Take a photo of a barcode or cover
quail's reviews
412 reviews
Waking the Moon by Elizabeth Hand
Did not finish book. Stopped at 0%.
Did not finish book. Stopped at 0%.
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Dark Academia
I was already leery of this square, but I really didn't enjoy this book. Started it on the 8th of Sept and DNFed on the 12th, which made my September a bit of a wash since the rest was taken up by Gardens of the Moon lol.
I was already leery of this square, but I really didn't enjoy this book. Started it on the 8th of Sept and DNFed on the 12th, which made my September a bit of a wash since the rest was taken up by Gardens of the Moon lol.
Dragonsbane by Barbara Hambly
adventurous
emotional
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: First in a Series
Hard Mode: The series is more than three books long. (DONE)
I changed up this square for something shorter, because my planned books were all very, very long and I just didn't have the time to read them all. Anyway, I like to throw in some classic fantasy to these cards, especially written by women, and I absolutely loved this book! It was emotional and quite unexpected too in a lot of ways - the main character was an older lady witch, along with her husband who's a Lord and dragonslayer of old, but honestly traumatised by it and absolutely not wanting to slay another damn dragon. The magic was interesting, and although the antagonist was quite stereotypical as an evil, seducing witch, I didn't find it too tiresome to read. The ending surprised me completely, and I really enjoyed the take on dragons, as well as the strength of the main character, Jenny Waynest. I wish I'd read this when I was younger, because I would absolutely have latched onto her as a role model! I will definitely read the sequels to this at some point.
Hard Mode: The series is more than three books long. (DONE)
I changed up this square for something shorter, because my planned books were all very, very long and I just didn't have the time to read them all. Anyway, I like to throw in some classic fantasy to these cards, especially written by women, and I absolutely loved this book! It was emotional and quite unexpected too in a lot of ways - the main character was an older lady witch, along with her husband who's a Lord and dragonslayer of old, but honestly traumatised by it and absolutely not wanting to slay another damn dragon. The magic was interesting, and although the antagonist was quite stereotypical as an evil, seducing witch, I didn't find it too tiresome to read. The ending surprised me completely, and I really enjoyed the take on dragons, as well as the strength of the main character, Jenny Waynest. I wish I'd read this when I was younger, because I would absolutely have latched onto her as a role model! I will definitely read the sequels to this at some point.
Song for the Basilisk by Patricia A. McKillip
challenging
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Entitled Animals
Hard Mode: The animal in the title is a fantasy or sci-fi creature. (DONE)
Another classic (ish) fantasy book, and this one wasn't what I expected at all tbh! It was really flowery-written in a way which was pretty, but also often obscured the meaning of the words so I found it a bit hard to follow at times. The world-building was interesting but as vague as the magic system, which while it was kinda compelling, made it a bit frustrating for me because a) it was hard to follow what the fuck was happening!!, and b) the potential was there but it fell a bit short for me. I love interesting magic systems, but I also love understanding what I'm reading haha. It was basically a revenge story about a kid whose entire house was killed by the Basilisk, but it's just the nickname of a high house and not an actual basilisk, boo. Idk, it was okay! Compelling enough that I finished it cos I wanted to see what happened. Also one of the places was called Luly which I loved, cos that's my nickname for my cat Lula haha.
Hard Mode: The animal in the title is a fantasy or sci-fi creature. (DONE)
Another classic (ish) fantasy book, and this one wasn't what I expected at all tbh! It was really flowery-written in a way which was pretty, but also often obscured the meaning of the words so I found it a bit hard to follow at times. The world-building was interesting but as vague as the magic system, which while it was kinda compelling, made it a bit frustrating for me because a) it was hard to follow what the fuck was happening!!, and b) the potential was there but it fell a bit short for me. I love interesting magic systems, but I also love understanding what I'm reading haha. It was basically a revenge story about a kid whose entire house was killed by the Basilisk, but it's just the nickname of a high house and not an actual basilisk, boo. Idk, it was okay! Compelling enough that I finished it cos I wanted to see what happened. Also one of the places was called Luly which I loved, cos that's my nickname for my cat Lula haha.
The Necessity of Rain by Sarah Chorn
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Judge a Book by its Cover
Hard Mode: Pick the book based only on the information available on the cover. No reading the blurb! (DONE)
Okay this one? One of my stand-out books of my entire bingo card, oh my GOD. It was so so good. I've never cried so fucking much lmao, absolutely devastating. Beautiful worldbuilding. Don't read the blurb on storygraph because it's very very misleading!! It's about a world of gods and their creations, in which women escape from a war-torn place to a divine city, and their stories and trauma. One of the main characters is a butterfly woman and the other is the child of a god and she shines as bright as the sun. The third main character is the disabled child of another god, and her hair is made of perpetually flowering vines. It deals with grief, difficult mother-daughter relationships, trauma and neglect, and deep, deep love, and I cannot recommend it enough. Absolutely beautiful prose, really gorgeous world I'll be thinking about forever, flower language, and queer main characters who I adored. I had to stop reading it during my lunch break because it was making me cry so much!! Devastating. Loved it.
Hard Mode: Pick the book based only on the information available on the cover. No reading the blurb! (DONE)
Okay this one? One of my stand-out books of my entire bingo card, oh my GOD. It was so so good. I've never cried so fucking much lmao, absolutely devastating. Beautiful worldbuilding. Don't read the blurb on storygraph because it's very very misleading!! It's about a world of gods and their creations, in which women escape from a war-torn place to a divine city, and their stories and trauma. One of the main characters is a butterfly woman and the other is the child of a god and she shines as bright as the sun. The third main character is the disabled child of another god, and her hair is made of perpetually flowering vines. It deals with grief, difficult mother-daughter relationships, trauma and neglect, and deep, deep love, and I cannot recommend it enough. Absolutely beautiful prose, really gorgeous world I'll be thinking about forever, flower language, and queer main characters who I adored. I had to stop reading it during my lunch break because it was making me cry so much!! Devastating. Loved it.
The Wings Upon Her Back by Samantha Mills
reflective
medium-paced
3.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Published in 2024
Hard Mode: It's also the author's first published novel. (DONE)
This one I didn't really enjoy so much. The main character was meant to be about 42, but her POV voice read so young I seriously had my doubts, and especially since some parts were flashbacks to her younger self - it made it quite hard to tell the sections apart, outside of her using a different name to refer to herself in the past. The relationship between the main character and her abusive mentor was good and chewy, but it wasn't enough to save it, and I disliked half of the main characters quite a lot. Another book where I think skipping over a lot of the supposedly brutal training in the past did the present sections a hell of a disservice, because we see all this trauma but we're only told about it, and we don't get to see how horrific a lot of it was. Like, don't get me wrong, there was some pretty gnarly shit just from that mentor-student relationship, but it didn't quite hit. Also, for a character who was supposedly very religious, the main character sure didn't think much about religious things idk. Also for a book predicated on a deeply indoctrinated character reaching a tipping point, it didn't quite match up for me. We see that tipping point really early, but we're not really shown her reaching it, so it kinda loses its impact imo. Idk idk, it was okay. I've read better whump fic.
Hard Mode: It's also the author's first published novel. (DONE)
This one I didn't really enjoy so much. The main character was meant to be about 42, but her POV voice read so young I seriously had my doubts, and especially since some parts were flashbacks to her younger self - it made it quite hard to tell the sections apart, outside of her using a different name to refer to herself in the past. The relationship between the main character and her abusive mentor was good and chewy, but it wasn't enough to save it, and I disliked half of the main characters quite a lot. Another book where I think skipping over a lot of the supposedly brutal training in the past did the present sections a hell of a disservice, because we see all this trauma but we're only told about it, and we don't get to see how horrific a lot of it was. Like, don't get me wrong, there was some pretty gnarly shit just from that mentor-student relationship, but it didn't quite hit. Also, for a character who was supposedly very religious, the main character sure didn't think much about religious things idk. Also for a book predicated on a deeply indoctrinated character reaching a tipping point, it didn't quite match up for me. We see that tipping point really early, but we're not really shown her reaching it, so it kinda loses its impact imo. Idk idk, it was okay. I've read better whump fic.
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
tense
medium-paced
5.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Survival
Hard Mode: No superviruses or pandemics. (DONE)
This book was completely unexpected for me!! I really really enjoyed it. Absolutely did not expect one half of the POV to be from an uplifted race of jumping spiders hit by the sapience-growing virus, but I had no complaints. The POV for Portia was refreshingly inhuman and I absolutely adored the building of spider civilisation and how the POV followed through the generations of Portias and Biancas and their brethren. From the humanity perspective, I really liked the main POV character (an old man historian, who could have guessed he'd be Quail Bait huh!!) and I enjoyed the lowkey romance with him and the engineer as he went in and out of stasis over the years. It was a really fun look at how life could be on an ark spaceship like that, and especially with the extra spanner in the works of the satellite above the Portias' planet! I don't think I'll read the sequels cos I heard they're about different species, but really enjoyed this - I nearly replaced it cos I'd heard some negative things on meme, so I'm glad I stuck with it in the end.
Hard Mode: No superviruses or pandemics. (DONE)
This book was completely unexpected for me!! I really really enjoyed it. Absolutely did not expect one half of the POV to be from an uplifted race of jumping spiders hit by the sapience-growing virus, but I had no complaints. The POV for Portia was refreshingly inhuman and I absolutely adored the building of spider civilisation and how the POV followed through the generations of Portias and Biancas and their brethren. From the humanity perspective, I really liked the main POV character (an old man historian, who could have guessed he'd be Quail Bait huh!!) and I enjoyed the lowkey romance with him and the engineer as he went in and out of stasis over the years. It was a really fun look at how life could be on an ark spaceship like that, and especially with the extra spanner in the works of the satellite above the Portias' planet! I don't think I'll read the sequels cos I heard they're about different species, but really enjoyed this - I nearly replaced it cos I'd heard some negative things on meme, so I'm glad I stuck with it in the end.
The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern
mysterious
medium-paced
4.5
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Dark Academia
Hard Mode: The school itself is entirely mundane (DONE)
This was a rec by a friend whose judgement I trust on book recs, and I quite enjoyed it - I'm going to copy/paste my thoughts from our discussion about it on discord haha. It was kinda relentlessly weird and I had a few quibbles with the writing style from a technical standpoint (I'm not a fan of present tense, and I thought it read a bit hm. Fanficcy at times, to be succinct lol, I wouldn't be surprised if Morgenstern was a fanfic writer let's just say), but I loved it overall! I might have liked a bit more to the ending though, and also more fleshing out of the romance I think too - I liked the romance, but it was very very fast. I admit I looked at discussion of the book and saw people saying the prose was gorgeous and I think it was like. Very serviceable! But I wouldn't describe it as gorgeous. I actually found myself thinking huh, for such a cool world and imaginative story I haven't highlighted any parts at all, which I often do when I love someone's prose. Also, I was a bit extra disappointed on the romance because I was promised a silver fox and Dorian did not read like an older guy!! He's described as a silver fox!!! Betrayed. Additionally, I was pissed that we were told he was cutting down lots of monster things disguised as Zachary but we didn't get to see it!! Don't just tell us that he's traumatised by it! I want to see the trauma!! Guess this is similar to how the romance wasn't as fleshed out as I'd like - it was far too fast (like the Aliette de Bodard I read earlier on this bingo). So yeah. It was fun! But I had some Issues lol.
Hard Mode: The school itself is entirely mundane (DONE)
This was a rec by a friend whose judgement I trust on book recs, and I quite enjoyed it - I'm going to copy/paste my thoughts from our discussion about it on discord haha. It was kinda relentlessly weird and I had a few quibbles with the writing style from a technical standpoint (I'm not a fan of present tense, and I thought it read a bit hm. Fanficcy at times, to be succinct lol, I wouldn't be surprised if Morgenstern was a fanfic writer let's just say), but I loved it overall! I might have liked a bit more to the ending though, and also more fleshing out of the romance I think too - I liked the romance, but it was very very fast. I admit I looked at discussion of the book and saw people saying the prose was gorgeous and I think it was like. Very serviceable! But I wouldn't describe it as gorgeous. I actually found myself thinking huh, for such a cool world and imaginative story I haven't highlighted any parts at all, which I often do when I love someone's prose. Also, I was a bit extra disappointed on the romance because I was promised a silver fox and Dorian did not read like an older guy!! He's described as a silver fox!!! Betrayed. Additionally, I was pissed that we were told he was cutting down lots of monster things disguised as Zachary but we didn't get to see it!! Don't just tell us that he's traumatised by it! I want to see the trauma!! Guess this is similar to how the romance wasn't as fleshed out as I'd like - it was far too fast (like the Aliette de Bodard I read earlier on this bingo). So yeah. It was fun! But I had some Issues lol.
Boys, Beasts & Men by Sam J. Miller
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
4.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Five Short Stories
Hard Mode: Read an entire speculative anthology or collection. (DONE)
This was a queer short story collection with a large variety of stories, a lot of them very emotionally devastating and some painful to read, and a lot of them were genuinely very weird. I struggle a lot these days with short-form fiction (which is odd because I read a lot of short fanfic ofc), so it was quite hard to make myself finish the whole book for this square, but I did it! I enjoyed the book overall, some stories more than others, and I feel like some of them will stick with me for quite some time. They did make me want to read up more on queer history, and some of them were quite focused on things like the riots or AIDS, and therefore very heavy hitting, emotionally.
Hard Mode: Read an entire speculative anthology or collection. (DONE)
This was a queer short story collection with a large variety of stories, a lot of them very emotionally devastating and some painful to read, and a lot of them were genuinely very weird. I struggle a lot these days with short-form fiction (which is odd because I read a lot of short fanfic ofc), so it was quite hard to make myself finish the whole book for this square, but I did it! I enjoyed the book overall, some stories more than others, and I feel like some of them will stick with me for quite some time. They did make me want to read up more on queer history, and some of them were quite focused on things like the riots or AIDS, and therefore very heavy hitting, emotionally.
Empire of the Feast by Bendi Barrett
funny
fast-paced
4.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Self Published/Indie
Hard Mode: Self-published and has fewer than 100 ratings on Goodreads OR an indie publisher that has done an AMA on r/Fantasy. (DONE)
This was a pretty short book at 98 pages, but I really really enjoyed it! It was a pretty high concept sci-fi vibe that drops you in straight away with the rebirth of an Empress as someone who doesn't know what the fuck is going on, and it worked pretty well with the political intrigue vibe. A ship where the rapacious and deadly spirit of the nearby Sun is kept at bay by the Empress presiding over a perpetual orgy and using the sexual energy from it as their source of power. Interesting concept! I did predict the twist/betrayer pretty early on, but it wasn't any less of a fun read for that.
Hard Mode: Self-published and has fewer than 100 ratings on Goodreads OR an indie publisher that has done an AMA on r/Fantasy. (DONE)
This was a pretty short book at 98 pages, but I really really enjoyed it! It was a pretty high concept sci-fi vibe that drops you in straight away with the rebirth of an Empress as someone who doesn't know what the fuck is going on, and it worked pretty well with the political intrigue vibe. A ship where the rapacious and deadly spirit of the nearby Sun is kept at bay by the Empress presiding over a perpetual orgy and using the sexual energy from it as their source of power. Interesting concept! I did predict the twist/betrayer pretty early on, but it wasn't any less of a fun read for that.
The Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
5.0
r/fantasy bingo 2024-25: Prologue and Epilogue
Hard mode: must have both (DONE)
This is a sequel to The Jasmine Throne, and it didn't disappoint. I absolutely loved it, there was a lot of intrigue and I still loved the central relationship, but the ending was such an awful cliffhanger I desperately need book 3, oh my god!! I thought the upping of the stakes was really well done, and as usual I loved Suri's lush writing style.
Hard mode: must have both (DONE)
This is a sequel to The Jasmine Throne, and it didn't disappoint. I absolutely loved it, there was a lot of intrigue and I still loved the central relationship, but the ending was such an awful cliffhanger I desperately need book 3, oh my god!! I thought the upping of the stakes was really well done, and as usual I loved Suri's lush writing style.