My favorite fantasy reads from 2024: Part 1

Blogmas 2024

Merry Christmas already!

Today we are talking of one of my most read genres: fantasy! I read so many books that I had a long list of favorites and decided to have a part 1 and part 2!

So let’s go for part 1 today!

First in Young Adult fantasy you have:

WOW!

It’s a story like none other! A one of a kind! It’s a story where the villains take the floor and evil twins talk in your stead. It’s wicked and gleeful! Amoral and funny like heck!

One of the many proofs that I absolutely adored that book: it has more tabulations and annotations than any book I have read these last months!
When the synopsis says “The wicked are better dressed, with better one-liners” that’s absolutely true!
The banter or just Rae’s inner monologues were so funny and sarcastic that I was cackling! I can’t wait to get my hands on a finished copy and make TONS of graphics and add lots of quotes on Goodreads!

Long Live Evil strangely reminded me of Yellowface by RF Kuang because this was also a parody and sometimes a jubilant satire, of stories, books and characters. Sarah Rees Brennan dissected plots, characters arcs, characters building and worlds creation with sharp wits and a keen sense of self-deprecation. All to give us a mirthful tale where desperate characters embrace their inner villains to save what’s most dear to them, wanting to alter fate but ending up with an unexpected boon. Or is it truly?

What’s certain is that I will read the sequel and will now read Sarah Rees Brennan’s backlist!

Give me the sequel already!

This was an excellent surprise and a book I probably would never have read if I didn’t get it in a book box !
That story feels like a mash up of fantasy, mythology and themes found in anime and mangas.
-Blue and magenta hair ? Check.
-Excentric boy in silken pajamas ? Check.
-Gifted girl best in class to fight revenants. ? Check.
-A blight infecting the deads and making more revenants ? Check.
-Hybrids no one believe are true but the girl ? Check.
-Non gifted grandson of exorcists leaders. ? Check.
-A lost god whose disappearance creates chaos in Hell because ten gods are needed? Check !
-Fated mates or rather soul mates ? Check.
-I would doom the world for her ? Check
-An enchantment turned bad with transfer of magic and quest to get it back ? Also check !

This is not my usual genre but it worked extremely well with action, fights against evil, a quest and a love story ! I want the sequel now !

I loved so many things in that story!

-the stone magic (alchemy). It’s a new kind of magic for me.

-the underdog trying to win the big prize (become a royal alchemist). Zilan is extremely driven!
Whatever the difficulty, she rises to the occasion.

-the family dynamic and love (cousins who feel like siblings).
Even if sometimes Zilan envied her cousins (“Why did she deserve parents and beauty and a chance at her dreams while I got nothing at all?”) she loved them above anything else and needed their friendship. These three had each other’s back and it gave me all the warm feelings.

-the role reversal with the female MC being all tough and the prince feeling more like a delicate flower. Zilan is not a romantic. She is strong and determined, driven by her ambition. Li Hong has a soft heart and is easily intimidated by his mother. He loves ducks, his sisters and we can feel his romantic soul.

-the plot twists (a really big one I never saw coming and then another big one!!!). Truly the author surprised me big time!

-the historical setting (loosely inspired on China’s history)

-that we’ll get a sequel and I can’t wait!!

The Scarlet Alchemist is an historical fantasy mixing a strong female character with big dreams and the cruelty of people in power and what they’d do to keep that power.

I was surprised in the best way and loved that story way much than what I had expected.

Sabaa Tahir completely enthralled me with her brutal, frightful and adventurous novel! I think my heart stopped beating several times as I couldn’t believe what was happening.
Be aware that there is a lot of death and hopeless situations as Sabaa doesn’t sugarcoat anything!

That book is filled with:
-great characters that you will love as some are Laia and Elias’s kids and Helene’s nephew;
-very morally grey characters morphing into villains;
-lots of death and suspense;
-twists (plural) one of the biggest at the end.
-romantic feelings emerging amidst chaos;
-adventure and a quest;
-huge cliffhanger!

Then we have the Historical Fantasy category.

The Warm Hands of Ghosts was not what I imagined.
I hadn’t read the synopsis but I didn’t expect a tale so bleak, dark, weird but beautiful too!

It’s my first Katherine Arden and the writing was gorgeous.
But even with a beautiful penmanship, the story was painful to read sometimes.


Katherine Arden did an amazing job writing about the madness of the Great War. You feel that she did a lot of research for that book and I learned a lot following Laura in the ward, discovering new techniques or with Freddie witnessing the hungry mud eating soldiers alive.
There is a definite gothic vibe to the book, an eeriness and even creepiness, especially when reading about Freddie’s chapters. If I could read Laura’s chapters, Freddie’s were too painful and angsty to read and I had to cheat and read the ending at some point before backtracking.

It’s a masterpiece of woven tale, intertwining historical facts with fantasy elements, fitting for the madness that WWI was.

 didn’t expect to love that book as much as I did! Nor to be awed by its writing!

HG Parry threw me in a world post WWI made of magic universities, aristocracy, faerie magic and I emerged only once my read finished with wonder in the heart and a bittersweet aftertaste.

Read this book if you love:
-excellent writing;
-intense friendship stories with their ups and downs.
-found family story;
-magic academia;
-the underdog rising above her station;
-complicated human relationships;
-flawed heroes who will make mistakes but will seek to make amends;

That story was a wonder and reading it was like being in a haze, obsessed by faerie quest. It was enthralling, beautiful, magical and bittersweet.

And now, my two winners! One is Urban fantasy (that book is amazing)

Deborah Harkness remained true to ADOW and you will be pleased to know that The Black Bird Oracle reads as a continuity of the story. The tone, the prose, the characters everything you loved in the previous books is present.

It was a pure treat to read!
I loved discovering every member of that new family, every character extremely well fleshed out thanks to Deborah’s impeccable penmanship (even the ghosts, I am looking at granny Dorcas.

I adored seeing the twins and their growth in their own magical power and I reveled in Diana and Mathew’s married bliss, even when confronted with ordeals.

In true Deborah Harkness fashion, she weaves a tapestry of interconnected events and fates switching between past lives, ancestors and present times. It is a testimony to her talent that no inconsistency is showing and that all these many events arrange themselves like an intricate puzzle! Give me more please and I hope we won’t have long to wait for the sequel.

And the other is EPIC/high fantasy!

 It really is like these western movies because Gabriel de Leon has a foul mouth, he is swearing like a sailor but he is also determined to protect his charge, Dior, at whatever cost.
Then we also have a variety of villains.
Some being morally grey like Celene, Gabe’s sister turned vampire and called a liathe.
Celene was a real “piece of work” (I am trying to stay polite here) and love is certainly not what motivates her to help Gabriel! But she also was a total badass!
‘“I am Celene Castia. Sssword of the Faithful. Liathe of dread Wulfric.” ‘Dead eyes gleaming, Celene raised her blade toward the Untamed. ‘“And I am deliverance. For you and all our accursssed kind.”’

There is a lot of dark humor and sarcasm BUT only in Gabriel’s POV!
Because we get parts from Celene’s POV and these parts are DARK and BLEAK and GORY!
That was so much more hopeless than Empire of the Vampire!
That’s for sure, Celene is a badass but she doesn’t share Gabriel’s sarcastic personality!

The writing is EPIC!!!
Going from powerful when Celene gives all her titles before announcing that she will be the end of someone to having me snickering when Dior gave as good as she got from Gabe!
I love the elegant writing, the old language mixed with crude and foul mouth of Gabe.

The characters are also amazing!
Not only Gabriel who is a rough man with a big heart and no fear for the battles ahead but Dior and her ironwill, Celene’s badassery and other characters I won’t mention for fear of spoiling you!

Add to it that there is of course a quest/race to save mankind and lots of twists and turns! And that ending!!!!!!!! I had predicted some of it BUT Jay Kristoff still surprised me!
Now tell me you don’t think it is amazing hu?

Tomorrow you will get part 2!

Thanks for reading.

Sophie