Moonward Society

I am a fan of CG Drews’ other works (Hazelthorn in particular) so I was very excited to receive an advanced copy of Scorpion Deep! It did not disappoint. In this book we follow Jonathon Covey, a lonely boy with a difficult home life, who is living in a small island town. Jonathon’s friends all got into a college that he could not get into and will leave the island at the end of the summer, leaving Jonathon even more alone. To try to save himself from the loneliness, Jonathon does a ritual to call upon Scorpion Deep, a mythical eldritch sea god. The ritual works and Jonathon is left to contend with the monstrous sea god. I put aside all my other reading once I started this book because I could not put it down! It’s very compelling, mysterious and really draws you in. I read it nonstop and almost wish I had drawn it out a bit more because I was sad once it ended! Similarly to some of Drews’ other novels, the asexual representation is incredibly well done. Jonathon’s experiences are so re...

This is the third and final installment of the Faebound series! I do wish I had reread the first two books before diving back into this world. It took me a few chapters to get back into it and there were a lot of things that I forgot about. The world the El-Arifi has built in this series is intricate and detailed, which I loved, but it just takes a little time to remember all the details. So if you are able to reread the first two before reading this latest addition, I would definitely recommend that! I will probably read the whole trilogy again at some point. Lettle has set off on a quest with Alder to uncover his mysterious past, while Yeeran has stayed in Mosima working as an ambassador to try to stop the fighting between fae and elves. All of my favorite characters make appearances and there’s a few new great characters introduced. We even get some chapters with points of view I don’t remember seeing in the previous books! Overall I really enjoyed this last book! I thought the twis...

A Long and Speaking Silence by Nghi Vo is the seventh novella in The Singing Hill Cycle. I’ve been a fan of all the other books in this series and this one is no different! I really enjoyed this story! We’re stepping back in time a bit in this book and visiting some of Chih and Almost Brilliant’s early years. The pair have not been working together for that long at this point. Their relationship does feel different from other books where they are more established as solid partners. I like seeing how their relationship has grown throughout the series. In this novella, Chih has run into a bit of trouble when they had their moneypurse stolen and so now is working as a waiter in a restaurant. They are of course still a cleric of Singing Hills Abbey so they still try to collect stories as much as they can. Some of the towns’ inhabitants are more reluctant to talk to Chih than others are, and Chih sometimes struggles with getting stories from people. We get to see a more doubtful and unsure ...

I was in a bit of a reading slump when I started reading this book, but The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones by Lex Croucher has definitely cured my slump! This is the first time in a long time I've stayed up late into the night to finish a book. I couldn't put it down once I started reading.  Briar Jones, a nonbinary teenager, is hired to work at a mysterious boarding school for the summer. The school is attended by a number of rich, privileged people, one of whom is Briar's former best friend Sebastian Wolfe. The two have not been in contact since Sebastian started attending the school seven years ago. While working there, Briar has to contend with what happened between them. Luckily, they also make some friends with some of the students while they are working there. I absolutely loved the character of Briar. They are so relatable, and felt so real to me! Their relationship with Sebastian is also complex and interesting. It kept me intrigued throughout the book.  I think th...

First to Finish is the second book in the Pole Position series by Rebecca J. Caffery. This is a queer sports romance series based on Formula 1 racing. I read the first book in the series and thought it was a very fun read and this second book follows in the footsteps of that one! It’s a quick and sometimes spicy read! In First to Finish, we follow driver Johannes Muller and his race engineer Caleb Hughes as a budding romance starts between them. I really liked the chemistry between these two! We also get to see some other characters from the first book, primarily Kian and Harper, which I liked! It was nice to have follow up on their story. As a Formula 1 fan, I would say the racing descriptions seem pretty accurate (although of course dramatized at points for the sake of the story!) I’ve had trouble consuming some fictionalized F1 media in the past because of inaccuracies but there was nothing glaring here that took me away from the story! I also don’t usually read sports romance but h...

I absolutely loved this book! I don’t read a ton of memoirs, but I’m a big fan of Isabel’s from her TikTok videos, so when I saw she was writing a book I was very interested in reading it. I first saw Isabel‘s TikTok videos when she was fostering the dog Tiki, so I was excited to see his story included! This memoir focuses mostly on Isabel‘s life in New York City. We jump back to her childhood a few times to provide context for different things she discusses, but primarily we read about her young adult/adult life. Isabel discusses her romantic relationships, and how they each shaped her life. She has a clarity about her past relationships that I think many people would envy. She talks about them in this raw way that seems very vulnerable. I admire her for that. Isabel’s writing makes her feel very relatable. I felt like I was one of her friends that she was telling about all her relationship woes. I was invested in the story the whole time. And of course, there is a lot of focus on the...

Prince Material is the second book in the Prince Pact series by Nora Phoenix. I enjoyed reading the first book in the series, so I was excited to get to read the second one as an eARC. I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much though. In this book, we follow Floris, a Dutch prince and Orson, an engineering student from New Orleans. They are roommates at a college in Massachusetts. We get both of their POVS throughout the book, which I liked. The book starts off a bit slow and there isn’t that much happening for the first 50% of the book. It was a bit of a struggle to get through the beginning of the book, but the second half definitely picks up the pace. I don’t think I connected with these two characters as much as I did with the ones in the first book. I thought they were a bit lackluster and I found their dialogue a little bit unbelievable at points. It felt cheesy sometimes, like not something people in real life would say. I still plan to read the other books in this series when they ...

A Mouthful of Dust by Nghi Vo is a continuation of the Singing Hills Cycle. This short novella follows Cleric Chih of the Singing Hills abbey and their birdlike companion Almost Brilliant as they travel to a new place to record stories to bring back to the abbey. In this particular story the pair travel to Baolin, a place famous for it's pork and it's legendary famine. While in the town, Chih is forced to stay at the town magistrate’s home where they discover something strange taking place. I’m a huge fan of this series and I loved this new chapter of the Singing Hills Cycle. It’s definitely the creepiest of the novellas so far, I could feel myself getting tense while reading certain parts! Chih is such a likable character that I love reading about all their adventures and the stories they gather. I also love when Almost Brilliant is included, the back and forth between the two is always fun! Available in the US starting October 7, 2025. I received this book from NetGalley as a...

My Roommate from Hell is a fun YA romance that I absolutely loved! Our main character Owen is off to college, where he ends up rooming with the Prince of Hell, Zarmenus. The pair have a rocky start, and don’t appear to be well suited as roommates. Their rocky start comes to a tipping point when Zarmenus asks Owen to be his fake boyfriend in order to help improve his image. Owen agrees and his life at college begins to change. When I first started this book, I was a bit worried about not liking the main character as I found Owen to be a bit annoying and a goody two shoes. He tries very hard to be perfect in every aspect of his life which I found grating at first. However, as I kept reading and learned more about Owen, and as he evolved over the course of the book, I ended liking his character a lot more! I love the scenes where Zarmenus and Owen are together. They have such great chemistry and their banter is just perfect! The fake dating aspect is the best part of the book. I would def...

Finna by Nino Cipri is a sci-fi novella that takes place in an IKEA-like furniture store. We follow our main character, Ava, and her ex-partner Jules, who are both employees at the store, as they go on an adventure through a wormhole that spawns in the middle of the labyrinth-esque box store. An older customer has gotten lost in the wormhole and it it up to this duo to retrieve her. They travel through the multiverse, meeting interesting (and some scary!) people along the way. Even in such a short story, there is a ton of queer representation throughout. Jules is nonbinary and they talk about how difficult it is being misgendered by customers. Though currently not dating, we learn about the relationship between Ava and Jules. That relationship is one of the main focal points of the book. One of my favorite quotes from the story is: It’s an old sadness … doesn’t heal, but you get used to bearing it. This is the first book in the LitenVerse series, and I will definitely be reading ...

These Vengeful Gods by Gabe Cole Novoa reminded me of a mix of the Hunger Games books and the TV show Arcane in the best way! I’ve read other books by this author that I really enjoyed but this might be my favorite one yet! In this book, we follow Crow, a trans teenager living with his uncles in the Shallows, the lowest and most neglected part of the city. Crow is a descendent of the god of death, and has survived a genocide that wiped out most of the other descendants of death. Because of his godly heritage, Crow has some supernatural abilities and uses those abilities as an underground street fighter to earn money. When Crow’s uncles are arrested for helping Deathchildren refugees escape the city, Crow vows to save them by entering a championship known as the Tournament of the Gods, where the winner is granted a boon from the gods. This book has so many elements that I absolutely loved. The world building is so good- I felt like I was in the city with them as they travelled around ...

I thought the title of this one was so fun that I had to read it! And They Were Roommates follows our main character Charlie, a trans teenager who is attending a prestigious but very strict boarding school as a scholarship student. We see Charlie struggles as he deals with rigorous coursework, athletic requirements, making friends and dealing with his roommate who he previously had a fling with at summer camp. We meet a cast of characters from Delilah, Charlie’s best friend who attends a sister school, to Jasper, Charlie’s roommate and a brilliant poet. Overall, this book was fun and lighthearted! I like Charlie and felt he was the most fleshed out of the characters. He seems very relatable and reminds me of some of my friends growing up. His journey to finding his place at the school is very real and heartwarming. I think most of us have been through times where we felt like we didn’t fit in and the writing really does a good job of putting the reader in that headspace. This is a boo...

The Prince and the Player is a fun, lighthearted romance book, with vibes similar to the movie The Prince and Me as well as Red White and Royal Blue. We get dual alternating POVs from the two main characters, Farron and Tore. Farron is a senior in college from Ohio and captain of the soccer team. Tore is a prince of Norway who enrolls in the same university as Farron and joins the soccer team. With Tore quickly becoming a rising star on the team, the two clash almost instantly. Farron immediately seems to dislike Tore, both because of Tore’s talent on the field and Farron’s perception of Tore’s wealth and privilege. I inhaled this book, reading it pretty much in one sitting. I thought both main characters were well written, and I particularly liked Tore, who just seemed so sweet and thoughtful. Farron, while grumpy at times, was also likable as a character and I think we get a lot of depth from them both beyond just grumpy/sunshine. Though they both act like idiots at certain points ...

I’m a big fan of Casey McQuiston’s work and this one did not disappoint! In The Pairing, we follow Theo and Kit, a former couple who by chance have ended up on the same food tour of Europe. They were previously supposed to go on this tour together, but broke up right before the tour started. This was their last chance to use the funds from their original tour and not have them be wasted. The two end up overcoming some of their differences, start talking again, and eventually start a competition of who can hook up with someone else in each of the cities they go to. The descriptions of the food and the cities make me want to go on this food tour so badly. I read the majority of this book on a plane and it made me want to immediately hop on another plane to go do a European food and wine tour. It just sounds so fun! I thought the two main characters Theo and Kit were very relatable and I would want to be friends with them in real life. They were so cool, but they were also flawed and I ju...

Faebound by Saara El-Arifi is an excellent start to what I think will be an incredible series! This is a fantasy story told in dual points of view between two sisters- Yeeran, a colonel in the Elven army who can wield drum battle magic and Lettle, a diviner who uses the deaths of magical creatures called obeah to tell the future. Yeeran is exiled from the Elven lands after disobeying orders and getting soldiers killed. Yeeran asks a loyal captain of hers, Rayan, to watch out for her sister as she is exiled but Lettle instead follows her sister into exile with Rayan tagging along to protect her. As they try to hunt a huge obeah so that Yeeran may return with honor to the Elven lands, the group is captured by the fae. The fae were previously thought to be extinct and the group is thrust into their mysterious world. I really enjoyed this book! The amount of diverse, queer representation is phenomenal! I thought the world building was also excellent- really immersive, but not overwhel...

An Education in Malice is a queer dark academia book that takes place in the 1960s. We follow Laura and Carmilla as they attend a women’s college in Massachusetts. Carmilla is a senior, while Laura is just starting out there as a freshman. Carmilla is the prized star student of the poetry professor De Lafontaine, but newcomer Laura is also talented poet and the two become academic rivals, striving constantly to impress their professor. The relationship between Laura and Carmilla was very compelling to read about. The rivals to lovers is played out so well here, and you really feel the tension between the two. This is the queer gothic academia book I’ve been looking for. S.T. Gibson has a way with words, and I absolutely love the prose in this book. There are so many great lines such as: “I often felt like a wolf wearing the skin of a girl, balancing on two legs and hoping no one would notice.“ This story is a retelling of Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu. I have not read the original ...

The Baker and the Bard by Fern Haught is a YA graphic novel in which we follow a baker, Juniper, and a bard, Hadley, as they embark on a quest to find a missing ingredient for a very important bakery order. Along the way they come across a town with mysterious monster problem and try to help solve the mystery. I thought this book was a very quick and cute read. If you’re into the cozy fantasy genre, this is definitely of that realm. I like the colorful and lovely illustration style. The plot is simple, but I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing. This book will make you smile and I don’t think it needs to go really any deeper than that! I received this book from NetGalley as an ARC. All opinions are my own. ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Rating: 3.75 stars

Most Ardently: A Pride & Prejudice Remix by Gabe Cole Novoa is a very enjoyable take on a classic! I’m a big Pride and Prejudice fan and also a fan of classics retellings. This one kept quite a few of the pivotal scenes and lines from the original with it’s own twist which I definitely appreciated. We follow Oliver Bennet, a gay trans teenager, who is known to most of the world as ‘Elizabeth’. Only a trusted few know his true self, so he is expected to wear dresses, attend dances and eventually marry and become someone’s wife. He meets Darcy first at a ball where he sees how poorly Darcy treats ‘Elizabeth’, but then later meets Darcy again as himself, and gets to see a different side of Darcy. I’ve been following along with the classics remixed series, and this one is probably my favorite so far. I enjoy Oliver as the main character and his interactions with not only Darcy, but his family and friends ring true to the character of Elizabeth Bennet from the original series. I though...

That Time I Got Drunk and Saved a Human is the third book in the Mead Mishaps series by Kimberly Lemming. If you’re a fan of the series, I think you’ll enjoy this latest edition. This one might be my favorite of the series, I liked it even better than the first one. The series as a whole is so fun, and this one is no exception. We are following Dante, a dragon and side character in the previous books, on his quest to find his mate. Along the way, we get to see some of the characters from the previous books, which was nice. I like how connected everything is in the series. There’s a lot of the funniness of the previous books as well as the spice. However, there’s also a lot of miscommunication between our two main characters which got to be annoying at some parts. This audio book was narrated by Hazel Addison. This is the same narrator who did the first book which I also listened to as an audiobook. I really like this narrator and think she does a good job with doing the different chapt...

I really enjoyed this book! Both from noble families, Gwen and Art have been engaged to be married since they were children. They grow up hating each other, but when they each discover that the other is queer they become allies instead of enemies. Gwen is falling in love with a knight, Lady Bridget and Arthur begins to fall for Gwen’s brother, Gabriel, who is the future king of England. While things do get a little dark at points during this book, overall, it’s a pretty light read. Both Gwen and Arthur can be annoying at times, but they are teenagers, so that’s to be expected! They both experience a lot of growth throughout the book, so I was happy to see that. There’s quite a bit of Arthurian legend here, which I was fan of. I had initially assumed when reading the book that these characters were intended to be the legendary characters. It was a nice surprise to learn that they weren’t. I also liked that they weren’t relegated to the typical roles of Arthurian retellings. I haven’t la...