Rainbow Shelf: 5 Indigo Books
The Rainbow Shelves are rapidly approaching their end (red, orange, yellow, green, blue). Indigo is second to last, and it has the dubious pleasure of being easily confused with blue so both shelves perhaps contains some of the other’s color. However, the contents of this shelf are some of my personal favorites of my own collection.
The 5 Indigo books I am listing here are all fiction this time, but I think they are wonderful choices.
[image error]
1.
Nimona by Noelle Stevenson
Genre: Fiction, Graphic Novel, Fantasy
This is the first year I have dived into reading graphic novels regularly, and I am loving it. I have also started pressing friends who read them for recommendations – and have looked up lists like “5 Top Graphic Novels of the Last Decade” and such for recommendations. Nimona popped up on several of those.
With my interest in fantasy the cover caught my eye and then part of the description had “brilliantly subversive, sharply irreverent” and I added it to the list. I am actually starting it early next week and cannot wait! Dragons! Battles! Shapeshifters!
[image error]
2.
The Archived by Victoria Schwab
Genre: YA Fantasy
Regretfully this a series that was never finished due to publishing bureaucracy (and will never be finished according to the author), but the premise sounds fascinating to me. Normally I would be hesitant to start a series with no ending but the concept of souls resting around in an archive similar to books that only some people can read? It appeals to the part of me that likes archives and the part of me that enjoys a story with a deep, macabre twist.
The main character, Mac, is the Keeper of these archives is pulled into a twisting mystery when it turns out that someone has been deliberating altering the contents of the archives. It touches on the boundaries of the living and the dead, sleeping and waking, and I think it sounds quite worthy of a read, regardless of the incompleteness.
[image error]
3.
The Beast’s Heart by Leife Shallcross
Genre: Fiction, Fantasy Retelling
As mentioned in my previous lists, I enjoy retellings of fairy tale and children’s stories. From complete genre changes to new point of view takes on the classic stories, the concept has always piqued my interest. Beauty and the Beast has long been one of my favorites as well. As a child growing up I envied the library in the Disney animated version and then as an adult I wondered at the kindness Belle expressed versus the darker assumptions applied to that tale (everything from bestiality to STARTING TO RELY ON CAPTOR).
This particularly retelling is from the Beast’s point of view, a rare gem for this fairy tale that so often focuses on the Beauty character. I don’t know if I will like the change until I read it, but for now the concept is enough for me to add it to the tbr pile.
[image error]
4.
The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
Genre: Science Fiction, Alternative History
In this version of Earth, the year 1952 happened quite differently with a meteorite falling and obliterating much of the Eastern Coast of the USA. This event puts Earth on a rapidly dwindling timer for humanity as it will soon be inhabitable and the space race takes on a much more dramatic face.
This story follows Elma York, initially hired as a calculator to get the first man on the moon before she starts to wonder why she can’t be the one to go to space. Or for that fact, why can’t a woman go? There are women pilots and scientists and societies views on what a woman should do may not be enough to slow Elma down.
I am always up for an alternate history book with a strong female lead.
[image error]
5.
Here, There Be Dragons by James A. Owen
Genre: YA Fantasy (with dragons)
An unusual murder, a fantastical atlas, and three perfect strangers sound like great ingredients for a great literary jaunt. Not to mention that the series is called The Imaginarium Geographica appeals to both the adult and the child within me. The title having the word dragon in it does not harm either.
This appears to be a book that I would enjoy at any stage in my life, and if there ever comes a time I do not enjoy a fantastical journey I fear there shall be much wrong with my world.
Here is a full list of the indigo books in the picture above:
The Worlds of J.R.R. Tolkien by John GarthThe Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian SelznickWayward Son by Rainbow RowellVoices: The Final Hours of Joan of Arc by David Elliott The Looking Glass Decades by Jay E. Daily (This book does not have an ISBN, you can find it by searching online but Goodreads does not have an entry for it.)Infinity by Sherrilyn KenyonThe Bane Chronicles by Cassandra ClareDoctor Who by Dan Abnett & Jonathan MorrisThe Last Romantics by Tara ConklinThe Night Circus by Erin MorgensternWhat Star? by Brian JonesAmerican Gods by Neil GaimanThe Black Tides of Heaven by J. Y. YangSeafire by Natalie ParkerThe Blue Fairy Book by Andrew LangThe Arabian Nights translated by Sir Richard BurtonSpinning Silver by Naomi NovikThe Last True Poets of the Sea by Julia Drake
