Knitting, Sci-fi and other stuff...

5⭐️🫑 I've gotten behind on my blog posting.  I had some looming ARC deadlines so I ploughed through three books in only a few days.  So first off, Fount and Fortune by Mickey Schoonover.  I received the ARC of the second book.  I read the prologue and about a page of the first chapter and decided I really needed to read book one to know what was going on.  I'm glad I did.  This duology is amazing.  It's an alternative history dystopian set in a Fascist Dictatorship in Florida.  A governor appointed by the Spanish government during colonization of Florida back in ~1516 stumbled on the fountain of youth.  He declared himself the Conquistador and kept control of the Fount.  He used the healing abilities of the water to become immortal basically.  Florida became the Empire Eternal and the book takes place more or less in present day 565 years later.  The FMC, Evangeline, is a farm worker who lives and works on the Conq...

5⭐️2🌶 I finished my ARC/ALC of Blood of Truth and Traitors by Aria Ashbrook a couple days ago.  They kill off one of my favorite side characters so it's taken me a couple days to wrap my head around the book.  It was phenomenal even though it was soul crushingly sad.  It picked up right where book two left off.  Rose and company discovered an Issen city in the mountains.  I don't want to get into it too much because of spoilers but the entire book takes place in and around this Issen city Isthyr.  Rose "travels" via her Raven sight abilities to check up on Kay, Jonas and William.  She's also able to see some other key pieces of events while in raven form.  She discovers a ton of information about her lineage, all key plot points and the gang find out there is a prophesy to boot, because of course there is and Rose is basically the chosen one.  She has to go through a trial of sorts in this book.  It is meant to teach somethi...

4.5⭐️2🌶 I finished my ARC of The Reaping Rose by Eva Simmons a couple days ago.  It was good.  My original plan was to reread the first book, The Hanging Heart before this one but I just don't have time.  I remembered virtually nothing from the first book, other than I enjoyed it.  This was a solid middle book in a trilogy.  It completed some plot arcs, then blew open a whole new can of worms.  An even badder bad guy, potentially, was revealed at the end of this book.  We got to see a good amount of Wilder and Elorie together, happy and having extremely hot nooky, which is always a treat IMO.  Several side characters got more characterization and two characters started their own love story.  At least I hope it ends up being a love story.  Once my plate isn't overflowing with arc obligations I plan to revisit these books and give them the attention they deserve.  The writing is great and the existential implications that...

5⭐️1🌶 I finished my ARC of The Last Fury by Talina Arden.  It was phenomenal.  It's a little hard to describe as its a dark dystopian urban fantasy romance.  It had traditional fantasy creature elements like Fae, Vampires, Warewolves, Witches and Demons.  It was also set in a near future dystopian city with modern technology and terminology.  It seems as though the magical world pushed its way into "ours" at some point and although humans are aware of the magic most of them try to avoid it.  Magic weilding folk also keep to their own parts of the city as do the humans.  The FMC is an EMT who works graveyard shift and has done so for the last eight years.  Sera has been feeling a power growing for the last few months.  When the book opens she has just utilized her power for the first time.  She has no idea what it nor how she's done it.  Her and her shad partner take another call.  In this alleyway while attending a...

5⭐️1🌶 Ooof and wow, this ARC of An Ember in the Dawn of Night by Emery Fynn broke me.  It was so good.  This post is going to have some mild spoilers because there's no other way to talk about just how clever Fynn's writing is.  This book tosses the reader right into the action unapologetically, there's no prologue, just bang, chapter one.  And right within those first couple of chapters the FMC is following a tip to a home where a family resides.  She proceeds to slaughter said family, then goes gets cleaned up, stops at her best friends house where they bone, so she can get out of her head.  Then she travels back to her own place.  There is very little world building or exposition, we're just along for the ride.  She mentions names of towns, districts, canal ways with no explanation you just have to guess or look at the map at the beginning.  I loved this.  It was refreshing and its disorienting.  I think its a plot d...

5⭐️2🌶 I finished my ARC of Twisted Roots and Soil by AJ Charley a couple days ago.  This one was so good.  I don't even know if I can describe it.  In this society women, especially women like the FMC Alyxia, are expected to marry and continue the sacred bloodline by the time they hit 30.  Aly's parents have a husband picked out for her already and he's a deuche.  Aly is a Foundation.  She is a member of one of the founding families of this realm and she has golden (literally) blood.  When they turn 20 these people go through a ritual to determine which branch of magic they will choose and at what strength it will be.  Aly was pressured by her parents to choose a certain branch, which wasn't the one she truly wanted and thus failed the ritual.  She has no magic and has been hiding that fact from everyone for the last 8 years.  Her sister Bri has fled the realm and wants to meet Aly to give her important information.  Al...