Tag: booktok

Age Gaps in Fantasy

Why is age gap EVERYWHERE? I cannot open a fantasy book – even if it is a high fantasy, and the romance is the tiniest of subplots that takes up less than 1% of the book! – and not end up with an age gap. Some books have an equality between their main characters in their romance but it seems so common even in popular books especially if they are non human.

NB: Some spoilers (light or as many as you could find on a blurb) will be present in this post for Poison Study, Order of Blood and Ruin, Lightlark, Throne of Glass.

I am going to break down human age gaps first then move on to paranormal and fantasy races etc.

One of my most recent reads, Poison Study by Maria V Snyder had an age gap. A huge one, 19 and 33. I have read it a few times before when I was younger but it always is something I wince at. It just seems so odd, and exaggerates the power dynamics between them – I have written another post on Equality and Power which talks about power dymanics outside of Age Gap – when honestly it isn’t fully nessacary. Yes, Valek was supposed to help the Commander to power and that had to be early enough that Yelena was in the country and the orphanage, but I really wish something had been done to age up Yelena or nudge Valek down out of his thirties because that is a gigantic age gap.

I am not blaming this book specifically, another book I absolutely adored and read over and over (title retracted because of spoilers) has an age gap which gets worse during the series. In the beginning it is sixteen and twenty, which was pushing it a bit, but I was willling to let that go. Then he gets trapped in a time warp in space and ages to twenty five, and she is still only eighteen. We have gone from four years (with her a minor and him an adult) to seven years with her barely an adult.

This trend of FMCS always being exactly eighteen is weird too, its like they decide to make them the age that they can say they are adults even if they essentially are not especially in comparison to the looonng lives of their love interests.

 I really loved a series by KM Shea which had an age gap that somehow circumnavigated all of the power dynamics that usually come with it in a really wholesome lovely way. In that Jade is twenty six, she has an established career, she has an apartment, she has a very supportive family whom she could return to if she wanted. She is not the lonely vulnerable eighteen year old that so many vampire novels are populated with and so when Connor the vampire (who’s age is old but never quite stated and it’s a spoiler so I wont say) comes along they have a relationship first as friends and then lovers that doesn’t fall into the toxic almost fatherly but sexual relationship which I find so odd in many fantasy books.

We’re on non-human relationships now so lets consider some more!

Lightlark (I’ve only read the first one!) has two love interests both of whom are old. Much older than our eighteen year old heroine Ida (again eighteen! And I honestly am not even annoyed at the author at this point, it is so so common its an industry problem and societal more than a personal thing as the trope is so easy to fall into.) They are fae like elementals and live for a long time and it works with the lore and the worldbuilding. But I refuse to believe that it isn’t possible to a) age up Ida a little bit. B) pop a few more rulers in the timeline so that Oro and Grim are younger or c) do both!  I would love a heroine who is several centuries old (if you have any recs drop them in the comments!) but it is so so rare.

A series I love and haven’t finished, the Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas (I’m trying to pick out popular examples but its so frequent I could do more) features a thousands of years age gap between Caeleana and Rowan. Lets not start on the power dymanics of her relying on him to control her magic or that he treats her so badly at the start, but the age gap itself is huge. I believe she is nineteen at this point, possibly even eighteen or twenty but either way she is a long long way from several thousand.

The Trope of the older mysterious man is so so common that I cant even hate the books that they are in (I adore some of these with my whole obsessive bookish heart) but I really think that it needs to stop. The occasional old fae is fine, but it is just so common and none of them acknowledge the difficulties of this like that they are from different generations and often cultures, with different expectations.

I digress to go read but what are your thoughts on this incredibly popular trope that is rampant in so many fantasy books?

Happy Reading!

XOXO

Lottie

0

Notorious Virtues by Alwyn Hamilton

Notorious Virtues was a fun trials led fantasy between two heroines from very different pasts. I enjoyed how Lottie and Honora didn’t fall into the trope of the one raised rich is evil and how Lottie wasn’t as innocent as she pretended to be to win the support of her relatives. With a love interest that is a journalist that hates the Holzafall family and a really interesting origin story of the monarchy/goverment this is a must read if you enjoy your fantasy with a side of trials! 

This feels like the Inheritance Games but set in a fantasy world with a rebellion! We have trials, we have a family warring over an inheritance and we also have touches of world building that go delightfully deep and mention the economic power that these families wield.

World – 4/5 – it feels like the quintessential rebellion fantasy world but a little bit more Victorian and I honestly cannot wait for where this goes, I think the way the few locations that are described are all so vivid is really promising!

Characters – 3/5 – I didn’t love love love any of the characters but I didn’t hate any of them either (as characters, morality aside). I think that this books strength is the trials and the world and the characters were for me just a way of exploring that.

Plot – 3.5/5 – trials for me are a very predictable plot because they are so popular in fantasy right now but I did still enjoy it.

Romance – 4/5 – not there much, but what was was cute.

 Violence Rating: Level 3 

Romance Rating: Sweet

Content Warnings: family killing each other, magical slavery (forcing certain members to obey or die by magic, determined by heritage not race).

0

Voice of the Ocean by Kelsey Impicciche

ARC – coming out 22nd of April

Let me just say I loved that she made the prince a pirate! It changes the entire dynamic, making them at sea (a place where Celeste the little mermaid) is comfortable and experienced as well as adding extra to the tensions between the two kingdoms! I have read a lot of Little Mermaid retellings that don’t make sufficient changes from the original fairytale that the plot is still entertaining to follow but the reveal at the end (even though there were clues!) I was still surprised by.

I also really liked that Celeste was able to speak and just didn’t because she knew her accent would stand out.

World – 3.5/5 – I mentioned that it was at sea, we get to see a little bit of the palace as well as generally her on the ship and then on the land for a brief amount of time. There isn’t much word building, the focus is Celeste and her personal relationships.

Romance – 4/5 – It was predictable, after all one of the major points of the Little Mermaid is that she falls in love with the prince, but I still liked the journey to get there and Raiden himself was interesting and I would have liked more development of his morals and character.

Plot – 3.5/5 – there was a twist at the end, but the rest of the plot stayed smooth and predictable. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, one of the things of retellings is we know the plot but it’s the journey to get there!

Characters – 3.5/5 – Mauve the Cecaelia was actually my favourite despite her limited page time because she had the interesting position of agreeing with the siren properganda/beliefs but also being friends with someone who is muddying up the waters (sort-of-pun intended!).

Damsel Reader Recommendation: 13+, for lovers of fairytale retellings!

Violence Rating: Level 3

Romance Rating: Sweet

Content Warnings: she is stripped at one point, I was worried it would lean into SA but it balanced on the edge.

0

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).

 

0

Fearless by Lauren Roberts

14+B

Wow. This only came out yesterday and my copy was only delivered at eight but I raced through this one in only a few reading hours! Let me just start by saying that Powerless as a series has been one of my favourites that I found in 2024 and I have been slightly stalking on all the socials any teasers or snippets but oh my goodness was it so much better than I could have dreamed!

This book returns to the format of Powerless with three trials, however these are centered around Bravery, Brutality and Benevolence which are the three things that the last king thought a good ruler needed to be. Paedyn is engaged to Kitt as we know from the last few pages of Reckless and this time she is solo tackling these challenges which will prove to the court that she deserves to be queen – even if she is Ordinary. I really enjoyed how Paedyn doesn’t flinch away from saying that she wants power, she enjoys it she says that it is everything she wanted since she was a child. In a league of romantasy books where the FMC wants to be a ‘normal girl’ Paedyns character has stuck out to me from page 1 of Powerless. She welcomes any power that she survives to get and she will become so powerful that the powerless like her have no choice but to be welcomed back into Ilya.

Of course this is a romantasy so how could I not chat a little about the romance! Kai Azer won my heart from the first page but this book really showed just how their relationship was in someways inevitable, in some ways because of other people’s decisions but overall the tension and chemistry that pulls them together even when she is engaged to his brother. All my reviews are spoiler free so I wont continue but oh my goodness did they have to weather a lot of storms but by the end I honestly don’t think any other ending could have worked as well as the one Lauren Roberts wrote!

Let’s go to the star ratings!

World – 4/5 stars – it is solid and I really enjoyed seeing a little bit more of it in the second trial but it is a relatively normal fantasy world that I have seen portrayed a lot before so I can’t say that it is completely original and new but I can say that it fits the story perfectly and illustrates the divide between powerful and the ordinary!

Plot – 5/5 – Romance may be the plot but the plot isn’t all romance! We have so many twists and turns and reveals that I am going to have to go back through and reread the first ones with new eyes!

Characters – 4.5/5 – I love them so much, Kai and Kitt really show the differences that an upbringing can make and also the different damages of psychological abuse and physical on how people grow up to view the world. Paedyn as always is amazing and her POVs are always so distinct in contrast to the royals Kitt and Kai as well as (little tiny spoiler here Edrics pov) which shows the divide in the world viewpoint very well!

Romance – Suggestive/Fade to Black after little buildup – 5/5 – it’s a romantasy this is what we are here for! We had some really great romantic moments that I definitely need to quote over and over again in all of my reviews forever more but I just loved this one!

Age recommendation: YA, 13+

Romance Rating: Suggestive/Fade to Black after little buildup. This is not steamy making out at all, it feels very soft and honestly it almost borders on sweet.

Violence Rating: Level 4. While violence does happen its not as much as a lot of books I read and it never feels graphic or gorey.

Content Warnings: Betrayal, infidelity.

0

Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

13+

My copy of Sunrise on the Reaping just arrived and I realised that I haven’t done any reviews for the original trilogy or Ballard so today I am going to remedy that before I start reading it.

Hunger Games is famous for a reason – the stunning dystopian world, so harsh and merciless yet portrayed in a way that expertly and subtly satirises our own world. It is just everything and honestly this book belongs on the best YA books for a reason.

We get introduced to Katniss on the most terrifying day of the year – the Reaping day. Instantly the world is painted for us in bright colour, the harshness and divide between the districts and capital as well as the injustice within the drawing of the slips from the Reaping ball. Essentially gambling your life on the fact that your slip wont be drawn so you can get a meager amount of grain to bring home is so dystopian yet we don’t doubt for a second that the whole of district 12 has done this at some point – and the slips are cumulative. The poorer you are the more chance you have of death by starvation which means you put more slips in which means you have more chance of dying on live tv.

I could talk about the stunning dystopian world forever – but I suspect everyone knows the basics of this series so let me continue to the star ratings!

World – 100000/5 –  so so much within it. Every little detail has so much more linked to it – we are in a world that Suzanne Collins has so much more going on than we ever know! With little snippets into other games, and the fact that everyone thinks that this is normal – it is a truly dystopian world unlike any other.

Romance – Sweet – 5/5 – the romance and the emerging love triangle and the fact that Katniss and Peeta’s relationship is based entirely on survival and what will get them sponsors – right?

Characters – 5/5 – from the Tributes who have been raised to think that dying for the Capitals amusement will get them honour and that they should volunteer to Rue to Prim, Katniss’s motivation for survival and to the over the top Caesar Flickerman who seems so jovial but is literally making childrens deaths into a sport they are all so real I feel like I could hold conversations with them! Katniss herself is a heroine who is truly strong, she has the skills that despite her disadvantage and the fate of 12 tributes before her she will do her best to come home!

Plot  – 5/5 –  yes. Just yes. From reveals to plot twists to fights and interviews we have a plot which is almost completely contrived by Gamemakers who want to make the games as entertaining as possible. But as always humans are not controllable and especially when it comes to survival!

Romance Rating: Sweet: Kissing, cuddling, clothes on, mild innuendo.

Violence Rating: Level 5

Content Warnings: obviously death, on page and off page, grief, survival, starvation, dehydration, manipulation.

0

Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by the Broke and Bookish and now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl where bloggers are given a prompt that is usually a list of ten bookish things.

This weeks prompt was –

Love Freebie…. Top Ten Romance Tropes!

Rivals to Lovers – Celaena Sardothian and Sam Cortland are honestly one of the most beautiful couples I have ever read – just EVERYTHING about their relationship is swoonworthy. So Rivals-to-Lovers has to go to their romance in Assassins Blade.

Enemies to Lovers – Powerless, Kai Azer, Paedyn Gray. Everything about their relationship redeemed Enemies to Lovers for me, they are just such a swoony couple and I was supporting them from page one (that meeting scene….how could I not?)

Friends to Lovers – Changeling by Molly Harper (she is also best friends with his sister so we get the friends older brother trope in there too!)

He falls first and harder – Graceling, Kristen Cashore (tho Kat falls pretty hard for Po too!).

Flirty sparring – I think this again has to go to Powerless (I had to try really hard not to add sharing a bed non romantically and comforting them from nightmares because all of these are in the perfection that is Powerless).

Arranged Marriage – Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson – this was tricky, I love arranged marriage theoretically but it is rarely done well (if you have any recs I’d love them.) Arranged Marriage is a huge trope in it but not romantically.

Royalty/Aristocrat – I think that Jessica Day George’s couple from Dragonskin Slippers (review coming!) Luka and Creel might just have to take this one, the book is slightly younger than many of my other recs (still a 12+ because of violence etc) but it is 100% worth a read and it does hold up even as an older reader.

Slow Burn Romance – This was tricky because slow burn can mean over the book, the series or whatever but I think it goes to Connor and Jade from KM Shea’s Magiford subseries! It is the only book I haven’t written a full review on yet but I promise its coming!

Academia Romance –  Deadly Education, slow burn, subplot romance, dark but stunningly intricate and deadly.

Do you have any recs with these or other tropes??

Happy Reading!

Lottie

7

Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by the Broke and Bookish and now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl where bloggers are given a prompt that is usually a list of ten bookish things.

This weeks prompt was –

New-to-Me Authors I Discovered in 2024

Lauren Roberts – I just love Powerless so much and cant wait for Fearless to come out this year!

Jennifer Lynn Barnes – I cant believe it took me so long to read the Inheritance Games, its so good and I cant wait for my TBR to get down to the next book!

Holly Jackson – a good girls guide to murder had been on my list since forever and I finally read it in early January (but I bought it in December and read half of it in a friends copy a few months ago!)

Naomi Novik’s Scolomance series – she has written the Temeraire series which I had read but I feel like this is such a different series it counts! A Deadly Education definitely stands out among this years reads.

K M Shea – At the beginning of the year I went through a huge K M Shea phase, reading through all her Magiford series and several of her fairy tales (I’m planning on writing reviews of the Magiford series soon because they are amazing!).

Tara Grayce – she wrote the elven alliance (which has a part two series which is going to get its third book this year!) Also planning to write reviews of these for the series before the new book comes out!

Casey Blair – I read Coup of Tea for the first time in 2024 and loved it!

Amelie Zhao – Blood Heir was so good and I’m midway through Red Tigress now!

Emma St Clair – Royally (re) arranged was really good and I’ve read several more of her books since (she has done a series collab with Jenny Proctor if you are looking for sweet romances).

Happy Reading!

0

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

1

Good Girl, Bad Blood, Holly Jackson

13+B

This was the sequel to a good girls guide to murder and Pip has promised not to investigate again into any crimes after she ended up at the hospital for the double homicide case. She has gained internet fame documenting her search for justice and the events of the last book on her podcast titled – what else? – a good girls guide to murder and is in her last year of high school – investigation is an obsession Pip is refusing to go down again.

Of course, this promise is immediately shattered when her friends older brother Jamie goes missing. The police dismiss the case, he is a twenty-four year old who dropped out of uni and has run away twice before with no contact. Connor (her friend) begs Pip to investigate and after trying to get the police involved she reluctantly agrees.

Unlike last time her investigation is more public with episodes of her podcast regularly airing to share the new developments (I wondered personally about if the villains were getting a little too much forewarning because of the podcast but they didn’t which I was relieved about). Pip is asking people for any footage/sightings of Jamie, but the case goes far wider than that.

I loved that the previous book contained some of the major clues for this one and it really emphasised how despite the small town appearance, so much more goes on under the surface people don’t want to acknowledge. Some people are furious with Pip for exposing crimes they would have preferred not to know about and as the trials for the guilty from the last book go on the themes of injustice vs justice with an added element of vigilantism is really interesting to read. It doesn’t have quite the complexity of the previous book, I feel like Pip was really wading through five years of secrets there that she didn’t have in this book but it was completely unputdownable.

Plot – 5/5 – it was great, it kept me guessing and I am hooked for the next book despite it resolving nicely.

Characters – 4.5/5 – they were great! Half a point deduced because the new characters of this one didn’t have quite the depth and darkness of the last book which balanced so well against Pip’s organised investigation. Love love love Ravi and his feelings about Jamie were so well expressed – he has been the family that lost their son and he is trying to desperately stop that from happening to Jamie’s family.

World – 5/5 – I love it, it is so realistic the underbelly of the little town that no one looks at but everyone kinda knows is there.

Romance – 5/5 – Soft Romance – like the last book it is a subplot but I still love it so much!

Things to be aware of: child death (referee too) serial killers, gun violence, drugs, mentions of past SA (none graphic, nothing on the page), violence in general, dangers of catfishing, also several f-bombs that all seemed to be in the same chapter but in case you avoid that I just thought I’d mention it!

1

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑