Category: Fantasy

Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Fiction, New & Upcoming, Romance, Thrillers

Library Reads – July 2026

Posted on by Zachary

With the way the weather has been this week, it’s a perfect time to get out of the heat and do some summer reading. Along with the heat, July has brought a new LibraryReads list full of book recommendations from library staff across the country! Below you’ll find some of the books from this month’s list along with a review from one of America’s numerous library workers.

Top Pick: The Story Keeper by Kelly Rimmer

In this compelling gothic novel set in Australia, recently divorced 50-something Fiona buys her uncle’s decaying country estate with plans to refurbish it. But the locals fear the place is haunted. When Fiona discovers a novel that appears to be set in the house, it becomes a dual-timeline story, with chapters from the book woven into the narrative. – Robin Beerbower, LibraryReads Ambassador, AZ

NoveList read-alike: The Secret Book of Flora Lea by Patti Callahan Henry

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Posted in Adult, Audience, Fantasy, Fiction, Genre

Fantasy-Mystery Fusions

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

Not too long ago, I dove into the world of genre fusions by sharing some of my favorite works of historical fantasy. If you’re curious, you can read that post here. Today, I’m going to take a look at another fantasy genre fusion, this time between fantasy and mystery. As far as I’m aware, this genre fusion doesn’t have an official name, but I’m fascinated by it, particularly because the genres it pulls from are so different. While a fantasy novel usually has to follow a certain set of rules in order to be believable, those rules can be just about anything the author wants, and many fantasy authors revel in breaking established conventions of the genre. Mysteries, on the other hand, are bound by a strict set of genre expectations. The very best fusions between fantasy and mystery, in my opinion, are capable of reinvigorating both of the genres they pull inspiration from. Let’s get started!

Hemlock & Silver by T. Kingfisher

When poison expert Anja is summoned by the King to uncover the cause of his daughter Snow’s mysterious illness, she knows the stakes couldn’t be higher.  When she arrives at the royal palace, Anja finds both her young patient and the court surrounding her haunted by secrets and scarred by tragedy.  Soon, Anja discovers that the cause of Snow’s illness is not medical, but magical, devised by a ruthless adversary who lurks within the castle’s mirrors.  To save Snow and stop the magic of the mirrors from falling into the wrong hands, Anja’s courage and smarts will be put to the test.  My favorite element of this loose retelling of Snow White was the surreal,  creepy mirror-realm.  T. Kingfisher’s horror chops were certainly evident in some of the scenes featuring it, and while the mirror magic was a little confusing at first, this actually turned out to be to the story’s benefit.  The reader discovers how the mirrors work side-by-side with Anja, thereby getting a good sense of how this mystery’s detective thinks well before the main climax.  If you’re looking for a new twist on an old story, told with T. Kingfisher’s signature humor and heart, Hemlock & Silver will chill, intrigue, and enchant you.

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Posted in Fantasy, Fiction, Genre, Historical, Uncategorized

Great Historical Fantasy

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

Genre fusions are having a bit of a moment right now, so today I want to talk about one of my favorites: historical fantasy.  Plenty of fantasy novels have, for lack of a better word, historical vibes: most people are familiar with the basics of the ‘generic medieval fantasy setting’, even if they don’t read much fantasy themselves. But today I want to go beyond that, and explore books that introduce fantastical elements into real-world history.  In a historical fantasy novel, an author has an opportunity to inject the unexpected into the familiar, and a historically inspired setting provides a window to explore what fantasy can be outside of the ‘medieval Europe but not quite’ formula.  Here’s a selection of works of historical fantasy, all available through the Monarch Library System, that will appeal readers who love both genres and what happens when the two combine.

She Who Became The Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan

In the middle of the 14th century, China is wracked by famine and scarred by war.  This is the time of the Yuan Dynasty, the period of the Mongol Empire’s rule.  After the death of her brother, a young girl assumes his identity to become Zhu Chongba, rising from obscurity to become a great military commander – but when faced with the brutal calculus of war, she must make an unspeakable choice.  She Who Became The Sun bears some similarities to the legend of Hua Mulan, but readers shouldn’t expect anything like Disney’s cheery musical rendition of the story.  Rather, Zhu Chongba resembles the thorny antiheroines of Seth Dickinson’s The Traitor Baru Cormorant and R.F. Kuang’s The Poppy War.  The setting of this book is brilliantly realized: the bleak portrait of the famine-stricken village of Zhu Chongba’s childhood forms one of the most effective prologues I’ve read in a genre novel in some time.  Parker-Chan also presents a brilliant antivillain in Ouyang, a captive who has risen high in the army and royal court of Henan. I couldn’t put this book down, and the ending left me with a fierce book hangover.  Luckily, She Who Became The Sun is the first of a completed duology, and the conclusion, He Who Drowned The World, is also on the shelf at Mead, ready for avid readers to pick up right away.

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Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Science Fiction

Love Across Time

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

Romance, particularly where it overlaps with fantasy and science fiction, needs a challenge for the main characters to overcome in order to be together.  Could anything be more challenging to overcome than time itself?  Today, I’m spotlighting a trendy subgenre that doesn’t seem to have an official name, but that I like to call “timestream romance”.  These books feature characters who fall in love amidst the tangles of time travel, time loops, and multiple reincarnations across the centuries.  Let’s get started!

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

The story of This Is How You Lose The Time War unfolds as a series of letters between Red and Blue, agents of two enemy organizations whose battlefield is time itself.  As Red and Blue leave messages for one another across time, their enmity first thaws into respect, and then blossoms into love.  But what will it cost for the two of them to be together?  This book is both exquisitely written and emotionally honest in spite of the out-of-this-world situation it portrays, with character voices that expertly thread the delicate needle of being witty and charming while still feeling real.  I found it pretty refreshing to read an enemies-to-lovers romance that focused on a meeting of the minds rather than flashy duels.  This book is an intense emotional journey in a small package, certain to stay with you even after the final page is turned.

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Posted in Fantasy, Games, Science Fiction

Zachary’s Recent Games

Posted on by Zachary

When the weather gets cold, I like to get cozy and settle in to a game. I have a bad habit of playing a few games at the same time and bouncing between them as my interest in a particular game fluctuates. This week’s blog post is a list of the games I’m currently playing. If a game is on multiple platforms, I’ll include links to the different versions.

The Outer Worlds 2 (PS5/Xbox)

Obsidian developed my favorite Fallout game, so I’ve been partial to their games for the last few years. They’ve continued a design choice since Avowed that I appreciate. Avowed was open enough that it felt like an open-world game, but it was contained enough that I didn’t feel punished by going in a particular direction. Sometimes open-world games prioritize the size of the world without filling it with enough content to reward exploration, and to be honest, as I’ve gotten older, I don’t want to spend hundreds of hours sifting through a game to find what’s worth looting. Avowed also allowed you to upgrade the equipment that you liked throughout the entire game, so I didn’t have to waste time on loot grind. It was nice to see The Outer Worlds 2 kept that streamlined design, and I find the Outer Worlds setting interesting. Outer Worlds’ setting tends to be a little more comedic than Fallout: New Vegas was, but it still itches that Obsidian itch.

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Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Fiction, Horror

Great Speculative Fiction from 2025

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

It’s that time of year again!  Last year, I surveyed a sampling of the years’ greatest sci-fi, fantasy, and horror.  You can read that post here – all of those books still come highly recommended.  Now the time has come to do the same for the new releases of 2025.  The same caveat from last year applies: I’m only one person, I can only read so many books in a year.  Therefore I couldn’t possibly include every amazing new speculative fiction release from the past year, no matter how much I might like to.  I’d also be remiss if I didn’t point out that 2025 has been an absolute banner year for horror, and this list leans a lot more towards that genre than last years’.  With the preamble out of the way, let’s get started!

The Works of Vermin by Hiron Ennes

In the city of Tilliard, opera is bloodsport, perfume is politics, and one person can have many names over the course of a life.  We view this city through the eyes of Guy Moulène, one of the rank and file of Tilliard’s pest control companies.  On a routine job, Guy discovers an insect the size of a dragon – one that may be even more dangerous after it’s slain.  Guy’s story entwines with that of Asteritha Vost, perfumer to Tilliard’s elite.  When Aster becomes entangled with Mallory vont Passant, a newcomer to Tilliard with a past shrouded in mystery, she unearths secrets that may shake the city to its core – that touch upon the past of her ruthless employer, Grand Marshal Maximian Sorav.  As a work of horror fantasy, The Works of Vermin is no less than the total package.  Tilliard’s atmosphere of rotten beauty is pitch-perfect, calling to mind Jeff Vandermeer’s Ambergris and China Miéville’s New Crobuzon.  Innes also delivers on pacing and plot – there’s a sequence of plot twists about three quarters of the way through that literally made my jaw drop.  Prospective readers should definitely exercise discretion about content, as this story goes to some extremely dark places.  That said, it’s also suffused with some welcome macabre humor: when things get that bad, sometimes there’s nothing to do but laugh.  The Works of Vermin was a privilege to read, a book over four-hundred pages that I wish was longer.  If Ennes ever wants to return to the Tilliard setting, I’ll happily come along, bugs and all.

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Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Horror

Let’s Get Gothic

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

October may be over, but I don’t think there’s ever a bad time to recommend something gloriously grim.  When you’re craving the decaying splendor and unspeakable secrets of a gothic novel, nothing else will do.  Each of these selections puts a unique contemporary spin on the gothic genre, and all will be an excellent accompaniment to the cold days and long nights coming right around the corner.

The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling

Jane Shoringfield is aware that her hasty marriage to Dr. Augustine Lawrence is highly irregular. Dr. Lawrence insists upon certain unusual rules – particularly that Jane never set foot in Lindridge Hall, the Lawrence family’s ancestral home.  But when Jane finds herself with no choice but to break her husband’s prohibitions, she realizes her marriage comes with more than she bargained for: magical secrets and the very literal ghosts of Augustine’s past.  In The Death of Jane Lawrence, Caitlin Starling has deftly crafted a gothic novel that feels like the classics while speaking directly to what modern readers want.  At first, this book appears to be a fantasy-influenced homage to gothic mainstays, such as Rebecca and Jane Eyre.  But gradually, alongside the heroine, the reader comes to realize that this is in no way the story that they were expecting.  The ending was one of the best twists I’ve had the pleasure of reading this year.  Naturally, I wouldn’t dream of spoiling it.

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Posted in Fantasy, Genre, Uncategorized

One Of A Kind Fantasy

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

Part of the reason we love genre fiction is familiarity, but even the biggest fantasy die-hards will admit that sometimes familiarity starts to get same-y.  Never fear: I’ve compiled a list of fantasy novels that do something truly unique with the genre’s toolbox.  These recommendations, all available at Mead, may get you out of a reading slump if you need it, and remind you why you fell in love with fantasy.  And if you happen to be new to the genre, any of these books would be a great place to start.

The Saint of Bright Doors by Vajra Chandrasekera

Fetter lost his shadow in childhood, as part of his mother’s ambition for him to fulfill a prophecy that he would one day assassinate his father.  As a young man in the city of Luriat, Fetter tries to process his past by attending a therapy group for former Chosen Ones.  He discovers his affinity for the mysterious Bright Doors that mark the cityscape, as well as the role he might have to play in a rebellion against his father.  The Saint of Bright Doors is a much needed re-imagining of some of fantasy’s most enduring tropes, and Fetter’s emotional journey over the course of the book is something truly unforgettable.  As you read it, you’ll find yourself asking questions not only about the stories we tell one another, but also about the aspects of our real world that they reflect.

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Posted in Adult, Fantasy, Fiction, Genre, Historical, Horror, Science Fiction, Uncategorized

A Mostly Magical Miscellany

Posted on by Sydney Anderson

Ordinarily, when I’m putting together a post for this blog, I tailor my recommendations to follow a certain theme.  This can be a good way to get creative energies flowing, but unfortunately, it also means that if I haven’t been able to talk about some of my absolute favorites, just because I haven’t been able to fit them into a theme.  Today, I aim to fix that.  July just so happens to be my birthday month, so as a birthday gift to myself and all of you wonderful readers, I’ve compiled a selection of books for no reason other than because I love them.  Just because of my personal tastes, most of these will fall into the fantasy genre, but there are a couple wildcards!  Let’s get started!

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin

Genly Ai is a human emissary to the planet Winter, home of the Gethenians, an alien species who have no concept of gender and change their sex in order to reproduce.  Mounting political strife throws Genly into the path of the Gethenian Estraven.  Soon, the two realize they will have to overcome their differences and depend on one another in order to survive, and possibly bring Winter into a new era in the process.  All of this is told with the compassionate characterization and beautiful prose that made Ursula K. LeGuin a master of the science fiction genre.  As much as I adore this book, it is worth noting that it was originally published in 1969, and therefore readers should be mindful of encountering some language and content that is considered outdated today.  LeGuin herself later expressed regret that the book’s narration uses “he” to refer to the Gethenian characters rather than singular “they”.  The novel’s themes, however, are timeless.  I think everyone has one or two novels they encountered in college that expanded their ideas of what fiction could do, and this is one of mine.  The story and characters of The Left Hand of Darkness will remain with you long after the final page is turned.  If you haven’t read it yet, I can’t recommend it highly enough, and if you have, it’s a book worth revisiting again and again.

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Posted in Adult, Fantasy, History, Horror, Music, Mystery, Staff Picks, Teen & Young Adult, Thrillers, Uncategorized

Abbie’s Recent Reads for July

Posted on by abbiebourelle

Dear readers, welcome back and thank you for letting me share with you the books that I have been enjoying. As usual, I delight in a diverse range of genres. This month’s reads come from the genres of non fiction, fantasy, and horror. I greatly enjoyed reading these titles and I hope one of these catches your eye!

FantasticLand by Mike Bockoven

A shout out to my fellow librarian, Aubrey, for recommending this title is in order. Thank you Aubrey! If you are looking for a book that stays with you long after the closing page, this one is it! It has been a week or so since I finished this book, but I still find myself thinking about it. Dear reader, this book is a work of fiction, but it could very easily be set in the real world present day. FantasticLand is a theme park in Florida built by an eccentric billionaire. What sets FantasticLand apart is that it is designed to be many mini theme parks in one. There are different sections of the park. All are designed to be their own unique world. There are places like The Pirate Cove, The Fairy Prairie, and so on. Everything is great until a super hurricane hits. In theory, the staff that stay behind to care for the park should be fine. There is enough food and water for everyone. Dear reader, if that were the case we would not have a story. What results is something that resembles a slasher movie as the young people trapped in the park turn on each other. Each faction fights for dominance as supplies dwindle. The sordid tale is told from the point of view of interviews with those who made it out alive. Only the survivors can tell the tale of what REALLY happened inside FantasticLand. What keeps me thinking about this book is that this is no ordinary slasher. It poses psychological questions about the effects of phone addiction on our young population. Yes, it is a fiction, but it makes one wonder.

Click HERE to request FantasticLand!

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