Genre: Fantasy

Recent Reads | Alchemy of Secrets and All of Us Murderers

Posted December 29, 2025 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 1 Comment

Apparently I just have unpopular opinions about Stephanie Garber’s books, and in this case I’m happy about that! I loved the Caraval trilogy and preferred it overall to Once Upon a Broken Heart, unlike most people. I was a little nervous going into this book because so many Garber stans thought it was generally kind of mid or gave it 3-3.5 stars. I’m happy to report that I actually loved this one. The story is set in our world (urban fantasy vibes) but super magical. The main character, Holland, took a folklore class by a mysterious professor where she learned about urban myths and local legends. She’s always been convinced that magic is real while many others in the class think it’s just fiction. Holland soon realizes that her instincts were right and the myths are real. She needs to find the mythical Alchemical Heart by the end of the following day or she dies. It was really fun to get pulled into the magic of Los Angeles with Holland and her companions. The story is INCREDIBLY fast-past for a fantasy book and I loved that. My attention was rapt the entire time, with the characters uncovering more as they traveled around the city. The reason this isn’t five stars is because the fast pace did lead to a lack of character development (or development in general in some places). The book is short at 324 pages and could have benefited from 25-50 more to flesh out a few more […]

Holiday Reviews | Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon and The Christmas Keepsake

Posted December 15, 2025 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

Story I was not expecting a five-star Christmas book because unfortunately it’s very rare for me, but I just adored this. The story follows Grace and Henry, two widows (widowers?) who are still freshly grieving losing their spouses but their moms push them together for a little meet cute. They become friends first and bond over holiday movies. Grace has two kids, owns a bar, and recently adopted a crazy puppy. Henry is alone, avoiding the house he owned with his late wife, and on hiatus from work. Wintery Setting & Holiday Feels Grace and Henry have various conversations by phone or in-person watching holiday movies and analyzing them. There are different sections in the books with Christmas movie names so the reader has an idea of what they’ll be discussing or what references will be made, but that was really the most Christmassy part of the movie. It was technically a part of the plot but I certainly wanted more from it. The other “issue” with the holiday feels is that this is a book heavily focused on grief – both the expected deaths from illness and the unexpected deaths from an accident/tragedy. It made for a VERY heavy read at times, which you all know is not my preference… especially for a festive book. Overall As you can tell, I adored this book. I loved Grace and Henry so much – their banter and slow-burn relationship as they realized it was okay to move forward with their lives […]

Recent Reads | Brigands & Breadknives, Mate, and The Academy

Posted November 20, 2025 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

I’m a huge fan of this series and Travis Baldree’s cozy fantasy writing style. I struggle with the world building and magic systems often in fantasy books, so cozy fantasy has been a great way for me to read fantasy without getting overwhelmed. So far, all of the books have been amazing. Unfortunately this one just did not hit as much as the others. I didn’t mind the fact that it had more action vs. the cozy mundane but somehow it didn’t hold my attention at all. There were too many characters and repetitive scenes along the journey that I didn’t follow. It may have been my fault because I read it at night before bed on my Kindle and would always fall asleep in the middle of a page. It took me so long to read because I was making the slowest progress ever, plus the book itself wasn’t holding my attention. I think part of the appeal for these (for me) is the audiobook, so reading an early copy maybe wasn’t the right move. I don’t know if that would have affected my enjoyment but it’s worth noting for myself in the future. I’d definitely continue to read more in this series! For my immediate reaction on socials, I debated copy/pasting my review of BRIDE as my review for MATE because I generally felt the exact same, except I liked this a little more somehow? It took me 200 pages instead of 100 to get into this. The […]

Recent Reads | Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales and The Business Trip

Posted May 7, 2025 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

Unfortunately I don’t know if this was a victim of my reading slump or if I just didn’t love it as much as the other two, but it took me a LONG time to read this. I started in early March right after it came out and ended up putting it on hold for nearly a month while I finished up some other things. I began it again in earnest in early April and didn’t finish until the last day of the month, when I was DETERMINED to get it done. I think if I had just sat down and actually read it I would have enjoyed it more. In my brain this is still a five-star series if that counts for anything. The story follows Emily and Wendell as they try to fix the curse on his kingdom. I love the two of them plus Shadow and other characters. The pacing of the story was a little off and felt like staccato events happening on and off with some fluff in between. I never felt the real danger or adventure that I felt in the other two books. I can see this being the final installment but am also a little disappointed by the ending if it actually IS the last book. This series is the epitome of cozy fantasy with a litttttle more action. I was debating what thriller to read when I remembered a friend told me how addicting this one was, and I really needed something to […]

Recent Reads | Onyx Storm and Beautiful Ugly

Posted February 6, 2025 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments

If you thought IRON FLAME was a slog to get through with all of the filler and unnecessary fighting, allow me to introduce you to ONYX STORM! Also a slog with even more filler and (at least) less fighting. This book would be boring for 100 pages and then offer 50 pages of intrigue and then keep repeating until the end of the book. I’m starting to question the sanity of myself and others who continue to read the series – I genuinely don’t get it. FOURTH WING was a comparatively fun ride, especially for those nostalgic for old school YA fantasy, aged up into romantasy with sex scenes. I still didn’t really understand the five star reviews of that book because of the horrible, repetitive romance and writing style but at least I could understand why the experience was fun for folks. This book and its predecessor brought to the table a whole lot of nothing except for at the very end. And this one doesn’t have me itching to pick up the next book like IRON FLAME did. I’m wondering if this is where me and my FOMO part ways with this series… We’ll see how I feel when the next one comes out but as of now I’m mostly frustrated and confused. I’m gonna go read some theories because this book pretty much answered nothing that was brought up in the previous two books. If it’s true that this was originally a trilogy and got pushed to […]

Holiday Reviews: I’ll Be Gone for Christmas and Spectacular

Posted December 11, 2024 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

Story I’m a sucker for THE HOLIDAY and any book that promises that kind of “holiday house swap” will certainly make it on my TBR. I went and requested a bunch of Christmas books a few weeks ago and this was the first one that came in on Libby, so I ended up making it my first holiday book of the year! Clover and her ex-fiance, Knox, are still living on the same property, working the family farm after her mom passes away. Bee is living in San Francisco and looking to escape her twin sister, Beth, after she made some mistakes with their shared company. Luckily Bee’s friend invented a house swap app and the two gals end up leaving their lives behind for the holiday season. The book saw Clover start to fall for Bee’s sister and Bee begin to fall for Knox – as expected. The story itself was absolutely a cute, drama-free, slow burn romance with practically zero spice. It certainly is a more diverse version of THE HOLIDAY and exactly what I wanted in that regard. There were a lot of character names for no real reason (one of them was named Dee and another was Bee, which should be illegal) and I got a little confused when trying to keep two plotlines straight. Wintery Setting & Holiday Feels The premise of following a holiday season in the city along with one in a “Christmas-obsessed” small town in Ohio sounded like the best of both […]

Crescent City Series Review

Posted March 6, 2024 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

I knew this series was a bit different than her usual books. I haven’t read a ton of urban fantasy before and the concept feels a little foreign to me! I wasn’t sure what to expect and kept putting these books off. All in all, I’m glad I waited – I found myself in a little group of people who were mostly rereading the first two in order to prepare for the third book’s release. I managed to fit both in and finished HOSAB on the same morning HOFAS released. I’m writing these reviews a bit late so details are fuzzy and reviews may be brief for the first two, but here we go! SJM baby girl this book did not need to be this long. That’s my only qualm. I really kind of loved this otherwise. It definitely took some getting used to with the cell phones and email addresses mixed in with fae and angels and witches. Absolutely nothing wrong with the genre but it’s so weird to see it from Maas! I liked Bryce as a character even though she wasn’t written to be a super likeable MC. She was stubborn and made some dumb decisions but it was cool to see her evolve and understand why she acted certain ways. I liked the friend group, including Hunt, that started to develop in this book. I also really enjoyed that there was kind of a mystery at the center – it was more interesting to learn about […]

Review: Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands

Posted January 24, 2024 / Book Reviews / 1 Comment

It’s no secret that the first EMILY WILDE book was my favorite of 2023. I had high hopes and expectations that the same could be said about the second installment. Luckily, I ended up loving it! It took me a while to read but that’s because I ended up waiting for release week to mix in the audiobook I had preordered. I really enjoyed the first audiobook so it only felt right to keep that going! We follow Brambleby, Emily, her niece, and one of the other professors at their university in the Austrian Alps. She’s working on a map book this time and they hope to track down a lost professor of dryadology while they’re there. This story was just as whimsical and cozy as the first, with a dash of intrigue and danger where appropriate! I like that Emily has become more self-aware and able to recognize when she’s struggling to related to other people. The first book took a while for her to understand how to avoid insulting the locals. Emily was aware when she was messing things up with her niece and tried her best to fix them. We got to learn more about Brambleby’s world, which was a lot of fun. There were lots of faeries to meet and discuss along the way too. I know I’ve said this before but I was obsessed with faeries as a kid. Not the ACOTAR type but these small sprites and little mischievous ones. I don’t think this type […]

Review Roundup | The Maid, Bookshops and Bonedust, and Twilight Falls

Posted November 30, 2023 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

THE MAID is a book that I’ve debated reading for a while. I wasn’t sure if it would be for me but I ended up snagging a cute little paperback copy and staring at it on my shelves for a long time. I wasn’t sure what to read earlier this month and it was calling to me, so I picked it up. I won’t lie, it took me a while to get into. I wasn’t sure if I could get into Molly’s head. That ended up not being the issue but I’ll get to my thoughts in a second. This story follows Molly the maid, who stumbles upon the dead body of a frequent guest at the hotel she works at. She ends up getting mixed up in everything (a few crimes) without even knowing what’s going on. She struggles with social situations and appears to be neurodivergent (not given a name on page and everyone else seems to think she’s just quirky or “bad” at reading social cues). The book was hard to read for me in the first half. It just felt like she was getting taken advantage of over and over again by bad people, and I was really upset reading it. I don’t pick up books where people like this are being taken advantage of or bullied because honestly it’s one of those things that just hits me too hard. I contemplated DNFing multiple times because it was simply hard to read and I wasn’t sure […]

Review: Iron Flame

Posted November 13, 2023 / Book Reviews / 1 Comment

Usually I do review round-ups at this point in my blogging life but because this book took me longer to read and I assumed I’d have more to say about it, I thought I would do an old-fashioned single book review here. It’s no secret that I did not love FOURTH WING as much as everyone else did. I ended up rating it higher than it probably deserved at 3.5 stars because of how addicting it was and how intriguing the ending was as well. I was curious to read IRON FLAME for sure and even preordered a copy to partake in the nonsense of release week with everyone else. I didn’t like the cringe-worthy romance and cheesy writing of the first book. I really thought it was like a mash-up of every fantasy book written before. I can totally see why people read it and got similar nostalgic vibes of some early YA paranormal/fantasy books, but that didn’t make it a five-star read for me. The…interesting…writing was still very much present in this book. The conversations sounded so weird sometimes and language felt out of place. For example, she says at one point that her heart is beating like a hummingbird’s wings (or something like that). Are there hummingbirds in this world somehow? Just out there flying around with the dragons? Are there dogs and other normal animals too? The world-building here is so weird! Another moment that stuck out was when her and Rhiannon were chatting before class […]