My very favorite Bossy January reads!
This month my favorite reads consisted of multiple fantasy reads, aka escapes from reality--one magical mystery on a ship, an adventure that toggled between layers of time and reality, and a couple of unlikely heroes' magnificent quests alongside wonderful supporting characters--as well as a romantic story that tackled weighty issues (my favorite kind), and a historical fiction story that made me buy into a body-snatching storyline.
If you've read any of these titles, I'd love to hear what you think!
And I'd also love to hear: what are some of your recent favorite reads?
01 Voyage of the Damned by Frances White
Frances White's debut is a locked-room mystery on a magical ship full of uncertain alliances, deadly vendettas, and a sassy and flamboyant main protagonist who just might become an unlikely hero and save the kingdom.
To honor Concordia's thousand years of peace between its twelve provinces, the emperor's ship sets out on a voyage to the sacred Goddess's Mountain. The twelve heirs of Concordia are aboard, each with a special magical power (a Blessing).
All except one, that is. Ganymedes Piscero is, as always, a general disappointment: a class clown lacking in magical ability. But he's determined to keep that fact secret.
Various characters aren't who they seem, sometimes impersonating others, which makes it difficult to identify what's occurring (and requires a lot of retroactive explanation), and the story's tension loses some of its power because it's so prolonged.
But the LGBTQ love is lovely. The friendship between Ganymedes and dark-humored 6-year-old Grasshopper is funny and sweet, and I loved his unexpected-hero emergence and his role as unlikely savior. A multi-phased surprise ending is satisfying.
For my full review of this book--and for links to my reviews of other fantasy books--please see Voyage of the Damned.
02 My Oxford Year by Julia Whelan
My Oxford Year takes a light, romantic tone and within it, explores weighty issues like serious illness, loss, grief, vulnerability, and offers a suitably complicated ending that doesn't wrap up life's messy loose ends in an unrealistically neat bow.
American Ella Durran has had a plan for her education and career sine she was 13: to study at Oxford.
Now she's 24, she's just as driven, and she's finally at Oxford.
In addition to branching out into studying literature across the pond, Ella has agreed to be an education policy consultant for a potential presidential candidate back home, which means she's on call at all hours. Her phone is always at hand, and if her bosses call, she drops everything to pick up and be a sounding board or a problem-solver.
Her propensity for remaining emotionally closed off free up a lot of time. She's never been in a serious relationship and has no interest in one--she doesn't have time for frivolity when she's chasing so many goals.
The happy ending that the tone of the novel seems to be assuring readers at the beginning morphs into a far more complex version of a resolved story by the end, with significant pain and yet glimmers of hope that transcend the immediate situation.
I loved the facing of mortality in the story--as well as the focus on literature and its power.
Click here for my full review of My Oxford Year.
03 The Resurrectionist by A. Rae Dunlap
Dunlap's debut novel explores early Edinburgh surgical schools, questionable methods of obtaining study subjects, a main protagonist's surprisingly believable entrée into body snatching, a forbidden love, and serial killers, and I was in for it all.
Dunlap's debut novel is dark, twisty, gothic, and it's set in 19th-century Scotland as fictionalized versions of real-life serial killers Burke and Hare are terrorizing Edinburgh.
James Willoughby is a naïve young medical student whose family fortunes have taken a negative turn, leaving him with a passion for studying medicine but no resources to pursue schooling. He becomes drawn into the underworld of body snatching when he seeks paid work to fund his studies--and begins to understand (and assist with) the process of obtaining cadavers for his surgery study. Ultimately, terrifyingly, his activities lead him to run into the cadaver-producing killers Burke and Hare.
Dunlap does a wonderful job of bringing a spooky, fascinating underworld of Edinburgh to life, while also exploring the burgeoning surgery and medical school experience, and, against all odds, building the somewhat-reasonable-feeling case for James's horror-turned-acceptance on the subject of mining graveyards for bodies to study.
I love Dunlap's writing and the way the author crafted this story. I'm definitely in for reading this author's future books!
Please click here for my full review of The Resurrectionist.
04 The Last Hour Between Worlds (Echo Archives #1) by Melissa Caruso
I may not have followed all of the echoes in time, creatures convincingly impersonating other creatures, or protagonists' complex, evolving motivations, but I adored the characters, their connection, their banter, and the amount of heart in the story.
Kembral Thorne, expert investigator, is on leave and bleary-eyed from single-parenting her newborn, and she's questioning why she agreed to come to a work New Year's Eve party in the first place.
But when people start dropping dead around her, she realizes that someone is plunging the party down through layers of reality, through echoes of time in which strange events loosely repeat themselves--and seem to be building in intensity. In fact, the whole world seems to be in terrible danger.
It looks like Kembral will have to work tonight after all--and, even worse, she'll need to cooperate with her nemesis Rika Nonesuch, the cat burglar, in order to try to save the world.
I love Caruso's writing style, her character-building, and the way the characters relate to each other. The hard-fought connection between Rika and Kembral (and the rich past that's revealed) had me swooning, and their banter is sometimes grumpy, hesitantly vulnerable, and often darkly funny. I predict that I'll be reading all of Caruso's other books as well.
I listened to The Last Hour Between Worlds as an audiobook.
For Bossy reviews of many other books that play with time--this is one of my favorite elements--you can check out the books and lists at this link.
05 Spellslinger (Spellslinger #1) by Sebastian de Castell
Kellen begins as a principled, headstrong young man lacking in the magic crucial for power, familial stability and social standing in his world. By the end of the book he is satisfyingly resolved, stronger, and accepting of his complicated fate.
“I’m a woman, kid. You probably haven’t met one before, coming as you do from this backward place, but it’s like a man only smarter and with bigger balls.”
Kellen is struggling in his mage's trials aimed at earning him a name among his privileged people, the Jan'Tep. And the struggle feels even worse because his younger sister is living up to the family's powerful name by demonstrating more powerful magic than any student in their school. But Kellen's magic hasn't come in--and he fears that it never will.
But as he uses his smarts, his unlikely allies, and his loyalty to get by, he finds himself discovering uncomfortable truths about his family and his community--and questioning everything he thought he knew.
I loved the characters' dynamics, the outsider Ferius Pargosi who becomes a mentor and deeply loyal friend, the quest, the uprising of the downtrodden, and the setup to book two, Shadowblack, which I definitely want to read.
I also appreciated witnessing Kellen's tough road to self-acceptance--particularly in light of his discovery that his parents have hidden, tamped down, and diminished his particular type of magic, deeming it destructive to Kellen and to the family's status. I can't wait to see him come into his own in book two.
For my full review please check out Spellslinger.
06 Blood of the Old Kings (Bleeding Empire #1) by Sung-Il Kim
In this first installment of The Bleeding Empire, Kim sets three characters on paths to discover their worth, their purpose, and their power. When the protagonists' journeys intersect, the story ramps up in intensity and in epic scope.
In Blood of the Old Kings, dead sorcerers power the empire, which has long been run on a system of necromancy and sacrifice.
Arienne knew since she was a young girl that because she was born with magic, her future would end with her locked in chains in a casket, an essential, dark end used to benefit others by generating immense power.
But when a long-dead sorcerer takes the shape of a voice in her head and pushes her to question the rules she's always lived by, Arienne dares to dream of defying her fate.
Cain is savvy, street-smart, and living in the capital. When his best friend goes missing, he'll do anything to find out what's happened to her.
Loran is a brokenhearted widow and a skilled swordswoman willing to make deep sacrifices to ally with the fated, powerful, dangerous dragon who might empower her and save them all.
This three-character-driven plot sets the scene by exploring the unrest within the empire, the desperate struggles of its people; and the dark intents of those ruling it all.
Each of the three main protagonists begin to understand their own power--and when their paths intersect, they realize that together, they are more formidable than they could have ever imagined.
For my full review, please see The Blood of the Old Kings.
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