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The Empress of All Seasons by Emiko Jean

Each generation, a competition is held to find the next empress of Honoku. The rules are simple. Survive the palace's enchanted seasonal rooms. Conquer Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Marry the prince. All are eligible to compete--all except yokai, supernatural monsters and spirits whom the human emperor is determined to enslave and destroy. Mari has spent a lifetime training to become empress. Winning should be easy. And it would be, if she weren't hiding a dangerous secret. Mari is a yokai with the ability to transform into a terrifying monster. If discovered, her life will be forfeit. As she struggles to keep her true identity hidden, Mari's fate collides with that of Taro, the prince who has no desire to inherit the imperial throne, and Akira, a half-human, half-yokai outcast. Torn between duty and love, loyalty and betrayal, vengeance and forgiveness, the choices of Mari, Taro, and Akira will decide the fate of Honoku in this beautifully written, edge-of-your-seat YA...
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Early May Reviews (2023)

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I'm participating in Dracula Daily (starting May 3rd), reading the book on the dates for each section.

Recent Reviews

Reviews forthcoming for A HOUSE WITH GOOD BONES by T. Kingfisher, TERRIER by Tamora Pierce, and BLOOD DEBTS by Terry J. Benton-Walker.

THE UNDEAD TRUTH OF US by Britney S. Lewis is Fantasy/Horror marketed as Young Adult. Zharie starts seeing people as zombies, including her mother right before her untimely death. Told in First Person with Single POV.

LADY KNIGHT by Tamora Pierce, book 4 of Protector of the Small is Fantasy marketed as Young Adult. Keladry is a new knight with a role to play in the war against Scanra. Told in Third Person with an Omniscient Narrator.

CURSES by Lish McBride is Fantasy, with queer character(s), marketed as Young Adult. Merit was cursed to be a beast unless she marries someone of her mother's choosing. Told in Third Person with Ensemble POVs.

THE BURIED AND THE BOUND by Rochelle Hassan, book 1 of The Buried and the Bound is Fantasy, with queer character(s), marketed as Young Adult. Leo was cursed to forget his true love on his sixteenth birthday. He teams up with Aziza, a hedgewitch, to try and break his curse. Told in Third Person with Ensemble POVs.

I also wrote an essay with some personal thoughts related to reading FEED THEM SILENCE by Lee Mandelo.

DNFs

I've been trying to churn through some of the miscellaneous titles in my to-read pile where they ended up in my queue just for being (usually queer) fantasy books. This results in some gems, like THE BURIED AND THE BOUND (review listed above), but also means I have a pretty long DNF list for this fortnight.

  • BEYOND THE RUBY VEIL by Mara Fitzgerald

  • A DARK AND STARLESS FOREST by Sarah Hollowell

  • THE DARK TIDE by Alicia Jasinska

  • LIAR CITY by Allie Therin

  • THE WITCH AND THE VAMPIRE by Francesca Flores

  • FUTURE FEELING by Joss Lake

  • SEVEN FACELESS SAINTS by M.K. Lobb

  • MY DEAR HENRY by Kalynn Bayron

  • AUGUST KITKO AND THE MECHAS FROM SPACE by Alex White

  • REBEL SEOUL by Axie Oh

  • THE BLACK COAST by Mike Brooks

I wrote formal DNF reviews for THE WITCH COLLECTOR by Charissa Weaks and IMPOSTORS by Scott Westerfeld.

Rereads and Older Reviews

I re-read DOWN AMONG THE STICKS AND BONES and BENEATH THE SUGAR SKY by Seanan McGuire, THE GHOST BRIDE by Yangsze Choo and BATTLE ROYALE by Koushun Takami.

Current Reads

I'm still working my way through re-reads of THE VEILED THRONE by Ken Liu and KING OF THE RISING by Kacen Callender.

I started WALK BETWEEN WORLDS by Samara Breger but I don't like the narrative style and I'll probably end up DNFing it pretty soon.

I've almost done with BLOOD DEBTS by Terry J. Benton-Walker, it's a fantastic book and I'm excited to see how it ends.

THE FIRST SISTER by Linden A. Lewis is a good but stressful read so far, it's a sci-fi book dealing with various forms of exploitation (frequently compared to The Handmaid's Tale, and with good reason).

In Case You Missed It

This time last year I read WHITE SMOKE by Tiffany D. Jackson, a horror novel about a Black girl with anxiety who moves to a small town in Ohio as part of her mother's job.

Pluggables and Podcast News

If you're looking for a place to buy any of the books I've reviewed, please consider our Bookshop page (if you use our links to purchase any books we get a small commission). Let us know if there's a category you'd like to see curated and we'll see if we can get some titles together.

The 2023 prompts are now available from the annual reading challenge! It runs from January 1st to December 31st this year. Find info and links here.

As for the podcast, hopefully you're enjoying our most recent episode. If you'd like to receive episodes early, as well as bonus content, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Patrons receive this newsletter one week early, as well as a list of upcoming podcast episodes.

Patrons pledging $20 or more each month receive a bonus episode. Patrons pledging $50 or more can vote once per month on what we'll cover in the podcast. You can find all of those polls here. Patrons at any level receive the booklist with our planned episodes for up to three months at a time.

Thanks for reading, the next roundup will be in two weeks!

-Robin

Co-host of Books That Burn

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