These are some of the books I’ve read for the Tarot Black Lives Matter book bingo, presented by The Tarot Sequence fandom! This is run primarily by Kathy @pages below vaulted sky.

I made a post-signing up for the challenge with my plans, and if you just want the challenge info head over to Pages Below Vaulted Sky. I’ll be doing a bigger check-in post at the beginning of October.

If you’re looking for books to use, we’ve got some great lists on reddit in our /r/Fantasy Black Lives Matter Megathread

A Song of Blood and Stone by L. Penelope

A treacherous, thrilling, epic fantasy about an outcast drawn into a war between two powerful rulers.

Orphaned and alone, Jasminda lives in a land where cold whispers of invasion and war linger on the wind. Jasminda herself is an outcast in her homeland of Elsira, where her gift of Earthsong is feared. When ruthless soldiers seek refuge in her isolated cabin, they bring with them a captive–an injured spy who threatens to steal her heart.

Jack’s mission behind enemy lines to prove that the Mantle between Elsira and Lagamiri is about to fall nearly cost him his life, but he is saved by the healing Song of a mysterious young woman. Now he must do whatever it takes to save Elsira and it’s people from the True Father and he needs Jasminda’s Earthsong to do it. They escape their ruthless captors and together they embark on a perilous journey to save Elsira and to uncover the secrets of The Queen Who Sleeps.

Thrust into a hostile society, Jasminda and Jack must rely on one another even as secrets jeopardize their bond. As an ancient evil gains power, Jasminda races to unlock a mystery that promises salvation.

The fates of two nations hang in the balance as Jasminda and Jack must choose between love and duty to fulfill their destinies and end the war.

I loved this book start to finish. I listened to the audiobook and the narration worked really well for me.

The book opens with a dusty-road frontier town, so right away I was into this more modern setting, which turned out to be quite modern indeed with telephones and cars, I always love this mix of early tech and magic. The world is split, with most of the magic users living in a land separated by a magical barrier, close to where Jasminda lives. She, an Earthsinger, doesn’t really fit in Elsira, and the people in her town never let her forget this. As Lagrimari are also distinguishable by skin color, she faces fear and bigotry everywhere she goes. The only times this barrier fails and there’s a breach, the countries have a new war. Honestly the more I learned about the Lagrimari dictator, the True Father, the more I wanted to throttle him too.

The worldbuilding trickles in through epigraphs that are fables from this strange world, and later, the mystery of how we got to this divided point is revealed through a series of old memories. There’s a lot neither we nor the characters know to start off, but I was happy with the info by the end.

A lot of the focus of this book is on the relationship between Jasminda and Jack and how she’s this very lonely person that has a hard time trusting and opening up. But she’s also a woman used to living on her own in a hostile land, she’s tough, resourceful and smart. I really liked how they worked together, and how it wasn’t all easy sailing.

I’ll be continuing with the series, I understand the main characters change book to book, but I’m pretty happy with how things tied up here, so I don’t think I’ll mind that.

Goodreads

BLM Bingo: MARTYR: change, surrender or letting go, MAGICIAN: set in a secondary world, LOVERS: featuring strong friendships or romance,

r/fantasy bingo: Romantic Fantasy / Paranormal Romance, Novel with Chapter Epigraphs H, Graphic Novel or Audiobook, Featuring Politics

Dread Nation by Justina Ireland

Jane McKeene was born two days before the dead began to walk the battlefields of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville—derailing the War Between the States and changing America forever. In this new nation, safety for all depends on the work of a few, and laws like the Native and Negro Reeducation Act require certain children attend combat schools to learn to put down the dead. But there are also opportunities—and Jane is studying to become an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. It’s a chance for a better life for Negro girls like Jane. After all, not even being the daughter of a wealthy white Southern woman could save her from society’s expectations.

But that’s not a life Jane wants. Almost finished with her education at Miss Preston’s School of Combat in Baltimore, Jane is set on returning to her Kentucky home and doesn’t pay much mind to the politics of the eastern cities, with their talk of returning America to the glory of its days before the dead rose. But when families around Baltimore County begin to go missing, Jane is caught in the middle of a conspiracy, one that finds her in a desperate fight for her life against some powerful enemies. And the restless dead, it would seem, are the least of her problems.

I freakin loved this book, binged the hell out of it, and really looking forward to the next one. I was pretty surprised because I’m not a huge fan of YA, quite put off by zombies and struggle with books that come to close to real-world horrors. I just loved the protagonist so much, it was great to read and paced well, and zombie killing twin scythes seems actually fun. Well maybe not fun-fun, but the MC is really good at this.

Jane starts off strong, telling us that the first time someone tried to kill her was the day she was born. You know a book means business when it starts like that. She’s got a very strong voice, and a bold and rash temperament that often gets her into trouble. The other main character is Kate, who starts off as a sort of vapid belle nemesis but turns out alright and really brave too.

The book is split into two the first half taking place at zombie-fighting school and the second half taking place after the plot thickens. I liked how there was aways this contrast of white people trying to act like everything is fine with their parties and their white picket fences, while there are still zombies all over the place and Black people are allegedly free but don’t really have a lot of choices except kill zombies. There’s a lot of commentary on how even in apocalypse racism thrives.

Maybe it’s also a function of how quickly I read it, but there was always a lot going on to keep me interested, and stuff just going from bad to worse and oh no even worse.

Dread Nation also has epigraphs, and I loved the snarky difference between what Jane was writing home and what she actually thought about her school and what was going on.

So yeah, really loved this one and looking forward to more zombie killing and conspiracy uncovering badassery.

Goodreads

BLM Bingo: JUSTICE: basedon or inspired by real life injustice, HIEROPHANT: coming of age or YA contemporary, STRENGTH: action-adventure,

r/fantasy Bingo: Set in a School or University, Ace / Aro, Novel with Chapter Epigraphs H,

Queen of the Conquered by Kacen Callender

An ambitious young woman with the power to control minds seeks vengeance against the royals who murdered her family, in a Caribbean-inspired fantasy world embattled by colonial oppression.

Sigourney Rose is the only surviving daughter of a noble lineage on the islands of Hans Lollik. When she was a child, her family was murdered by the islands’ colonizers, who have massacred and enslaved generations of her people—and now, Sigourney is ready to exact her revenge.

When the childless king of the islands declares that he will choose his successor from amongst eligible noble families, Sigourney uses her ability to read and control minds to manipulate her way onto the royal island and into the ranks of the ruling colonizers. But when she arrives, prepared to fight for control of all the islands, Sigourney finds herself the target of a dangerous, unknown magic.

Someone is killing off the ruling families to clear a path to the throne. As the bodies pile up and all eyes regard her with suspicion, Sigourney must find allies among her prey and the murderer among her peers… lest she become the next victim.

Queen of the Conquered reckons with the many layers of power and privilege in a lush fantasy world—perfect for readers of V. E. Schwab, Kiersten White, and Marlon James.

Queen of the Conquered is set in a secondary world, inspired by the US Virgin Islands under colonial rule. We’re in the head of Sigourney, who through a mix of circumstances and scheming is the only one of the islanders allowed to participate in high-level politics. The story has a lot of manipulating, some magic, and a classic murder mystery story. Sigourney is interesting, but she’s not a likeable protagonist.

While I found the setting & Sigourney’s craft very interesting, I didn’t really enjoy the book. A lot of that is simply on me not liking this kind of protagonist. Don’t get me wrong, I think she was very human and very believable. I just tend to prefer nice people in books, I deal with enough assholes in real life, especially in this shitshow year. If I’d have done a bit more research before picking up the book I would probably have not picked it up, but it was an engaging book and I was really into the plot, so I’m glad to have read it. The other thing that bothered me was how things got pretty repetitive. The main character spends so much time thinking the same things about how she’s perceived. A narrative device that I found really interesting to start also felt overused by the end, and just felt info-dumpy.

The story is a mix of politics intertwined with mystery. I really liked the mystery part, and how the MC was the only one trying to solve it because of her unique craft. I also loved where it ended up going, and I’ll probably be curious enough to give the sequel a try. When Sigourney failed to pick up some super obvious hints, the mystery kinda dragged on. The reason she misses that makes perfect sense and is good commentary on her character, but reading-wise I could’ve done with a bit more conciseness.

I really enjoyed the audiobook narration, but I have no clue what any of the actual proper nouns might look like because of the mix of unfamiliar borrowed words, from Dutch I think, and unfamiliar accent.

Goodreads

BLM Bingo: MAGICIAN: set in a secondary world, JUSTICE: basedon or inspired by real life injustice, HIGH PRIESTESS: mystery,

r/fantasy Bingo:Graphic Novel or Audiobook, Any r/Fantasy Book Club / Read Along Book, Featuring Politics