Well, no one can say that I’m not making good headway on my reading goals in 2024! I’ve read a lot – and continue to do so. As always, there are a certain amount of spoilers, but I’ve only included those which I feel are necessary.
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A Court of Wings and Ruin (ACOTAR #3)
“Feyre has returned to the Spring Court, determined to gather information on Tamlin’s actions and learn what she can about the invading king threatening to bring her land to its knees. But to do so she must play a deadly game of deceit. One slip could bring doom not only for Feyre, but for everything-and everyone-she holds dear. As war bears down upon them all, Feyre endeavors to take her place amongst the High Fae of the land, balancing her struggle to master her powers-both magical and political-and her love for her court and family. Amidst these struggles, Feyre and Rhysand must decide whom to trust amongst the cunning and lethal High Lords, and hunt for allies in unexpected places” (x)
I really enjoyed this book, as I did the previous books in the series. What’s fun about this one, though, is that Feyre has more power than she has thus far. She is on a secret mission while she is secretly High Lady of the Night Court and she is full of power and knows how to use it.
Every book in this series is better than the last, and you should absolutely read them.
Read my review of the first two books in the series in this post.
Content warnings include: war, violence, sexual content, and death.
Red, White, & Royal Blue
“When his mother became President, Alex Claremont-Diaz was promptly cast as the American equivalent of a young royal. Handsome, charismatic, genius―his image is pure millennial-marketing gold for the White House. There’s only one problem: Alex has a beef with the actual prince, Henry, across the pond. And when the tabloids get hold of a photo involving an Alex-Henry altercation, U.S./British relations take a turn for the worse. Heads of family, state, and other handlers devise a plan for damage control: staging a truce between the two rivals. What at first begins as a fake, Instragramable friendship grows deeper, and more dangerous, than either Alex or Henry could have imagined. Soon Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret romance with a surprisingly unstuffy Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations and begs the question: Can love save the world after all? Where do we find the courage, and the power, to be the people we are meant to be? And how can we learn to let our true colors shine through? Casey McQuiston’s Red, White & Royal Blue proves: true love isn’t always diplomatic” (x).
So this is a book that I read after I watched the movie. My former roommate is obsessed with this book, so I watched the movie – which is SO cute, by the way. I loved it so much that I decided to read the book. And I am glad that I watched the movie first because, while I did love it, it is fairly different from the book.
Content warnings include: outing, sexual content, homophobia, death of a parent, sexual assault, drug abuse, and racism.
20+ of the Best History Novels
Homecoming
“Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959: At the end of a scorching hot day, beside a creek on the grounds of a grand country house, a local man makes a terrible discovery. Police are called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most baffling murder investigations in the history of South Australia. Many years later and thousands of miles away, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. Having lived and worked in London for two decades, she now finds herself unemployed and struggling to make ends meet. A phone call out of nowhere summons her back to Sydney, where her beloved grandmother Nora, who raised Jess when her mother could not, has suffered a fall and is seriously ill in the hospital. At Nora’s house, Jess discovers a true crime book chronicling a long-buried police case: the Turner Family Tragedy of 1959. It is only when Jess skims through its pages that she finds a shocking connection between her own family and this notorious event—a mystery that has never been satisfactorily resolved” (x).
Wow wow wow. This book made me realize that I need to read more books by Kate Morton!
This book goes between 1959 and early 1960 and the modern time. It is a book about familial love, romantic love, and crime. It’s also about how the true crime industry impacts real families, and how family secrets impact people.
Content warnings include: child death, murder, death, miscarriage, pregnancy, infidelity, and animal death.
Miss Austen
“England, 1840. Two decades after the death of her beloved sister, Jane, Cassandra Austen returns to the village of Kintbury and the home of her family friends, the Fowles. In a dusty corner of the vicarage, there is a cache of Jane’s letters that Cassandra is desperate to find. Dodging her hostess and a meddlesome housemaid, Cassandra eventually hunts down the letters and confronts the secrets they hold, secrets not only about Jane but about Cassandra herself. Will Cassandra bare the most private details of her life to the world, or commit her sister’s legacy to the flames?” (x)
As an Austen lover, I loved this book! Cassandra Austen is such a fascinating person; obviously she is the lesser-known Austen sister, but her work enabled Jane’s work to be as well-known as it is. The biggest thing she did, though, was burn so many of Jane’s letters, both to her and to others that they loved. We don’t know what exactly was in those letters, but we do know that Cassandra felt that what was in them was a danger to her sister’s legacy.
This book looks at what Jane Austen’s life was like, and it postulates what was in her letters. It also looks at what Cassandra was like, as she is just as important as her sister.
That being said, while I enjoyed this book, if you don’t like historical fiction and Jane Austen, you won’t enjoy this book.
Content warnings include: grief, death, and death of parent.
17 Classic Novels Worth Reading
The Kingmaker’s Daughter (The Cousin’s War #4)
“The Kingmaker’s Daughter—Philippa Gregory’s first sister story since The Other Boleyn Girl—is the gripping tale of the daughters of the man known as the Kingmaker, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick: the most powerful magnate in fifteenth-century England. Without a son and heir, he uses his daughters, Anne and Isabel, as pawns in his political games, and they grow up to be influential players in their own right. At the court of Edward IV and his beautiful queen, Elizabeth Woodville, Anne grows from a delightful child to become ever more fearful and desperate when her father makes war on his former friends. Married at age fourteen, she is soon left widowed and fatherless, her mother in sanctuary and her sister married to the enemy. Anne manages her own escape by marrying Richard, Duke of Gloucester, but her choice will set her on a collision course with the overwhelming power of the royal family” (x).
It’s no secret that I like Philippa Gregory and that I’m a nerd for English history before 1700. And I’ve read … a gigantic number of novels about the War of the Roses. Which is why I read this, and I’m so glad I did. I have never read a version of Anne like the one in this book, which surprised me in a good way.
I’ve read many of Philippa Gregory’s books in this series, and you can check out my review of some of them here: The Last Tudor; The White Queen; Three Sisters, Three Queens; and The Red Queen.
Content warnings include: animal death, child death, death, pregnancy, incest, infidelity, sexual assault, miscarriage, and suicidal thoughts.
2023 Recent Reads: January-March
A Court of Frost and Starlight (ACOTAR #3.5)
“Feyre, Rhysand, and their friends are still busy rebuilding the Night Court and the vastly altered world beyond, recovering from the war that changed everything. But Winter Solstice is finally approaching, and with it, the joy of a hard-earned reprieve. Yet even the festive atmosphere can’t keep the shadows of the past from looming. As Feyre navigates her first Winter Solstice as High Lady, her concern for those dearest to her deepens. They have more wounds than she anticipated-scars that will have a far-reaching impact on the future of their court” (x).
This is a fantastic book that is perfect for transitioning between Feyre’s saga and the other books, which feature her but are centered around other characters. Feyre and Rhysand can mentally recover from the events in the previous books, and we can get a view of the beginnings of the story in the next book.
Content warnings include: sexual content, alcohol, alcoholism, grief, death, war, pregnancy, biphobia, and body horror.
The Best Audiobooks I’ve Listened To
A Court of Silver Flames (ACOTAR #4)
“Nesta Archeron has always been prickly-proud, swift to anger, and slow to forgive. And ever since being forced into the Cauldron and becoming High Fae against her will, she’s struggled to find a place for herself within the strange, deadly world she inhabits. Worse, she can’t seem to move past the horrors of the war with Hybern and all she lost in it. The one person who ignites her temper more than any other is Cassian, the battle-scarred warrior whose position in Rhysand and Feyre’s Night Court keeps him constantly in Nesta’s orbit. But her temper isn’t the only thing Cassian ignites. The fire between them is undeniable, and only burns hotter as they are forced into close quarters with each other. Meanwhile, the treacherous human queens who returned to the Continent during the last war have forged a dangerous new alliance, threatening the fragile peace that has settled over the realms. And the key to halting them might very well rely on Cassian and Nesta facing their haunting pasts” (x).
One of the things I love about Sarah J. Maas is she does one of my favorite things: continues creating books in her world but lets the key couple live their happily ever after. Feyre and Rhysand are here and their lives impact things, but this book is about Nesta and Cassian. It’s also about PTSD and war. I don’t want to spoil too much so I’ll stop there, but it is definitely (so far) my favorite ACOTAR book.
Content warnings include: sexual content, violence, rape, sexual assault, alcoholism, and pregnancy.
2022 Recent Reads: October-December
The Orphan of Cemetery Hill
“Boston, 1844. Tabby has a peculiar gift: she can communicate with the recently departed. It makes her special, but it also makes her dangerous. As an orphaned child, she fled with her sister, Alice, from their charlatan aunt Bellefonte, who wanted only to exploit Tabby’s gift so she could profit from the recent craze for seances. Now a young woman and tragically separated from Alice, Tabby works with her adopted father, Eli, the kind caretaker of a large Boston cemetery. When a series of macabre grave robberies begins to plague the city, Tabby is ensnared in a deadly plot by the perpetrators, known only as the “Resurrection Men.” In the end, Tabby’s gift will either save both her and the cemetery—or bring about her own destruction” (x).
This is such an interesting book. Hester Fox does such a great job of combining historical fiction with fantasy aspects, especially ghosts and witches. I really enjoyed it!
I’ve previously read and reviewed The Witch of Willow Hall, which you can check out here.
Content warnings include: death, medical trauma, murder, emotional abuse, racism, slavery, war, suicidal thoughts, injury/Injury detail.
19 Retellings of Classic Fiction You Need To Read
A Lullaby for Witches
“Two women. A history of witchcraft. And a deep-rooted female power that sings across the centuries. Once there was a young woman from a well-to-do New England family who never quite fit with the drawing rooms and parlors of her kin. Called instead to the tangled woods and wild cliffs surrounding her family’s estate, Margaret Harlowe grew both stranger and more beautiful as she cultivated her uncanny power. Soon, whispers of “witch” dogged her footsteps, and Margaret’s power began to wind itself with the tendrils of something darker. One hundred and fifty years later, Augusta Podos takes a dream job at Harlowe House, the historic home of a wealthy New England family that has been turned into a small museum in Tynemouth, Massachusetts. When Augusta stumbles across an oblique reference to a daughter of the Harlowes who has nearly been expunged from the historical record, the mystery is too intriguing to ignore. But as she digs deeper, something sinister unfurls from its sleep, a dark power that binds one woman to the other across lines of blood and time. If Augusta can’t resist its allure, everything she knows and loves—including her very life—could be lost forever” (x).
After reading The Orphan of Cemetary Hill, I decided to read this one. This is different from the other Hester Fox books I’ve read in that it goes between the past and the present, and the story consistently relies on both parts. Definitely beware the content warnings on this one, though!
Content warnings include: murder, death, domestic abuse, eating disorder, pregnancy, emotional abuse, death of parent, drug abuse, and drug use.
2022 Recent Reads: July-September
Pretty Girls
“Sisters. Strangers. Survivors. More than twenty years ago, Claire and Lydia’s teenaged sister Julia vanished without a trace. The two women have not spoken since, and now their lives could not be more different. Claire is the glamorous trophy wife of an Atlanta millionaire. Lydia, a single mother, dates an ex-con and struggles to make ends meet. But neither has recovered from the horror and heartbreak of their shared loss—a devastating wound that’s cruelly ripped open when Claire’s husband is killed. The disappearance of a teenage girl and the murder of a middle-aged man, almost a quarter-century apart: What could connect them? Forming a wary truce, the surviving sisters look to the past to find the truth, unearthing the secrets that destroyed their family all those years ago … and uncovering the possibility of redemption, and revenge, where they least expect it” (x).
Whooo body. This book is easily the most graphic book I have ever read in my life. Be VERY careful before reading this book; I could barely handle it. And it’s not graphic sexually; it’s violence. Don’t get me wrong – it’s incredible – but it is so outrageously graphic.
Other than that, I can’t say much because it will spoil it, but keep in mine my warning.
Content warnings include: rape, murder, and torture.
Advice Books To Read (That Aren’t Cheesy!)
House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
“Bryce Quinlan had the perfect life-working hard all day and partying all night – until a demon murdered her closest friends, leaving her bereft, wounded, and alone. When the accused is behind bars but the crimes start up again, Bryce finds herself at the heart of the investigation. She’ll do whatever it takes to avenge their deaths. Hunt Athalar is a notorious Fallen angel, now enslaved to the Archangels he once attempted to overthrow. His brutal skills and incredible strength have been set to one purpose – to assassinate his boss’ enemies, no questions asked. But with a demon wreaking havoc in the city, he’s offered an irresistible deal: help Bryce find the murderer, and his freedom will be within reach. As Bryce and Hunt dig deep into Crescent City’s underbelly, they discover a dark power that threatens everything and everyone they hold dear, and they find, in each other, a blazing passion – one that could set them both free, if they’d only let it” (x).
Obviously after I finished the ACOTAR series I had to check out Crescent City! What’s different from ACOTAR is that it’s set in a modern magical setting; there’s social media and phones and colleges and sports, etc. Another difference is that there are a whole bunch of magical non-human species and not just fae.
It’s hard to tell right now when it’s so fresh, but I think I prefer Crescent City to ACOTAR.
Content warnings include: death, violence, murder, slavery, drug use, sexual content, and suicidal thoughts.
House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
“Bryce Quinlan and Hunt Athalar are trying to get back to normal-they may have saved Crescent City, but with so much upheaval in their lives lately, they mostly want a chance to relax. Slow down. Figure out what the future holds. The Asteri have kept their word so far, leaving Bryce and Hunt alone. But with the rebels chipping away at the Asteri’s power, the threat the rulers pose is growing. As Bryce, Hunt, and their friends get pulled into the rebels’ plans, the choice becomes clear: stay silent while others are oppressed, or fight for what’s right. And they’ve never been very good at staying silent” (x).
Again, I really enjoyed the Crescent City series! This book is super interesting because, like its order in the series, it’s right in the middle: Hunt is no longer a slave but is not an exile/on the run, Bryce is acknowledged as her father’s daughter but is also not an exile/on the run, the battles are not the start but not the end of a new-ish war, etc.
I won’t give more away because that’s already kind of spoil-y!
Content warnings include: sexual content, violence, death, torture, slavery, and war.
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House of Odysseus (Songs of Penelope #2)
“On the isle of Ithaca, Queen Penelope maintains a delicate balance of power. Many years ago, her husband, Odysseus, sailed to war with Troy and never came home. In his absence, Penelope uses all her cunning to keep the peace—a peace that is shattered by the return of Orestes, king of Mycenae, and his sister Elektra. Orestes’s hands are stained with his mother’s blood. Not so long ago, the son of Agamemnon took Queen Clytemnestra’s life on Ithaca’s sands. Now, racked with guilt, he is slowly losing his mind. Penelope knows destruction will follow in his wake as surely as the Furies circle him. His uncle, Menelaus, the battle-hungry king of Sparta, longs for Orestes’s throne—and if he can seize it, no one will be safe from his violent whims. Trapped between two mad kings, Penelope fights to keep war from Ithaca’s shores. Her only allies are Elektra and the distant Helen of Troy, Menelaus’s enigmatic wife. And watching over them all is the goddess Aphrodite, who has plans of her own” (x).
I actually didn’t realize that this was one book in a series until I started writing this post, so you definitely don’t need to read the previous book, although knowledge of Greek myths and what happens in the Illiad or the Odyssey definitely helps.
I read this because I am – as anyone who has read my Recent Reads posts knows – a huge nerd and I’m so interested in what happened in the 10 years between when the Trojan War ended and Odysseus returned home.
One of the things that makes this book super interesting is the fact that the narrator is Aphrodite who knows (almost) everything. Something else is that it really shows the ways women ran things in a world where men thought they ran things.
Want to see my reviews of similar books? Check out my review of Circe here and The Song of Achilles here.
House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City #3)
“Bryce Quinlan never expected to see a world other than Midgard, but now that she has, all she wants is to get back. Everything she loves is in Midgard: her family, her friends, her mate. Stranded in a strange new world, she’s going to need all her wits about her to get home again. And that’s no easy feat when she has no idea who to trust. Hunt Athalar has found himself in some deep holes in his life, but this one might be the deepest of all. After a few brief months with everything he ever wanted, he’s in the Asteri’s dungeons again, stripped of his freedom and without a clue as to Bryce’s fate. He’s desperate to help her, but until he can escape the Asteri’s leash, his hands are quite literally tied” (x).
Ahh this book was so good! It was such a good wrap-up of the series. There will probably be another book or two in the series, but I hope it’s like ACOTAR in that future books are in the same world but focusing on different characters.
Content warnings include: torture, violence, war, sexual content, and slavery.
2021 Recent Reads: October-December
Clytemnestra
“You were born to a king, but you marry a tyrant. You stand by helplessly as he sacrifices your child to placate the gods. You watch him wage war on a foreign shore, and you comfort yourself with violent thoughts of your own. Because this was not the first offence against you. This was not the life you ever deserved. And this will not be your undoing. Slowly, you plot. But when your husband returns in triumph, you become a woman with a choice. Acceptance or vengeance, infamy follows both. So, you bide your time and force the gods’ hands in the game of retribution. For you understood something long ago that the others never did. If power isn’t given to you, you have to take it for yourself” (x).
Apparently, my theme in reading in 2024 so far is “romantasy” (fantasy/romance) or based on Greek myths. This novel tells the story of Clytemnestra, who was sister to Helen of Troy and forced to marry Agamemnon, Menelaus’ brother. It’s good but intense. The one thing I actively disliked about it is that it ends before the end of Clytemnestra’s end in the myths, which both gives a fake sense of a happy ending and is a disservice to Clytemnestra’s myth.
Definitely mind the content warnings for this one, folks.
Content warnings include: child death, murder, violence, rape, war, and slavery.
Like this post? Share it! Then check out:
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Kate Mitchell is a blogger, chronic illness patient, and advocate who helps people understand chronic illness and helps chronic illness patients live their best lives.
I have so many of these on my wish list!!