Tag: Fantasy

Book Review, Fantasy

Bride by Ali Hazelwood ~ Book Review

Morgan

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Genre: Romantasy

I had fun with this book. I’m not a huge fantasy reader, but a vampire/werewolf romance seemed pretty palatable (despite the choice to spell both creatures in a random different way). Misery Lark, a Vampyre, agrees to a marriage of convenience to the Alpha Were, Lowe. Misery, however, has an ulterior motive to her agreement and is really on a quest to discover what happened to her best friend.

The intricacies behind how the Were/Vampyre worlds and politics came to be did not particularly interest me, but I liked that there was a mystery that was central to the plot. This made the story feel like a little more than a fluffy romance. I found that I wanted to know what was going on that had led to the disappearance and I was looking for clues along the way.

The romance between Lowe and Misery was a slow burn and I enjoyed watching it unfold. The somewhat forbidden nature of it made it especially fun. The details about Were anatomy were…less fun. Honestly it really took me out of the scenes that were supposed to be steamy.

Overall I liked this more than I expected to. I liked both main characters and found the plot intriguing. 

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Bride on Goodreads

Book Review, Fantasy, Fiction

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett ~ Book Review

Morgan

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Genre: (Cozy) Fantasy

Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries was suchhh a cozy read. Emily, a professor, goes on an expedition to a small village to study the faerie folklore there. Emily is not a people-person and has a little trouble interpreting what other people’s actions mean. This element of her personality was really refreshing to see illustrated and it helped a lot with understanding her character. What Emily is good at is research into faeries. She has a wealth of knowledge about them and when her academic rival, Wendell Bambleby, shows up to disrupt her work she is not pleased.

I really enjoyed the setting of the little village of Hrafnsvik and the cast of characters who lived there. To be honest, I’m a few weeks out from finishing this book and I can’t say any of them particularly still stand out to me, but the close-knit community feel was there and I really appreciated it.

I don’t feel like all that much really happened in this book and, as is often the case for me and fantasy, I struggled to wrap my head totally around the world the story existed in. I enjoyed the general plot, but kind of skimmed a lot of the magical lore. I had a nice time with this book, but that was about the extent of the impact it had on me.

Check out my bookstagram: @Treat.your.shelf
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries on Goodreads
Buy Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries at an indie bookstore near you

Book Review, Fantasy, Fiction

When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill ~ Book Review

Morgan

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Genre: Fantasy

When Woman Were Dragons is set in almost our world, but not quite. The Mass Dragoning of 1955 saw thousands of women spontaneously turn into dragons, but it’s not spoken about anymore. Even Alex’s aunt, who has since transformed herself is no longer spoken of.

The concept behind this book and the way that society responded was fascinating and applicable to real life. The repression of women and conversations about their experiences was blown up to dragon-scale, but was still relatable. That said, it was someone one-dimensional and repetitive.

Alex finds herself raising her younger cousin, Bea, who she has been trained to introduce as her sister so as not to reference the aunt that became a dragon. Bea, however, is preoccupied with dragons, which consistently gets her in trouble. Alex must navigate empathy for her cousin with the expectations of society. Alex’s circumstances made her a compelling main character. She was forced to grow up so quickly and come to her own conclusions about the world around her.

The situations that Alex and Bea dealt with began to feel somewhat repetitive to me after a while and often didn’t seem to move the plot forward. In contrast, a lottt happened at the end of the book that I think could have been slowed down and explored more fully. This lack of balance kept me from fully loving this book

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Buy When Women Were Dragons at an indie bookstore near you
When Women Were Dragons on Goodreads

Book Review, Fantasy, Fiction

Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune ~ Book Review

Morgan

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Genre: Fantasy

Wallace lived to work. He was seen as ruthless by all those around him and kept most everyone at arm’s length. When he finds himself at Charon’s Crossing, a tea shop owned by Hugo who informs Wallace that he’s dead, Wallace begins to question whether he ever really lived.

Conceptually, I loved the idea of this magical tea shop and the cast of characters who owned it ferrying ghosts to the afterlife on the side. It was charming and whimsical and I enjoyed seeing them interact with customers and explain how things worked to Wallace.

I found there to be a lot of characters to keep track of, and to me things seemed a little jumpy. Wallace suddenly becomes a better person, a romance pops up out of nowhere, the rules of their universe change. These big moments didn’t feel believable to me because they happened seemingly without build-up. 

This was a sweet book, but it was kind of slow and I didn’t take too much away from it besides a contented warm fuzzy feeling.

Check out my bookstagram: @Treat.your.shelf
Buy Under the Whispering Door at an indie bookstore near you
Under the Whispering Door on Goodreads