Review: Costumes for Time Travelers, by A.R. Capetta

 

Anyone who has hiked through time knows the town of Pocket. It’s the place travelers first reach after they stumble away from their hometime, passing through on their way to any other when. To Calisto, Pocket is home. They love their grandmother’s shop, which is filled with clothes from every era that are used to make costumes for time travelers. Calisto has no intention of traveling—it’s too dangerous. For Fawkes, traveling is life. He put on time boots when he was young and has been stumbling through eras ever since. When he floats into Pocket, Calisto meets him for the first time, though Fawkes has seen Calisto—in glimpses of what hasn’t happened yet. He’s also seen the villains chasing them both. Now Calisto and Fawkes must rush—from Shakespeare’s London to ancient Crete to California on the eve of a millennium—to save Pocket, and travelers, from being erased. From the Lambda Literary Award–winning author of The Heartbreak Bakery comes a fairy-tale romance that weaves in and out of time, from kiss to kiss and costume to costume.

"Destiny is a temporal disorder."

A.R. Capetta's Costumes for Time Travelers is a delightfully cozy time travel adventure. It pays homage to a few staples of the genre while giving its own spin, with a fun focus on tailoring not only as an art but also as a kind of time travel. The nonbinary main character Calisto is a young and enthusiastic tailor apprentice who has never time traveled, and the contrast with time savant Fawkes makes for a fun dynamic.

Theirs is a love story out of order, sweet and gentle. In fact, given the premises I expected far more angst than what I got, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. The book ambles gently, setting up a threat to reality, but it never feels like the stakes are too high. Perhaps the narration lacks some urgency in that regard.

The points of view are also all over the place, with an open third person narration that jumps too suddenly from one perspective to the next. It's a lovely book, but it may have benefitted from some rewriting.

Costumes for Time Travelers is a sweet summer read.

✨ 3.5 stars

 

📚🥾 So you want to read about out-of-order time-travelers?

Here's my review of Ian McDonald's Time Was  

 

Review: Emberclaw, by L.R. Lam

Arcady faces their greatest heist yet: posing as a noble student at the arcane University of Vatra. When the University announces the reinstatement of archaic trials of magic, the ever-penniless Arcady seizes the chance. If they win, they not only prove their worth, but the scholarship will give them more time to unlock secrets and reveal, once and for all, that their grandsire was not the Plaguebringer. Yet grief still leaves Arcady broken, and when they close their eyes, they dream of a certain dragon.
Everen, once the hope of dragons, is now hated by his kind. When he is eventually released from his prison, the Queen is clear: while he may help protect the island from wraith attacks, he is no longer a prince of the realm. As he struggles to find his place in Vere Celene, visions of the past, the future, and tantalizing glimpses of Arcady still haunt him. If he steers the wrong path through fate’s storm, he may never be able to create a future where both humans and dragons live in harmony.
Arcady soon realizes that to survive the rising threats from both their old life and their new one, they must use every trick at their disposal—even magic stolen from a dragon they thought dead. And as time runs out before an ancient danger awakens, Everen must fight his way back to Arcady, earn their forgiveness, and learn what it truly means to be an Emberclaw.

"Humans always attack what they fear."

L.R. Lam's Emberclaw concludes the duology that started with the excellent Dragonfall (click here to read my review), but unfortunately it doesn't quite stick the landing, losing everything that made the first installment so unique in favor of a generic magical academia/trials plot. This is to the absolute detriment of the series, which started off so strong, with a packed heist plot and interesting things to say about gender and the weight of expectations.

The core duo spends half of the book apart, each of them dealing with issues that seem to just be there in order to make the book long. The academia/trials part is the most meandering, with no clear sense of direction and new characters we feel no connection to, but Evemer's slow plot doesn't do him any favors either. Things start picking up speed and some semblance of form once the book hits the halfway point, but by that point it's too late and the existential threat feels more like an afterthought. The relationship between Evemer and Arkady, too, feels shallow and unearned after the fireworks of the first novel.

One good narrative thread that gets explored more, and has an interesting development, is Sorin. She takes center stage as she develops doubts and more agency and is, in general, a more well-rounded character.

Emberclaw is not a strong finish.

✨ 3.5 stars

 

🐲📚 So you want to read about dragons and academia?

Here's my review of Moniquill Blackgoose's To Shape a Dragon's Breath
 

Review: Sargassa, by Sophie Burnham

Selah Kleios is twenty-two years old and suddenly one of the most important women in the empires. The role of Imperial Historian is her birthright, something she’s been preparing for since birth—but she was supposed to have more time to learn the role from her father, the previous Historian. In the wake of her father’s sudden and shocking assassination, Selah finds herself custodian of more than just the Imperial Archives, the towering central library that safeguards all collective knowledge of the Roman Imperium and its client empires. There’s also the question of the two puzzling classified items her father left in her care—an ancient atlas filled with landscapes that don’t exist, and a carved piece of stone that seems to do nothing at all.
Soon, though, it becomes clear that the Iveroa Stone is more than just a slab of rock. With the reappearance of an old lost love who’s been blackmailed into stealing it for an unknown entity, Selah finds herself in a race to uncover the mysteries the Stone holds. But she isn’t the only one with an interest in it—she’ll have to contend with the deputy chief of police, an undercover spy, and her own beloved half brother along the way. What begins as an act of atonement and devotion ultimately pulls her into the crosshairs of deep state conspiracy, the stirrings of an underground independence movement, and questions that threaten to shake the foundational legitimacy of Roma Sargassa’s past, present, and future.

"She will always choose change."

Sophie Burnham's Sargassa is an incredible alt-history novel, set in a world where the Roman Empire never fell and injustice runs rampant. When Selah's father dies, she has to fill his shoes pretty quickly and take his place as Historian, a hereditary job that's meant to be like a custodian of ancient knowledge. But the world she has to move in, a world where indentured servitude was never stopped, forces her to come to terms with some very harsh truths.

This is a multi-POV epic that also follows her slave-adjacent half-brother, a nonbinary rebel, a righteous cop, and an idealistic thief. Their characters meet and play off of each other beautifully, even the racist misogynist of a cop who's tragically in the wrong place at the wrong time. The luring corruption of the city functions as a backdrop to this delightful mystery as a millennia-old lie unfurls into the light and battle-lines are drawn.

The setting is perfect, with fantastic pieces of worldbuilding, little things you can really trace to the actual Roman Empire. At the end of the book is a helpful compendium explaining how this colony came to be, and the revelations only enrich the experience. You get the sense, early on, that not everything is as it seems, and it's fun to follow the clues clearly left for the reader.

Between the themes of systemic violence and slavery, there wouldn't seem to be much time for love stories, but two delicate queer romances unfold organically, following the course of the novel to its incredible conclusion. In particular, the sapphic love story featuring Selah has the strongest foundation, and a strong development.

Sargassa is the fantastic first book of a series that promises to be explosive.

✨ 4.5 stars

Snippet: The Brides of High Hill, by Nghi Vo

The Cleric Chih accompanies a beautiful young bride to her wedding to the aging ruler of a crumbling estate situated at the crossroads of dead empires. The bride's party is welcomed with elaborate courtesies and extravagant banquets, but between the frightened servants and the cryptic warnings of the lord's mad son, they quickly realize that something is haunting the shadowed halls.
As Chih and the bride-to-be explore empty rooms and desolate courtyards, they are drawn into the mystery of what became of Lord Guo's previous wives and the dark history of Do Cao itself. But as the wedding night draws to its close, Chih will learn at their peril that not all monsters are to be found in the shadows; some monsters hide in plain sight.

“Fear serves, when nothing else is left.”

Nghi Vo's The Brides of High Hill is another great installment in the Singing Hill Cycle, a story about the many faces monsters can wear, about lies and deception. It becomes clear very quickly that this is a version of Bluebeard, but then the story takes an abrupt turn, careening towards a plot twist that leaves you reeling. The ending was a bit rushed for my taste, making this installment a bit weaker than the other books in the series, but it's still an incredible story, and Vo's prose is excellent as always. This is also the first novella when Cleric Chih seems to be attracted to someone.

✨ 3.5 stars

Snippet: Awakenings, by Claudie Arseneault

Innkeep, hunter, blacksmith, nurse—Horace has apprenticed for every clan in the domed city of Trenaze, and they've all rejected em. Too hare-brained. Too talkative. Too slow. Ever the optimist, e has joined Trenaze's guards to be mentored. Horace has high hopes to earn eir place during eir trial at the Great Market. That is, until the glowing shards haunting the world break through the city's protective dome, fused together in a single, monstrous amalgam of Fragments.

“Your story is my story.”

Claudie Arseneault's Awakenings is a sweet novella set in a queernormative world, a cozy adventure that starts when the nonbinary aroace main character find themselves in a situation bigger than them and decide to leave their city and help a mysterious figure regain their memories. The two will cross paths with a merchant and his sentient wagon, and the three will set off for adventure. This book believably lays the groundwork for what promises to be a fun series of short works about finding oneselves and the importance of friendship.

✨ 3.5 stars

Review: The Unbalancing, by R.B. Lemberg

Beneath the waters by the islands of Gelle-Geu, a star sleeps restlessly. The celebrated new starkeeper Ranra Kekeri, who is preoccupied by the increasing tremors, confronts the problems left behind by her predecessor. Meanwhile, the poet Erígra Lilún, who merely wants to be left alone, is repeatedly asked by their ancestor Semberí to take over the starkeeping helm. Semberí insists upon telling Lilún mysterious tales of the deliverance of the stars by the goddess Bird.
When Ranra and Lilún meet, sparks begin to fly. An unforeseen configuration of their magical deepnames illuminates the trouble under the tides. For Ranra and Lilún, their story is just beginning; for the people of Gelle-Geu, it may well be too late to save their home.

"To heal, you must first become trusted".

R.B. Lemberg's The Unbalancing is a quiet story of salvation, an Atlantis-like story set in a world governed by a Bird goddess, where stars are kept by starkeepers and people do magic with their names. The main characters, a nonbinary demisexual poet and a loud starkeeper with much hurt in her past, come together to save their island from destruction, and they find love with each other.

The poet is a quiet character, unwilling to take on the role that others are sure should be hers; the contrast with the starkeeper, who took what she could to emancipate herself, makes for an interesting dynamic. The starkeeper is an extrovert, taking on many lovers, but behind the exuberant veneer is someone who is deeply hurt. The poet is still questioning, attempting to find their place and the precise iteration of their nonbinary identity, for this is a world where nonbinary people can be of five different types, and they signal it through hair tokens and complex hairstyles. This is a story of acceptance, too, and finding one's worth, and overcoming one's past.

The worldbuilding is immaculate, painting with deft strokes a world that is complex and different and deeply accepting, where consent matters to acts of magic and the stars come from afar. It is a slow unraveling, when the mystery of the stars' origin is revealed, and it is deeply touching. The ending feels just right in its inexorability, with pages of exquisite prose.

The Unbalancing is a quiet treasure of a novel.

✨ 4 stars

📚📚📚 IF YOU LOVE THIS, YOU MIGHT LIKE:

* Keeper of the Dawn, by Dianna Gunn

for: community, consent

ARC Review: Running Close to the Wind, by Alexandra Rowland

Avra Helvaçi, former field agent of the Arasti Ministry of Intelligence, has accidentally stolen the single most expensive secret in the world―and the only place to flee with a secret that big is the open sea. To find a buyer with deep enough pockets, Avra must ask for help from his on-again, off-again ex, the pirate Captain Teveri az-Haffar. They are far from happy to see him, but together, they hatch a plan: take the information to the isolated pirate republic of the Isles of Lost Souls, fence it, profit.
The only things in their way? A calculating new Arasti ambassador to the Isles of Lost Souls who's got his eyes on Avra's every move; Brother Julian, a beautiful, mysterious new member of the crew with secrets of his own and a frankly inconvenient vow of celibacy; the fact that they're sailing straight into sea serpent breeding season and almost certain doom. But if they can find a way to survive and sell the secret on the black market, they’ll all be as wealthy as kings―and, more importantly, they'll be legends.

My thanks to the author for providing an ARC copy.

Alexandra Rowland's Running Close to the Wind is a cozy low-stakes pirate adventure set in the same world of the excellent A Taste of Gold and Iron, loosely connected to it by a plot point. The two books couldn’t be more different, as Running Close to the Wind is funny. Hysterically, being-in-stitches, laughing-on-the-floor funny. It’s so funny that it’s too funny sometimes, but it’s a joy to read a book that doesn’t take itself so seriously while simultaneously delivering some very profound reflections in the more serious segments.

The trio of main characters is a delight, their banter on point as the dynamic between Avra and Teveri expands with the arrival of the mysterious Julian and his wiles. The characters are unapologetically horny, but the book is surprisingly chaste in that regard, while also being incredibly tender in parts. I especially enjoyed the few conversations about having and defending one’s boundaries. The rest of the cast, from the colorful crew to the pirates on the island, were all painted in deft strokes, resulting in vivid characters with so much to say. It really was reminiscent of Our Flag Means Death, as it was pitched, and it was an absolute romp.

The world gets expanded in a really clever subversion of what we know from A Taste of Gold and Iron, showing what the outside world thinks exactly of the choice to keep for themselves the only way to sail safely during a certain time of the year. There’s sea serpents and giant turtles and ghosts that need a complex reference guide to be handled, and it’s all so delightful. This choice to have loosely interconnected stories where the world is explored more and more is an intriguing one, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Running Close to the Wind is a fun adventure with hidden depths.

✨ 4 stars

Snippet: Mammoths at the Gates, by Nghi Vo

The wandering Cleric Chih returns home to the Singing Hills Abbey for the first time in almost three years, to be met with both joy and sorrow. Their mentor, Cleric Thien, has died, and rests among the archivists and storytellers of the storied abbey. But not everyone is prepared to leave them to their rest. Because Cleric Thien was once the patriarch of Coh clan of Northern Bell Pass--and now their granddaughters have arrived on the backs of royal mammoths, demanding their grandfather’s body for burial. Chih must somehow balance honoring their mentor’s chosen life while keeping the sisters from the north from storming the gates and destroying the history the clerics have worked so hard to preserve. But as Chih and their neixin Almost Brilliant navigate the looming crisis, Myriad Virtues, Cleric Thien’s own beloved hoopoe companion, grieves her loss as only a being with perfect memory can, and her sorrow may be more powerful than anyone could anticipate.

"Memory is greater than death". Nghi Vo's Mammoths at the Gates is an exploration of grief and mourning, a novella about how memories can be shaped and how your loved ones are their own people with stories that you don't know. It's a story about change and the need to embrace the unfamiliar, sometimes funny, sometimes poignant; another extraordinary novella in the Singing Hills cycle, with so much to say about the nature of stories.

✨ 4 stars

📚📚📚 IF YOU LOVE THIS, YOU MIGHT LIKE:

* The Heretic's Guite to Homecoming - Theory, by Sienna Tristen

for: the power of stories, healing

Review: He Who Drowned the World, by Shelley Parker-Chan

Zhu Yuanzhang, the Radiant King, is riding high after her victory that tore southern China from its Mongol masters. Now she burns with a new desire: to seize the throne and crown herself emperor. But Zhu isn’t the only one with imperial ambitions. Her neighbor in the south, the courtesan Madam Zhang, wants the throne for her husband—and she’s strong enough to wipe Zhu off the map. To stay in the game, Zhu will have to gamble everything on a risky alliance with an old enemy: the talented but unstable eunuch general Ouyang, who has already sacrificed everything for a chance at revenge on his father’s killer, the Great Khan.
Unbeknownst to the southerners, a new contender is even closer to the throne. The scorned scholar Wang Baoxiang has maneuvered his way into the capital, and his lethal court games threaten to bring the empire to its knees. For Baoxiang also desires revenge: to become the most degenerate Great Khan in history—and in so doing, make a mockery of every value his Mongol warrior family loved more than him.

"Porcelain wasn't a person, and it neither felt nor grieved". Shelley Parker-Chan's He Who Drowned the World is the gut-wrenching conclusion to the duology that started with She Who Became the Sun. It's filled to the brim with immoral characters doing their worst to achieve their goals, and you can't help cheering for Zhu, who's only slightly better than the rest of them. This book is a tragedy, and it's a damn good one.

The brutal narration doesn't shy away from the realities of war and from the terrible life of courtesans at court, with numerous scenes of violence, some of which are of a sexual nature. But the descriptions aren't horribly graphic. This book also features characters submitting to sex in order to achieve their goals, and a sort of BDSM nonsexual relationship forming between two characters in order to help the submissive character keep their focus.

The characters are incredibly compelling; the one that could be argued to be the main villain of the narrative is so complex and mired with guilt, set on a path of self-actualization that doesn't stop at anything, even at hurting people they might feel some genuine affection for. It's a novel filled with betrayals and painful realizations. It's a reflection on femininity and masculinity and self-hatred, and it makes its points with harsh precision. And yet there's also a sliver of hope, a beautiful moment of compassion.

The magic takes more focus than in the first book, with the Mandate of Heaven and its uses being at the center of many a plot point. The relationship between Zhu and Ma transitions to the background, until it takes center stage again at the end of the book with some chilling moments. Then there's a tragic relationship between two men, where it's not clear whether one of them is even attracted to men.

He Who Drowned the World is an extraordinary feat of a novel.

✨ 5 stars

📚📚📚 IF YOU LOVE THIS, YOU MIGHT LIKE:

* Lady Hotspur, by Tessa Gratton

for: complicated characters, complex politics

Review: Dragonfall, by L.R. Lam

Long ago, humans betrayed dragons, stealing their magic and banishing them to a dying world. Centuries later, their descendants worship dragons as gods. But the gods remember, and they do not forgive. Thief Arcady scrapes a living on the streets of Vatra. Desperate, Arcady steals a powerful artifact from the bones of the Plaguebringer, the most hated person in Lumet history. Only Arcady knows the artifact's magic holds the key to a new life among the nobles at court and a chance for revenge.
The spell connects to Everen, the last male dragon foretold to save his kind, dragging him through the Veil. Disguised as a human, Everen soon learns that to regain his true power and form and fulfil his destiny, he only needs to convince one little thief to trust him enough to bond completely--body, mind, and soul--and then kill them. Yet the closer the two become, the greater the risk both their worlds will shatter.

"Truth was a wound that could bite". L.R. Lam's Dragonfall is many things: a queer enemies-to-lovers romance, a heist book, a high-stakes epic. None of these things take center stage, instead striking a perfect balance and creating a novel that works well, where not all is as it seems and you keep questioning who's right. Who betrayed whom? The dragons, or the humans? The bond between the two certainly seems to work a certain way. Can we even trust the dragons' chronicles, since so few survived the fire that destroyed their library?

The world-building is on point, the magic system well-developed, even if some things are still a mystery or maybe don't work as we're told. The dragons, banished generations before to a dying world, are only bent on revenge. The humans, having forgotten everything, now worship them as gods: this creates a truly interesting dynamic when the two perspectives collide. There's a black market for dragon relics, a secret sect of assassins bent on punishing those who desecrate these relics, and hints of a larger world and an existential threat.

The POVs are phenomenal. Two of the POVs feature the two halves of the romance: Everen, the dragon prophet with a terrible mission, and Arcady, the nonbinary thief with a big secret. It's delicious to watch these two wallow in angst and slowly peel away the layers that protect them, learning to trust each other until disaster strikes. While Arcady's POV is a simple first person narrative, Everen's POV is much more interesting, with its first person that almost morphs into a second person, as he's addressing his whole narration to Arcady.

The other POV character is one of the assassins tasked with punishing heretics: the young woman is reluctant to do her job and has a terrible relationship with her father figure, who molded her to his purposes and has her wrapped around his little finger. The latter, a high priest, seems to know more than he lets on about the conflict brewing. The rest of the cast pulls its weight, especially Everen's sister and Arcady's father figure, to create a vibrant narrative.

Dragonfall is an incredible tale about love and sacrifice.

✨ 4.5 stars

Review: The Godbreaker, by Mike Brooks

 

As the Black Keep Council prepares for war, journeying far to protect their lands and friend, The God-King and his sister try to keep Narida together in the face of betrayal while the Splinter King remains at large.
The Golden and his hordes of raiders press their advantage and sweep across the land with unholy powers. Sacrifices will be made, and not everyone will make it back to Black Keep alive.

I raced through the series and now I'm directly reviewing the third and not-so-final book. Mike Brooks' The Godbreaker is not, unfortunately, a good conclusion for a trilogy that started so strong and with such unique storytelling, with its nuanced focus on diplomacy. It's a shame, because the story is still so interesting, and the queer characters are a delight to explore.

There's an established mlm couple whose back-and-forth is frankly amazing, a really cute mlm relationship taking its first steps, and a whiff of an unexpected wlw relationship. The world-building is incredibly interesting, and the big surprise event at the beginning of the third book was adequately forewarned, in retrospect.

But one can't help feeling cheated by the cop-outs, the fake ending, and all the time focused on a sub-plot that should definitely have been a separate novella, given it doesn't seem to affect the main plot at all. This book feels chaotic, and not in a good way. It feels as if Brooks had the material for a quadrilogy but decided to make it a trilogy and create a new series after this one, but there are huge gaps and events that feel forced, just to create a sort of adequate conclusion.

The God-King Chronicles is an intriguing series, but The Godkiller doesn't stick the landing.

✨ 3.5 stars

Review: The Black Coast, by Mike Brooks

 

When the citizens of Black Keep see ships on the horizon, terror takes them, for they know who is coming: for generations, Black Keep has been raided by the fearsome clanspeople of Iwernia. Saddling their war dragons, the Naridans rush to defend their home only to discover that the clanspeople have not come to pillage at all. Driven from their own homeland by the rise of a daemonic despot who prophesies the end of the world, they have come in search of a new home. Meanwhile the wider continent of Narida is lurching toward war. Black Keep is about to be caught in the cross-fire of the coming war for the world – if only its new mismatched society can survive.

"Meet the wave head-on, and trust in your ship". Mike Brooks' The Black Coast is the first book in a trilogy dealing with a larger threat to the world, but this first volume sets the stage for a grander conflict, focusing instead on the battle for integration between two people that have only ever been enemies but now need to find a common ground. The clash of cultures and customs feels believable, with one culture pretty rooted in mysoginy and the other teeming with homophobia; but perhaps they can take the best of each other and make something greater. Daimon and Saana, on opposite sides, work hard to make this alliance work.

This is a multi-POV epic that doesn't only deal with this conflict, but also jumps to other two realms to prepare the stage. Here we have a myopic warrior hailing from the same culture as the raiders, the princess of Narida dealing with a dinastic threat against her brother the God-King, and a street-rat stumbling onto a plot far greater than she could possibly imagine. All POVs are well-handled, but since their stories don't seem to come to a resolution, one certainly hurries to return to Daimon and Saana and their fight for the survival of their people.

The world-building is phenomenal. The author does some really interesting things with language, creating a culture where the six genders are represented by different diacritics on the pronouns, and another culture where speakers define themselves by their relationship to the person they're talking to (thus "this servant thinks", "this brother thinks", "this son thinks", and so forth). Also, the dragons are very much dinosaurs. They're called dragons, but the way they're described makes it pretty clear that they're our dinosaurs or something very similar.

One of the cultures is very queernormative: queer people can marry and adopt children. While the two main romances of this book are straight, there are a few queer POV characters and it certainly seems like there will be more of that in the other books of the series.

The Black Coast is a solid introduction to a fantastic epic story.

✨ 4 stars

Snippet: When the Angels left the Old Country, by Sacha Lamb

 

Uriel the angel and Little Ash (short for Ashmedai) are the only two supernatural creatures in their shtetl (which is so tiny, it doesn't have a name other than Shtetl). The angel and the demon have been studying together for centuries, but pogroms and the search for a new life have drawn all the young people from their village to America. When one of those young emigrants goes missing, Uriel and Little Ash set off to find her.
Along the way the angel and demon encounter humans in need of their help, including Rose Cohen, whose best friend (and the love of her life) has abandoned her to marry a man, and Malke Shulman, whose father died mysteriously on his way to America. But there are obstacles ahead of them as difficult as what they’ve left behind. Medical exams (and demons) at Ellis Island. Corrupt officials, cruel mob bosses, murderers, poverty. The streets are far from paved with gold.

This is a lovely immigrant tale. Sacha Lamb's When the Angels left the Old Country will seem very familiar to Good Omens fans, but Jewish culture permeates the narration and the story couldn't be more different, a tale of antisemitism, friendship, and justice. The relationship between the genderless angel and the small demon is the best part of the book, but all the small interations with all the people they met on the way are truly delightful, and Rose is a perfect co-protagonist.

✨ 4 stars

Snippet: The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Practice, by Sienna Tristen

 

Freshly-risen from the underworld of his insecurities, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani is halfway through his journey to the fabled Pilgrim State. But the world this side of the Iphigene Sea is not an easy one: violence and subterfuge litter the way forward, and something meaner stalks the edges of Ronoah’s certainty, something that threatens to turn the very reason for his pilgrimage to dust.
To survive, he will have to be clever and kind in equal measure. To ask for help from the acrobats and queens-to-be and foreigners’ gods that cross his path. To confront that beguiling, bewildering companion he travels with, the one whose secrets are so vast and unforgivable. He will have to draw on every story he knows in order to make it to the Pilgrim State with his soft heart intact—and then make it home again.

"Speak of this to everyone". Sienna Tristen's The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Practice is a stunning conclusion to this rich duology filled with empathy and self-care. Ronoah's journey towards healing is not over after the first book; now he has to practice what he learnt. Meanwhile the author shows us with their stunning prose their world filled with joy and life, a wonderful tapestry of stories where everything is connected. Ronoah builds new, lovely connections with people, and his relationship with the god first known as Reilin only grows in complexity and tenderness, towards a miraculous ending.

✨ 4 stars

Review: The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory, by Sienna Tristen

 

Ashamed of his past and overwhelmed by his future, Ronoah Genoveffa Elizzi-denna Pilanovani feels too small for his own name. After a graceless exit from his homeland in the Acharrioni desert, his anxiety has sabotaged every attempt at redemption. Asides from a fiery devotion to his godling, the one piece of home he brought with him, he has nothing.
That is, until he meets Reilin. Beguiling, bewildering Reilin, who whisks Ronoah up into a cross-continental pilgrimage to the most sacred place on the planet. The people they encounter on the way—children of the sea, a priestess and her band of storytellers, the lonely ghosts of monsters—are grim and whimsical in equal measure. Each has their part to play in rewriting Ronoah’s personal narrative.

Change requires work. Sienna Tristen's The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory is like a long hug, a thorough exploration of living life with a crippling anxiety disorder, and of the steps to take in order to get better. Disguised as a fantasy travelogue, this books takes its time delving into Ronoah's psyche and his struggles, picturing them with a language that is both compassionate and precise. The reader gets to truly experience the terrible vertigo of his self-destructive thoughts, but also his journey towards healing. The writing is phenomenal in this regard, pulling at heartstrings all the way.

Deciding to follow Reilin in his journey is only the first step for Ronoah, who begins experiencing new things and learning that he too has value, sometimes yanked in that direction by his travelling companion. Reilin might seem callous at first glance, but he's supportive in his own pushy way, helping Ronoah begin his journey towards healing. Along the way, Ronoah will meet different people and experience important lessons, and he'll learn to share a part of himself - slowly, painstakingly slowly, he'll put in the work.

The world is painted vividly, so rich with a staggering history and complex in its own right. Interwoven in the text are snippets of tales, perhaps true, tales of the gods who made this world, tales recounted by the characters. It is a book about the importance of stories, about how context and a change in perspective can change how a story is read. The middle part, taking place in a caravan of traveling storytellers, is delightful, and it shows well the variety of this world. But stories permeate the text, both in the beginning and at the end; stories upon stories.

A glance at the plot might make one think that this novel is going to feature a queer love story, but in this first book of the duology it hasn't been the case; one detects a certain attraction, certainly admiration, towards Reilin, but this doesn't seem to be that kind of story. This is not a flaw: the book works perfectly on its own, painting Ronoah's important journey with all the care it deserves. It's still, to an extent, a queer book, and thus I feel like it should have a place on this blog: Ronoah comes from a country where queer relationships aren't frowned upon, and he's surprised to learn that this is not the case in other countries, that he's travelling through a country where queer love is punished. There's a beautiful conversation with a queer minor character who discovers, through a story, that he's not alone, that queer people do exist other than him; and a character seems to be nonbinary, to the extent that a word like that can mean something to an all-powerful being.

The Heretic's Guide to Homecoming - Theory is a precious journey to experience.

✨ 4.5 stars

Review: The Keeper's Six, by Kate Elliott

 

It’s been a year since Esther set foot in the Beyond, the alien landscape stretching between worlds, crossing boundaries of space and time. She and her magical travelling party, her Hex, haven’t spoken since the Concilium banned them from the Beyond. But when she wakes in the middle of the night to her son’s cry for help, the members of her Hex are the only ones she can trust to help her bring him back from wherever he has been taken.
Esther will have to risk everything to find him. Undercover and hidden from the Concilium, she and her Hex will be tested by dragon lords, a darkness so dense it can suffocate, and the bones of an old crime come back to haunt her.

Badass mom to the rescue! Kate Elliott's The Keeper's Six is an adventure-filled, action-packed novella that features a 60-years-old protagonist, something we don't ever see much of. Esther is an excellent protagonist, experienced and shrewd despite her aches and pains; it was a delight to watch her talk circles around everyone, gleaning information about her son's whereabouts with her negotiation skills and finally finding the truth. I also loved to see her Jewish faith deftly incorporated in the narrative.

This was really a well-rounded novella. In a short amount of pages, Elliott depicts her world and makes you really understand everything of its complexity; the explanations never feel like info-dumps, although having a character who conveniently needs everything explained by the protagonist certainly helps; but those conversations never feel forced. The character in question is fascinating, his past much more so, and in general this story is really organic when it explores the team's past: you get the sense that you really know the members of Esther's Hex, masterfully sketched out in a few words and dialogues.

This is a mix of sci-fi and fantasy; we start off in modern day Australia and make our way to the in-between. I hesitate to call this portal fantasy because it's implied that the dragons used some technology to make the Keeps, more than magic, although magic is certainly used throughout the story. The dragons are fascinating, especially our big bad, and the central mystery slowly unraveling itself, teased ever since the beginning, is worth the wait.

Taking center stage of the narrative is a beautiful established queer relationship between a human man and a non-binary dragon, who met under less than ideal circumstances; the dragon, Kai, has a horrific past that catches up with them and threatens their happiness.

The Keeper's Six is a delightful action-packed adventure that finishes too soon.

✨ 4 stars

Review: Wild and Wicked Things, by Francesca May

 

On Crow Island, people whisper, real magic lurks just below the surface. Neither real magic nor faux magic interests Annie Mason. Not after it stole her future. She’s only on the island to settle her late father’s estate and, hopefully, reconnect with her long-absent best friend, Beatrice, who fled their dreary lives for a more glamorous one. Yet Crow Island is brimming with temptation, and the biggest one may be her enigmatic new neighbor. Mysterious and alluring, Emmeline Delacroix is a figure shadowed by rumors of witchcraft. And when Annie witnesses a confrontation between Bea and Emmeline at one of the island's extravagant parties, she is drawn into a glittering, haunted world. A world where the boundaries of wickedness are tested, and the cost of illicit magic might be death.

'Tis the season of Great Gatsby retellings. Much like last year's The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo, Wild and Wicked Things by Francesca May is marketed as a queer, witchy take on the American classic - but I fail to see the parallels. Yes, the story is set in the appropriate time period, there's a house whose owner is mysterious enough, they're on an island, and wild parties abound. But the similarities, I think, end there. That said, the book is delightful. It works best if one doesn’t think too hard about the supposed inspiration and simply lets the story speak for itself. It’s a packed adventure that isn’t afraid to take its time; every beat serves its purpose, even in its moments of stillness.

First and foremost, it’s a book about sisterhood and the bonds we form in a traumatic setting. The relationship between Emmeline and her longtime companions is deep and heartbreaking. The friendship between Annie and Beatrice, shadowed by a tragic loss, is no less compelling. This is a book with deeply flawed characters, which can be a risk, but Francesca May manages to strike a balance. Emmeline in particular was fascinating, a study in contrasts, although I would have liked her gender nonconformity to be more explored.

This is a dark novel with dark themes, abuse and sexual assault among them; Emmeline uses sacrificial blood magic, and such magic has a price.

I found the romance not as developed as I would have liked; then again, with such a packed plot, it might be expected. The mutual fascination between Emmeline and Annie is explored, but I got the feeling that it wouldn’t have taken that form if not for their link.

What I really loved was Annie’s journey; seeing her coming into her own and realizing her queerness, in every sense of the word, and accepting herself.

✨ 3.5 stars