I’d never read any books from either of these bestselling authors before I picked up Spells Trouble, but I really love the idea of a mother-daughter duo writing urban fantasies featuring teenage twin sisters who are witches descended from those persecuted at the infamous Salem witch trials. Hunter and Mercy Goode are on the cusp …
Category: Fantasy
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/28/spells-trouble-sisters-of-salem-1-by-p-c-cast-kristin-cast/
May 24 2021
The Lights Of Prague by Nicole Jarvis
How to make the now well-worn trope of vampires and monster hunters feel fresh and new again? Set the proceedings in historic Prague, with a firm eye on local history and mythology free of the influence of the too-standard figures of modern, Western-European-leaning pop culture, while also infusing a 21st-century sensibility to the proceedings. We …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/24/the-lights-of-prague-by-nicole-jarvis/
May 20 2021
Sage And King by Molly Ringle
This might be the first fantasy romance novel where not only did I not want to gouge out the eyes of the protagonists at any point in the proceedings, I was actively rooting for their happiness because I respected every single one of their decisions. Prince Zaya, third in line to the throne of Lushrain, …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/20/sage-and-king-by-molly-ringle/
May 17 2021
A Master Of Djinn (Dead Djinn Universe #1) by P. Djèlí Clark
P Djèlí Clark wrote two novellas set in this universe before A Master Of Djinn, and I think that if you preferred A Dead Djinn In Cairo to The Haunting Of Tram Car 015 then you’ll definitely enjoy this one too. Like the prior novellas, his first full-length book is about mystical goings-on in an …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/17/a-master-of-djinn-dead-djinn-universe-1-by-p-djeli-clark/
May 11 2021
Black Water Sister by Zen Cho
It’s weird feeling like I’m perfectly suited to review this book as a diaspora Malaysian but also feeling inadequate to review this book for that very same reason. The experience of reading Black Water Sister was like stepping back into old, comfy clothes and wandering around my hometown, but a small part of me was …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/11/black-water-sister-by-zen-cho/
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/05/03/odyssey-of-the-dragonlords-players-guide-by-james-ohlen-jesse-sky-drew-karpyshyn/
Apr 30 2021
The Beautiful Ones by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
I’m gonna preface this by saying that I’m sure there are tons of readers who love this book, who just adore this Belle Epoque-inspired fantasy romance novel. And I’m glad for readers who find joy and comfort in its pages. But if you, like me, find shitty historical romance tropes utterly tiresome to the point …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/04/30/the-beautiful-ones-by-silvia-moreno-garcia/
Apr 24 2021
The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix
Wasn’t this fun! Susan Arkshaw has grown up in a rural corner of southwestern England, with an absent father and a very absent-minded artist mother. Two minutes before The Left-Handed Booksellers of London opens — on May 1, 1983 — Susan turns 18. She’s also just had one of her recurring dreams, full of giant …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/04/24/the-left-handed-booksellers-of-london-by-garth-nix/
Apr 16 2021
Malice by Heather Walter
This book was such a struggle to get through, and I might not have done it if I hadn’t been grimly determined to see how Heather Walter made good on the terrific premise of Sleeping Beauty’s true love actually being the dark fairy who cursed her. In the land of Briar, bordering on the fae …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/04/16/malice-by-heather-walter/
Apr 09 2021
An Interview with Oliver K. Langmead, author of Birds Of Paradise
Q. Every book has its own story about how it came to be conceived and written as it did. Birds Of Paradise had a particularly long gestation, as you note in your afterword. How did this novel evolve? A. In the end, it took me more than a decade to finish writing Birds of Paradise. …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/04/09/an-interview-with-oliver-k-langmead-author-of-birds-of-paradise/