Tag: Romance

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Book: “A Simple Twist of Fate” by April Asher

Publishing Info: St. Martin’s Griffin, May 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound

Book Description: At the bright-eyed age of eighteen, witch Harlow “Harry” Pierce attended her first Fates Haven Finding Ceremony certain the Blue Willow Wisp would lead her to her Fated match, her cougar shifter boyfriend, Jaxon Atwood. But Fate had other plans, guiding her best friend to him instead. With a broken heart, all her belongings, and a vow to never return, Harry did the only thing a broken-hearted witch could do. Run.

Thirteen years later, she returns to her magical hometown—with her half-human, half-shifter goddaughter in tow—hoping that not only would the town work its magic on the troubled teenager, but that the local Alpha of the Rocky Mountain Pack could help Grace identify—and control—her fiery abilities.

Jaxon Atwood was a shifter of few words and even less patience… until his mother retired as Alpha of the Rocky Mountain Pack and left the running of things to him. It’s a headache he didn’t need, and one that brought the witch who’d ripped his heart from his chest knocking on his door.

Ever since the disappearance of the town’s Fate Witch over a decade ago, Fates Haven’s magic has been slowly going haywire. There hasn’t been a Fated Match made in thirteen years, putting the town in serious jeopardy of losing its title of Most Fated Mates Per Population. But now, something is stirring in Fates Haven, Colorado, and it smells like the past, tastes like change, and looks like A SIMPLE TWIST OF FATE.

Review: To start on a random note, I think this is one of the few cases where the cover actually spoils bits of the story. Now, I get why they included the dragon! Dragons are super popular right now, and I’m sure people will pick this book up based on this fact alone, so I can’t really blame the designers for making a savvy business decision. But on the other hand, this book is heavy on the cozy side of things, and one of the few actual plot points in the story has to do with a mystery about one of the characters. A mystery that is spoiled by this cover! Ah well. Like I said, this book lives and dies by its vibes, so the actual “twist” here is probably not that important anyways.

While this book didn’t perfectly click for me, I did enjoy the central romance. Over the last few years, as I’ve read more romance novels, I’ve discovered that I have a secret love of second chance romances, especially ones about highschool sweethearts re-connecting as adults (recs welcomed and appreciated!). So, in many ways, this was great match for me, especially with the supernatural twist of fate and the way that it lead our couple astray all of those years ago. I also enjoyed the angst that came from the fallout of this situation. Jaxon, perhaps, was owed a bit more of an apology from Harry. But at the same time, she was teenager at the time, and in a world where the concept of “fated” relationships exists, one can easily understand her reaction to the situation she found herself in.

I do wish Jaxon’s chapters had a bit more depth or a more established arc for him, as well, as his chapters became a bit repetitive with his thoughts fixated on his remaining attraction to Harry. Again, this is fairly standard in many romance novels, but I think it’s definitely an area of improvement for most books in the genre. Sure, it’s great that the romantic interest is so strongly focused on the heroine, but he needs to have an actual personality himself!

My biggest struggle with the book came down to the tone. As I said above, this is heavy on the cozy side of things, and part of the way it explores this light-hearted tone is through an abundance of, well, silliness. There was a point about a third of the way into the book where three adult women were spending their time…navigating a series of Legos on the floor to prepare for a competition at a festival. In this scene and throughout, especially when the women characters were together, it often felt like we were all back in not even high school, but middle school. We’re told these women have careers, but they behaved and talked like super young teenagers. You know how in “Friends” there is a running joke about the fact that they’re all hanging out a coffee shop all the time instead of working? Well, the same problem was here! I’m fine with a more light-hearted tone, but this one skewed too far, losing sight of the more serious aspects of the story and reducing the relationships between many characters to cliches.

In many ways, this was a fun romantic comedy with fun magic at its heart. Unfortunately, the tone was too silly and ridiculous for me, at parts. But fans of more light-hearted stories are sure to enjoy this one!

Rating 7: An enjoyable second chance romance, but the women characters behaved more like middle schoolers than adults, which took me out of the story a bit.

Reader’s Advisory:

“A Simple Twist of Fate” can be found on these Goodreads lists: High School Sweethearts and Fated.

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Firebird” by Juliette Cross

Publishing Info: Bramble, April 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound

Book Description: A conqueror captivated…
A witch prophesied to save them all…
A world where dragons rule Rome.

From the moment Roman general and nephew to the emperor Julianus Dakkia laid eyes on Malina, he was enthralled by the Dacian dancer. Years later, the fierce beauty stands before him on a scarred battlefield, her life in danger. He instinctively shifts into his fierce dragon form to save her, an action that may mean his head on the imperial gate. But he and his dragon know one thing: she belongs to them.

Malina can’t believe that the centurion who had once bestowed a secret talisman on her is the Roman general of legendary brutality. His warrior prowess cannot be denied, yet they don’t reveal the secret he hides. All Malina knows is his protection and gentle touch. And she cannot deny how her soul has always seemed to answer his.

As they navigate a world where flying deathriders conquer and burn, their love will ignite a firestorm that can only end in heartbreak or death. Or both.

Review: This is a difficult book to review. On one hand, it’s simply following a tried-and-true romantasy equation, almost point by point at times. On the other hand, within the greater context of the story, I think many of these tropes rubbed the wrong way for me. However, given how standard much of the language and tropes used in this book are to the genre, I fully expect my opinion of this one to be an outlier. Ah well. By this point, I’m well used to being on the wrong side of these dragon romance books. (But wait! I did like “Dragon Unleashed” by Grace Draven, so it’s not all bad all the time automatically or anything!)

As always, I do want to start with a few positives. For the most part, I did enjoy the setting of this book, being based on ancient Rome. I feel like this is a bit of a trend recently, and as I enjoy Roman history, it’s been fun seeing it pop up within the fantasy genre (largely because the history is so long and full of different highs and lows and focal points that you can end up with quite a lot of variety even with this focus).

That said, I don’t think this particular iteration did much with this concept. For example, this book was hyped as a combination of ancient Rome meets George R.R. Martin. Do you know what those two things have in common? A strong focus on political machinations! Do you know what this book had practically zero of? That’s right, political machinations. Anything you do see is so superficial as to be practically worthless. Instead, the comparison to Martin would more accurately come down to the book’s focus on the horrendous treatment of women in this civilization. Obviously, there is historical accuracy behind much of this. But that alone doesn’t justify a heavy focus on the subject unless it’s going to be addressed thoroughly. And, like Martin, there were times where this book seemed to be reveling in the horror of it all, rather than including them for any truly important reason. Pay attention to the trigger warnings on this one, for sure.

My real problem came down to the romance, however. In so many ways, this romance exemplified the many ways that romantasy tropes can go wrong if sprinkled into any old plot line without much care. For some background, an important feature of this book is the fact that the MMC (morally grey with tons of secrets, obvs) participated in the razing of the MFC’s people. Which, again, this sort of thing is a staple of the genre, and the obligatory reveals of his ulterior motivations can be expected. But, necessarily, that explanation has to be incredibly good to counterbalance the actual gruesome harm he participated in, something that cannot be simply erased. Some authors are capable of turning this corner with their MMC. Others…are not.

Beyond this, the entire set up of the book and the romance is based around the fact that the MMC captures the FMC and keeps her as a “body slave.” So, that’s a pretty heavy topic to manage in a romance, that sort of dynamic, where the power imbalance is so extreme. Again, this can be navigated, but it takes a careful hand on the wheel to do so. Unfortunately, we didn’t see that here. Instead, the romance starts up quickly and hits hard, without ever really dealing with the facts of this power imbalance. And for me, this left an inescapable sheen of ickiness over the entire affair.

Further, the inclusion of dragons into this story lead to a strong focus on mating bonds. Beyond the laziness factor of this trope (which allows authors to just handwave away any actual character growth or natural progression of romantic interest/feelings and instead justify instalove/lust), the language that accompanied this choice rubbed up incredibly awkwardly (to put it mildly) against the slave/master nature of the relationship. “You’re mine.” “Say you’re mine.” etc. etc., are all very common phrases in romance/romantasy, especially when you’re dealing with any sort of mating bond situation. However, when paired with the set up of this story and the dynamics between Juliannus and Malina, this all began to feel rather gross. And, again, this isn’t to say that mating bond books can’t be done well! I think “Bride” by Ali Hazelwood is an excellent example of how to navigate this trope, avoiding the instalove pitfall as well as the questions regarding consent. This book, however, did not do any of that.

So yeah, I really disliked this book. I think it’s a perfect example of the “plug and play” style of writing that is all too prevalent in the rising star that is the romantasy genre. Everyone wants to cash in and the results are books that feel as if the author/publisher simply drew popular tropes out of a hat and mashed them together, with no concern for how well they would work together. Mating bonds and the possessive language that often accompany it? Sometimes good! Pair that with a slave/master dynamic and fastburn intimacy? Absolutely not.

I don’t recommend this book. I think there are much better examples of all the tropes included to be found elsewhere, and I think the author’s inability to properly explore the power imbalance of her central romance ruins any attempt to enjoy it.

Rating 4: Tropes gone bad and a rather gross slave/master romance at its heart really ruined this one for me.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Firebird” can be found on these Goodreads lists: Greco – Roman Fantasy and April 2025 Most Anticipated Romance Releases.

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “This Monster of Mine” by Shalini Abeysekara

Publishing Info: Union Square & Co., April 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound

Book Description: Eighteen-year-old Sarai doesn’t know why someone tried to kill her four years ago, but she does know that her case was closed without justice. Hellbent on vengeance, she returns to the scene of the crime as a Petitor, a prosecutor who can magically detect lies, and is assigned to work with Tetrarch Kadra. Ice-cold and perennially sadistic, Kadra is the most vicious of the four judges who rule the land – and the prime suspect in a string of deaths identical to Sarai’s attempted murder.

Certain of his guilt, Sarai begins a double life: solving cases with Kadra by day and plotting his ruin by night. But Kadra is charming and there’s something alluring about the wrath he wields against the city’s corruption. So when the evidence she finds embroils her in a deadly political battle, Sarai must also fight against her attraction to Kadra – because despite his growing hold on her heart, his voice matches the only memory she has of her assailant…

Review: This is going to be a very strange review to write, mostly because it was a very strange book to read. I’m honestly having a hard time thinking of a book that was more of a roller coaster ride than this one. One minute I’m loving it, whipping through action scenes, swooning over the love interest. The next, I’m irate, considering DNFing, franticly scanning other reviews to see if I’m way off base or totally missing something.

Beyond the whiplash that this experience created, I was also off balance due to the fact that my usual points of interest/concern were reversed. I’m a character reader first and foremost, and more often than not, if I get through a book I’m otherwise struggling with, it comes down to the strength of the characters or the narrative voice. Here, however, the characters (more, the main character) was the problem, but the writing itself was so good that it carried me through the real deep troughs I experienced otherwise. The author simply has an excellent style and voice! The world-building was perfectly crafted, the dialogue all felt believable, hitting all of the right notes in its humorous, serious, or romantic moments. And the exploration of its themes regarding law and justice were *chefs kiss.*

And, again, when I wasn’t getting bogged down in the main character, I really enjoyed the romance! The story is a true slow burn, and while the romance is important to the story, it doesn’t overshadow the other serious aspects of the story, such as the aforementioned themes regarding justice or the mystery behind what happened to Sarai. And, for his part, Kadra was an excellent romantic interest in his own right! Strong, but compassionate. Filled with purpose, but also focused on Sarai as she works through her trauma. And, honestly, a hell of a lot more patient with her more ridiculous moments that I ever would have been.

And then, there’s Sarai. Now, if she had simply been an unlikable heroine through and through, we probably wouldn’t be here, good writing bedamned. No, instead, she has a lot of strengths as a narrator! I enjoyed most of her inner voice, and her motivations and magical abilities were all very interesting. The problem, however, came down to her approach to discovering the truth behind the attempt on her life. To get into my feelings with this, I’m going to have to go into some spoilers of actions in the first half of the book. For those who want spoiler free, I’ll just say she makes wild leaps of logic throughout that make zero sense. The rest of this review, however, will be a bit more in-depth with my problems here.

SPOILERS BELOW!

So, a little backstory: years ago, someone attempted to kill Sarai. The nature of the crime left her body and mind broken, with all but the barest fragments of memory of the event wiped from her mind. All she does remember is a specific voice, one that instructs another person to patch her up and get her out of the city, granted in a rough and tough tone of voice. In the years since, there has been a suicide spree, with many individuals with magical abilities like Sarai seeming to kill themselves in odd ways. Years later, she returns to try to discover what happened and who tried to kill her. Almost immediately, she recognizes the voice from her memories as Kadra.

Now, as readers, we know that Kadra can’t have been the attempted murderer, simply because we know we’re reading a romantic fantasy novel and he’s the romantic interest. Sarai couldn’t (and shouldn’t!) think this way, too. However, from the memories she does have, even she admits early in the book that whomever the voice belonged to was responsible for patching her up and could have very well been there for other reasons than being the person behind the attempt on her life. I read a paragraph from her saying just this and I thought, “Great, phew! We got the obvious bit out of the way right from the start and reinforced the idea that the true mystery here is why Kadra was there, why he helped her, and why he banished her out of the city.”

Unfortunately, no. In the very next chapter, Sarai is full-on convinced that Kadra must have been the one to try to kill her (somehow immediately forgetting/disregarding the fact that he then, inexplicably, saved her?? Why he wouldn’t have just finished her off for good is simply…never mentioned or thought of). What’s worse, Sarai begins to suspect that Kadra must also be behind the deaths of the others like her, those who have been supposedly committing suicide.

Early in their time working together, Kadra and Sarai go to the morgue to look over the body of the most recent “suicide victim.” While there, Sarai witnesses Kadra fighting with the coroner over the manner of death, insisting that it couldn’t be a suicide (something that Sarai agrees with, after viewing the body). The coroner, on the other hand, is sure it’s a suicide and has ruled it as such. What’s more, she’s sick of Kadra coming by FIVE OR SIX TIMES before this over the last few months to argue this very point! Sarai, internally, goes on to think this: “Aha! Kadra must be behind this! He’s perfectly positioned himself to cover up his crimes by being the investigator behind them!!”

Girl, what?? No one thought this guy was murdered EXCEPT Kadra! If it wasn’t for him, this guy would have been buried and listed as a suicide months ago! And yet somehow, Sarai, dumb dumb that she is, has decided that it’s totally reasonable and smart that a murderer would stage an elaborate scene to make a crime look like a suicide, and then, after completely getting away with it, spend the next few months arguing with a coroner, insisting that it was, in fact, a murder! It honestly boggled my mind.

Next, a few days later, Kadra decides that he and Sarai should go inform the family that this guy didn’t commit suicide but was killed and that they’re looking into it. Sarai, SUPREME DUMB DUMB that she is, thinks to herself this: “Great! Maybe while I’m there I can uncover proof that Kadra was behind it!!”

Girl, WHAT?!?! You think that Kadra murdered this guy, set up an elaborate staged suicide, called that very same staging into question, and is now going to take a woman with incredible magical abilities back to the home of the victim where he just so happened to leave around evidence that explicitly condemns him?? What is he getting out of this?? How is this helping him and not, as any normal person would think, clearly revealing him to be the only person most likely to have NOT killed these people. And again, throughout this, Sarai never deals with the fact that her theory of Kadra as the man behind her own murder attempt is completely blown out of the water by the simple fact that he WAS THE ONE TO SAVE HER!

The face-palming throughout all of this was frankly appalling. I won’t go into more details, but these flaws in thinking and ridiculous theorizing continued on well over the halfway mark in the book. Later, there are even more “revelations” that Sarai takes as confirmation of Kadra’s guilt, all of which are equally as stupid as the two examples I listed above. Even writing about it now, I’m getting mad about it all again.

What’s worse, as I said, so much about this book was clicking so well for me! The writing was so strong, the story-telling was good, Kadra was excellent! All the right pieces were there. But somehow, it feels like the author went astray with Sarai herself, as if she knew she wanted to create this suspicion between Sarai and Kadra, but couldn’t quite manage to make it actually work. So, instead, Sarai is just an idiot who thinks completely illogical things, just to maintain the mystery element behind Kadra and his involvement.

All of this said, I’ll definitely check out another book by this author. I think she’s got great potential, and with a few tweaks, I could have loved this book! Unfortunately, I couldn’t get past Sarai herself; I can’t remember the last time I read a book where a main character was this flawed in their reasoning for so long. However, other readers may be less bothered with it, particularly if characters are less important for you. The vibes of the story and the romance itself were very good!

Rating 7: I’d give this a 6 just for Sarai herself. But the actual writing and world-building deserves enough praise to bump it up to a 7.

Reader’s Advisory:

“This Monster of Mine” can be found on this Goodreads list: 2025 Debut Novels.

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Exquisite Ruin” by AdriAnne May

Publishing Info: Gallery Books, March 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound

Book Description:

Review: Sadaré wakes in a labyrinth, remembering nothing except that she is a powerful sorceress. Her only companion is a hostile immortal named Daesra—beautiful, dangerous, and demonic—who bound his divine soul for power and revenge.

Despite their animosity, the two have no choice but to work together to reach the center and defeat the monster who prevents their escape. But the longer they wander, the more deadly and alive the maze becomes—and the more Sadaré finds herself drawn to Daesra in ways she can’t explain.

As sorceress and demon develop a tenuous truce, the labyrinth gives Sadaré glimpses of their shared history of passion and pain that make her question everything she knows. Unlocking the secrets of her past may be the only way to survive and heal their entwined fates—but as she learns more about the betrayals that brought them to the labyrinth, Sadaré begins to fear that the monster at the center could be Daesra … or even herself.

Review: Regardless of my “hit and miss” track record with the romantasy genre, I was immediately intrigued by this one given its ties to the Minotaur myth. What a unique story! The only other version I know of that tackles this myth was the excellent short story by Naomi Novik in her latest short story collection. Now, that entire collection was probably my favorite short story book ever, so the bar was fairly high. But still, given how rarely this tale has been adapted, I felt confident that there was still a lot of room for exploration, especially with a romance angle added on.

That said, I didn’t pay tons of attention to the summary, and when I opened it up and started reading and realized that it was an amnesia story…I was less than thrilled. Totally subjective take, but amnesia is one of my least favorite tropes. For one thing, I think it’s very rare that an author can properly pull it off, and we saw plenty of examples of this stumbling block here: Sure, Sadare claims to remember nothing, but again and again, she makes assertations about her own history/motivations/preferences that she couldn’t possibly know. It’s hard to truly write a blank slate character, as would be true of an actual amnesiac, and Sadare is definitely not it. Beyond that, I have little tolerance for much of the flip-flopping we got from her, one minute drawn to the MMC and the next fearing and hating him once again, often with little given on the page to motivate a change from one emotion to the other.

The writing was also fairly stilted and it took me a long time to get invested. I think this comes down to an over-reliance on a telling vs. showing style. Sentence after sentence begins with Sadare saying “I…” did something/said something/thought something. As this was an early version, more polishing could be done here before the finished copy comes out, but often those changes are things like missed words or spelling rather than sweeping style changes.

So far this has been rather negative, but I do want to touch on what I did like. Whenever the story was given some breathing room from the romantic tension, I liked the exploration of the original myth and their wanderings through the maze. It could feel a bit repetitive at times with dead end met after dead end. But, on the other hand, this is a story about two individuals trapped in a maze. It should feel hopeless at times!

There were the pieces of a lot of good things here. I think both Sadare and the MCC had good foundations and the world-building was also very interesting. I think this author simply still needs some room to grow as far as the actual quality of the writing itself. With a more solid grip on the basics, this could have been a great read! As it stands, I think it will definitely appeal to the romantasy readers who enjoy monster fics. But if you’re generally a fantasy reader first and foremost, this might not be for you.

Rating 7: A unique romantasy with some creative world-building, but it was held back by an overly “telling” style of writing.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Exquisite Ruin” can be found on this Goodreads list: Greco – Roman Fantasy.

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Book: “Slaying the Vampire Conqueror” by Carissa Broadbent

Publishing Info: Bramble, March 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound

Book Description: Sylina has sacrificed everything for her goddess–her soul, her freedom, her eyes. Life in service to the Arachessen, a cult of the Goddess of Fate, has turned Sylina from orphaned street-rat to disciplined killer, determined to overthrow Glaea’s tyrannical king. But when a brutal vampire conqueror arrives on their shores, Sylina faces an even deadlier adversary. She’s tasked with a crucial mission: infiltrate his army, earn his trust… and kill him.

Atrius is a terrifying warrior carving an unstoppable path through Glaea. Yet when Sylina becomes his seer, she glimpses a dark and shocking past–and a side of him that reminds her far too much of parts of herself she’d rather forget. Sylina’s orders are clear. The conqueror cannot live. But as the blood spilled by Glaea’s tyrant king runs thicker, her connection with Atrius only grows stronger. A connection forbidden by her vows. A connection that could cost her everything.

Review: Bramble’s aggressive timeline to re-printing seemingly all of Carissa Broadbent’s back catalog is really biting into my plan to try and space these reads out! So, here we are, back with the latest, one that’s been out as an indie release for a while now and that I had been saving for a rainy day!

While I’ve definitely had favorites, I’ve always highly rated and greatly enjoyed Broadbent’s books, so I was excited to check this one out. I was particularly excited by the nature of this book, its being a stand-alone rather than part of a duology/trilogy, as many of her other titles are. And this one worked great in this format! The romance is a true slow burn, but one that resolves by the end of the book. The characters are strong enough to be introduced quickly and still pack a punch. And the world-building benefits from the various other books that are set in this same world, but still approachable to new readers, with few references to previous storylines.

Broadbent is one of those authors whose books seem to straddle the line between romantasy and romantic fantasy. They’re definitely romances, with a decent number of spice scenes and HEAs. But she also puts tons of effort into her world-building and magic system, and I think this gives the books good cross-over appeal to fantasy readers in general who enjoy a central love story. All of this to say, this was one of her best love stories yet!

I think the slow-burn nature of their relationship played out in the best way possible, with both characters coming in with their own goals and many pre-existing opinions about one another. But through the events of the story, their relationship begins forming first and foremost around mutual respect for one another’s abilities. Indeed, before the book spends much time at all with thoughts of romantic interest, we see several scenes instead of Sylina and Atrius admiring one another’s battle prowess. All of this ground work makes their eventual romance all the sweeter, as it feels as if it progresses at a natural and believable pace.

I also really loved Sylina as a character! The magic behind her blindness and the way that she interacts with the world was so interesting, from the details of her maneuvers while fighting to simple things like the ways that she and those like her connect with one another. As readers, its easy to have early suspicions about Sylina’s religion and the order that she works for. But the book does a great job exploring her slow path to questioning the way she has been brought up to understand the world, her views on authority and individual judgement, as well as autonomy. Throughout most all of her books, Broadbent has taken a keen look at religious extremism, often drawing neat but profound parallels to our current world, and this one is yet another example of this.

The book also doesn’t shy away from the violence and horror of the conflict brewing on the page. There’s a scene in the last third of the book that took me by surprise with just how grim it became. But, as this is a romance as well, things do get wrapped up with a nice HEA for our main characters. If you’re a fan of Broadbent’s work, then this is a must read! And if you’re looking for an easy entry point to her books, this is also a good place to start as it doesn’t commit you to more than one book!

Rating 9: Enticing and exciting! When you’re not busy swooning, you’ll be on the edge of your seat!

Reader’s Advisory:

“Slaying the Vampire Conqueror” can be found on this Goodreads list: Titles That “Slay”.

This post may contain affiliate links for books we recommend.  Read the full disclosure here.

Note: Some long-time readers may remember that I reviewed this book 2-3 years ago. Well, T. Kingfisher has seen a surge in popularity since and, as such, many of her back catalog titles are being re-published by Tor/Bramble with new covers and marketing. (I definitely now have to versions of this book, I loved it that much!) As Kingfisher is one of my favorite authors writing today, I wanted to re-surface this review with the updated cover for those who may not be in the know!

Book: “Swordheart” by T. Kingfisher

Publishing Info: Bramble, Feb. 2025

Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!

Where Can You Get this Book: Amazon | IndieBound | WorldCat

Book Description: Halla is a housekeeper who has suddenly inherited her great-uncle’s estate… and, unfortunately, his relatives. Sarkis is an immortal swordsman trapped in a prison of enchanted steel. When Halla draws the sword that imprisons him, Sarkis finds himself attempting to defend his new wielder against everything from bandits and roving inquisitors to her own in-laws… and the sword itself may prove to be the greatest threat of all.

Review: Once I discover a favorite author, it can only be expected that you’ll probably see a lot of reviews for them going forward. So as not to just run through them one after another, I’ve been trying to hold off on picking up a new Kingfisher novel until I feel like I’ve been in a bit of a slump. And, for whatever reason, many of my October books were a bit underwhelming. While this was a bummer, it gave me the only excuse I needed, so I immediately jumped back into the world of the Clockwork Boys with this standalone book.

You would think being left a grand estate and all the wealth and prestige that comes with that would be a blessing. But for Halla, the housekeeper turned unexpected heiress, it has lead to nothing but trouble. Hounded by the relatives of the deceased, Halla has all but given up hope of collecting on her inheritance. That is until, when trapped in a cluttered room in a mansion that should by rights belong to her, Halla draws a dusty old sword and finds…a swordsman as well? One who is enchanted to the sword and sworn to protect its wielder for the remainder of their life. But while Halla seems like an easy enough individual to protect, Sarkis, the swordsman, is in for a surprise.

I think it would be a bigger shock than anything if I read a book by this author that I didn’t enjoy. There are enough strengths in her general storytelling ability, her solid characters, and her witty dialogue that it’s hard to imagine a book that felt like a flop. There have been stories I’ve enjoyed more than others, however. So where does this one fit on that scale?

While much of the appeal of this book lay in the strength of the qualities I listed above, there were a few aspects of this story that I found particularly charming. For one thing, Halla is an “older” heroine, coming in with an age somewhere in her 30s. Kingfisher has used several older heroines like this to helm her books, and it’s something I always appreciate. Life and adventure doesn’t only come for twenty-somethings! And, indeed, we get more variety and life experience with an older lead who brings more baggage (both good and bad) to the story. Halla is an unlikely leading lady in that she starts the book out as a bewildered heiress who seems as if she may have been happier remaining a housekeeper for the rest of her life. What’s more, as the story progresses, her romance with Sarkis comes from the perspective of a woman who has already been married once and knows what’s what.

I also appreciated that this was one of the longer books I’ve read by this author. She tends to write books that come in between the 200-250 page count, just enough to be considered full novels instead of novellas, but noticeably shorter than the average fantasy novel out there. On one hands, this is a quality I love as there are so many massive fantasy tomes out there that not only don’t need to be the length they are (and are often worse for it) but the sheer amount of time it takes to read one lengthy novel necessarily limits how many one can get through. That said, I loved being able to settle in to this story a bit more than I have with past, shorter books by this author. I became highly invested in Halla’s journey towards self-worth and Sarkis’s work to restore the humanity he gave up when he became attached to the sword. We learn a lot about their personal histories, so it’s truly gratifying to see them come up against similar challenges here and make different choices.

That said, there came a point around the three quarters mark where I began to feel like the book was quite literally tracing the same road back and forth. This is played for good humorous affect, but the final go around did begin to feel a bit tedious as I began to wish that our characters could finally have something go right for them.

Overall, however, I really enjoyed this book. It was enjoyable and solid in all of the ways I’ve come to expect by this author, and I appreciated the increased page length to really soak in this particular world and these characters and their romance. Fans of this author or for those looking for a cozy fantasy novel, this is definitely a book for you!

Rating 8: Everything you could want from cozy fantasy fiction!

Reader’s Advisory:

“Swordheart” can be found on these Goodreads lists: CozySFF and Above 30 Romance Heroines.