|
|
|
|
| Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah BakerIntroducing: Avery and Zib, two very different children from the same "very safe, very ordinary town" whose separate lives intersect when they find their way to a strange place known as the Up and Under.
Want a taste? "[E]verything had been decided for them. This is so often the case with children, and few of them will come to resent it, for few of them will ever know."
Metafiction alert: Fans of Seanan McGuire's novel Middlegame may recall the children's book Over the Woodward Wall by A. Deborah Baker; now, using the Baker pseudonym, McGuire has made this fictional book a reality. |
|
|
|
Fable
by Adrienne Young
What it is about: A first entry in a planned duology by the author of the Sky in the Deep series finds the teen daughter of a seaside village’s most powerful trader testing the limits of skills imparted by her late mother to reconnect with her father and establish her place among his crew.
Series alert: Book 1 in the Fable duology.
For fans of: Sarah J. Maas, John Flanagan and Leigh Bardugo
|
|
| The Invisible Life of Addie Larue by V.E. SchwabFrance, 1714: Addie Larue makes a Faustian bargain with capricious Luc, one of the old gods. The downside of "time without limit" and "freedom without rule"? No one will remember her.
New York City, 2014: Addie discovers that one person, bookstore owner Henry, may be the exception. But is it enough?
For fans of: other time-focused tales of loss, love, and loneliness such as Kate Atkinson's Life After Life or Laura Barnett's The Versions of Us. |
|
|
|
The Last Druid
by Terry Brooks
What it is about: A conclusion to the Shannara saga is set in the war-torn Four Lands, where a group of heroes organizes to defend the region while one carries world-changing technology to the Skaar homeland and another becomes trapped in a deadly realm.
Reviewer's notes: Brooks' epic began with The Sword of Shannara in 1977, and generations of fantasy readers will want to read the series finale.
For fans of: Terry Goodkind, Margaret Weiss and Brandon Sanderson
|
|
| Burning Roses by S.L. HuangWhat it's about: Teaming up to protect their home from deadly Sunbirds, sharpshooter Rosa and archer Hou Yi also battle their inner demons.
Why you might like it: This poignant, introspective mash-up of European fairy tales and Chinese mythology by the author of the Cas Russell novels focuses on the bond between a pair of aging monster-hunters.
Try these next: if you're curious about these characters' backstories, read Huang's previous novellas Hunting Monsters and Fighting Demons; if you're seeking more Asian-influenced fantasy with an LGBTQIA cast, check out JY Yang's Tensorate novellas. |
|
| A Deadly Education by Naomi NovikWhat it's about: Galadriel "El" Higgins, a loner with an affinity for dark magic, just wants to survive until graduation, but the heroics of her classmate, golden boy Orion Lake, may prove more lethal than the maleficaria that infest the school.
Is it for you? This 1st book in the Scholomance series has garnered controversy over the inclusion of racial stereotypes, for which the author has apologized and pledged to remove from subsequent editions.
For fans of: Marina and Sergey Dyachenko's Vita Nostra, Lev Grossman's The Magicians, or Leigh Bardugo's Ninth House. |
|
|
|
The Memory Thief
by Lauren Mansy
What it is about: In this unforgettable journey through the city of Craewick—a city where memories are currency, citizens are divided by ability and “Gifted” individuals can take memories from others as they please, Etta Lark must prove her allegiance to the Shadows rebel group she quit following an accident years earlier in order to rescue her mother from a corrupt culture that would steal her memories and sell them to the highest bidder.
Review: "Mansy’s clear exposition smoothly delivers both the action-filled plot and the intricacies of a richly imagined universe, along with gently predictable romance and a thoughtful look at social inequalities." ~ Debbie Carton, Booklist
|
|
|
|
The Ocean at the End of the Lane
by Neil Gaiman
By storytelling genius... Neil Gaiman delivers a whimsical, imaginative, bittersweet and at times deeply scary modern fantasy about fear, love, magic and sacrifice to reveal and to protect us from the darkness inside—a moving, terrifying and elegiac fable.
The premise: Returning to his childhood home in the English countryside for a funeral, the unnamed middle-aged narrator of this haunting, lyrical fable finds himself drawn to an ordinary-looking farmhouse that's anything but. As long-buried memories surface, he recalls events that occurred at Hempstock Farm when he was seven.
Award winning: Winner of the 2013 Lotus Award for Fantasy and British Book Awards (the Nibbies) Book of the Year
|
|
|
|
Seer of Sevenwaters
by Juliet Marillier
What it is about: Sibeal, a druid in training, visits the warrior's island of Inis Eala preparatory to her final pledge. When her Sight leads her to the survivor of a shipwreck, a Norse scholar named Ardal, the two form a bond despite Felix's amnesia . Soon Sibeal and Ardal embark on a perilous journey that brings the young druid into conflict with her beliefs and her growing feelings for the man whose life she saved.
Series alert: The 5th book in the Sevenwaters series can be read as a standalone.
|
|
|
|
The Deep
by Rivers Solomon, with Daveed Diggs, William Hutson, and Jonathan Snipes
The premise: Descended from pregnant African women thrown overboard by slavers, the wajinru (their name means "chorus of the deep") are an aquatic people united by the History they elect to forget.
The plot: As the wajinru's chosen historian, Yetu serves as the living repository of their collective memory. It's slowly destroying her.
The backstory: For this heartwrenching novel, author Rivers Solomon took inspiration from the Hugo-nominated song of the same name by hip-hop trio Clipping, which in turn was inspired by mythological themes explored by Detroit electronic music duo Drexciya.
|
|
|
|
The Binding
by Bridget Collins
In a world... where all books are repositories of memories, specially trained Binders extract traumatic experiences from the minds of consenting adults while crafting elegant codices to contain them.
Starring: apprentice binder Emmett Farmer, who (reluctantly) learns his trade from the elderly Seredith while navigating fraught encounters with a client, the privileged Lucian Darnay.
Want a taste? "There’s a growing trade in fakes, you know...Novels, they call them. They must be much cheaper to produce. You can copy them, you see. Use the same story over and over, and as long as you’re careful how you sell them, you can get away with it."
|
|
|
|
The chimes
by Anna Smaill
What it is about: After a civil war divides London into poor and elite sections with a law against retaining memories, Simon, an orphan, joins a gang of scavengers, but his intense memories lead him to defy the law and engage in an epic struggle for justice and freedom.
Award winning: Winner of the 2016 World Fantasy Award
Review: "The novel's purposefully confusing beginning mirrors Simon's bewilderment, and patient readers will be well rewarded as the reality of Simon's world swims into focus and the story suddenly becomes gripping and impossible to put down." ~ Megan McArdle, Library Journal
|
|
Contact your librarian for more great books! |
|
|
|
|
|
|