This book was everything I wanted.

Carry On is a story out of a story: in Rowell's earlier novel, Fangirl, the title character writes volumes and volumes of fanfiction of a Harry Potter-like series and Carry On, Simon is the name of her best known fic. Carry On was pitched as “the story that Cath wrote in Fangirl” but it grew from this meta-book idea into it's own solid and highly enjoyable novel. Set in a magical English boarding school the cast of this book faces the threat of a bizarre enemy who is eating power and leaving gaping dead zones in the magical atmosphere. Two boys, long-time enemies (poised on the delicious edge of either killing or kissing each other) have to find a way to work together long enough to solve an eighteen year old murder and save the World of Mages.

The Tenderness of Wolves by Stef Penney is set in Canada in the 1860s in an isolated fur-trapping settlement that is shocked by a bloody murder. The 17 year old son of a local family has disappeared and is considered the main suspect- his mother sets out on his tracks into the tundra determined to bring him back, either innocent or guilty. The tone of this book is deeply influenced by the harsh and barren landscape which tends to bring out the worst and best in people. Extremely well written.

A Burnable Book and The Invention of Fire by Bruce Holsinger are a set of mysteries set in London in the 1380s. The main character is John Gower, a poet, a buyer and seller of secrets and a good friend of Geoffrey Chaucer. In each book he faces a crime that threatens to throw his carefully balanced city into chaos and violence. These books capture the feeling of daily life in a medieval setting better than anything I've ever read in the era.

Possession by AS Byatt is a story of two modern academics, Roland and Maud, both of whom are researching fictional Victorian Poets, Randolph Ash and Christabel La Motte respectively. The discovery of a scrap of a letter from Ash to La Motte leads to a fateful meeting between the two scholars which sends them on a suspenseful whirlwind search for the true relationship between the poets. This book is a mystery, a romance, a thriller and also contains a set of extremely beautiful poems seemingly written by very different poets but in actuality all written by the same author. I was incredibly impressed by the scope of the writing and was completely drawn into the addictive plot.

Tale of Sand by Jim Hensen, Jerry Juhl, Ramon Perez, Chris Robinson and Stephan Christy is a comic book based on a scrip by Jim Hensen which was (to the the best of my knowledge) never filmed. It is also a tour de force of a comic book, which page layouts and pacing unlike anything I have ever seen. The visual humor and gorgeous style are well worth it, and the story is a fascinating inside-out puzzle of a narrative.

Fantasy Sports by Sam Bosma was an absolute treat. It's not a very long book, less than 60 pages, but each page is beautiful and well-written. The story follows a pair of ill-matched mages who must face down an evil undead wizard in a game of high-stakes fantasy basketball.

Supermutant Magic Academy by Jillian Tamaki is a cuttingly funny examination of human nature through the lens of a loose group of magical high school misfits. There are friends, enemies, crushes, boring or deadly thrilling homework assignments, riffs on relationships with technology, nature and (most terrifyingly) other people.

Beyond: the Queer Sci-Fi and Fantasy Anthology edited by Sfe Monster is the gorgeous result of a very successful kickstarter project. A whole bunch of stories from 26 different contributors show queer characters in space, on earth and in fantasy in a range of beautiful styles.

How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran was hilarious. Moran was an odd duckling growing up in England in the 1980s who stumbled in the music journalism scene in the 1990s just in time to be the only woman at nearly every job she landed. Chapters in this book range all over the place (periods, siblings, riot grrl, dating, marriage, abortion, birth, fashion, work, sexism, porn) and some were more to my fancy than others. But this is the kind of book that makes me laugh in public and then read bits out loud to the people around me so that they could laugh out loud too.

Gender Outlaw: The Next Generation edited by Kate Bornstein and S Bear Bergman is a collection of essays by gender outlaws of every type. Sad, funny, stirring, factual- it's quite a grab bag but always an enjoyable one.