What happens when you have a zombie outbreak in the middle of an underwater cruise? Welcome to This Gilded Abyss by Rebecca Thorne. With as much as I’m used to the cozy feelings of the Tea series, Thorne’s newest series is a refreshing change of pace. You really get the feeling of being cramped with no escape as chaos erupts around our characters.
The Monsters We Defy by Leslye Penelope is a bit of a slow burn, but once it ignites, you can’t put it down. It’s an interesting mix of historical fiction, urban fantasy, and magical realism. The story follows Clara Johnson, a bit of a spirit medium cursed with magical debt to a powerful spirit, who is offered a chance at freedom. The catch? She just has to assemble a super-powered crew and pull off a magical heist.
Have you ever found yourself going to a bar to escape life, buying a really hot woman a drink and the hooking up with her in her car? Only to later find out that said hot woman was your best friend’s mother? Oh, you’ve never done that?
Go Luck Yourself by Sara Raasch follows in the steps of it’s predecessor with its cozy, Hallmark-y setup. It has that quirky royal premise, small-town charm, and an enemies-to-lovers romance. I was here for it
Have you ever dreamt of being the assistant for a world famous actress and then that world famous actress falling in love with you? I know I have more than once!
Nightmare Before Kissmas by Sara Raasch is exactly what the title promises. You get a cozy holiday romance with a little bit of our favorite little spooky holiday vibe mixed in.
I didn’t know that it was possible to find a book so tailor-made for me. All Systems Red by Martha Wells is the first entry in the Murderbot Diaries series and features an AuDHD coded SecUnit robot that is programmed for…security…Murderbot is just its chosen name.
Astrid Parker Doesn’t Fail by Ashley Herring Blake is every bit a queer coming out story as it is an enemies-to-lovers romance, and it works beautifully on both levels. As the second entry in the Bright Falls series, it builds on the world we already know while giving us a character I honestly wasn’t expecting to enjoy this much.
Vampire of El Norte by Isabel Cañas had me hooked from the start. The creatures here are exactly what I want from a vampire story. They were dark, menacing, and genuinely terrifying.
The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together by Heather McGhee broke me down in ways I wasn’t prepared for. It’s one thing to know racism is destructive, but it’s another to sit with the reality that people will actively harm themselves just to ensure people of color don’t benefit. That’s not just cruel, it’s self-sabotage on a national scale, and it’s exhausting to realize how deep that rot goes