In the ongoing tire fire that is 2020, supply chains are still messed up and the postal service is still struggling—as are local bookstores. Independent retailers have begun asking that people start their Christmas shopping early, so that everyone can properly and safely manage the influx. If you can do so, I encourage you to …

Please excuse my love of puns as I use this opportunity to shout: THIS BOOK IS AMAZING. PLEASE BUY THIS BOOK IMMEDIATELY. IN FACT, BUY TWO. Thank you. It’s not just a pun that makes me want to yell about this book, though. Ring Shout is a magnificent, no-holds-barred triumph of a novel. P. Djèlí …

In 2020 perhaps more than all the other years combined I’ve wondered if being human was really such a good thing. Not that I have a choice in the matter. Does anyone? Well…maybe Natsuki, the protagonist of Earthlings, has an inkling. Natsuki, who we see as both a young girl and a grown woman at …

Fall! Finally, an excuse to pretend we’re inside by choice. Cozy blankets, hot cider, and the kind of scares that stay safely within the frame of a TV set or the pages of a book. If you’re looking to feel a chill down your spine that pairs well with the spooky season and maybe some …

I first read Kushiel’s Dart when I was too young for it, which was, in fact, the perfect age. I must have been about 14 when I picked the thick paperback from the shelf at my local Barnes and Noble. Most paperbacks were thick back then—there’s since been a shift to softcover—but this one was …

Every time I start a Jenn Lyons book I’m immediately overwhelmed and intrigued, and every time I finish a Jenn Lyons book I’m overwhelmed and desperate for more. It’s a very particular delight that comes with books so long and dense that the multiple glossaries and references  at the end are not so much a …

When you deal with bad people, sometimes there are no good choices. And if you keep dealing with them, well, you might just find it’s no longer about bad choices, but the choice to be bad. To be monstrous. Monstrousness has always been the heart of this trilogy, and the question of what makes a …

In a reading rut? Wondering what to do with yourself as the heat fluctuates wildly and the pandemic presses on (in America, at least)? Here are eight very different books for this eighth month of this endless year. I enjoyed all of them, and I hope you’ll enjoy at least one, too. 1. The Wizard’s …

Kushiel’s Dart was published almost twenty years ago. In the decades since its release it has become a classic, spawning two sequels and half a dozen other books set in the world of Terre d’Ange. Full of the sinister, the sensual, the political, and the personal, Kushiel’s Dart centers on the remarkable story of Phèdre …

The Merciful Crow was one of my favorite debuts—favorite books, period—of 2019, and I’m overjoyed to find that the conclusion of Fie’s saga, The Faithless Hawk, is as original, emotional, dramatic, and insightful as her introduction. Fie has, against all odds, gotten Prince Jasimir and his bodyguard Tavin to safety. They are protected by an …