Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Stacking The Shelves (Reading Reality) and The Sunday Post (Caffeinated Reviewer) are both blog memes about sharing the books we’re adding to the shelves and sharing news of the week ahead.

New Purchases

Back from an amazing vacation in Orlando, where we not only did 4 days at Universal Studios, but we got to see a SpaceX launch on our day at Cape Kennedy! Didn’t get a lot of reading done while I was there, but I did splurge on the latest weighty tome from Brandon Sanderson as soon as we got home – Wind and Truth: Book Five of the Stormlight Archive.

For Review

In putting together a Most Anticipated list for 2025, I requested a bunch of new ARCs, and 4 were approved almost instantly – plus I got a surprise review copy from an old friend!

In many ways, Dragonclaw was the soft launch of my return to regular reviewing, so nabbing a copy of L.R. Lam’s Emberclaw was never in question. Idolfire by Grace Curtis was a book I saw featured on Instagram, and it had me at the promise of “epic sapphic fantasy roadtrip with sword fights and a slowburn romance.”

As an editor, I always love what queer collections Lee Mandelo puts together, so Amplitudes: Stories of Queer and Trans Futurity is a very exciting addition to the review shelves. I actually requested a copy on Edelweiss over a month ago, so getting an immediate NetGalley approval was a huge relief. Wooing the Witch Queen, the new romantasy by Stephanie Burgis, is another lingering Edelweiss request, and another case of NetGalley to the rescue!

That old friend I mentioned? None other than the amazing M.Christian,who kindly gifted me a copy of the new edition of his collection, In Control: The Short, Kinky, Otherworldly Fiction of M.Christian.

Currently Reading

As for what I’m currently reading, I’ve got 3 books on the go. I’ve gone back to finish the last few stories in You Like It Darker, this year’s Stephen King collection, not because I’m hugely excited (it’s far from the vintage dark horror I was looking for), but because I want to clear the currently-reading shelf. Crown of Vengeance by Mercedes Lackey & James Mallory is actually a vacation reread, but with an ARC of the final book on my TBR, I want to refresh my memory. Finally, to no great surprise, I’ve cracked the spine on Wind and Truth, but I know it’s likely to be an on-again/off-again kind of read for a while.