe thinks of ghosts, and interacts with them, is tied to Lipan Apache tradition and culture. It makes for a brilliant combination!

Beyond the Black Door by A.M. Strickland
Genres: Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Asexual MC, nonbinary secondary character
Goodreads

Kamai was warned never to open the black door, but she didn't listen ...

Everyone has a soul. Some are beautiful gardens, others are frightening dungeons. Soulwalkers―like Kamai and her mother―can journey into other people's souls while they sleep.

But no matter where Kamai visits, she sees the black door. It follows her into every soul, and her mother has told her to never, ever open it.

When Kamai touches the door, it is warm and beating, like it has a pulse. When she puts her ear to it, she hears her own name whispered from the other side. And when tragedy strikes, Kamai does the unthinkable: she opens the door.

A.M. Strickland's imaginative dark fantasy features court intrigue and romance, a main character coming to terms with her asexuality, and twists and turns as a seductive mystery unfolds that endangers not just Kamai's own soul, but the entire kingdom ...

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As the blurb says, soulwalkers are people who can travel into and within another person’s soul. The soulwalker needs to go to sleep in fairly close proximity of the person whose soul they are visiting – and that person also needs to be asleep – but one in, they can wander as they please.

What do souls look like? They manifest as houses, each one unique, and there’s no way to predict if a person’s inner house will be small, large, grand or plain (although I think it’s noteworthy that a person’s soul house appears the same to every soulwalker). But you should be very careful not to disturb anything – furniture and decor are all metaphorical stand-ins for aspects of personality, emotions, and memories, so repositioning a sofa or breaking a vase could have HUGE consequences!

But sometimes those consequences are good – iirc, trained soulwalkers can interpret what they find in a person’s inner house, and move things around in order to help heal or offer peace. Alternatively, a trained soulwalker need touch nothing to ‘read’ your secrets from the decor – secrets they will absolutely remember when they wake up, making them excellent potential spies…

Transformation (Rai-Kirah, #1) by Carol Berg
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, High Fantasy
Goodreads

Seyonne is a man waiting to die. He has been a slave for sixteen years, almost half his life, and has lost everything of meaning to him: his dignity, the people and homeland he loves, and the Warden's power he used to defend an unsuspecting world from the ravages of demons. Seyonne has made peace with his fate. With strict self-discipline he forces himself to exist only in the present moment and to avoid the pain of hope or caring about anyone. But from the moment he is sold to the arrogant, careless Prince Aleksander, the heir to the Derzhi Empire, Seyonne's uneasy peace begins to crumble. And when he discovers a demon lurking in the Derzhi court, he must find hope and strength in a most unlikely place...

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Another soul-related magic – in fact, this one is also about travelling into other people’s souls. The difference is that the Wardens who battle demons (to free victims of demonic possession) enter a person’s soul physically – they step through a portal to enter a landscape that is the soul, and they can be lost or killed there if something goes wrong. But it’s the Aifes, the portal-makers, that I want to feature here.

An Aife doesn’t just make the portal into someone’s soul – they also create that landscape, by weaving their own soul or being with that of the other person (almost always someone who’s demonically possessed). This is incredibly intimate and, unsurprisingly, incredibly difficult – as is keeping the portal open long enough for the Warden to travel through it, defeat the demon, and make it back out again.

It’s not perfectly clear whether this is an innate ability that is honed through training and practice, or whether it’s something anyone with enough magic (and you need a lot) could learn to do – or maybe a bit of both. Aifes are always women, but again, it’s not clear if that’s just a cultural thing, or if this is an ability only women can have or learn.

Either way, I’m just in awe of the idea that you can a) in practical terms merge souls with someone who is almost always a complete stranger, b) turn your merged souls into a landscape, and c) allow someone else to physically enter that landscape. Tell me that’s not mindblowing!

This is only the latest of my lists of magical abilities – you can find the rest below!

(Some Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Some More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Even More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Yet More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!

Or hop over here to start exploring my lists of especially epic magic systems!

The post (Still More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction! appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

Ten (Still More) Ridiculously Cool Magical Abilities in Fiction!

It is annual tradition that I make lists of interesting magic systems and magical abilities for Wyrd & Wonder, and 2024 will not be the year I break my streak! You can find this year’s magic systems list over here, and this post will spotlight ten different magic powers that intrigue and delight me!

(What’s the difference between a magic system and a magical ability? Well, I define a magic system as something that allows the practitioner to do many things, whereas an ability lets them do one thing – even if that one thing can be utilised in a lot of different ways!)

Thus, here is 2024’s list of some of the very coolest magical abilities!

The Tainted Cup (Shadow of the Leviathan, #1) by Robert Jackson Bennett
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Gay MC
Goodreads

In Daretana’s most opulent mansion, a high Imperial officer lies dead—killed, to all appearances, when a tree spontaneously erupted from his body. Even in this canton at the borders of the Empire, where contagions abound and the blood of the Leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death at once terrifying and impossible.

Called in to investigate this mystery is Ana Dolabra, an investigator whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities.

At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol. Din is an engraver, magically altered to possess a perfect memory. His job is to observe and report, and act as his superior’s eyes and ears--quite literally, in this case, as among Ana’s quirks are her insistence on wearing a blindfold at all times, and her refusal to step outside the walls of her home.

Din is most perplexed by Ana’s ravenous appetite for information and her mind’s frenzied leaps—not to mention her cheerful disregard for propriety and the apparent joy she takes in scandalizing her young counterpart. Yet as the case unfolds and Ana makes one startling deduction after the next, he finds it hard to deny that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.

As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the safety of the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra—and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.

Featuring an unforgettable Holmes-and-Watson style pairing, a gloriously labyrinthine plot, and a haunting and wholly original fantasy world, The Tainted Cup brilliantly reinvents the classic mystery tale.

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Most of the characters we meet in The Tainted Cup have magical enhancements – to their sense of smell or their size or even to their pheromones. But the main character, Kol, has a perfect memory, allowing him to remember every detail of a crime scene or suspect interview. In his world, this isn’t even an unusual power to have – it’s one many people choose, although not too many, as people are aware that being unable to ever forget anything will eventually become overwhelming and cause a dramatic burnout.

But we’re not talking about something as ‘simple’ as a photographic memory. Kol can also perfectly recall what he hears, smells, tastes – and does. Shown how to pick a lock, he can perfectly remember, and execute, what he was taught. Guided through a sword move, he can replicate it again perfectly every time. I mean??? That’s kind of objectively amazing. I definitely wouldn’t want to never be able to forget anything – but if I could just have that part? The doing-it-right-once-and-able-to-do-it-again-forever bit? Just imagine how incredible that would be!

Unraveller by Frances Hardinge
Genres: Fantasy, YA
Representation: Major gay character
Goodreads

In a world where anyone can cast a life-destroying curse, only one person has the power to unravel them.

Kellen does not fully understand his unique gift, but helps those who are cursed, like his friend Nettle who was trapped in the body of a bird for years. She is now Kellen's constant companion and his closest ally.

But the Unraveller carries a curse himself and, unless he and Nettle can remove it, Kellen is a danger to everything – and everyone – around him . . .

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Curses are a staple in fantasy, and so is breaking them – but never quite like this. Usually, breaking a curse requires a whole entire quest, and generally a character (or group of characters) only ever set out to break one curse. But Kellen has unravelled dozens and dozens of curses – it’s his magical gift, bestowed on him through a tragic accident. His whole life is travelling from place to place, undoing curses and (arguably just as important) identifying the people who cast them. This would be a big deal in plenty of magical settings, but Kellen lives in a country where everyone has the potential to become a curser – and although sometimes curses are a way of levelling the playing field between the misused and the upper classes – a way of getting justice when the person who’s done wrong is too rich to suffer consequences in court – usually it’s just spite and hate, and the curse is so completely disproportionate to the perceived ‘wrong’.

So it’s pretty gamechanging, to have someone around who can undo curses!

The wide-ranging ramifications of the existence of an unraveller is honestly just as excellent as the magical ability itself is. Yes, Unraveller is meant for younger readers, but like everything by Hardinge, there’s a lot here for grown-ups to enjoy too!

Magic, Lies, and Deadly Pies (Pies Before Guys Mystery, #1) by Misha Popp
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Bi/pansexual MC (possibly on the ace spectrum?), secondary gay hispanic character
Goodreads

Daisy Ellery’s pies have a secret ingredient: The magical ability to avenge women done wrong by men. But Daisy finds herself on the receiving end in Misha Popp’s cozy series debut, a sweet-as-buttercream treat for fans of Ellery Adams and Mary Maxwell.

The first time Daisy Ellery killed a man with a pie, it was an accident. Now, it’s her calling. Daisy bakes sweet vengeance into her pastries, which she and her dog Zoe deliver to the men who’ve done dirty deeds to the town’s women. But if she can’t solve the one crime that’s not of her own baking, she’ll be out of the pie pan and into the oven.

Parking her Pies Before Guys mobile bakery van outside the local diner, Daisy is informed by Frank, the crusty diner owner, that someone’s been prowling around the van—and not just to inhale the delectable aroma. Already on thin icing with Frank, she finds a letter on her door, threatening to reveal her unsavory secret sideline of pie a la murder.

Blackmail? But who whipped up this half-baked plot to cut a slice out of Daisy’s business? Purple-haired campus do-gooder Melly? Noel, the tender—if flaky—farm boy? Or one of the abusive men who prefer their pie without a deadly scoop of payback?

The upcoming statewide pie contest could be Daisy’s big chance to help wronged women everywhere…if she doesn’t meet a sticky end first. Because Daisy knows the blackmailer won’t stop until her business is in crumbles.

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This is probably the most ‘cute’ magical ability on this list, but only at first glance. Daisy can bake all sorts of things into her pies (although it’s not 100% clear if her power only applies to pies, or potentially any baked good); concentration and energy, for students studying for exams; happy vibes; courage; even forgiveness (although she can’t control what or who the person who eats her pie will forgive, only make them more inclined to forgiveness in general). It depends on what she’s thinking about and/or feeling as she bakes.

And then of course, there’s the murder pies she doles out to rapists and other abusers. I just think it’s objectively excellent to be able to murder people with pie magic, okay? That is both delightful and epic.

How the murder pies actually work is just *chef’s kiss*, but as it’s a minor spoiler, I’ll put it under a cut. [View post to see spoiler]

A Rational Arrangement by L. Rowyn
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
Representation: Autistic MC, brown bisexual MC, bisexual MC
Goodreads

“But these are vital aspects of marriage. If one cannot discuss them, what's the use in meeting at all? It's like trying to decide what you'll have for dinner without mentioning food.”

Wisteria Vasilver does wish to marry. Truly. But though she lives in Paradise, arranging a match is full of traps and pitfalls for the unwary ... or perhaps just for her.

Nikola Striker, Lord of Fireholt, expects he'll wed ... someday. But not now, and never to a rich icicle of a woman like Miss Vasilver. No matter how much his parents might want the match, or his house might need her dowry. Besides, he has his own problems -- most of them people who need his help as a mind-healer.

Lord Justin Comfrey, Viscount of Comfrey, would be more than happy to help Striker with his financial troubles, and not just to ensure that Miss Vasilver's dowry doesn't tempt Striker into marriage. If only he could find some way to make his proud, stubborn friend accept the money!

Can three people of such different temperaments ever find their way to a more perfect Paradise?

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Magical healers aren’t common enough in fiction, imo – more stories featuring them, please! – but A Rational Arrangement is literally the only time I’ve ever come across someone who can heal mental illnesses, injuries, and disorders!

I mean. !!!

A small part of what Nikola does is casting out demons – although that requires the consent of the patient/victim, which can be very difficult to get. But he’s also able to heal various mental illnesses, correct developmental disorders before they get too far, and repair ‘mind-shapes’ which are out-of-true – like shrinking the fear of someone with paranoia, whose ‘fear-shape’ has become ‘swollen’, so they no longer struggle with irrational fears.

But this healing ability doesn’t come with instructions; Nikola – and others with this power, he’s not the only one – must study, because they can only heal when they know what the problem is. If Nikola can’t identify it, he can’t fix it, which means the notes of other mind-healers are priceless, as is getting as much experience as possible in examining as wide an array of minds – healthy and unhealthy – as possible.

Makes sense to me! And gods, I can’t even imagine how different our world would look if we had people who could do this.

(An important note: when he examines the mind of the autistic love interest – who at one point does ask to be ‘fixed’ – his power says there’s nothing wrong with her. She’s different, but not ill or broken. One of many reasons I love this book so much!)

Hostage (The Change, # 2) by Rachel Manija Brown
Genres: Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy, YA
Representation: Korean-descent demisexual MC, disabled brown MC, hispanic MC, minor F/F
Goodreads

Welcome back to Las Anclas, a frontier town in the post-apocalyptic Wild West. In Las Anclas, the skull-faced sheriff possesses superhuman strength, the doctor can speed up time, and the squirrels can teleport sandwiches out of your hands.

In book one, Stranger, teenage prospector Ross Juarez stumbled into town half-dead, bringing with him a precious artifact, a power no one has ever had before, and a whole lot of trouble— including an invasion by Voske, the king of Gold Point. The town defeated Voske’s army, with the deciding blow struck by Ross, but at a great cost.

In Hostage, a team sent by King Voske captures Ross and takes him to Gold Point. There he meets Kerry, Voske’s teenage daughter, who has been trained to be as ruthless as her father. While his friends in Las Anclas desperately try to rescue him, Ross is forced to engage in a battle of wills with the king himself.

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In the second book of the Change series, we meet Kerry, one of the royal family of Gold Point – so, the daughter of King Voske, aka the main villain of the series. Most of Voske’s children are Changed (possessing magical abilities, or superpowers, depending on if you consider this series fantasy or sci fi), but Kerry’s is hands-down the most interesting to me. She can create seemingly any object she pleases – but it only exists while she’s touching it, and no one, including herself, can see what she’s made.

What she makes has limits – she doesn’t seem to be able to create things with moving parts, for example, and she can’t create a key to a lock she doesn’t know (although she could probably copy a key if she got to see, and maybe handle, the original). But she can definitely make weapons, which – can you imagine trying to fight someone whose sword or whatever you CAN’T SEE???

The Bright and Breaking Sea (Captain Kit Brightling, #1) by Chloe Neill
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Goodreads

Chloe Neill brings her trademark wit and wild sense of adventure to a stunning seafaring fantasy starring a dauntless heroine in a world of magic and treachery.

Kit Brightling, rescued as a foundling and raised in a home for talented girls, has worked hard to rise through the ranks of the Isles' Crown Command and become one of the few female captains in Queen Charlotte's fleet. Her ship is small, but she's fast--in part because of Kit's magical affinity to the sea. But the waters become perilous when the queen sends Kit on a special mission with a partner she never asked for.

Rian Grant, Viscount Queenscliffe, may be a veteran of the Continental war, but Kit doesn't know him or his motives--and she's dealt with one too many members of the Beau Monde. But Kit has her orders, and the queen has commanded they journey to a dangerous pirate quay and rescue a spy who's been gathering intelligence on the exiled emperor of Gallia.

Kit can lead her ship and clever crew on her own, but with the fate of queen and country at stake, Kit and Rian must learn to trust each other, or else the Isles will fall....

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Kit’s world is criss-crossed with ley lines, veins of magic spread all over the planet – including through the sea. And the sea is just what Kit is Aligned to; she can sense, access and even manipulate the magic running through the ley lines that run through the ocean. You can do a lot with a powerful Alignment – but magic is so little understood that anything more than passively sensing ley lines (and the area around them) is incredibly dangerous.

Which is maybe why Kit’s the first person to figure out how to use her Alignment with the sea to speed her ship. It’s a little like pulling yourself along a rope to cover ground faster; Kit accesses the ley, and uses it to haul or shoot her ship forward. She has to be incredibly careful to do so without jepordising the safety of the ship and crew, and even so, it does her permanent damage. But the trade-off is very worth it in a world without engines – a ship that can move impossibly faster than its peers (and especially its enemies) is priceless when chasing down smugglers, delivering urgent, top-secret missives, or in naval warfare.

I’ve seen magic-users manipulating wind to speed ships before, but never anyone doing this. Kit’s not even controlling the actual currents and tides to push her ship along – it’s something much stranger, but also simpler, which gives this ability a kind of primordial feel that I like very much!

Blackheart Knights by Laure Eve
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: In book one: bisexual MC, secondary nonbinary character
Goodreads

Power always wins.

Imagine Camelot but in Gotham: a city where knights are the celebrities of the day, riding on motorbikes instead of horses and competing in televised fights for fame and money.

Imagine a city where a young, magic-touched bastard astonishes everyone by becoming king - albeit with extreme reluctance - and a girl with a secret past trains to become a knight for the sole purpose of vengeance.

Imagine a city where magic is illegal but everywhere, in its underground bars, its back-alley soothsayers - and in the people who have to hide what they are for fear of being tattooed and persecuted.

Imagine a city where electricity is money, power the only game worth playing, and violence the most fervently worshipped religion.

Welcome to a dark, chaotic, alluring place with a tumultuous history, where dreams come true if you want them hard enough - and are prepared to do some very, very bad things to get them . . .

"A riveting tragedy of blood and desire - and the coolest thing you'll read this year" ― Samantha Shannon, author of The Bone Season and The Priory of the Orange Tree

"The boldest, smartest, most adventurous fantasy I've read in ages - and it's really f**ing fun" ― Krystal Sutherland, author of Our Chemical Hearts

"Arthurian legend meets urban fantasy in a brilliant, bloody wild ride" ― Jay Kristoff, No.1 New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author

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How about making copies of yourself? Not illusions, but fully material, physically indistinguishable duplicates with all of your memories? Who are not puppets of the original, but fully independent, able to think and act on their own? Sounds more like the start of a horror story, but Eve’s version doesn’t have the copies turning evil! I think this is the only time I’ve ever seen this magical power, in a book or any other media, and I wish we’d gotten to see more of it. But what we did see was pretty amazing!

Elatsoe (Elatsoe, #1) by Darcie Little Badger, Rovina Cai
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Lipan Apache asexual MC
Goodreads

Imagine an America very similar to our own. It's got homework, best friends, and pistachio ice cream.

There are some differences. This America has been shaped dramatically by the magic, monsters, knowledge, and legends of its peoples, those Indigenous and those not. Some of these forces are charmingly everyday, like the ability to make an orb of light appear or travel across the world through rings of fungi. But other forces are less charming and should never see the light of day.

Elatsoe lives in this slightly stranger America. She can raise the ghosts of dead animals, a skill passed down through generations of her Lipan Apache family. Her beloved cousin has just been murdered in a town that wants no prying eyes. But she is going to do more than pry. The picture-perfect facade of Willowbee masks gruesome secrets, and she will rely on her wits, skills, and friends to tear off the mask and protect her family.

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I’ve seen lots of characters who can see and/or communicate with ghosts – but always human ghosts. Even more rarely, characters who can summon ghosts – but again, always human ones! Whereas the eponymous Elatsoe belongs to a maternal tradition of animal ghost-raisers – and ‘animal’ covers everything from insects to mammoths! If it’s dead – even long, LONG dead – Elatsoe can, in theory, summon them back to the living realm.

(I mean, in theory, she could also bring back humans. But as Lipan Apache, she and her family know that messing about with human ghosts will always, always end badly.)

One of the many incredible moments in the book is when Elatsoe interacts with pre-historic ghost beasties – brings back, or falls into, the ocean which used to cover the land she’s standing on. It’s amazing.

It’s something I’ve never seen before – all of it, not just the ocean scene – and I just… love that it’s animals for once. And how much of the way Elatsoe thinks of ghosts, and interacts with them, is tied to Lipan Apache tradition and culture. It makes for a brilliant combination!

Beyond the Black Door by A.M. Strickland
Genres: Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Asexual MC, nonbinary secondary character
Goodreads

Kamai was warned never to open the black door, but she didn't listen ...

Everyone has a soul. Some are beautiful gardens, others are frightening dungeons. Soulwalkers―like Kamai and her mother―can journey into other people's souls while they sleep.

But no matter where Kamai visits, she sees the black door. It follows her into every soul, and her mother has told her to never, ever open it.

When Kamai touches the door, it is warm and beating, like it has a pulse. When she puts her ear to it, she hears her own name whispered from the other side. And when tragedy strikes, Kamai does the unthinkable: she opens the door.

A.M. Strickland's imaginative dark fantasy features court intrigue and romance, a main character coming to terms with her asexuality, and twists and turns as a seductive mystery unfolds that endangers not just Kamai's own soul, but the entire kingdom ...

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As the blurb says, soulwalkers are people who can travel into and within another person’s soul. The soulwalker needs to go to sleep in fairly close proximity of the person whose soul they are visiting – and that person also needs to be asleep – but one in, they can wander as they please.

What do souls look like? They manifest as houses, each one unique, and there’s no way to predict if a person’s inner house will be small, large, grand or plain (although I think it’s noteworthy that a person’s soul house appears the same to every soulwalker). But you should be very careful not to disturb anything – furniture and decor are all metaphorical stand-ins for aspects of personality, emotions, and memories, so repositioning a sofa or breaking a vase could have HUGE consequences!

But sometimes those consequences are good – iirc, trained soulwalkers can interpret what they find in a person’s inner house, and move things around in order to help heal or offer peace. Alternatively, a trained soulwalker need touch nothing to ‘read’ your secrets from the decor – secrets they will absolutely remember when they wake up, making them excellent potential spies…

Transformation (Rai-Kirah, #1) by Carol Berg
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, High Fantasy
Goodreads

Seyonne is a man waiting to die. He has been a slave for sixteen years, almost half his life, and has lost everything of meaning to him: his dignity, the people and homeland he loves, and the Warden's power he used to defend an unsuspecting world from the ravages of demons. Seyonne has made peace with his fate. With strict self-discipline he forces himself to exist only in the present moment and to avoid the pain of hope or caring about anyone. But from the moment he is sold to the arrogant, careless Prince Aleksander, the heir to the Derzhi Empire, Seyonne's uneasy peace begins to crumble. And when he discovers a demon lurking in the Derzhi court, he must find hope and strength in a most unlikely place...

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Another soul-related magic – in fact, this one is also about travelling into other people’s souls. The difference is that the Wardens who battle demons (to free victims of demonic possession) enter a person’s soul physically – they step through a portal to enter a landscape that is the soul, and they can be lost or killed there if something goes wrong. But it’s the Aifes, the portal-makers, that I want to feature here.

An Aife doesn’t just make the portal into someone’s soul – they also create that landscape, by weaving their own soul or being with that of the other person (almost always someone who’s demonically possessed). This is incredibly intimate and, unsurprisingly, incredibly difficult – as is keeping the portal open long enough for the Warden to travel through it, defeat the demon, and make it back out again.

It’s not perfectly clear whether this is an innate ability that is honed through training and practice, or whether it’s something anyone with enough magic (and you need a lot) could learn to do – or maybe a bit of both. Aifes are always women, but again, it’s not clear if that’s just a cultural thing, or if this is an ability only women can have or learn.

Either way, I’m just in awe of the idea that you can a) in practical terms merge souls with someone who is almost always a complete stranger, b) turn your merged souls into a landscape, and c) allow someone else to physically enter that landscape. Tell me that’s not mindblowing!

This is only the latest of my lists of magical abilities – you can find the rest below!

(Some Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Some More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Even More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!
(Yet More Of) The Coolest Magical Abilities in Fiction!

Or hop over here to start exploring my lists of especially epic magic systems!

The post Ten (Still More) Ridiculously Cool Magical Abilities in Fiction! appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

I Can’t Wait For…Lord of the Empty Isles by Jules Arbeaux

Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted over at Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about but haven’t yet read. Most of the time they’re books that have yet to be released, but not always. It’s based on the Waiting on Wednesday meme, which was originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. 

This week my Can’t-Wait-For Book is Lord of the Empty Isles by Jules Arbeaux!

Lord of the Empty Isles by Jules Arbeaux
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
Representation: Aro-ace MC, queerplatonic M/M, queer cast
Published on: 6th June 2024
Goodreads

Interstellar fugitive Idrian Delaciel will die by inches, and Remy Canta will laugh as he goes.

Five years ago, Idrian ordered a withering—a death curse—cast on Remy's brother that cost him his life, and Remy hasn't been the same since. Now Remy finally has the materials he needs to return the favour, but he has one major problem. When he casts the withering, it rebounds onto him.

The implications are unthinkable: Remy is fatebound to his brother's killer.

Even worse, the only way to slow the curse for long enough to find a cure is to join forces with Idrian and his criminal crew. But when he gets there, Remy discovers there are more than just their lives at stake.

Idrian is the sole provider of life-saving supplies to tens of thousands of innocents, and when he dies, they'll die with him. Caught up in perilous heists and a race against time, Remy finds himself truly living for the first time since his brother died.

Too bad for Remy—the only way to stop a withering is to kill the witherer.

Winter's Orbit meets The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet in this story of loss, power, and privilege with a queerplatonic hate to love story at its heart.

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I received this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of this post (which is not a review, as I haven’t yet finished reading the book).

I don’t usually feature books I have arcs of for Can’t Wait Wednesday – and I’m not sure I’ve ever featured one I’d already started reading before!

But I’m reading Lord of the Empty Isles right now, and I already can’t wait for it to reach the rest of the world.

This book feels…kind of game-changing? Oh, not the stuff about Things Being More Complicated Than Remy Knows (although I do like that very much). But what it’s saying about relationships, connections – the fact that it’s not a romance at the centre of this story, but it is entirely about love, love, love; so many different kinds, and all of them just as valuable, as important, as romantic love. Some of them much more important: what does a romance matter next to the love a person has for their community? How can you say a romantic partner – or even partners, if you have more than one – matters more than all those hundreds and hundreds?

But we do say that, all the time, and I don’t know if that’s ethically wrong and I don’t want to debate it – but it is so immensely refreshing, and relieving, to find a story that highlights and honours and uplifts the kinds of love (white, Western) media tends to forget about or outright dismiss!

I’m ace and autistic: treating romantic love like The Best love and also The Only One That Matters has never made sense to me. I don’t mind romances! I even enjoy them! But Lord of the Empty Isles feels like it’s speaking directly to me, in my language, after a lifetime of hearing only gibberish.

Plus, I love literally all of the characters and I desperately need to know WHAT REMY’S GOING TO DO so, you know, Lord of the Empty Isles is more than an IssuesTM book; it’s also an incredible story so excuse me, please, but I need to get back to reading it RIGHT NOW.

You’ll get the chance to do the same in just two weeks!!!

The post I Can’t Wait For…Lord of the Empty Isles by Jules Arbeaux appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

Must-Have Monday #187

Must-Have Monday is a feature highlighting which of the coming week’s new releases I’m excited for. It is not meant to be a comprehensive list of all books being published that week; only those I’m interested in out of those I’m aware of! The focus is diverse SFF, but other genres sneak in occasionally too.

SIX books this week!

(Books are listed in order of pub date, then Adult SFF, Adult Other, YA SFF, YA Other, MG SFF.)

Goddess of the River by Vaishnavi Patel
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: Desi cast and setting
Published on: 23rd May 2024
Goodreads

A powerful reimagining of the story of Ganga, goddess of the river, and her doomed mortal son, from Vaishnavi Patel, author of the instant New York Times bestseller Kaikeyi.

A mother and a son. A goddess and a prince. A curse and an oath. A river whose course will change the fate of the world.

Ganga, joyful goddess of the river, serves as caretaker to the mischievous godlings who roam her banks. But when their antics incur the wrath of a powerful sage, Ganga is cursed to become mortal, bound to her human form until she fulfills the obligations of the curse.

Though she knows nothing of mortal life, Ganga weds King Shantanu and becomes a queen, determined to regain her freedom no matter the cost. But in a cruel turn of fate, just as she is freed of her binding, she is forced to leave her infant son behind.

Her son, prince Devavrata, unwittingly carries the legacy of Ganga’s curse. And when he makes an oath that he will never claim his father’s throne, he sets in motion a chain of events that will end in a terrible and tragic war.

As the years unfold, Ganga and Devavrata are drawn together again and again, each confluence another step on a path that has been written in the stars, in this deeply moving and masterful tale of duty, destiny, and the unwavering bond between mother and son.

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Patel made a huge splash with her debut Kaikeyi, and pretty much everyone has been looking forward to her next book! Which is heeeeeeeeeere!

Once again, Patel is writing about mythology I know next to nothing about – I knew the Ganges is an incredibly sacred river in Hinduism, but I had never heard of the goddess Ganga until I was looking into the inspirations behind this book. And sorry-not-sorry, but it is SO GREAT to see mythologies featured that I DON’T know inside-and-out!

The next Greek retelling that comes at me is going OUT THE WINDOW, I s2g

The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits by Ben Berman Ghan
Genres: Adult, Sci Fi
Published on: 21st May 2024
Goodreads

A gorgeously complex work of literary speculative fiction that spans centuries The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits starts in 2014 with a winged alien sowing the seeds of a strange forest on the moon. The novel then moves through humanity’s colonization of the moon and its consequences, onto a war with alien beings within a space-going whale, a cyborg mind that sleeps for hundreds of years after sheltering the city of Toronto from the worst of the war and finally a re-creation of humanity. Ghan poses thoughtful questions about artificial intelligence, humanities quest for the stars and ecological destruction in this wide-ranging story, which is held together equally by beautiful writing and deft characterization. The end result is an ambitious debut that leaves the reader contemplating many amazing possibilities for the future of our world.

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This sounds very odd, but interesting-odd. Aliens who live inside a space-whale? A winged alien (not from the species who lives in the whale?) making a forest on the moon? Recreating humanity after an interspecies war? I’m wary of anything calling itself Literary Fiction, but you have my attention, sir!

A Swift and Sudden Exit by Nico Vincenty
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Sci Fi
Representation: F/F
Published on: 21st May 2024
Goodreads

An immortal, doomed to die. A time traveler, desperate to save her.

When Zera travels back in time to 2040, she aims to investigate the geomagnetic storm that scorched the earth. Instead, she finds the beautiful Katherine, who speaks of past storms and asks with her dying breath, “Is this the first time we meet?”

From WWII-era New York to early 2000s New Orleans and everywhere in between, Zera chases both storms and Katherine, thinking her immortality is the key to fixing the future. But as the immortal goes from a reluctant ally with a deadly hunter to a romantic complication, Zera wonders if the past is really set in stone, or if she can still save the world—and Katherine.

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I can’t remember the last time I read a time travel book, but a time traveller in love with a doomed immortal??? Just from the blurb, I’m already so invested in there two getting their happy ending!

The Shabti by Megaera C. Lorenz
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: M/M
Published on: 21st May 2024
Goodreads

Can you flimflam a ghost?

It’s 1934. Former medium Dashiel Quicke travels the country debunking spiritualism and false mediums while struggling to stay ahead of his ex-business partner and lover who wants him back at any cost. During a demonstration at a college campus, Dashiel meets Hermann Goschalk, an Egyptologist who’s convinced that he has a genuine haunted artifact on his hands. Certain there is a rational explanation for whatever is going on with Hermann’s relics, Dashiel would rather skip town, but soon finds himself falling for Hermann. He agrees to take a look after all and learns that something is haunting Hermann’s office indeed.

Faced with a real ghost Dashiel is terrified, but when the haunting takes a dangerous turn, he must use the tools of the shady trade he left behind to communicate with this otherworldly spirit before his past closes in.

For readers who enjoy A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske, The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune, and Malice by Heather Walter

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Initially I did not realise this was historical fantasy OR queer – I thought it was historical fiction about someone debunking the supernatural. Which it kinda is, but turns out the supernatural is real sometimes! I am intrigued.

We Mostly Come Out At Night: 15 Queer Tales of Monsters, Angels & Other Creatures by Rob Costello, Kalynn Bayron, David Bowles, Shae Carys, H.E. Edgmon, Michael Thomas Ford, Val Howlett, Brittany Johnson, Naomi Kanakia, Claire Kann, Jonathan Lenore Kastin, Sarah ("S") Maxfield, Sam J. Miller, Alexandra Villasante, Merc Fenn Wolfmoor
Genres: Fantasy, Horror, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Queer MCs
Published on: 21st May 2024
Goodreads

An empowering cross-genre YA anthology that explores what it means to be a monster, exclusively highlighting trans and queer authors who offer new tales and perspectives on classic monster stories and tropes.

Be not afraid! These monsters, creatures, and beasties are not what they appear. We Mostly Come Out at Night is a YA anthology that reclaims the monstrous for the LGBTQA+ community while exploring how there is freedom and power in embracing the things that make you stand out. Each story centers on both original and familiar monsters and creatures—including Mothman, Carabosse, a girl with thirteen shadows, a living house, werebeasts, gorgons, sirens, angels, and many others—and their stories of love, self-acceptance, resilience, and empowerment. This collection is a bold, transformative celebration of queerness and the creatures that (mostly) go bump in the night.

Contributors include editor Rob Costello, Kalynn Bayron, David Bowles, Shae Carys, Rob Costello, H.E. Edgmon, Michael Thomas Ford, Val Howlett, Brittany Johnson, Naomi Kanakia, Claire Kann, Jonathan Lenore Kastin, Sarah Maxfield, Sam J. Miller, Alexandra Villasante, and Merc Fenn Wolfmoor.

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‘Monsters, angels and other creatures’? I am SOLD! Give me all the queer beasties and beings, please and thank you! I love stories that conflate queerness and monstrousness (in a not-queerphobic way) so this is my JAM!

Together in a Broken World by Paul Michael Winters
Genres: Queer Protagonists, Sci Fi, YA
Representation: M/M
Goodreads

Two boys fall in love in a deadly world, but it’s the secrets they keep that might kill them.

Seventeen-year-old Zach was visiting his uncle in a small Montana town when a mysterious illness ripped through the world. Most died, but those who survived the Infection became mindless killers, spreading the disease with a single scratch. Now, a year later, civilization lies in ruins, and Zach is the town’s sole survivor. Desperately lonely, he longs to return to his family in Seattle, but his fears hold him captive.

Eighteen-year-old Aiden is on a critical mission for the covert Scientific Collective, delivering vials whose contents could cure the Infection. Tortured by his boyfriend’s death, he welcomes the risks of the perilous journey. When a militia attacks Aiden, he flees to Zach’s town.

The boys escape together and soon form a bond as they comfort each other in this desolate and broken world. The farther they travel, the more their affection grows, as do the forces pulling them apart. But their greatest threats are the secrets they keep. Zach hides details of his uncle’s death, and Aiden conceals the vials’ sinister origins. In order to survive, they’ll have to confront the truths that could tear their love apart.

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Love in the apocalypse! Which will definitely not survive if these twits keep secrets this important from each other. WHEN WILL PEOPLE LEARN THAT CLEAR AND OPEN COMMUNICATION IS THE FOUNDATION OF A HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP AND ALSO THE ONLY WAY TO MAKE IT OUT ALIVE???

Will you be reading any of these? Did I miss any releases you think I should know about? Let me know!

The post Must-Have Monday #187 appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

Ten (Still More) Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems!

Every year that I’ve taken part in Wyrd & Wonder, I’ve made lists of cool magic systems and another for magical abilities – and I’m not breaking my streak now! Here is 2024’s list of magic systems I find especially enchanting – please enjoy!

Penric's Demon (Penric and Desdemona, #1) by Lois McMaster Bujold
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Goodreads

On his way to his betrothal, young Lord Penric comes upon a riding accident with an elderly lady on the ground, her maidservant and guardsmen distraught. As he approaches to help, he discovers that the lady is a Temple divine, servant to the five gods of this world. Her avowed god is The Bastard, "master of all disasters out of season", and with her dying breath she bequeaths her mysterious powers to Penric. From that moment on, Penric's life is irreversibly changed, and his life is in danger from those who envy or fear him.

Set in the fantasy world of the author's acclaimed novels THE CURSE OF CHALION, PALADIN OF SOULS and THE HALLOWED HUNT, this novella has the depth of characterization and emotional complexity that distinguishes all Bujold's work.

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In the World of the Five Gods – which covers several other novels as well as the Penric and Desdemona series, but I’m focusing on the P&D series for this list – sorcerers, with the help of their demons (nothing like Christian ones, but they do co-habit the sorcerer’s body) can perform ‘downhill’ and ‘uphill’ magic. Demons are creatures of chaos (again, not in the classic sense), so creating order is difficult – thus, ‘uphill’ magic, because it’s an uphill struggle – but creating chaos is easy, ‘downhill’. How this actually works out in practical terms is absolutely fascinating; making fire? Easy! Fraying ropes? Extremely doable! But mending something that’s broken? Very hard. Healing? Almost impossible, outside of these times when destruction can be healing (like nuking a tumour, a thing which does come up in the series!)

This has the fun side-effect of meaning that a really ‘powerful’ sorcerer is one who – with their demon – can think of creative ways to wreak a little havoc. And creative thinking applied to magic is one of my VERY favourite things!

Uphill magic generates a kind of magical/chaotic friction, so when a sorcerer-and-demon pair do more than a little of it, they then need to ‘offload’ some chaos to reduce that friction. (If they don’t, the heat generated by the friction can literally cook the sorcerer’s body.) The fastest way to shed some chaos is to kill things like bed-bugs and fleas and flies en-mass – these being beasties that are theologically acceptable sacrifices, because they fall under the remit of the Bastard, the god to whom all demons belong. Whereas, if a sorcerer uses their demon to kill another human, the Bastard will take the demon back to the realm of chaos, where it will lose all its personality, effectively obliterating it.

The P&D series is one novel (The Assassins of Thasalon, chronologically book 10) and a whole bunch of novellas, which makes for very quick (but oh-so-enjoyable) reading if you want to check out this superficially simple, but extremely excellent, magic system!

The Darkness Before Them (The Soulfire Saga, #1) by Matthew Ward
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, High Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Sapphic MC, major Deaf character
Goodreads

The first in an exciting, action-packed new trilogy from epic fantasy author Matthew Ward, The Darkness Before Them introduces readers to a world ruled by a dangerous immortal king, where souls fuel magic, and a supernatural mist known as the Veil threatens to engulf the land.

These are dark times for the Kingdom of Khalad. As the magical mists of the Veil devour the land, the populace struggles beneath the rule of ruthless noble houses and their uncaring immortal king.

Kat doesn’t care about any of that. A talented thief, she’s pursuing one big score that will settle the debt that destroyed her family. No easy feat in a realm where indentured spirits hold vigil over every vault and treasure room. However, Kat has a unique gift: she can speak to those spirits, and even command them. She’ll need every advantage she can get.

Kat’s not a hero. She just wants to be free. To have her old life back. But as rebellion rekindles and the war for Khalad’s future begins, everyone – Kat included – will have to pick a side.

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In the world of Darkness Before Them, there’s no debate over whether souls exist – they most definitely do, and small, semi-sentient pieces of them power basically everything! When people die, little pieces of their soul are snipped off by the church – and are then bound to light lamps, keep locks locked, or even power engines. If you die in debt, your entire soul can be stripped of its memories and made into a kind of unstoppable, unkillable guardian/soldier creature. All of civilisation revolves around and depends upon this practice, this economy of souls, and hi, that’s not terrifying or creepy at all.

That it is of course inextricably tied up in the distribution of wealth and classism makes it even more interesting (and feel even more believable).

If you have a very special Secret Thing, you can ‘talk’ to these sentient bits of soul, and trick them into giving you their ‘key’ – the code that tells them what to do. So you can convince these soul-snippets that you have the authority to be in a restricted area, or that they should unlock their lock for you; whatever it is they do, you can make them do it – or stop doing it. You can, perhaps, imagine the chaos that might ensue…

The Outstretched Shadow (Obsidian Mountain, #1) by Mercedes Lackey, James Mallory
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Epic Fantasy
Goodreads

Kellen Tavadon, son of the Arch-Mage Lycaelon, thought he knew the way the world worked. His father, leading the wise and benevolent Council of Mages, protected and guided the citizens of the Golden City of the Bells. Young Mages in training--all men, for women were unfit to practice magic--memorized the intricate details of High Magic and aspired to seats on the council.

Then he found the forbidden Books of Wild Magic--or did they find him? The three slim volumes woke Kellen to the wide world outside the City's isolating walls. Their Magic was not dead, strangled by rules and regulations. It felt like a living thing, guided by the hearts and minds of those who practiced it and benefited from it.

Questioning everything he has known, Kellen discovers too many of the City's dark secrets. Banished, with the Outlaw Hunt on his heels, Kellen invokes Wild Magic--and finds himself running for his life with a unicorn at his side.

Kellen's life changes almost faster than he can understand or accept. Rescued by a unicorn, healed by a female Wild Mage who knows more about Kellen than anyone outside the City should, meeting Elven royalty and Elven warriors, and plunged into a world where the magical beings he has learned about as abstract concepts are flesh and blood creatures-Kellen both revels in and fears his new freedom.

Especially once he learns about Demons. He'd always thought they were another abstract concept--a stand-in for ultimate evil. But if centaurs and dryads are real, then Demons surely are as well. And the one thing all the Mages of the City agreed on was that practicing Wild Magic corrupted a Mage. Turned him into a Demon. Would that be Kellen's fate?

Deep in Obsidian Mountain, the Demons are waiting. Since their defeat in the last great War, they've been biding their time, sowing the seeds of distrust and discontent between their human and Elven enemies. Very soon now, when the Demons rise to make war, there will be no alliance between High and Wild Magic to stand against them. And all the world will belong to the Endarkened.

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In many ways, the Obsidian Mountain trilogy hews to the most classic fantasy classics – it feels very traditional, almost stereotypical at times, especially with the eye-rollingly over-the-top EvilTM Demons. And at first glance, the magic looks very classic and simple too.

BUT.

What if magic was alive and sentient? Because that’s what makes the Wild Magic unique, and deserving of a spot of this list. Wild Mages cast spells, and for the most part those spells don’t look too strange; do a thing, say a thing, spend some energy, and stuff happens. But there’s another element to Wild Magic spells, and that’s the personal price the mage has to pay, completely separate from whatever energy went into the healing or fire-summoning or whatever. There’s no predicting what the price will be – although depending on the circumstances, the mage has the option to refuse it, but if they do then the spell doesn’t happen – and sometimes the price is really incredibly odd. When Kellen casts a Finding spell early in the first book, the price of the spell is to rescue a servant girl’s kitten.

???

Later, as the price of a healing, the Wild Magic requires the caster to clear a polluted pond.

The prices are always for a kind of greater good, but it makes it clear that the Wild Magic wants things – and I don’t think that’s something I’ve encountered anywhere else, a magic that has its own wants and plans – some of them very long-term plans – and Big Picture view of the world, with thoughts on how to improve or repair that world.

You can kind of understand why some people within this world find the Wild Magic terrifying. But equally, why even more might revere it.

The Garden of Delights by Amal Singh
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: Brown cast
Goodreads

Amal Singh is an engaging and motivated writer from Mumbai, India, with a long list of short story credits in Clarkesworld, F&SF, Apex, Fantasy and many others.

In the city of Sirvassa, where petals are currency and flowers are magic, the Caretaker tends to the Garden of Delights. He imparts temporary magical abilities to the citizens of Sirvassa, while battling a curse of eternal old age. No Delight could uplift his curse, and so he must seek out a mythical figure. A god. When a Delight allows a young girl an ability to change reality, the Caretaker believes he’s at the end of his search. But soon a magical rot takes root in his Garden, and the Caretaker must join forces with the girl and stop it from spreading. Even as he battles a different rot that plagues Sirvassa, he learns that Delights are always a precursor to Sorrows.

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We’re all familiar with the idea of magical potions, and one of the things that goes in them is usually plants – but in the eponymous garden of The Garden of Delights, the plants themselves – specifically, flowers – are magical. Consuming a petal from one of these flowers conveys temporary magic – this one gives you the power to levitate; that one gives you super-speed, and almost anything else you can think of. There’s even a Delight – that is, one of these magical flowers – to help you figure out what Delight you want! (Which I would definitely need, since I have no idea which one I’d choose!)

You can use multiple Delights simultaneously, but those who really know what they’re doing can mix the flowers into potions that are more than the sum of their parts.

And then there are the Florrals, people who have a much stronger connection to the flowers than normal humans. For you or me, a Delight is mostly a kind of pretty toy, something wonderful and joyful but not powerful in the way we’re used to thinking of power. But the Florrals…well, that’s spoiler territory: you’ll have to read the book yourself to find out about them!

The Master of Samar by Melissa Scott
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: M/M
Goodreads

Rejected by his aristocratic family, Gil Irichels has been content to make his living as a traveling cursebreaker, working with his lover, the feral mage Envar Cassi, and their bodyguard, swordswoman Arak min’Aroi. After a series of deaths leave him the sole heir to the family’s house and fortune, Irichels’s main concern is to do whatever he must to settle the estate and return to his previous life. But these is something very wrong in seaborne Bejanth, starting with the deaths of his kin and spreading into the complex web of politics and magic that holds the city together. As he struggles to discover the truth behind his family’s losses, he realizes that there is more at stake than the fall of one house. Someone is unraveling the web of curses on which the city depends, and Irichels is the only person who can stop them—if it’s not already too late.

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Curses are magical contracts in the world of Master of Samar – contracts with strange, alien spirits referred to as demons (although they have nothing to do with the Christian concept of demons). These are a lot more legalistic than your typical demon pacts, and a big chunk of the world relies on them – the city of Bejanth, for example, not only exists (like Venice) out on the water because of contracts of this kind, their shipping routes are also defined by contracts the city has made with the sea-demons.

Mages are people who’ve made many personal contracts – for protection from stabbing, for supernatural healing, even for the ability to throw fireballs. The contracts are marked on their skin for all to see (hence the tattoo-looking things on Envar’s arms on the cover), and the darkness of those marks indicates how long is left in the contract; if the contract is nearly up, the marks are distinctly more faded than fresher, newly-made ones.

But ‘how long is left in the contract’ is not necessarily anything as simple as time; if you bargain for protection from stabbing, for example, your contract might only protect you from stabbing for five years – or it might only protect you from 15 stabbings. If the former, the cursemarks will look faded as the five year limit gets closer; with the latter, the marks will grow paler each time someone tries to stab you, indicating that the demon’s side of the deal is nearly complete.

Basically, the more cursemarks a mage has – and the darker those marks are – the more careful you should be about pissing them off!

Empire of the Feast by Bendi Barrett
Genres: Adult, Queer Protagonists, Science Fantasy
Goodreads

In Empire of the Feast, we awaken with Riverson, 32nd ruler of the Stag Empire, as he attempts to govern without the memories of his previous lives. To survive the ever-sharpening gears of war, he will need to mend the political schisms threatening to tear his empire apart while maintaining the erotic rituals holding off the eldritch horror known only as the Rapacious.

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Sex magic doesn’t get featured a lot outside of the more paranormal romance side of SFF, but Empire of the Feast is a very unique science fantasy that puts sex magic front-and-centre – because without the eternal orgy, aka the titular Feast, overseen by the Empress (or, from the start of the novella, Emperor) a universe-ending not-god will break out of its prison and devour absolutely everything.

Which is, uh. Not the kind of power or responsibility I’ve seen put on sex magic before! But no worries about the pressure causing anyone performance issues – the Empress (or Emperor) is connected magically to the orgy at all times, and can influence and guide it as necessary (or desired).

It’s been a while since I read this, but I think I remember being surprised that for an empire whose continued existence depends on sex magic, this novella isn’t very graphic with regards its eternal orgy. Which I mention just so you know that you won’t be inundated with sex scenes if you give this book a try!

The Emperor's Blades (Chronicle of the Unhewn Throne, #1) by Brian Staveley
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, High Fantasy
Goodreads

The circle is closing. The stakes are high. And old truths will live again...

The Emperor has been murdered, leaving the Annurian Empire in turmoil. Now his progeny must bury their grief and prepare to unmask a conspiracy.

His son Valyn, training for the empire’s deadliest fighting force, hears the news an ocean away. He expected a challenge, but after several ‘accidents’ and a dying soldier’s warning, he realizes his life is also in danger. Yet before Valyn can take action, he must survive the mercenaries’ brutal final initiation.

Meanwhile, the Emperor’s daughter, Minister Adare, hunts her father’s murderer in the capital itself. Court politics can be fatal, but she needs justice. And Kaden, heir to an empire, studies in a remote monastery. Here, the Blank God’s disciples teach their harsh ways – which Kaden must master to unlock their ancient powers. When an imperial delegation arrives, he’s learnt enough to perceive evil intent. But will this keep him alive, as long-hidden powers make their move?

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In the Chronicles of the Unhewn Throne (which I strongly recommend if you don’t mind your fantasy grimdark-leaning and can hold your nose through the probably unintentional misogyny), magic-users are known as ‘leeches’ and are pretty universally despised – most are killed as soon as their powers are discovered. The rest tend to be conscripted into the Kettral, the empire’s incredibly-exclusive, legendary elite corps of special operatives – who aren’t interested in the superstition stating all leeches are evil, only in how useful their powers can be.

Leeches can manipulate the world around them pretty much however they please – but each individual draws their power from a unique source, referred to as their Well. A Well can be almost anything; a material, like wood or gold; something like light or fire; or a species of animal – even specific emotions! At any given time, a leech is limited by how much of their Well is around – if your Well is gold, for example, you’re not going to be able to do much unless you happen to be surrounded by the bejewelled wealthy: an unlikely scenario on a top-secret Kettral mission. Whereas if it’s wood, and you’re in a forest? Your enemies should be VERY afraid. This means that a leech’s power-level is constantly changing, depending entirely on their physical surroundings – and most of them work hard to disguise what their Well is, meaning that if you’re going up against a leech, it’s almost impossible to figure out what substance etc you have to get them away from. What if you try to kill them in the bath, and their Well is water? Should you try and lure one into the desert, away from almost everything – only to discover their Well is heat or sand?

It’s a superficially simple magic system that in practice is absolutely fascinating.

My three favourite covers; from left to right, HarperCollins; Daphne Press; Allen & UnwinSabriel (Abhorsen, #1) by Garth Nix
Protagonist Age: 18
Goodreads

Sent to a boarding school in Ancelstierre as a young child, Sabriel has had little experience with the random power of Free Magic or the Dead who refuse to stay dead in the Old Kingdom. But during her final semester, her father, the Abhorsen, goes missing, and Sabriel knows she must enter the Old Kingdom to find him.

With Sabriel, the first installment in the Abhorsen series, Garth Nix exploded onto the fantasy scene as a rising star, in a novel that takes readers to a world where the line between the living and the dead isn't always clear—and sometimes disappears altogether.

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I can’t believe it’s taken me so many years to feature Sabriel in one of these lists, but in my defense, it has been a LONG time since I read it!

There’s actually several magic systems in this series, which can interact in very interesting ways, but the most iconic is the necromancy – because, in a wildly original move, necromancy in this world is performed with bells.

Not just any bells – sets of seven extremely special hand-bells, each with its own name, function, and, for lack of a better word, personality. And just for that extra bad-ass factor, they’re worn in a bandolier, allowing for easy access and (honestly, far more importantly) ensuring that there’s no way for any of the bells to ring accidentally. Because you really, MASSIVELY do not want that. The bell Astarael, for example, sends all who hear it directly into Death – including the person ringing it.

Even a trained necromancer or an Abhorsen (someone who binds and lays the dead to rest, rather than raising them like a necromancer) often find the bells very hard to control; they want to be used, and many of them don’t play nice.

The bells of a necromancer are different from those of an Abhorsen: very minor spoilers under the cut. [View post to see spoiler]

It’s all increidbly unique, and the further into the series you go, the more incredible backstories and worldbuilding you learn about the bells and their origins (and uses). The series is amazing in all other ways as well – if you haven’t read them yet, you very much need to!

Beyond Redemption (Manifest Delusions, #1) by Michael R. Fletcher
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: A LOT of mental illness rep
Goodreads

Faith shapes the landscape, defines the laws of physics, and makes a mockery of truth. Common knowledge isn't an axiom, it's a force of nature. What the masses believe is. But insanity is a weapon, conviction a shield. Delusions give birth to foul new gods.

Violent and dark, the world is filled with the Geisteskranken—men and women whose delusions manifest, twisting reality. High Priest Konig seeks to create order from chaos. He defines the beliefs of his followers, leading their faith to one end: a young boy, Morgen, must Ascend to become a god. A god they can control.
But there are many who would see this would-be-god in their thrall, including the High Priest’s own Doppels, and a Slaver no one can resist. Three reprobates—The Greatest Swordsman in the World, a murderous Kleptic, and possibly the only sane man left—have their own nefarious plans for the young god.

As these forces converge on the boy, there’s one more obstacle: time is running out. When one's delusions become more powerful, they become harder to control. The fate of the Geisteskranken is to inevitably find oneself in the Afterdeath.

The question, then, is: Who will rule there?

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I wasn’t able to finish this one, because I just do not have the stomach for grimdark and WOW is this grimdark (I saw it described as the most grimdark grimdark book to ever grimdark, so really I only have myself to blame) – but the magic system is phenomenally cool. In this world, reality is fluid – shaped by belief. The larger the number of people who believe a thing, and the more they believe it…the truer it becomes. (Albeit, only in the proximity of those who believe it. So in theory, you could have completely different laws of physics in City A than in City B.) It’s a world destined to be ruled by used-car salesmen and megachurch ‘pastors’, whose fast talk and/or charisma can convince people of all kinds of things – many potentially terrifying.

But above even these are those called Geisteskranken – the most powerful reality-warpers of all. Geisteskranken is a kind of catch-all term for people with mental health disorders – mostly (but not only) those with delusional disorders. Given the nature of delusions, and the nature of this world, those delusions alter reality in big ways – functionally giving the person who has them magical abilities. Many Geisteskranken are eventually destroyed by the manifestations of their delusions – believing in your delusions enough to wield them as power, but not enough to be consumed by them, is a very, very difficult line to walk.

It’s not just delusions – one of the main characters is a sociopath (which is…not a real medical term, and I admit to not being sure exactly what his real-world diagnosis would be), while a secondary character with pyromania has the ability to create fire. Impulse control disorders (like pyromania and kleptomania) also fall under the Geisteskranken umbrella, although I didn’t get far enough into the book to see what if any ‘magic’ kleptomania confers. (Maybe that no one ever catches you in the theft?)

If you pick this one up, there’s a handy guide at the end of the book explaining various different kinds of Geisteskranken and what they can do. (Although schizophrenia = believing you’re are, and therefore becoming, multiple people is another take that confuses me.)

California Bones (Daniel Blackland, #1) by Greg Van Eekhout
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy
Goodreads

When Daniel Blackland was six, he ingested his first bone fragment, a bit of kraken spine plucked out of the sand during a visit with his demanding, brilliant, and powerful magician father, Sebastian.

When Daniel was twelve, he watched Sebastian die at the hands of the Hierarch of Southern California, devoured for the heightened magic layered deep within his bones.

Now, years later, Daniel is a petty thief with a forged identity. Hiding amid the crowds in Los Angeles―the capital of the Kingdom of Southern California―Daniel is trying to go straight. But his crime-boss uncle has a heist he wants Daniel to perform: break into the Hierarch's storehouse of magical artifacts and retrieve Sebastian's sword, an object of untold power.

For this dangerous mission, Daniel will need a team he can rely on, so he brings in his closest friends from his years in the criminal world. There's Moth, who can take a bullet and heal in mere minutes. Jo Alverado, illusionist. The multitalented Cassandra, Daniel's ex. And, new to them all, the enigmatic, knowledgeable Emma, with her British accent and her own grudge against the powers-that-be. The stakes are high, and the stage is set for a showdown that might just break the magic that protects a long-corrupt regime.

Extravagant and yet moving, Greg van Eekhout's California Bones is an epic adventure set in a city of canals and secrets and casual brutality--different from the world we know, yet familiar and true.

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Imagine if you could gain the powers of creatures like dragons and krakens…by eating them. Only, such beasties are long-since extinct – so you’re eating fossils instead.

I mean – that is objectively cool, even if it’s sad that magical creatures aren’t around anymore. But their not being around anymore is actually very important – because it means that, a bit like oil in our world, these fossils will eventually run out. The supply is limited, and getting smaller every day.

It’s okay though! Because there’s a super easy workaround. See, when you eat a fossil, its magical properties end up in your bones. So if you can’t get your hands on, I don’t know, a griffin fossil, that’s fine!

You can just eat someone who’s eaten a griffin fossil.

Yeah. Being murdered and eaten is, uh, kind of a professional hazard for anyone belonging to the magical community in this book…

That makes 10! Looking for more? You can find them in my earlier lists here;

Ten Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems!
Ten (More) Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems!
Ten (Even More) Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems!
Ten (Yet More) Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems!

Or you can check out my lists featuring unique magical abilities – start here, and keep an eye out for this year’s in the next few days!

What are some of your favourite magic systems?

The post Ten (Still More) Ridiculously Cool Magic Systems! appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

I Can’t Wait For…From the Belly by Emmett Nahil

Can’t-Wait Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted over at Wishful Endings to spotlight and discuss the books we’re excited about but haven’t yet read. Most of the time they’re books that have yet to be released, but not always. It’s based on the Waiting on Wednesday meme, which was originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. 

This week my Can’t-Wait-For Book is From the Belly by Emmett Nahil!

From the Belly by Emmett Nahil
Genres: Adult, Horror, Queer Protagonists
Representation: M/M
Published on: 30th May 2024
Goodreads

The whaling vessel Merciful has just made its strangest catch yet: a massive whale containing a still-living man secreted within its stomach lining. Sailor Isaiah Chase is tasked with keeping the enigmatic man alive.

As their relationship grows, a series of accidents, injuries and deaths quickly befall the ship and its crew. Isaiah is plagued by strangely prophetic dreams, even as the crew continues their endless quest for whale oil under the command of an increasingly unhinged captain.

As events spiral further out of control, the mysterious man confesses what Isaiah has begun to suspect: the crew of The Merciful has fallen into a cycle of punishment for their greed and destruction. Isaiah must confront the sea's vengeance made flesh, and choose between this new, strange love and the fate of the ship itself.

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There’s a bit of an in-joke to me being excited for this book, because my book-bestie read Whalefall last year – a book about a man who is swallowed by a whale – and I could NOT have noped out harder. Too gross, too scary, claustrophobia and middle-class daddy issues? Absolutely not.

But From the Belly??? GIMME!

In my defense, From the Belly is clearly not about being stuck inside a whale, because the story starts with the mysterious man coming OUT of the whale. Also, no pretentious Lit Fic nonsense involving flashbacks about the MC’s relationship with his father, ffs. Just straight-up horror that is definitely not straight!

And who doesn’t want to see whalers being punished for their greed? Outside of the few Indigenous peoples who depend on it, whaling is FUCKING AWFUL, and I am totally down with seeing a ship full of them get their supernatural comeuppance.

I really, REALLY want to know how Nahil’s guy got in the whale – is he some kind of supernatural being himself? Surely he can’t be a random, completely normal human, especially since he knows what’s going on! Which: what IS going on? Who or what is doing the punishing? What is ‘the sea’s vengeance made flesh’ – is it mystery guy, is that what he is? The way the blurb is worded makes me think not, but… And what choice of Isaiah’s could make any difference???

I can’t wait to find out!

The post I Can’t Wait For…From the Belly by Emmett Nahil appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.

Must-Have Monday #186

Must-Have Monday is a feature highlighting which of the coming week’s new releases I’m excited for. It is not meant to be a comprehensive list of all books being published that week; only those I’m interested in out of those I’m aware of! The focus is diverse SFF, but other genres sneak in occasionally too.

ELEVEN books this week!

(Books are listed in order of pub date, then Adult SFF, Adult Other, YA SFF, YA Other, MG SFF.)

Road to Ruin (Magebike Courier, #1) by Hana Lee
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: East Asian-coded cast, bi/pansexual MC, MC with dyslexia, bi/pansexual MC
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

An electrifying, gritty fantasy from debut author Hana Lee that takes a royal messenger on a high-speed chase across a climate-ravaged wasteland, featuring motorcycles, monsters, and magic.

Jin-Lu has the most dangerous job in the wasteland. She’s a magebike courier, one of the few who venture outside the domed cities on motorcycles powered by magic. Every day, she braves the wasteland’s dangers—deadly storms, roving marauders, and territorial beasts—to deliver her wares.

Her most valuable cargo? A prince’s love letters addressed to Yi-Nereen, a princess desperate to escape the clutches of her abusive family and soon-to-be husband. Jin, desperately in love with both her and the prince, can’t refuse Yi-Nereen’s plea for help. The two of them flee across the wastes, pursued by Yi-Nereen’s furious father, her scheming betrothed, and a bounty hunter with mysterious powers.

A storm to end all storms is brewing and dark secrets about the heritability of magic are coming to light. Jin’s heart has led her into peril before, but this time she may not find her way back.

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A post-apocalyptic fantasy adventure, with dinosaurs, magic motorbikes, and a romance-by-letters between a prince and princess and the courier who delivers said letters back and forth, this is going to be a lot of fun for the right reader. It didn’t quite work for me, but I think it’s objectively great, and if the blurb grabs your attention you should definitely give it a go!

You can read an excerpt here, and my review here!

The Garden of Delights by Amal Singh
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: Desi-coded setting and cast
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

Amal Singh is an engaging and motivated writer from Mumbai, India, with a long list of short story credits in Clarkesworld, F&SF, Apex, Fantasy and many others.

In the city of Sirvassa, where petals are currency and flowers are magic, the Caretaker tends to the Garden of Delights. He imparts temporary magical abilities to the citizens of Sirvassa, while battling a curse of eternal old age. No Delight could uplift his curse, and so he must seek out a mythical figure. A god. When a Delight allows a young girl an ability to change reality, the Caretaker believes he’s at the end of his search. But soon a magical rot takes root in his Garden, and the Caretaker must join forces with the girl and stop it from spreading. Even as he battles a different rot that plagues Sirvassa, he learns that Delights are always a precursor to Sorrows.

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This is a truly beautiful book, set in a world that is rich and complicated and feels so unique. I don’t know if I’ll finish it, but that’s only because I’m having my weird problem again where the prose sounds ‘out of tune’ to me – something I’ve never been able to explain, and never seen another reviewer discussing. Since this is something that doesn’t seem to affect anyone else, and because I really do think Garden of Delights is objectively amazing, I hope tonnes of people read it and love it as it deserves to be loved.

My Darling Dreadful Thing by Johanna van Veen
Genres: Adult, Horror, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Sapphic MC
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

In a world where the dead can wake and walk among us, what is truly real?

Roos Beckman has a spirit companion only she can see. Ruth—strange, corpse-like, and dead for centuries—is the only good thing in Roos’ life, which is filled with sordid backroom séances organized by her mother. That is, until wealthy young widow Agnes Knoop attends one of these séances and asks Roos to come live with her at the crumbling estate she inherited upon the death of her husband. The manor is unsettling, but the attraction between Roos and Agnes is palpable. So how does someone end up dead?

Roos is caught red-handed, but she claims a spirit is the culprit. Doctor Montague, a psychologist tasked with finding out whether Roos can be considered mentally fit to stand trial, suspects she’s created an elaborate fantasy to protect her from what really happened. But Roos knows spirits are real; she's loved one of them. She'll have to prove her innocence and her sanity, or lose everything.

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WELL. This sounds terrifying. But despite being a horror wimp, I’m absolutely going to have to give it a go. I mean!!! *gestures wildly at the blurb*

When Among Crows by Veronica Roth
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: M/M
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

Step into a city where monsters feast on human emotions, knights split their souls to make their weapons, and witches always take more than they give.

Pain is Dymitr’s calling. To slay the monsters he’s been raised to kill, he had to split his soul in half to make a sword from his own spine. Every time he draws it, he gets blood on his hands.

Pain is Ala’s inheritance. When her mother died, a family curse to witness horrors committed by the Holy Order was passed onto her. The curse will claim her life, as it did her mother’s, unless she can find a cure.

One fateful night in Chicago, Dymitr comes to Ala with a bargain: her help in finding the legendary witch Baba Jaga in exchange for an enchanted flower that just might cure her. Desperate, and unaware of what Dymitr really is, Ala agrees.

But they only have one day before the flower dies . . . and Ala's hopes of breaking the curse along with it.

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Not gonna lie, I was not expecting to ever include Veronica Roth in one of these posts, but by all accounts When Among Crows is extremely impressive – many reviewers I trust have loved it – and it’s also queer? All right, I’m here for it! (And because it’s not obvious – this is a novella, not a novel.)

Starfire by Naomi Hughes
Genres: Science Fantasy, YA
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

In a world where dragons hatch from stars, Peregrine Kent would give anything to see the sky.

It’s an impossible dream. The Barrier surrounding his planet makes sure of that. Everyone else might feel safe, but the flat white sky just makes Per feels trapped. His OCD has been getting worse each day; if he could only be out among the stars, though, he would finally feel free.

His dream seems impossible…until the day a real live star dragon tears a hole in the sky, setting off a worldwide panic. With the help of a homemade submarine and its surly—and distractingly handsome—captain, Per sets off on a quest to escape the confines of his world and his own anxiety. But what he discovers instead is a devastating truth that will change everything he thought he knew about dragons, his planet, and himself.

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‘In a world where dragons hatch from stars’ was all I needed to hear. Sia is SOLD!

The Dangerous Ones by Lauren Blackwood
Genres: Fantasy, Historical Fantasy, YA
Representation: Black MC
Protagonist Age: 16ish
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

A romantic historical fantasy from New York Times bestselling author Lauren Blackwood, set in the American Civil War with vampires and people with demigod-like abilities.

1863, Pennsylvania

War doesn’t scare Jerusalem—she’s a Saint. Thanks to powerful demigod-style reflexes, endurance, and strength, she’s fearless. And ever since the Confederates declared civil war, partnering with the vampires who benefitted off slavery, she and her battalion of Saints are essential to the Union army.

Jerusalem herself had been enslaved by a vampire, escaping North only after her family was murdered. She knows the enemy better, hates the enemy more than anyone in her battalion, and has been using it to her advantage since she joined the war a year ago. More than anything she wants revenge, but if she can help Black people gain freedom and equality without having to steal it for themselves like she had to, then all the better.

But she never expects to have to team up with a vampire to do it. Alexei is one of those handsome, arrogant Ancient Vampires. But he’s on the Union’s side, and in the year they've known each other, has never done anything but prove he’s on hers.

Together, they set out to change the course of the war and take down the vampire who destroyed everyone Jerusalem loved. But for her, it’s about more than justice.
It's about killing a god.

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Black Saints taking names and kicking ass? Againt the Confederates?! This has the potential to be very cool indeed, sounds like!

Flyboy by Kasey LeBlanc
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Queer Protagonists, YA
Representation: Trans MC
Protagonist Age: 16ish
Goodreads

Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda meets the speculative twists of The Night Circus in this standout debut YA novel, about a boy who visits the magic-filled circus of his dreams each night in order to escape his daily reality where his trans identity remains a secret.

After an incident at his school leaves closeted trans teenager Asher Sullivan needing stitches, his mother betrays him in the worst possible way—she sends him to Catholic school for his senior year. Now he has to contend with hideous plaid skirts, cranky nuns, and #bathroomJesus.

Nighttime brings an escape for Asher when he dreams of the Midnight Circus—the one place where he is seen for the boy he truly is. Too bad it exists only in his sleep. Or at least, that’s what he believes, until the day his annoyingly attractive trapeze rival, Apollo, walks out of his dreams and into his classroom. On the heels of this realization that the magical circus might be real, Asher also learns that his time there is limited.

In his desperation to hang onto the one place he feels at home, Asher sets both worlds on a collision course that could destroy all the relationships he cares about most. Now he must decide how far he’ll go to preserve the magical circus, even if it means facing his biggest challenge yet—coming out.

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As a general rule I avoid coming-out stories, but this one is all mixed up with magic and a Night Circus-esque dreamland, so I am making an exception. Here’s hoping it lives up to that beautiful cover!

It Waits in the Forest by Sarah Dass
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, Horror, YA
Representation: Caribbean cast and setting
Protagonist Age: 16ish
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

Unlike the other residents of the small Caribbean Island of St. Virgil, Selina DaSilva does not believe in magic. With a logical mind and a knack for botany, Selina used to dream of leaving the island to study Pharmacology—until a vicious, unsolved attack left her father dead and her mother in a coma.

Now her guilt over her mother’s condition keeps her tethered to the island, relegated to conning gullible tourists with useless talismans and phony protection rituals. But when one of those tourists ends up at the center of a string of strange murders, the truth that Selina has been denying can no longer be there is evil lurking in the forests that surround St. Virgil. Another thing that can’t be avoided? Selina’s ex-boyfriend Gabriel, newly employed at the local newspaper and eager to put his investigative skills to use.

Desperate to put an end to the killings and claim justice for Selina’s family, these two former lovers race to find answers. But evil bides its time. And as long-buried feelings and long-hidden secrets about Selina’s family’s past begin to reveal themselves, only one answer remains—and it waits in the forest.

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I can’t remember the last time I saw a ‘sceptic forced to acknowledge magic exists’ story, but that seems to be what this one is. And that’s always kinda fun! Plus, Caribbean folklore? Um, yes please?

The Witches of Silverlake Volume One by Simon Curtis, Stephanie Son
Genres: Fantasy, Contemporary or Urban Fantasy, YA
Representation: Queer MCs, queer Black MC, trans Desi MC, bisexual Mexican-Puertorican MC, fat white protagonist, gay Black secondary character
Protagonist Age: 16ish
Published on: 14th May 2024
Goodreads

It's always tough being the new kid in the coven.

Elliot has had a rough year. His dad died, he had to move across the country, and now he’s about to start high school at LA’s prestigious Saint John the Baptist Academy, where his mom has accepted the position of Vice Principal. He’s quickly taken in by the school’s outcasts: the scholarship kids; the queer kids; and the ones who just don’t really fit in with the glossy trust fund babies of SJTBA. They immediately let him in on their little secret…they are witches. Elliot joins them in their world among the crystal stores and occult shops of Silverlake, but just as he feels he has finally found a sense of family with his new coven, a full moon initiation ceremony goes awry and unleashes a demon with a thirst for SJTBA student and faculty blood, whose gruesome killing spree reveals that forces much bigger and darker than their worst nightmares have had their sights set on Elliot all along…

With the fun and games of playing with crystals and candles over, the coven now realize that magic is powerful, real, and that it might be more dangerous than they’d ever imagined.

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I also don’t read comics/graphic novels that often, but this one looks and sounds awesome, and I’ve been excited for it ever since it was announced!

Kavithri by Aman J. Bedi
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: South Asian-coded cast and setting
Published on: 16th May 2024
Goodreads

An action-packed and empowering South Asian fantasy epic that fans of Jade City will love. An underdog story like no other - Kavithri will remind you of fantasy heroes like Arya Stark, Gideon the Ninth and Kaladin Stormblessed.

Meet Kavithri. Outcast. Underdog. Survivor.
Kavi is a Taemu. Her people, once feared berserkers and the spearhead of a continent-spanning invasion, are the dregs of Raayan society. Their spirits crushed. Their swords broken. Their history erased.

But Kavi has a dream and a plan. She will do whatever it takes to earn a place at the secretive mage academy, face the Jinn within its walls, and gain the power to rise above her station and drag her people out of the darkness.

Except power and knowledge come at a cost, and the world no longer needs a Taemu who can fight. So they will break her. Beat her down to her knees. And make her bleed.
But if blood is what they want, Kavi will give them blood. She will give them violence. She will show them a berserker's fury.

And she will make them remember her name.

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Kavithri releases in the UK this week, BUT, US readers will also be able to buy the ebook come Thursday – even if it’ll be a few more months before the hardback is published. There’s been a LOT of hype for this one, and I am cautiously intrigued…

You can read an excerpt here!

A Bone in His Teeth by Kellen Graves
Genres: Adult, Fantasy, Queer Protagonists
Representation: Trans MC
Published on: 17th May 2024
Goodreads

When a fall from the mast leaves Alba Marsh unable to sail, he finally has the chance to run away from his family debts in search of a better life. He hopes to reunite with his mother, Edythe, where they always promised to meet if things went awry, but finding the small, secluded, secretive town of Moon Harbor proves a greater challenge than Alba ever expected. Worse, upon arriving, no one seems to know anyone by the name Edythe Marsh at all.

Taking a job as the local lighthouse keeper while waiting for her to come, Alba attempts to find peace in his stolen freedom--but the sea has other plans. First come the shadows, then the voices, then watery trails left on the floor while he sleeps. He's inundated with erotic dreams of sirens calling out to him, and distant singing haunts his waking hours, all while the townspeople claim to hear nothing.

After a debtor catches up with him and he's forced to dispose of their body in the harbor, Alba is interrupted by Eridanys, the last merrow of Moon Harbor, who curses him from leaving until he can find out what happened to the other merrow that once filled those waters. Eridanys' demands, both mental and physical, are exhausting and endless--but as their relationship deepens, and Moon Harbor’s long-kept secrets are butterflied open to see, it becomes clear they may both be prey to the town in ways neither of them ever anticipated.

A BONE IN HIS TEETH is an adult, queer, trans/M dark fantasy/romance with horror elements. Coming May 17, 2024.

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One of the prompts for this year’s Book Bingo over on r/Fantasy is to choose a book based solely on its cover, without looking at the blurb. This is my pick, and I suspect you can see why.

Will you be reading any of these? Did I miss any releases you think I should know about? Let me know!

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