Tag: 14+B

A Tempest of Tea by Hafsah Faizel

Let me start with wow and go from there.

This is a simply stunning book that felt like a piece of art to read. We had so many historical and mythical references, a real mix of genres and throughout a plot that I couldn’t predict.

Let me start with the world. We have a tinge of Arthurian Legend, one of our main characters is called Arthie and she pulls a pistol from a stone. The lore around that was just so intricate too – a few sentences that don’t matter much to the plot but really highlight how everything is machined in this city that is ruled by a masked king. And Arthie goes directly against all the rules that should oppose her.

The world doesn’t stop at a touch of the Arthurian though, we also have a gloriously vivid depiction of a empire and colonialism and the EJC (The East Javeet Company = East India Company!) which throughout ties to this depiction of a city which feels at once same to our world but yet so far away in others.

From vampires that lurk the street and the serial killer vampire that gave them their bad name, the daughter of the EJC being part of a huge heist and it all led by a main character who has built an empire of secrets in the empire that stole her family.

Simply everything, it feels raw and intricate and deserves so much more hype than it has!

Plot – 4/5 – It was slower in the middle but the first and last 100 pages were simply breathtaking.

World – 5/5 – I’ve already gushed about this and I am sure there are details I have missed because it is just so full of tiny details that I cant wait to pick up on my next read-through (because this is going straight back on the reread pile!)

Characters – 4/5 – yes. Just yes. They all have personalities and they all have secrets and they all have motivations and honestly I just need the sequel now!

Romance – 5/5 – Sweet – oh this gave me all the butterflies. Honestly the wait was worth it and I need all the details because the last few pages have me in a whirlwind of theories!

Damsel Age Recommendation – 14+B

Romance Rating: Sweet (kissing, cuddling, clothes on, very mild innuendo) – honestly this one almost felt Suggestive but that’s just because the characters had such chemistry –  in actuality there is hardly any kissing just all the chemistry in the world!

Violence Rating: Level 4 – but there is no SA in it, this is for the violence!

Content Warnings: Colonalism, genocide, blood (minor descriptions).

 

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Damsel, Evelyn Skye

14+B

This is just so so so good.

I read it in one sitting! It has dragons, princesses, mazes and above all a really intelligent main character who was such a joy to read. Elodie’s love for her people guided so much of her decisions and the rest were made up out of love for her sister Floria. Throughout all of this there was the feeling of nostalgia but also of something new. Of something I hadn’t ever really seen done before. Evelyn Skye creates a vast world and timeline, introducing us to specific pinpoints that show who came before and how their path has molded Elodie’s. I love the message throughout that Elodie, intelligent strong and resourceful as she is couldn’t have survived without the sacrificed princesses that came before her and all of their research and experiences was building up and then culminating in her.

The theme of doing the honestly abhorrent thing for ‘the greater good’ was an idea that was explored through different characters, and its rare that I honestly am not sure who is the villain. I hate some of them yes, love others but in the end the true villain is the circumstances that have lead them here. The history that has ended up with a whole kingdom believing it is the right thing for three princesses to be sacrificed to a dragon every year for eight hundred years (don’t worry I’m not giving spoilers, anything I mention I make sure is the first few chapters or the synopsis).

Its just so beautiful, the exploration of this golden kingdom which is built on the blood and pain of young naive girls because no one questions it. Arranged marriages are common among royalty, you pick the brides from lower noble families from starving duchies and no one ever notices.

This book is one I will remember forever and honestly could write forever on but I’ll go a head to the star ratings (and gush some more in them!).

World – 5/5 stars, its explored beautifully we really get the impressions of all the different locations and landscapes from the dusty dessert that is Elodies home to the glittering palace to the darkness of the lair.

Plot – 1000000/5, its not just the story of Elodie its the story of all the princesses before her and it’s the story of a stepmother who knew something was wrong and was ignored and a royal family who had been raised in such a mess they didn’t know what was right anymore.

Romance – NA

Characters – 1000000/5 – just so good. We have so many different characters, some of which get a pretty limited amount of page space but we never feel that they aren’t real. They are always so realistic and we can always feel their dilemmas and pain even if they are not one of the multiple POVs throughout the book.

Things to be aware of: Threat, death (mentioned and avoided but only moderate on the page), corpses and flashbacks of death.

This needs to go on everyone’s TBR!

Happy Reading

Lottie

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Waiting on Wednesday: Nightweaver

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme that originated at Breaking the Spine but has now linked up with Waiting for Wednesday at Wishful Endings. It is always a fun chance to display books that are going to be joining our bookshelves very soon in 2025!

Thanks to NetGallery and Puffin for this e-ARC read!
Pub Date – 6th of March 2025
Age Category – YA
Genre: Romantasy, Pirate

Nightweaver by RM Gray

14+B

I just love the world!

The world in this is just gorgeous, layered on top of each other with so many different details and layers that it somehow feels like a pirate adventure, a regency demon hunting romance and yet a vivid fantasy world in its own right! Every location in this world has a vivid crispness and distinctness which I really enjoyed from the delicate magical feel of the manor conservatory to the rough decks of the Lightbringer ship at the beginning.

The story moves rapidly but the characters mindset is quite stagnant during the early few chapters. I actually enjoyed her resistance to the plot, it counterbalanced the ease of the elite with the situation and the flexibility of her family and really made it feel more realistic. Aster has been raised as a pirate for seventeen years and the abrupt change to household servant is one she resists but goes along with because of loyalty to her family. I really enjoyed how she still missed the sea despite the hardness of life there and her surprise in seeing a horse for the first time may be my favourite moment of the whole book!

The premise of the magic system is something we discover alongside Aster, but also as she unwinds and works through prejudices and perspectives she has been taught that have been instantly skewed by her own experiences on land. The Nightweavers (powerful elementals who rule the land) are something she has been taught to fear and they most certainly have the power to be feared. There are four different types of elementals but they are not the standard fire water earth and air, they really delve deeper than the element, controlling more that is connected to their ability. This level of depth to the reach of elemental abilities is rarely explored and I just loved it!

World – 100000/5 – just loved it, I’ve gushed enough about it but it really is the stand out thing for this book!

Romance – 4/5 – Soft Romance –  very romantasy, all the elements are there!

Characters – 5/5 – I really loved the supporting characters, the depth they had to their reactions and how it connected to their experiences. The main character Aster felt realistic and pirateish while maintaining a revenge driven plot which I always find interesting to read. Lewis her brother is just such a great character, and I love her sister Margaret as well – make that her whole family I love. They are so distinct and yet tied together so strongly. And Henry is just the perfect brother I just – I cant wait for the sequel!

Plot – 4/5 – it worked well and I really enjoyed it! It was fast paced at the beginning and then medium at others which meant I could have action and detail as well as Aster’s interactions with her family outside of a battle.

Things to be aware of: blood, death, violence, (quite a lot of both and it is quite graphic in places). The last third really steps it up which I wasnt expecting – it is still YA but certainly earns that B so make sure that you are in an emotional state to read it because it is pretty dark. There is a part where it balances between SA and just incredibly violent so be aware of that.

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As Good as Dead, Holly Jackson

14+B

The last instalment of this thriller left me wide eyed. I love it! It is exactly what I have wished authors would do but they always seem to steer clear of but Jackson goes for it 100% and this is the best ending I could have imagined – and one I didn’t!

I am trying really hard not to give spoilers (I think I am going to do a series roundup with this one where I will chat about spoilers but spoilers have no place in a book review). Pip is only a few weeks away from Kings Collage Cambridge and getting away from it all the mess and complexity in Little Kilton.

But Pip has been replaying the events of the last two books, especially the bloody end of Child Brunswick in the last book over and over. She hears gunshots in every sound, even just a door opening and closing and her own heartbeat. It is heartbreaking to see the fierce Pip of the first book so unsure about her own morality and the morality of everyone around her. She has seen the lines be drawn and redrawn and she has lost all faith in the justice system.

It has failed her multiple times with wrongful accusations and letting the rapist Max Hastings which she gave to them on a silver platter with multiple witnesses get away free. She has started identifying with the criminals she has been told are evil but instead she just sees it as gray. She cannot sleep and has resulted to drugs bought from Luke, her local drug-dealer and a part of the equation that started all this mess six years ago. I love the realism of this, it really shows the more complex lines in some of these cases – who are victims and who are victims who have been portrayed as villains.

She has decided one last case – a Jane Doe murder from Cambridge when she goes to uni. A black and white case and justice at the end of it to rewrite the rules of the world. Of course, this isn’t going to happen.

She starts getting weird notes, and the stalker quickly escalates from online threats to chalk figures without heads on her drive to beheaded pigeons.

This was honestly the most chilling read yet, for the first time Pip is going to die if she doesn’t work quick enough and for the first time we understand just how deep this whole entangled mess goes with Andie and Charlie and the rest of Little Kilton. I – I was honestly worried about Pip’s sanity at the beginning but she soon stabilised out into the intelligent if slightly obsessive Pip we love.

Plot – 1000000/5 – just so good, there are so many ties even back to the first chapters of the first book and Holly Jackson is a genius. Just so good.

Characters – 10000/5 – oh they are perfect! And I loved seeing a different side of Andie she is such an interesting complex character.

World  – 5/5 stars – so good, I love how Holly Jackson doesn’t shy away from the darker aspects of the world.

Romance – 10000/5 stars – Soft Romance – oh my god I love Ravi. I just love him. He is perfect in every way and we truly get a test of how far he is willing to go for Pip. He is the first book boyfriend I’ve read that completely believes the heroine even when evidence points against it. And I love it.

Things to be aware of: 14+B – I almost made this a 15, it was truly terrifying and dark in places so if you don’t like threat – and I’d say I’m pretty good with mature dark content – then give it a few more months! Warnings: murder (slightly more graphic here), kidnapping, serial killerism, police injustice, wrongful accusations, misogyny rape (mentions to the past books) and violence 5/5 and high threat, animal death

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Terrier (Beka Cooper Book 1) by Tamora Pierce

14+B
This book is another hit from Tamora, and I love how different Beka is from Alanna, Kennedy, Daine, and Aly. Unlike those series which are all set within a thirty-year time frame, this series is set hundreds of years before and stars Beka Cooper (yes she is George Cooper’s great great many greats relative) who is working as a Puppy. This is a trainee ‘Dog’ which is essentially Tortalls version of a police. Beka is a tough lead – I might even go as far as to say that she is one of the toughest heroines that i have ever read in the first book.
While this returns to the Tortall I love, Beka’s world is very very different from Alanna’s and Kennedy’s especially. It focuses on the Lower City and the crime within and the morally grey lines between being a ‘Dog’ and a criminal. Beka is older (16) than the other heroines have been in their first books, so she suits this darker representation of Tortall.
Characters – 5/5 stars – They are incredibly lifelike even though I would say that Beka isnt the most morally complex – i LOVE morally complex characters – which leaves room for the supporting cast to show the lack of set morals in the Lower City.
World – 4.5/5 stars – Tortall is amazing, but in this book, we only focus on a very small corner of it unlike some of the other books where we get to see different countries and customs.
Romance – NA – not present but there are sexual undertones to some of it.
Plot  – 1000/5 stars – It is complex it is twisty and it took a second read to see the clues to the criminal.
Things to be aware of: This was a tricky one to put an age rating on – but I had to add the B because it is pretty dark and there are a few sexual innuendos. As always the age ratings are just a guide so you can read it whenever you want as long as you are comfortable with a bit more violence than some of my recommendations.

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Powerless by Lauren Roberts

14+B

First – the dedication – “for every girl who has ever felt powerless”. That dedication is the first thing you read, and it tells you the one of the most important and nuanced parts of the book, the push and pull between being given power by your birth and gaining power by hard work.

Paedyn has earnt her power, as she is an ‘Ordinary’ without any of the superpowers of the Elites. It means that she will be killed instantly and painfully if she is caught. However, she pretends to be a Psychic and is able to fake it by constant practice and hyperfocus on the tiniest details. Kai on the other hand is almost ridiculously overpowered, but by his own work (and the cruelty of his father) he is deadlier than his birth power would have normally made him.

The juxtaposition of the two fathers in the story shows the power of parents. Pae’s father Adam who taught her how to become powerful even through she was born without the superhuman abilities of her peers and the King, who took his two sons and made them into the perfect molds of what he wished them to become; Kai into a weapon by torture and constant forcing past limits until he kills for the crown, Kitt into the next king.

The romance is out of this world. Kai and Pae have the perfect banter and the iconic lines of the best couples. Usually enemies to lovers isnt my favourite trope, but here it works perfectly. The most delicate thing between them is the power balance, which I am very invested in. Kai Azer is a prince and he can take the ability of any Elite in the vincity, he is essentially a powerhouse assassin, and yet Paedyn holds her own despite being in some of the most deadly trials I have ever read about.

Characters – 5/5 stars

World – 4.5/5 stars  – it isnt an uncommon premise, a split society between people with powers and those without, but it is executed beautifully.

Romance – 100000/5 stars –Suggestive Romance – I love love love Paedyn and Kai

Plot – 4.5/5 stars – it is well done and it supports the characters perfectly. The plot develops in the later half of the book much more than the first, and that means that the characters are already so established that you are really rooting for them.

Things to be aware of: It is quite violent, and there is a lot of on page brutality and medium graphic description, probably a 4/5 which gives it the B. The romance is a 14+ because of the enemies to lovers trope throughout the book. They regularly kiss, and sleep next to each other a few times, but it is non romantic and mostly to offer emotional support around the deaths of other characters.

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Guide to the Damsel rating system

As you all know I make sure to put age ratings and why I have rated them a 12 or a 15 or a B as well as my favourite things about the books and the characters on ALL my reviews, but I thought i would define what I call YA and what my age ratings mean on Damsel in Delight.

YA means young adults and through this can be stretched to cover anywhere from nine year olds to twenty somethings, I focus on the middle around 12- 18 and will report back on books accordingly. Everyone’s reading levels and comfort levels with different topics are completely different, of course, and it is immensely difficult to pin down exactly WHEN you should read books on your tbr, but in the end I am just offering the information so you can decide what you would be comfortable reading.

So my age ratings and what they mean:

10+ – These are books that are about 1/5 on violence and hardly ever have any romance. My reviews mention things to keep in mind when you are choosing to read them so just check those out.

10+B – Might have a little bit more violence or a few darker themes

11+ – Pretty much the same as a twelve 1 but essentially its just what age group I think would enjoy that book the most!

11+B – Honestly down in the lower categories the B doesnt really up the violence/themes/topics and I wont use it often.

12+ – these are books that are about 1.5/5 on violence, and 1/5 on romance. The exact amounts differ, but there is no truly out there content that would not be suitable for most 12-year-olds. The main themes that absolutely will NOT be in twelves include SA and self-harm as well as tropes that can be morally questionable like assassins being portrayed as heroes or arranged political marriages (even through i love them in some of my older reads, i feel like in a 12 they often are a little too much for especially younger readers )

12+B – These are essentially the 12’s with more violence. Still very little romance, but that might go up to a 1.5 depending on the book (that will be in the specific review). The violence will usually be strictly fantasy violence, and nothing too graphic for most readers, however these 12’s may be a little older than some readers are looking for.

13+ – This is where some of the more complex decisions come in. 13+ on some websites can have some incredibly mature and dark themes, which I adore when I read them portrayed well, but i think its important to read them when you would enjoy them more, and perhaps understand them more than get scared or put off by them earlier. My 13+ does have more violence in general than my 12+B’s, about a 2 or 3 out of 5, but most of them are not too graphic. The romance/sexual context in my 13+ recommendations is slightly higher, but there will be NO smut (non of the books i recommend have anything other than clean romance – look at my other blog post for my definition of that and how they correspond to the age ratings!) and in general will not progress much further than a few kisses.

13+B – this is very similar to a 13+ but is for the books between a 13+ and a 14+. I would usually say that these books will have a 4/5 of violence but the romantic content will be at a 3/5 and a few more complex themes may come in.

14+ – my 14+ do raise the bar from the 13s as they will consider darker topics and tropes/themes. The violence here will rise to a 4/5 for violence, but the romance in each book will vary, however they will remain AT OR BELOW a 4/5 and of course will be clean (see my other blog post for this exact definition). These is the age rating that I start introducing some more mature themes/topics including mentions of prostitution/sex/extreme drunkard behaviour. These will of course have trigger warnings of the individual reviews themselves as 14+s could be solely for violence as well.

14+B – These 14+Bs start drifting towards the significantly older category, but the violence and romance will remain the same, it will just be the darkness of the setting and world that will bump these up to a B. Darker worlds that have very in depth wars or brutal traditions or other themes that I feel justify a B just to let the reader know. (As a side-note, most dystopian books will float between a plain 14+ and that all important B because while they do have some similar topics to fantasy, they are the fictions satire and so are sometimes disturbingly close to reality)

15+ –  These are books that can approach a 5/5 on the violence scale and will have a 4.5/5 romance level usually – usually still clean! – but will ultimately be books that look at some of the topics of 14+ and 14+B in a greater depth, and expand them. There may, depending on the book, be mentions of toxic relationships but i will give warnings for those, and off the page SA.

15+B – This is mainly going to be for violent sexual content like SA and harassment which does come in to older YA reads.

16+ – a definite step up from a 15+ this will contain more betrayal/backstabbing and darkness than earlier ratings as well as more sexual content (check individual content warnings).

16+B – B’s are usually for violence, sexual or otherwise.

17+  – this is almost adult so it does contain more graphic depictions of violence etc.

17+B – B’s for sexual content and violence.

Adult –  by this point very mature themes are being explored and if you are on the younger end of adult I would definitely encourage a good read of the content warnings.

Some books are really hard to fit into these categories – eg the First Test by Tamora Pierce, i absolutely adore it and read it when i was about 12, but there is a lot of overt sexism towards the main character that may be too much for some readers, which is why I have bumped it up a rating to a 12+B just to be safe.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Different books in the series may have different age ratings, especially as the plot/romances/threat develops, so just make sure that you make sure that the further books in the series are also what you are comfortable with.

On a side note – my book ratings do not collaborate with movie ratings, movie twelves certainly have a LOT more in them violence wise than I would have in a book rec so if you are comfortable reading a little bit more violence or darker themes then have a look at some of the B reviews or go up a category, plenty of these books can be read earlier or later depending on your comfort level!

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