By Johanna Lindsey
Read: Feb 2010
Rating: Convoluted
There’s a LOT of fun to poke at this thing. Before I have fun, let me say that it wasn’t awful. It wasn’t really good, either.
BOOK-IN-A-MINUTE, Git-style
(Yes, that means spoiler)
Roseleen: I am a history professor with a penchant for old weapons. Look at this fabulous old sword my brother [...]

Once upon a time, I discovered a wonderful, wonderful book. Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted is immerses you in Ella’s world, giving you a best friend as well as an adventure.
Then Hollywood got their hands on it. And THEY RAPED IT.
Below is an off-the-cuff rant I wrote in 2004, before the movie was even released. [...]

By Kate Forsyth
Read: ~2002, November 2009
Rating: Gripping
Hoo-! I was up MUCH later than intended last night, polishing off the last of book 6, which I read right on the heels of #5. Good reading, there. When I say gripping, I mean it. The last third especially…
The Skull of the World follows Isabeau’s ultimate quest in [...]

By Kate Forsyth
Read: Sept-Oct 2009
Rating: Nostalgic
Number four, in what was meant to be a trilogy. I had always liked this one because it stars one of my favorite characters: Finn.
Fionnghal was born a princess, heir to the MacRurach clan, but was kidnapped by Maya’s regime to use as a tool. The MacRurachs have the gift [...]

Reviewed for the Feminist Review
By Alaya Dawn Johnson
Bolden
Racing the Dark is unique among fantasy books. The world draws upon Pacific Island and East Asian cultures to create a rich blend very different from fantasy canon—an island nation with an animist religion centering on sacrifice and binding. Though a young adult novel, Johnson is unafraid [...]

By Kate Forsyth
Read: July 2009
Rating: Comfortable
So, Lachlan and Iseult have won their throne! But now the land is covered in Bright Soldiers and the coasts are being raided by Fairgean. Maya the Ensorcellor is at large, and her followers are planning an insurrection. The Righ goes to war.
There’s isn’t really a single arch holding this [...]

By Kate Forsyth
Read: Way Back When, July 2009
Rating: Bonny
Book Two in the Witches of Eileannan is a big ‘un. It covers TWO mega-battles/wars, and a giantass cast of characters. I love it.
And plenty of men in kilts. Not much fetishizing of the kilts, but plenty of kilts. And women kilting their skirts up because skirts [...]

By Kate Forsyth
Read: Early 2000s?, June 2009
Rating: Love
I owe one of my good friends a debt of thanks for turning me onto these. At the time it was just the first two on the shelf and we all thought it would be a trilogy. Imagine our delight when it turned into SIX books!
Eileannan is a [...]

By Elizabeth Lowell
Read: June 2009
Rating: Cool?
Yeah, so, I’ve talked about how dangerous library book sales are, right? Right. I found me some romances. Proper swooning cover romances. I mean, check this inner cover out. Pink satin sheets, hair spread wantonly across pillows, limbs tangled and toes curling.

Oh yeah, and he’s got a mullet.
You might [...]

By Nancy Werlin
Read: June 2009
Rating: Excellent
There must have been some great turnover in the AuthorSphere. Newer YA writers–ie., books published after I stopped reading them (around age… 13?)–are clearly onto something. I mean, really, really onto something. It’s not just The Disreputable History. It’s How I Live Now and Libba Bray and Impossible. Cuz this [...]

Edited by Dana Stabenow
Read: Sept/Oct 2008 (review finalized May 2009)
Rating: Abysmal
It was a noble goal. Dana Stabenow writes sci fi/fantasy, and when someone suggested she try her hand at a mystery competition she laughed. But she said she’d try and it turned into a story. It was too long for the competition and she refused [...]

By Margaret George
Read: May 2009, approx. 240 pages.
Rating: Sigh.
I get very disappointed when books I want to be good… aren’t. It comes particularly hard on the heels of a riveting series, like the Black Dagger Brotherhood. And I just gave up on The Mermaid Chair, so it’s doubly depressing to give up on this as [...]

By J.R. Ward
Read: April-May 2009
Rating: Cool
My mom got me hooked on these. She bought the whole Black Dagger Brotherhood series (1-6) and she immersed herself in them for about a week. Then she passed them on to me.
Good, solid books. Not perfect, but few things are. As a whole, the series is delicious. It’s smart, [...]

By Ariana Franklin
Read: Feb 2009
Rating: AWESOME.
I go down on bended knee to my friend V for recommending this. The cover and its text make this sound like a pretty dark murder mystery that happens to be set in medieval Europe. That was pretty cool, but I wasn’t expecting to enjoy it so much. It’s FUNNY. [...]

By Tamora Pierce
Read: First time in 6th grade? Multiple re-readings thereafter. January 2009.
Rating: Immortal.
I love Alanna. I love, love, love, love, LOVE her. I think I was about 12… possibly 10 or 11… when I found In The Hand of the Goddess at the public library. It was exactly what I had been craving. A [...]

by Judith Lindbergh
Read: December 2008
Rating: Woah
I mean, seriously, woah. I’m still trying to sort out what I really think about this. I mean, it was good. It was really, really good. I can totally appreciate this as a writer, and an experienced reader. I’m not sure if that means its a good read, though… or [...]

By Donna Jo Napoli
Read: 1998, October 2008
Rating: Provocative
I still remember seeing Sirena on display at our school library, when it first came out. I was perhaps in 6th grade. It was on a special shelf, for the library’s special reader program–those readers got first pick of the new titles and were supposed to review them. [...]

By Anne Bishop
Read: September 2008
Rating: FAB.
You know the kind of book that you read in hours and days instead of weeks, the kind of book that makes you want to cry as you reach the end because it’s just so good? That’s the latter 2/3 of the Tir Alainn books.
The first, Pillars of the World, [...]

By Anne Bishop
Read: September 2008
Rating: Nifty
I don’t know why the Tir Alainn books have sat unread for so long. I snapped the first one up because I love Anne Bishop’s Black Jewels books. Maybe I could sense that the Tir Alainn books aren’t up to the same standard. Still, I’m enjoying them.
Where Black Jewels is [...]

by Stephanie Rowe
Read: 2007/2008
Rating: Mostly fab
I didn’t realize I hadn’t blogged about any of these! They’re so much fun! I found the first one at the grocery store, and by the time I finally read it I was able to hop online and buy the next 3. Yes, they’re that good. I followed them. I [...]

By P.C. Cast
Read: First half of 2008.
Rating: Um?
The Smart Bitches have raved about two of PC Cast’s books so I figured she was a pretty safe bet. And it was really just… so-so. Entertaining, but not madly so. I don’t know what was wrong, per se, they just weren’t as good as they could’ve been. [...]

By Karen Hawkins
Read: April 2007
Rating: Fun
Mmkay, I am a sucker for men in kilts. So much so that I’m adding a new category to the Fun Shtuff. Why? Cuz men in kilts are Hawtt. Ahem.
I grabbed this and ran–I just had a good feeling about it. And I was so right. Though there was [...]

Adam Ashforth
Rating: Decent
Read: December 2005
I’m unsure how to categorize this one. It was required reading for my Apartheid & After class. The main issue? Witchcraft.