Tag: Fantasy Reads

Book Review, Fantasy, Fiction

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Mass ~ Book Review

Morgan

Genre: Fantasy
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

I have heard sooo many good things about the Throne of Glass series and despite my difficulty getting into fantasy, I’m so glad I picked it up. I think part of what was helpful for me is that there wasn’t an overwhelming amount of worldbuilding at the beginning. It was integrated really naturally throughout the story. 

Celaena is an assassin fighting for her freedom. She has been chosen to compete against twenty-three other people and if she wins, she will leave prison and become the king’s champion. Before too many of her competitors are disqualified, however, they begin to show up dead.

There were so many pieces to this book that made it really bingeable: a love triangle, the competition itself, the mystery of what was killing people, the glamor of the castle and royalty within it, and hints of magic. I found the competition maybe slightly less compelling than the rest of it, but I loved Celaena’s solo adventures through the castle she was staying in and seeing her relationships grow and change.

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Buy Throne of Glass at an indie bookstore near you
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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

Check out my bookstagram: @Treat.your.shelf
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