Katherine

For the Wolf is the type of fairytale that draws you in and doesn’t let you go until the last page. Red is born the second daughter, and as everyone knows the Second Daughter is destined for the Wolf. On her twentieth birthday, she is sent into the Wilderwood to fulfill an ancient contract. And what results is a cross between a Red Riding Hood retelling and a Beauty and the Beast retelling with one of the best romances I’ve read in awhile (there’s only one bed!!). This book is brimming with loyalty and longing and political machinations.

My Heart is a Chainsaw is a both a thrilling novel and a lecture on slasher lore. Jade, local teen and horror expert, is facing down graduation, unsure of what comes next. Until two randos go missing in Indian Lake, and the perfect Final Girl shows up. Jade rushes to both convince the town and prepare the Final Girl for the carnage that is sure to follow. This book kept me on the edge of my seat, and there were multiple points where I had to put it down and walk away until I was convinced it was safe to go on.

A complex, yet succinct narrative of colonialism, trauma, and sapphic longing, FIREHEART TIGER is wonderfully beautiful. Princess Thanh feels out of place at home in the imperial court, which makes sense since she was sent away to live in the cold northern country of Ephteria as a hostage when she was a child. Now, she must navigate the negotiations not just with Ephteria, but with her old flame, Eldris. Throw in a fire elemental to the mix, and things are bound to go sideways.  This book is captivating, and raw, and perfect for fans of political intrigue. -Katherine

I’m a sucker for retellings and also for The Island of Dr Moreau, so I was expecting to love this book. After all, a murder mystery where the five main subjects are all members of a boyband and, oh yeah, also refugees from the Island of Dr Moreau? This was bound to be a good time. What I wasn’t expecting was the heart of the story, which explores the greed and exploitation of human nature, as well as what it means to be human at all.

Nothing but Blackened Teeth is kind of the perfect ghost story. Right from the beginning, it establishes a sense of dread that only grows with every page. Five friends, with fraught histories of their own, rent out a haunted Japanese mansion for a wedding. In order to provide a welcoming environment for the ghosts, the group lights a hundred candles to blow out one by one as each person tells a ghost story. When the last candle goes out, things go from tense to hostile.

One of the most thrilling and inventive vampire novels I have read in a long time (and trust me when I say I have read a lot), this new edition of CERTAIN DARK THINGS is a masterpiece. Atl flees to Mexico City after her family is slaughtered by a rival Vampire clan, teams up with a lonely garbage-collecting street kid. A classic noir with a twist, I couldn’t put this book down.

If you’re looking for science fiction that will reach into your chest and grab onto your heart, you can always depend on Cat Valente. Decades after the Polar Ice Caps melt, Tetley Abednego lives in Garbagetown, a floating patch of garbage that has been shaped into its own continent. This book brings joy to a future that feels bleak, and grapples with how fragile hope is. Like much of Valente’s work, this book perfectly balances wit and humor with lines that made me put the book down and stare at the wall. You won’t want to miss out on this journey through a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

This book is a queer magical retelling of The Great Gatsby, and is one of the most compelling books I’ve ever read. Vo infuses the story with magic in such a way that I find myself going “oh, the 1920’s were just Like This.” She has captured the essence and atmosphere of the original novel while crafting the characters into more compelling versions of themselves. The prose is in turns witty and breathtaking, the dramatic irony of retelling such a classic story is woven in beautifully, and the ending made me gasp out loud.

I loved Red, White, and Royal Blue so my expectations were high going in. That being said, Casey McQuiston still managed to blow me away with this stunning love letter to queer communities and found families, not to mention the families you're born with and may leave but never can quite forget in all their complicated messiness. The romance was very good, but one of the place this book shines is in how wonderful the supporting cast is. I wanted to be friends with every person in it. -Shana

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a master of genre fiction, and nothing exemplifies that more than The Beautiful Ones. This novel captures all the longing and intricate rituals of a historic romance with the fantastic world-building of a fantasy novel. When she was sent to stay with her cousin for her first season, Nina, a young girl with telekinetic powers, does not expect to enter a dance with the famous telekinetic performer, Hector Auvrey, and her own cousin-in-law, Camille. I read the last half of the book in one sitting because putting it down was nearly unthinkable.