Adult Fiction

Brigands & Breadknives

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by Travis Baldree
First sentence: “‘Fuck!’ creid Fern, ducking back inside the carriage a whisker before a clawed and scaled hand sailed past.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: November 11, 2025.
Others in the series: Legends & Lattes, Bookshops & Bonedust
Review copy pilfered off the ARC shelves at work.
Content: It is very sweary. Like VERY sweary. (I like a book that tells you what it is with the first word.) And there’s some fantasy violence. It will be in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Fern (the bookshop owner from the last book) has decided to relocate, after 20 years, to Thune, where the orc Viv is. Mostly to be near her friend, but also because Fern has lost the love of bookselling and needs a Change. Once in Thune, though, she realizes that she just can’t sell books anymore, and on a drunken whim, climbs into the carriage of the famous (legendary, even) one-eared Elf, Astryx. She doesn’t quite know what she’s thinking, but when Astryx finally discovers her, it’s too far for Fern to walk back. So, she stays. And she and Astryx – and a weird little (hilarious) goblin named Zyll, that Astryx is nominally returning for bounty – go on a journey.

Like Baldree’s other books, the premise is super simple. The joy, however, is in all the little things. It was Fern learning how to be on the road, growing into her own over the journey. (It was also Fern’s creative swearing.) It was the “diminished Elder Blade” knife that was just silly. It was the growing friendship and respect between Astryx and Fern. It was all their silly little side quests.

I listened to the other two on audio (Baldree is a fantastic narrator), and I wondered if this would hold up in print. It absolutely does. I loved being back in this world, I really enjoyed Fern as a main character, and I’d be happy to follow them all on any more silly adventures that Baldree dreams up.

Slipstream

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by Madge Maril
First sentence: “Stories sell.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy pilfered from the ARC stacks at work.
Content: There is swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and a couple on-page, but not super graphic sex scenes. It’s in the Contemporary Romance section of the bookstore.

Lilah just wants to be a serious documentary filmmaker. So, when her boyfriend and business partner decides to take on a documentary about an F1 racing team as their next project, Lilah feels betrayed. Even more so, when he tells her he’s been sleeping with he team’s marketing manager and breaks their relationship off. Newly dumped and betrayed, she turns to the team’s backup driver, Arthur Bianco, who only wants to get back on the grid, preferably on his old team, and not one where his overbearing uncle is the team principal. Of course, this means they go in together to try to sabotage the documentary. Of course, this means they will fall in love. And of course, things will work out happily ever after.

All that said, this one was a lot of fun. I think I liked it partly because Lilah wasn’t really part of the racing team – she was adjacent to, and while she was working for it, it’s not like she was part of the racing team. I liked it, too, because you got to see Lilah fall in love with F1 as well as with Arthur, and I thought Maril did that well.

Yes, it was corny and unbelievable, really, but hey, it’s a romance book. It’s not supposed to be. It was fun, and honestly, that’s all I expect. And this one absolutely delivered.

Audiobook: Problematic Summer Romance

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by Ali Hazelwood
Read by Elizabeth Lamont & Eric Nolan
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There is a lot of swearing, including multiple f-bombs, as well as some pretty detailed on-page sex. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Maya’s brother Eli and his fiance Rue are getting married in Italy, and everything about this is perfect. Except that Eli’s best friend, Connor, is going to be there. The Connor that Maya has been in love with for three years, and who Connor has very gently, but very firmly, discouraged. See: Connor is 38, and Maya is 23. Connor can’t get over the age difference, so even though they spent years talking daily, and they’re pretty perfectly matched, he won’t give in. Much to Maya’s dismay. She wants nothing more than to be with Connor, his imperfections and all.

First off: the book is, in fact, problematic. I’ve been thinking about it since I finished, and I’m not sure why I couldn’t get over the age gap. It’s the same as in Emma, why is that 21-to-37 age gap okay (I mean, Mr. Knightly literally saw Emma grow up!) and this one is not okay? I was talking to another friend about it, and she pointed out that if we switched the roles – Maya was older, and Connor was the younger one pining and not letting her “no” be final – then it would be really problematic. I don’t know. It could just be the way Hazelwood wrote Maya and Connor – she’s very flirty and aggressive and he is very reserved and protective. Maybe I’m not comfortable with that? (Which, yes, says more about me than the book. Maybe all of this says more about me than the book.)

That said, I adored the narrators on this one. Lamont was fantastic as Maya/the general narrator and though I don’t usually like a duet narration, I liked the way Nolan did the men. Maybe I’m just a sucker for an Irish brogue. So, even with the whole problematic part of it, I did end up enjoying the book. If only because the narrators were just amazing.

Audiobook: System Collapse

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by Martha Wells
Read by Kevin R. Free
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Others in the series: All Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue Protocol, Exit Strategy, Network Effect
Content: Like all Murderbot books, there is a lot of violence and swearing (Wells is a master of the artfully placed f-bomb). It will be in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

I don’t have much to say about this that I didn’t already say two years ago. I finally convinced my husband to read this series (thanks to the TV show on Apple+) and this was the last one he had to read, so we listened to it on audio on a recent long drive. I didn’t mind revisiting Murderbot and its world, and I had heard that the audio was really good.

The audio is really good. Free does a fantastic job with the narration, with capturing Murderbot’s personality, with the book in general. He kept my interest, and it’s one of those books you don’t want to turn off and get out of the car.

And an additional bonus: K, who was in the car with us, ended up listening as well, and she’s plowed through half of the series since we got back.

I call that a win.

Into the Riverlands

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by Nghi Vo
First sentence: “The barber paused, flicking water droplets from his razor with a brisk snap of his wrist.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is some violence and evidence of a murder. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

We scheduled an event with Vo, and the marketing person at work is super excited about this, so she decided to pass out Vo’s books to staff to get them excited, too. This was the one she thought I would like.

I’m not quite sure of the plot. There’s a monk – but they’re not religious – and their talking? sentient? bird named Absolutely Beautiful and they’re on a journey… somewhere? They meet up with people who go with them. Stories are told, a dead body is found. Maybe other stuff happens? I am honestly not sure.

Which is really my reaction to this. I have no idea what I read. I’m not a “good” enough, close enough, critical enough reader to actually get what happened in this short book (is it a long short story or a short book?). I can see how people like this; it was well written, and the language is beautiful, but personally. I don’t get it.

Exiles

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by Mason Coile
First sentence: “The beeping won’t stop.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: September 16, 2025
Review copy thrust on me by a co-worker who loved it. Spoiler: he was right.
Content: There is swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and two very grisly murders. It will be in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

It’s the near future, and humanity has decided to colonize Mars. They’ve sent some bots ahead to build a base, and three humans – Beck, Kang, and Gold – have been chosen to start a base there. But, when they come out of suspended animation (it’s a long seven-month trip, why stay awake?), the bots that were supposed to greet them aren’t responding. That’s the first clue that something… unusual… has happened. As the humans get to the base, they find parts of it destroyed, and some irregularities with the bots. And, as the mystery unfolds, they realize that the problem is larger than they could have ever imagined.

Oh, wow, this was intense. It’s being billed as gothic horror in space, but I felt like it was less horror and just good, straight-up science fiction. It’s a tight book, coming in at just over 200 pages, and it’s pretty flawless. The twists were genuinely surprising (well, I’m also not the closest reader), and it’s a clever look at what might happen on Mars (spoiler: it’s not good). Anyone who loved Murderbot will love this one as well.

Remarkably well done. (Maybe I should read William?)

Audiobook: Wild and Wrangled

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by Lyla Sage
Read by Connor Crais, Savannah Peachwood, and Stella Hunter
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Others in the series: Done and Dusted, Swift and Saddled, Lost and Lassoed
Content: There’s a lot of swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and (while it takes a while to get there) a lot of on-page sexytimes. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

All Camille has wanted to do is get married to get her (rich) parents off her back and to secure the future for her daughter. Except things don’t go according to plan: her fiancé never shows up for their wedding, sending a note calling it off. And, to make things worse, as Cam tries to rebuild her life, her first love, her high school boyfriend, Dusty Tucker, shows up back in her life. It didn’t work out – though they tried – the first time around, and Cam’s not sure if she wants to see if it can work out a second time. But Dusty is persistent, and being in a relationship with him feels… right. Can she buck her parents and her expectations and her fears, and make it work with him again?

I liked this one better than I have the past couple Rebel Blue books, though I still think I might be over cowboy romances. That said, I really enjoyed Cam and Dusty together, and I liked the hopefulness of two people who fell in love young, finding their way back to each other. Sage does know how to write characters, and maybe I liked this one more because they were just adoptive members of the Rider family, which meant no overbearing brothers to get in the way. This one had a weight to it – with the class issues and the tension of lost loves – that I think the others missed.

I still like Done and Dusted best (the first time is always the best, no?) but this one is a solid read.

Audiobook: The Knight and the Moth

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by Rachel Gillig
Read by Samantha Hydeson
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There’s violence, including violence towards women; swearing, including multiple f-bombs; and some on-page sex scenes. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Six is a diviner for the Abbess of Ashling in the country of Traum. Which means, people come to her, paying her in blood and the Abbess in money, and she drowns in the spring water and divines their futures for them. It’s all she’s ever known, and while she doesn’t love doing it (um, I would wonder if she did), she is very good. What she and her sister diviners (creatively: one through five) really want is for their ten year term to be up and for them to move on with their lives.

Except, over the course of a few nights, Six’s sister diviners go missing. Thankfully, the king and his knights are passing through, and Six escapes with them (well, with the one devilishly handsome, and yet not very nice – the use of the word “ignoble” happened more than once) to go visit each of the omens and to find out what happened to the only things (okay, they’re not “things”) she cared about.

I wanted to like this one much more than I actually did. I had issues with the world (why would you get six diviners at once, and have them all leave at the same time? Why would you NOT stagger their times of service?) and eventually, with the romance. Sure, the knight was all considerate and whatever, but when I finally got to the first sex scene, it was kind of… silly. There was absolutely no chemistry there, and I kept rolling my eyes at it all. And then the twist at the end? I’m not sure it made me mad because it was out of left field (there were clues, but not great ones), or because it was just stupid.

I finished the book (it was a book group book), but I didn’t love it, and I have no intention of reading the sequel.

Sounds Like Love

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by Ashley Poston
First sentence: “Most summer nights in the small beach town of Vienna Shores, North Carolina, there was music at the Revelry.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is swearing, including multiple f-bombs, and some off-page sex. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Joni grew up surrounded by two things: the ocean and music. Her parents owned the Revelry, a music hall in a town in the Outer Banks. She was happy, but she had big dreams: she wanted to be a songwriter, so after college (and a heartbreak), she headed west. She worked, and finally hit it (relatively) big, but over the past year, she’s had writer’s block. Mostly because her mother has been diagnosed with early-onset dementia, and Joni is afraid she’s going to miss, well, everything.

Then, as she heads back to Vienna Shores for a month-long break, she starts hearing voices in her head. It turns out that it’s Sebastian Fellows, a former boyband member, and who is trying to resurrect his career. Can the two of them work together long enough to get out of each other’s heads? (And do they even want to?)

After the mediocre reaction of Novel Love story (I think I’m one of the few who liked it), I didn’t know what to expect with Poston’s next one. But, she’s back on her game. This was fun, full of music and heart, with enough conflict and tension to keep the book interesting. I liked all the characters and the setting of a beach town in the summer. I liked the relationship between Joni and her parents, and the heartache of her mother’s memory fading. It not as good as Seven Year Slip, but it’s up there.

And it’s a perfect summer novel.

Alchemy of Secrets

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by Stephanie Garber
First sentence: “Holland St. James had been counting down the minutes until tonight.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: October 7, 2025
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There are some murders, and talk of deaths and killing, and some mild swearing. It will be in the Science-Fiction/Fantasy section (probably; it’s not really a romance) of the bookstore.

Holland St. James is a PhD student studying folklore and has become interested in these urban tales about the devil making deals with Hollywood actors. Then, one night, she stumbles on one of the tales – the Watch Man – who tells her she has 24 hours left to live, unless she finds the Alchemical Heart and delivers it to the devil. Thus begins a mystery and a “treasure hunt” that takes Holland through old Hollywood and into the past, uncovering truths about her parents’ deaths.

My initial reaction to this was that it’s pretty much exactly like every other one of Garber’s books. It felt like Caraval, just aged up a bit and set in the real world instead of in a fantasy world. There’s a conflicted heroine, trying to do her best; a couple of questionable love interests (though the spice level on this is basically at just kissing); a sister who has questionable motives but also the heroine’s “best interests” in mind; and several twists and turns, some of which were surprising.

It’s not a bad book, it just didn’t floor me the way I was hoping it would.