heddas_bookgems's Reviews (490)

“All my life I saw my inaction as harmless. I was happy to stand by while Kizzy made decisions, while she ran toward danger or threat, answered back to insults. I thought my silence, my stillness, was a fine way to be. But now I realised it made me as bad as those men who took the side of a monster, who watched a locked door as children starved to death inside.” You are enslaved afraid of your live but mostly the live of your sisters.

Twins Kizzy and Lil are Travellers. With their family they live a free life entertaining people with bear dances. But destiny strikes and they are captured and enslaved by boyars men. They both try to survive in their own way, one fighting the other one staying in line. Everything is better than the threat of being sacrificed to the most terrified boyar, the Dragon.

If you are expecting Deathless Girls by Kiran Millwood Hargrave to be solely about the brides of Dracul you are going to be disappointed. This book however is a wonderful novel about the prosecution of Travellers, due to their lifestyle and appearance in Europe. It’s a dark, historical novel about endurance, about will power, love for family with hints of magic. It had everything I I didn’t knew I needed. It had a poetic writing style, wonderful characters, it’s fast paced but painfully harsh, beautiful, small and delicate. I loved how Hargrave illustrated that hardship can develop strong wills and how love can overpower almost everything if we are bold enough to follow our hearts. However, expect a story about the background of the brides of Dracul so you won’t get disappointed.

“No, no, no. Not a novel, Bunny.”“Which is no longer novel, you know.”“Such a tired form.”“Flaccid. Limp.”“What we’re doing is far more . . .”“Innovative.”“Experimental.”“Performance based.'

Bunny is about Samantha, a student in creative writing in a Ivy League at Warren University New England. Her classmates, self called Bunny’s are unbearable, but when they invite her to “Smut Salon,” she can’t help but feel drawn to it. But with it she ends up in a fairytale horror.

Boy oh boy this was a shocking, absurdist and bizarre hallucination. This novel by Mona Awad, is extremely funny at points while at the same time it makes you scared, questions the education of creative writing and gives meta vibes describing the process of writing. But all the while you find a eerie feeling looming. Something’s wrong but you can’t grasp what. Awad drags you from thinking it’s one thing to ending it in such an epic mindshattering experience that the book lingers a while before you get a grip on what the hell it was that you were reading. And still I’m not sure. But if you’re in for a book that has Donnie Darko vibes, please give this one a go.

“It’s not that I want exactly this, to have a husband or home security system that, for the length of our marriage, never goes off. It’s that there are gray, anonymous hours like this. Hours when I am desperate, when I am ravenous, when I know how a star becomes a void.”

Luster is about Edie, a female painter of 23 years old, who is nearly unemployed and dates abusive or toxic men. When she starts dating Eric, a white man of middle age with an open marriage, she wants to adopt his life which is so different than her own.

For some books you simply have to be in a certain mood. Luster is such a book. Because this book portrays the hard things of life. Working hard but earning nothing, racism and sexism, the harsh results of capitalism renting a appartement with health issues. But also illustrates about how a low self esteem, caused by childhood trauma, translates in future relationships. And all of this in wonderful, although maybe a little overused, prose. And that’s the reason I did like it, as the writing was immaculate, but I wasn’t in the right headspace to really appreciate it. This book was supposed to have humor, but I missed that, as such it felt very dark. It was saddening to see this young female, struggle so much with her self-image resulting in destructiveness. Maybe it was supposed to let me feel that, but because of it this was not the book for this moment.

Robin Hobb’s The Golden Fool, the second book in the Tawny Man Trilogy, is a masterstroke in the realm of fantasy literature. Hobb doesn't just tell a story; she creates a world and characters so real you can almost feel it and hear them. Add to that an immense amount of mystery, suspense, and intense emotions and it left me breathless, again.

FitzChivalry Farseer is back at the center of it all. He’s still dealing with his past and grappling with a destiny he can’t escape. Now, he’s returned to Buckkeep as Tom Badgerlock, caught up in court politics while trying to protect Prince Dutiful and figuring out his complex relationship with the Fool.

It’s those relationships and these characters that make this my everything. Fitz is so real with his mix of vulnerability and toughness. You can feel every bit of his joy and pain. And the Fool—what a character! So mysterious, witty, and sometimes even a bit childish, the bond between him and Fitz is something truly special.

And then there’s a new character named Thick, the simple boy with the incredible Skill. He’s such an endearing character. His innocence and purity just grab your heart. When he calls Fitz “Dogstink,” it’s funny and touching at the same time, showing how their relationship grows and deepens.

The plot of Golden Fool as a second book may not be as full of plot twists as Hobb usually ends the book, but it still has some scary foresights and tense turns that kept me guessing. It might not top Fools Errand, due to some reasons (if you know you know), but it still had such an anxiety moment that it left a deep impression on me. Just when you think you’ve got it figured out, Hobb surprises you again. It’s a wild ride, and I loved every minute of it.

Alix E. Harrow's The Once and Future Witches weaves a rich tapestry of folklore, old fairytales, the suffragette movement, witch trials, and Avalon’s magic into an evocative narrative. While the novel begins with a slow and descriptive pace, the lore introductions at the start of each chapter significantly enhance the world-building and complement Harrow's atmospheric writing. These interludes not only ground the story’s magic but also pay homage to the power of storytelling itself.

Set in 1893, when witches are thought to be mere remnants of a dark past, the story follows the Eastwood sisters as they join the suffragists of New Salem. As they rediscover ancient magics, they aim to transform the women’s movement into a witch's movement, all while battling formidable forces that threaten their very existence. Hunted by shadows, sickness, and powerful enemies, the sisters must delve into ancient spells, forge new alliances, and repair their fractured bonds to survive.

The Once and Future Witches is more than a tale of magic; it’s a profound exploration of family dynamics, sisterly bonds, and the importance of communication and community. Harrow’s novel beautifully blends historical fiction and fantasy, highlighting the intersection of women’s rights, a magical quest for empowerment and showing how the fight for equality can be both mundane and magical.