DO IT, BUY THE BOOK- June, Challenge 1 Recommendations

By Fay Clark

New month, new challenge, new recommendations. This month I this the challenges have been made a little bit harder. That just means I'm going to have to give you some GREAT recommendations to even it out.

CHALLENGE 1 - READ A BOOK WRITTEN BY AN AUTHOR OF A DIFFERENT GENDER TO YOU.

Recommendation 1 - Nevernight by Jay Kristoff. Written by a man, this is the start to one of my favourite series ever. Daughter of an executed traitor, Mia Corvere is barely able to escape her father’s failed rebellion with her life. Alone and friendless, she hides in a city built from the bones of a dead god, hunted by the Senate and her father’s former comrades. But her gift for speaking with the shadows leads her to the door of a retired killer, and a future she never imagined.

Recommendation 2 - King's of the Wyld by Nicolas Eames. Written by a man, this has got to be the closest to a D&D adventure fantasy without actually being one. I loved it, would clearly recommend. Clay Cooper and his band were once the best of the best -- the meanest, dirtiest, most feared crew of mercenaries this side of the Heartwyld. Their glory days long past, the mercs have grown apart and grown old, fat, drunk - or a combination of the three. Then an ex-bandmate turns up at Clay's door with a plea for help. His daughter Rose is trapped in a city besieged by an enemy one hundred thousand strong and hungry for blood. Rescuing Rose is the kind of mission that only the very brave or the very stupid would sign up for. It's time to get the band back together for one last tour across the Wyld.

Recommendation 3 - A Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Soloman. This book is written by a non-binary person. It had a very haunting atmosphere and a great mystery plot. Aster lives in the low-deck slums of the HSS Matilda, a space vessel organized much like the antebellum South. For generations, the Matilda has ferried the last of humanity to a mythical Promised Land. On its way, the ship's leaders have imposed harsh moral restrictions and deep indignities on dark-skinned sharecroppers like Aster, who they consider to be less than human. When the autopsy of Matilda's sovereign reveals a surprising link between his death and her mother's suicide some quarter-century before, Aster retraces her mother's footsteps. Embroiled in a grudge with a brutal overseer and sowing the seeds of civil war, Aster learns there may be a way off the ship if she's willing to fight for it.

Recommendation 4 - Middlegame by Seanan McGuire. This was written by a woman. I adored this book, on of my favourite things I read in 2019. Meet Roger. Skilled with words, languages come easily to him. He instinctively understands how the world works through the power of story. Meet Dodger, his twin. Numbers are her world, her obsession, her everything. All she understands, she does so through the power of math. Roger and Dodger aren’t exactly human, though they don’t realise it. They aren’t exactly gods, either. Not entirely. Not yet. Godhood is attainable. Pray it isn’t attained.

Recommendation 5 - The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers. Written by a woman, this has to be my favourite Space Soap Opera ever. Rosemary Harper doesn’t expect much when she joins the crew of the aging Wayfarer. While the patched-up ship has seen better days, it offers her a bed, a chance to explore the far-off corners of the galaxy, and most importantly, some distance from her past. An introspective young woman who learned early to keep to herself, she’s never met anyone remotely like the ship’s diverse crew, including Sissix, the exotic reptilian pilot, chatty engineers Kizzy and Jenks who keep the ship running, and Ashby, their noble captain.

I do hope some of these peak your interest! You can find out what I've been reading over on our Instagram account @FanUniverses.

As always, keep reading and have FUN!

BOOK QUEEN OUT!