Look, I figured that if I'm going to read monster porn, then sooner or later I was going to have to do it: I was going to have to read the minotaur jizz book that everybody's been talking about. Which meant really getting out of my comfort zone and venturing into the strange world of... Heterosexual Romance.

I have to say, I had fun reading Morning Glory Milking Farm. I already knew that I liked the world it's set in, thanks to my beloved Two for Tea, and the setting was half of why I read this.

The other half was morbid curiosity. I wanted to know how it worked! And C.M. Nascosta really likes showing you how it works. There are plenty of details about how things work in this book. The details are measurable in fluid ounces and in size comparisons to oranges. At the end of the reading experience, you cannot say that you were not told how things work.

But how was the romance? It didn't do much for me, personally, because men, neither in human nor minotaur form, are my thing. (Nonbinary shapeshifting shadow people who run tea shops? Whole 'nother story.) However, Rourke is not a bad romance hero. He does this chivalrous, gentlemanly thing that I understand quite a lot of people enjoy, but he does it while respecting Violet's agency and letting her dictate how quickly their relationship progresses. He's really concerned about getting to know her as a person and not rushing anything, and he takes an interest in her life and career in a way that didn't strike me as controlling or condescending. Genuinely better than some human man characters I've read!

And I really like Violet. She is the typical millennial who went to grad school because that's how you get a good job, only to discover that getting a good job is impossible and sometimes, if you want to afford your apartment and occasionally buy name-brand orange juice or have a decent cup of coffee, you have to take a gig you never really saw yourself doing. Like jerking off minotaurs. It happens to the best of us.

So all in all, I'm not sad that I read this. It was a fun (albeit very sticky) time, and I will be reading more Cambric Creek books to learn all about how other types of monster genitalia work. The next one has a mothman!

A gem of a book that will appeal to all fans of atmospheric, language-driven, folkloric and historical fantasy. Left me so gobsmacked that all I can say is it's one of my favorites I've read all year.

I love reading fantasy in December, especially if I can devour a trilogy or short series. I did this last year with the His Dark Materials trilogy; this year, I opted for something shorter and quicker with the Greenhollow Duology.

I unreservedly loved the first book, Silver in the Wood. It has a storyteller-esque quality to the prose that I adore and often associate with Neil Gaiman. It has a lush, forest setting that feels both cozy and sinister. Tobias is a delightfully stoic main character. It's perfect.

My feelings about Drowned Country are more complicated. The voice is very different, stuck as it is in Henry Silver's mopey, selfish head. It will vary in its appeal depending on your ability to withstand/enjoy Howl Pendragon levels of self-pity. I have to say that I found it taxing.

However, I loved the deeply eerie approach Emily Tesh takes to writing the fae. She captures a brittle, desiccated uncanniness that I don't think I've seen taken to this level anywhere else. Once I got into this part of the book, I enjoyed things much more.

But I never got back onto Henry Silver's side, and I didn't really buy or want the ending that happens. The conclusion felt rushed to me, partially because this is a novella and things have to wrap up quickly, which is just a hazard of the format, but partially because the resolution didn't feel emotionally earned. It felt like a redemption arc without any actual redemption, just a lot of grace being afforded to someone whom I don't really think deserved it.

I'm not straightforwardly telling you to read the first book but not the second, because there are worthwhile things here that you would miss: the aforementioned creepy faerie stuff; more of Tobias out in the world; and the introduction of Maud Lindhurst, a character I like to imagine having many long years of adventures. And there are thought-provoking things here about love and possessiveness. However, I kind of wish that I hadn't immediately read this one. I think it would have felt good to marinate in the warm feelings I have for Silver in the Wood for a bit.

I've been reading this series from my library all year, and I think that this might be my favorite volume so far, which makes the fact that it's the final one even sadder. I liked that it felt less episodic than previous volumes, more like it's really building toward something while showing you the characters' everyday lives. I just wish that it had been longer, because there are a lot of plot threads that don't get as much time as they need to really shine and come to satisfying conclusions. Kita, the new character who is questioning his gender (though it seems so clear to me that I really should say "the new character who is a closeted trans girl whose egg just cracked"), especially gets short shrift in the ending. I would have loved even just a panel hinting at a happy ending there, or even just at a continued friendship with Sakuma, because their interactions seemed to have a lot of potential for nurturing. I'm just going to headcanon that they keep in touch, and that Sakuma and Wanko give Kita a safe, soft place to land if things get difficult.

Honestly, it warms my heart that this sweet little series exists. I wish I could have read something like this when I was a teenager.

Olivia Waite is by far my favorite historical romance author, so when I originally discovered Hen Fever, I was tempted to read it immediately, regardless of the time of year. But I exercised restraint, imagining the cozy idyll of me reading it snuggled under a blanket on Christmas Eve, and saved it.

This novella was surprising to me. It does deliver some coziness, centered around a small town poultry show and the various rivalries among the competitors. However, it packs more emotional weight than I expected. The heroines have both been shaped by war and loss, and the themes of grief and trauma are not what I've come to expect from Christmas romances. Waite does it well, though, and it's satisfying to watch her characters find their commonalities and help one another.

Any gripes I have about this are my usual novella pacing complaints. The first half was perfection, while the second half felt a bit rushed, having to wrap up not only the main romantic plot, but also tie up all the other threads relating to the chicken show competitors and their squabbles, and resolve what happens with the competition itself.

But I still really enjoyed Hen Fever, and I'm glad I managed to read something Christmassy this year.

For the last few years, since I've realized that I really like mysteries, I've been reading an Agatha Christie or two a year, and I think that Crooked House might be my favorite I've read so far. I've seen it on a lot of lists of Knives Out readalikes, and now that I've read it, I do think it's a good recommendation. Both share a similar big-old-house setting, ensemble casts with strong personalities (Jacob Thrombey and Eustace Leonides felt very similar to me, especially), poisoning as a method of murder, and a meta sensibility. Both are genre aware, and both subvert their genre. Of course, what makes Crooked House noteworthy is that Christie was doing this in 1949.

Also noteworthy is that her prose, especially her dialogue, is so timelessly readable, zipping along and drawing the reader through every twist and turn of the investigation. I had to adjust for some attitudes that seem weird or laughable now, but not as much as in some Christies. All in all, a really enjoyable reading experience.

2.5 stars rounded up.

Sweet Berries satisfies one of the reasons I read the Cambric Creek series--the ever-burning question of how does it work??--but leaves some of my other desires unsated. The world-building didn't feel as substantial to me as in other books in the series I've read, and I even had trouble telling some of the supporting characters apart (naming a character something that could be a shortened version of another character's name didn't help). Nascosta's tendency to write in circles around her plot is very apparent in this one, and I found all the skipping forward and doubling back distracting. I think this one needs a strong edit (formatting, structure, and grammar/spelling), but I still liked the trademark mixture of weird monster anatomy, emotional themes, and self-aware humor.

I read this for my queer book club, and for about the first third of the book, I kept thinking, why? Why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we keep voting for sad books like this one and In the Dream House and Pageboy? And we've got a book about a women's prison coming up next? Why can't we read a fucking rom-com or something, good Lord??

But this ended up being one of my favorite books of the year so far.

It follows a woman struggling to raise her daughter on her own when her wife dies shortly after giving birth, which is heartrending enough already. But this is also a dystopian novel, so she's doing all of this while also living in a profoundly unjust surveillance state that brands those who have "harmed" others (and if you're thinking that the definition of harm can be wildly arbitrary and unfair in its application, bingo) with additional shadows and steals their rights for the rest of their lives.

It's an emotionally heavy book that deals with the protagonist's overwhelming grief and fear and shame, but the narrative voice kept me reading. The style won't be for everyone--it's told in second person, impressionistic vignettes, addressed to her deceased wife--but I found it so effective.

I don't even want to say much more, because I don't want to spoil this for anyone. I went into it knowing only the basic setup, and I found it rewarding to see what the book bloomed into as I read. So I'll just say that it's a great book, almost unbearably relevant, one that I'm going to hold close to my heart for a long time. I can't wait to talk about it in book club.

Recommended for fans of insightful sociopolitical commentary in fiction, queer families, and novels that make you say "how in the world is this a debut??"