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Fighting Gravity by Leah Petersen
I really wanted to like this more. It’s a scifi romance, with a space prince and a scientist! But the writing style just didn’t click with me. The worldbuilding was very light and character development was pretty much non-existent. Without those things as a solid foundation, the rest of the book fell apart. The first chapter has one or two mentions of aliens and how the space!empire is structured, and then it just tapers off to nothing. More details about, like, EVERYTHING would’ve been nice, especially when certain aspects of the world weren’t as advanced as you’d expect in a futuristic society. Medical care, for instance, is basically at the…
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The Bone Key by Sarah Monette
So apparently I have a thing for books about repressed introverts who’re plagued by the paranormal when they’re not working in a museum. I’m not really surprised. It combines my love of books, antiques, mysteries and the paranormal, plus there’s a character with the potential for some sort of clam situation if they have a cute enough sidekick. (Spoiler: Kyle doesn’t have a sidekick (or friends). He also doesn’t go anywhere in a character development sort of way. It’s the only downside to an otherwise wonderful book.) Sarah Monette is the lady who wrote The Goblin King (as Katherine Addison), one of my favorite books from 2014! This is the…
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Lady Knight by L.J. Baker (2007)
Show me a story about a lady knight who falls in love with a noblewoman and I will show you MY HEART omfg this was so good! Crazy stressful, because it’s set in pseudo-medieval times where everybody is against a woman knight (even if she can kick all y’all’s asses) and nobody wants a rich noblewoman to date her and there is ALSO a religious fanatic who wants to start a holy war and it’s so, so stressful.
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Threshold by Jordan L. Hawk (2013)
This is the second book in the Whyborne & Griffin series and it is much like the first: wonderful plot, great characters, iffy sex scenes[1. more unfortunate word choices ruining otherwise okay sexytimes, although at least each sex scene involves important character/plot development things. I hate when you can cut out sexytimes entirely and lose nothing from the book; what’s the point of having them if they don’t DO anything?] and fun historical paranormal mysteries. Well, not FUN. More like terrifying.
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Iron & Velvet by Alexis Hall (2013)
As you know, I am a huge fan of Alexis Hall’s Prosperity series, which is a steampunk historical romance horror thing with amazing characters and a fantastic setting. Her Kate Kane series, meanwhile, is an urban paranormal mystery series with romance elements set in modern day London. I burnt out on urban paranormal mystery romances some years ago, but I had faith that AH wouldn’t just regurgitate the same old tropes that originally turned me off the genre. And he didn’t! A lot of the story elements ARE the same as other urban fantasy series– there are werewolves and vampires and witches, the protagonist is a half-faerie princess PI with…
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Hotblood! vol. 1 & 2 by Toril Orlesky (2014)
I think I found this series through Tumblr? Maybe? It’s a historical fantasy crime Western with centaurs, and it’s available free online. All things I enjoy! I ended up accidentally reading the equivalent of two volumes (plus a bit more) over the course of one evening. The art is so lovely. The limited color palette makes it kinda dreamy-looking, in a stark kind of way It’s a nice mix, and the pages are very pretty to look at.
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Widdershins by Jordan L. Hawk (2012)
I somehow stumbled across Widdershins while browsing through something on Scribd. I’m so glad I did, because I ended up having an amazingly fun time reading it.
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Stalking Darkness by Lynn Flewelling (1997)
So this turned out to be one of those books that was SO GOOD it made it impossible for me to read another book for a few days. I didn’t want to! I just wanted to keep thinking about Stalking Darkness, and the characters, and their world, and EVERYTHING. Best new character POV goes to Beka, a soldier and secret Chosen One. (That wasn’t a spoiler because it’s pretty obvious from the get-go.) She’s so great! She’s learning how to be a leader in the middle of war, while also being pulled along by a prophecy she knows nothing about. I’d read an entire book with just Beka, tbh. More…