Order [book in series=yearoffirstbook.book# (eg 2014.01), stand-alone or one-author collection=3333.pubyear, multi-author anthology=5555.pubyear, SFM/MM=5000, interview=1111]: 2020.01

Woven in Moonlight: A tapestry with some loose threads

Woven in Moonlight by Isabel Ibañez

Woven in Moonlight (2020) is a lushly imagined YA fantasy based on Bolivian history and culture, and featuring a creative form of magic based on weaving. The plot is exciting, filled with twists and turns and betrayals. For me, though, I also found that it had some elements that distracted me from the story, and some others that made less sense when I thought about them later.

Ximena is a young girl who lost her family when the indigenous Llacsans rose up against the colonizing Illustrians.

Scarlet Odyssey: Promising new series by a promising new author

Scarlet Odyssey by C.T. Rwizi

Scarlet Odyssey (2020) is the debut novel by C.T. Rwizi and the beginning of a new series, RED PLAINS. It’s an epic fantasy set in a world based on sub-Saharan Africa, featuring a group of young people who might have the chance to stop an evil plan — or might unwittingly put it in motion instead.

The central point-of-view characters are Musalodi (“Salo”), a young man who wants to learn magic even though his people forbid that study to men;

June 30th, 2020. Kelly Lasiter´s rating: 4 | C.T. Rwizi | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |

A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians: Left me wanting both more and less

A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry

H.G. Parry’s A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians (2020) is a sweeping fantasy novel that takes major events during the Age of Enlightenment — the French Revolution, the Haitian slave revolution, and the madness of King George — and overlays them with a skein of magic, investing the three major players with various powers: France’s Robespierre is a necromancer, Britain’s Prime Minister William Pitt is a mesmerist (among other things), and Toussaint Louverture is a weather mage (albeit a weak one,

June 22nd, 2020. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2.5 | H.G. Parry | SFF Reviews | no comments |

The Empress of Salt and Fortune: A literary puzzle-box

The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo

Cleric Chih and their hoopoe, Almost Brilliant, are on a journey to the capital — both to view the next month’s impending eclipse and to be present at “the new empress’ Dragon Court” — and along the way, the two make a stop at Lake Scarlet, where an old woman invites the pair to stay and catalogue, for the first time, the treasures held there. Chih soon discovers that the old woman, named Rabbit, has a fair number of stories to tell as well: stories of The Empress of Salt and Fortune,

The Girl and the Stars: The underground icy setting is the best part

The Girl and the Stars by Mark Lawrence

The Girl and the Stars (2020) is the first book in Mark Lawrence’s BOOK OF THE ICE series. It’s about a society that lives in an extremely harsh icy climate. They have a spiritual leader called “the regulator” who looks for children who are “broken” — children who are too weak or who have character traits that will not benefit the survival of their tribes when they become adults. Every few years, to cull the herd,

The Book of Koli: Has pretty much everything I want

The Book of Koli by M.R. Carey

Koli lives in a far-future post-apocalyptic England. He has never been beyond the walls of Mythen Rood, his tiny village, because outside are wild animals, vicious plants, and who knows what other dangers. The leaders of Mythen Rood are the Ramparts, a small group of people who have magic that allows them to work the salvaged technology of the ancient humans who used to be masters of the Earth (that’s us).

When kids in Mythen Rood turn 15 years old, the Ramparts test them to see if they have the magic to work the technology.

The Court of Miracles: A quick-paced series-opener with a few issues

The Court of Miracles by Kester Grant

There’s a scene in Kester Grant’s The Court of Miracles (2020) where an entire room of nobles is hypnotized by the head of the assassin’s guild into doing something horrific, but which they are wholly oblivious to. It’s an apt scene to note, because while this first book in the COURT OF MIRACLES trilogy is far from horrific (really, far from it), Grant is such a fluid writer that she lulls you into a sort of readerly trance,

The City We Became: Hail the champions of New York City

The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin

Note: N.K. Jemisin’s short story “The City Born Great,” free at Tor.com, is the opening chapter of this novel.

New York City is in danger from eldritch horrors. We’ve seen these things before, originally, and most notably, in stories by H.P. Lovecraft. These beings come from outside our universe. They are ancient, powerful, and merciless, and there is no negotiating with them. They want our planet and they’re looking for a way into our world to destroy us.

The Kingdom of Liars: Hold off to see how the sequel does

The Kingdom of Liars by Nick Martell

The Kingdom of Liars (2020) is a debut novel by Nick Martell and the beginning of his series THE LEGACY OF THE MERCENARY KING. As such, it shows some debut issues with character, plotting, and world-building, though it has an interesting mystery at its core.

There has “always been a Kingman in Hollow” goes the refrain, a member of the Kingman family who acts as a check on the king. But some years before the novel’s start, Michael’s father,

May 5th, 2020. Bill Capossere´s rating: 2.5 | Nick Martell | SFF Reviews | 3 comments |

Crave: Does the world need another Twilight knock-off?

Crave by Tracy Wolff

Apparently the market for breathless YA romances with sexy vampires isn’t fully saturated yet, because Crave (2020), a new paranormal romance thriller by Tracy Wolff that cheerfully admits to being inspired by Twilight — check out the blatant knock-off cover — offers readers a slightly updated take on the genre.

When her parents are killed in an automobile accident, high-school-aged Grace reluctantly leaves San Diego and travels to the remote, icy interior of Alaska, where her uncle Finn is headmaster of an exclusive boarding school,

Next SFF Author: Ben Aaronovitch

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