I rediscovered my love of romantic fantasies when my mother went into the hospital, and I needed a place to go to escape the horror of watching a parent’s health fail. I not only buried myself in reading fantasies filled with magical love stories, I started writing them again. Throughout my life, I’ve reached for fantasy novels whenever life got tough. As a child, I would read nearly every fantasy I could find. As an adult, my tastes have changed, and I’m looking for fantasy novels with a romantic twist. But still, it’s the heroine overcoming adversity despite the worst odds that gives me hope and comfort exactly when I need it.
I was a nobody, a Queen's Lady who was lucky to still be alive. Until the battle...
Soren is known as the Beast of Fein. He's a warrior feared in all the four kingdoms. As a reward for saving the people of Earst, Queen Beatrice gifts me to the brutal general. I'm fitted with a magical collar that forces me to do his will. I'm bound for life, which, according to the queen, won't be a long one in the Beast's care. My only hope is to find my beloved dragons that have gone missing in the valley. But in saving me, they might end up burning the four kingdoms to the ground.
Legendborn is a King Arthur tale set in modern-day Georgia. With that description, how could I not love this book?
Tracy Deonn is a master at blending Southern folk traditions and African lore with Arthurian legends. I fell in love with Bree, the typical Southern teenager starting out at UNC-Chapel Hill. She has magic, but it’s not the same magic as the mages who are gearing up for a magical war.
The tale is a clash of magical cultures topped off with a Romeo and Juliet romance. It grabbed me from the first page, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.
An Instant New York Times Bestseller! Winner of the Coretta Scott King - John Steptoe for New Talent Author Award
Filled with mystery and an intriguingly rich magic system, Tracy Deonn’s YA contemporary fantasy reinvents the King Arthur legend and “braids together Southern folk traditions and Black Girl Magic into a searing modern tale of grief, power, and self-discovery” (Dhonielle Clayton, New York Times bestselling author of The Belles).
After her mother dies in an accident, sixteen-year-old Bree Matthews wants nothing to do with her family memories or childhood home. A residential program for bright high schoolers at UNC–Chapel Hill…
Holly Black has taken me into the world of fairies—not Disney’s sparkly version of fairies, but a darker world of fairy lore that stems back into our ancient past time and time again.
With this book, I immediately fell in love with the blending of dark magic with a modern, sassy twist. Two human girls are pulled into the fairy world when their parents are murdered, and they are adopted by the killer, who also happens to be a fairy.
Jude, one of the adopted girls, is bullied all through school in this magical land for being human. She must learn how to be just as vicious, if not more vicious than her magical schoolmates to survive. Jude is everything I wish I could be. I find myself revisiting this series from time to time to remind myself how to be tough in the face of adversity.
"Lush, dangerous, a dark jewel of a book . . . intoxicating" - Leigh Bardugo, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Six of Crows
Of course I want to be like them. They're beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.
And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest. I hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.
One terrible morning, Jude and her sisters see their parents murdered in front of them. The terrifying assassin abducts all three…
This book is the start of a spicy romantic fantasy series that hooked me from the first page. It fed into my love of spooky vampires, dark mysteries, and a fun love story with snarky dialogue.
I devoured this book and the rest of the series during the pandemic lockdown. The complicated Kingdom of Solis provided the perfect escape. The high drama of this fantasy echoed the stress of the uncertainty of the stressful time I was living through. The promise that things can work out, even when everything is falling apart, proved to be the balm I so desperately needed. When things get stressful, I pull out this series for a reread.
“I hope you guys love this book as much as I do!! (Let me just say...Hawk *swoon*!!)” ~ NYT bestseller Sarah J. Maas
Captivating and action-packed, From Blood and Ash is a sexy, addictive, and unexpected fantasy perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas and Laura Thalassa.
A Maiden…
Chosen from birth to usher in a new era, Poppy’s life has never been her own. The life of the Maiden is solitary. Never to be touched. Never to be looked upon. Never to be spoken to. Never to experience pleasure. Waiting for the day of her Ascension, she would rather…
I discovered the Drakon series when wandering the stacks at my local library many years ago. Nearly twenty years later, I’m still thinking about these books.
Set in eighteenth-century England, this book is a romance between a thief and an earl—who are also dragons. How fun is that? This series feeds into my love of high-stakes historical romance and magical creatures.
I devoured the story of Kit’s chase of the elusive thief Clarissa, who is destined to steal his heart just as he is destined to capture hers. They are the ultimate enemies-to-lovers trope that I love to read and reread.
For centuries they’ve lived in secret among northern England’s green and misted hills. Creatures of extraordinary beauty, power, and sensuality, they possess the ability to shape-shift from human to dragon and back again. Now their secret—and their survival—is threatened by a temptation that will break every boundary. . . .
Dubbed the Smoke Thief, a daring jewel thief is confounding the London police. His wealthy victims claim the master burglar can walk through walls and vanish into thin air. But Christoff, the charismatic Marquess of Langford, knows the truth: the thief is no ordinary human but a “runner” who’s fled…
This series is a cozy fantasy with a warm blanket and piping hot tea. Breen, a young lady from the United States who is in search of adventure, travels to Ireland and finds more than she’s ever bargained for.
I love this series so much for the adventure and the found family waiting to join her in the fun. Breen also finds magical portals, dragons, and a dangerously handsome magical man.
At a time when I desperately needed a cozy read filled with friendships and new loves, Nora Roberts, the queen of romance, hit all the best high notes for me with The Awakening.
From Sunday Times bestseller Nora Roberts - a tale of adventure, magic and finding your home
Mists, shimmering silver fingers, rose over the pale green water of the lake. They twined and twisted toward a sky quietly grey, while in the east, over the hills, a pink blush waited, like a held breath, to waken.Breen Kelly had always been a rule follower. So, when her father left when she was twelve years old, promising to return, she waited. Now, more than a decade later, she's working at a job she hates and is tired of the life that playing…
Virologist Dr. Rachel Bisette sees visions of a Kachina and remembers the plane crash that killed her parents and the Dine medicine woman who saved her life. Rachel is investigating a new and lethal hantavirus spreading through the Four Corners, and believes the Kachina is calling her to join the work against the spreading pandemic.
She finds Eva Yellow Horn, a medicine woman with the key to fighting the pandemic. When Eva demonstrates ancient healing powers beyond science, Rachel recognizes her as the medicine woman who saved her life years before. Eva reveals that Rachel’s father was investigating the 1979 nuclear disaster in Church Rock, when his plane crashed, killing her parents. Now, Rachel undertakes a new investigation, but she is not alone.
“Visions of kachinas guide doctor to spiritual healing in pandemic.”
2014 Finalist in the Willa Literary Award
This is a book that once closed and last line read, my mind wandered to explore certain character motivations and potential follow-up responses. I don’t think an author has to answer every possibility, art comes into play best when the reader’s own imagination can wander within the story.
Dr. Rachel Bisette is drawn to the Four Corners to lead the search for a vaccine against a lethal pandemic. One elusive indigenous woman, Eva Yellow Horn, carries the gift of immunity. In her search…
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