I’ve once again fallen behind on my reviews. It was poor planning on my part, I just got so into Wyrd and Wonder posts that I plain forgot to write any reviews! I’m 9 behind, and here’s the first batch of 5 to catch up with!

Symbiosis (Escaping Exodus #2) by Nicky Drayden

• Genre: Sci Fi
• Age group: Adult
• Pub. date: February 23rd 2021 by Harper Voyager
• Format: Audiobook
• Pages: 336
• Goodreads link

Nearly a thousand years removed from Earth, the remnants of humanity cling to existence inside giant, space faring creatures known as the Zenzee. Abused and exploited by humans for generations, these majestic animals nearly went extinct, but under the command of its newly minted ruler, Doka Kaleigh, life in the Parados I has flourished. Thanks to careful oversight and sacrifice by all of its crew, they are now on the brink of utopia, and yet Doka’s rivals feel threatened by that success. The Senate allowed Doka to lead their people believing he’d fail spectacularly—a disaster that would cement the legitimacy of their long-standing matriarchy. Despite vocal opposition and blatant attacks on his authority, Doka has continued to handle his position with grace and intelligence; he knows a single misstep means disaster. When a cataclysmic event on another Zenzee world forces Doka and his people to accept thousands of refugees, a culture clash erupts, revealing secrets from the past that could endanger their future. For Doka, the stakes are bigger and more personal than ever before—and could cost him his reign and his heart.

He has fallen for the one woman he is forbidden to love: his wife, Seske.

Doka and Seske must work closely together to sway the other Zenzee worlds to stop their cycles of destruction. But when they stumble upon a discovery that can transform their world, they know they must prepare to fight a battle where there can be no winners, only survivors.

I loved the first book last year so I was very hyped to learn it’d be getting a sequel, and I wasn’t disappointed, this book was so much fun. Fun with a heavy side of body horror and tentacles and stuff. I love it when books deal with the aftermath of a big chance, and we see that here, life on the Zenzee has changed drastically and people are not having an easy time of it.

I liked the political and scheming aspects a lot, Doka as the first man in a position of power in this world has everything stacked against him, but he means so well and is easy to root for. His bodyguard is a tough, protective woman and I love her to bits. She’s not big on the concept of privacy.

For most of the book there was less focuss on the goey aliveness of the ship, but the new parts that was got to see and what we learned about Zenzee was great, and often yucky, definitely dangerous, but great!

Overall everything was pretty tense, and there was, again, a lot of discovering deep dark secrets, which I loved.

The Sound of Stars by Alechia Dow

• Genre: Sci Fi
• Age group: Young Adult
• Pub. date: February 25th 2020 by Inkyard Press
• Format: Ebook
• Pages: 322
• Goodreads link

Two years ago, a misunderstanding between the leaders of Earth and the invading Ilori resulted in the deaths of one-third of the world’s population.

Seventeen-year-old Janelle “Ellie” Baker survives in an Ilori-controlled center in New York City. With humans deemed dangerously volatile because of their initial reaction to the invasion, emotional expression can be grounds for execution. Music, art and books are illegal, but Ellie breaks the rules by keeping a secret library. When a book goes missing, Ellie is terrified that the Ilori will track it back to her and kill her.

Born in a lab, M0Rr1S was raised to be emotionless. When he finds Ellie’s illegal library, he’s duty-bound to deliver her for execution. The trouble is, he finds himself drawn to human music and in desperate need of more. They’re both breaking the rules for the love of art—and Ellie inspires the same feelings in him that music does.

Ellie’s—and humanity’s—fate rests in the hands of an alien she should fear. M0Rr1S has a lot of secrets, but also a potential solution—thousands of miles away. The two embark on a wild and dangerous road trip with a bag of books and their favorite albums, all the while creating a story and a song of their own that just might save them both.

I was excited to read this because I don’t see a lot of SciFi YA, so I was curious to see where it would go, and I liked it a lot! Colonizing aliens seems to be a theme I’m encountering a fair bit in my reading lately, and this was an interesting take on it. I liked how they showed up when humanity was clearly not doing well, so at first I thought maybe these guys have some solutions, but the more we learn about them the more despicable they seem. Except for Moris, who’s a great character, I loved how big a part music played in the communication between him and Ellie.

This book was a bit strange, because the setting is such a grim distopia, most of the action is set towards the end of the Ilori invasion, everything is pretty hopeless, human culture and emotions are being erased completely. But the characters are so sweet and fun, they make it a very enjoyable read!

Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

• Genre: Fantasy, Mythological, Historical
• Age group: Adult
• Pub. date: July 23rd 2019 by Del Rey
• Format: Print
• Pages: 338
• Goodreads link

The Mayan god of death sends a young woman on a harrowing, life-changing journey in this one-of-a-kind fairy tale inspired by Mexican folklore.

The Jazz Age is in full swing, but Casiopea Tun is too busy cleaning the floors of her wealthy grandfather’s house to listen to any fast tunes. Nevertheless, she dreams of a life far from her dusty small town in southern Mexico. A life she can call her own.

Yet this new life seems as distant as the stars, until the day she finds a curious wooden box in her grandfather’s room. She opens it—and accidentally frees the spirit of the Mayan god of death, who requests her help in recovering his throne from his treacherous brother. Failure will mean Casiopea’s demise, but success could make her dreams come true.

In the company of the strangely alluring god and armed with her wits, Casiopea begins an adventure that will take her on a cross-country odyssey from the jungles of Yucatán to the bright lights of Mexico City—and deep into the darkness of the Mayan underworld.

I read this for the Feminism in Fiction book club on r/Fantasy and I liked it a lot. I’m a sucker for Death gods and any sort of mythology to do with that, so I ate those aspects of the book right up. I didn’t find the begining that engaging, and I thought the language initially was pretty stiff, stilted, but after the initial situation changes it becomes a lot more flowy which makes me think it’s an intentional choice, as the MC becomes less constricted by her enviroment. I only really started getting into the book when a very hot, mysterious and naked man showed up, I’m a simple woman I guess.

I liked Casiopea, I thought she was kinda atypical in that her rebellion against her family and the world was usually a quiet smoldering anger, she was really good at lying, and had no fucks to spare for fear. For the other character I liked how well his personal journey made sense, to put it in a non-spoilery way.

The main draw for me in this book was defintely the atmosphere, and that really paid off in the last part where I got everything I’d hoped for. The pacing felt kinda strange, slow like a hot summer’s day is slow.

Finna (LitenVerse #1) by Nino Cipri

• Genre: Sci Fi
• Age group: Adult
• Pub. date: February 25th 2020 by Tor.com
• Format: Ebook
• Pages: 92
• Goodreads link

When an elderly customer at a big box furniture store slips through a portal to another dimension, it’s up to two minimum-wage employees to track her across the multiverse and protect their company’s bottom line. Multi-dimensional swashbuckling would be hard enough, but our two unfortunate souls broke up a week ago.

Can friendship blossom from the ashes of a relationship? In infinite dimensions, all things are possible.

This was a fun novella, playing with the horror of large furniture stores like Ikea, if they were multidimensional portals. It’s an adventure through different dangerous worlds, and a commentary on the lack of value coorporations place on lives. Working for this chain store is a huge drag and we get a lot of views of that. I liked the two main characters, it was a fresh angle and that’s just broken up before being flung into this situation together, and how they dealt with still caring for each other but their relationship being over.

Under the Pendulum Sun by Jeannette Ng

• Genre: Fantasy
• Age group: Adult
• Pub. date: October 3rd 2017 by Angry Robot
• Format: Audiobook
• Pages: 409
• Goodreads link

Catherine Helstone’s brother, Laon, has disappeared in Arcadia, legendary land of the magical fae. Desperate for news of him, she makes the perilous journey, but once there, she finds herself alone and isolated in the sinister house of Gethsemane. At last there comes news: her beloved brother is riding to be reunited with her soon – but the Queen of the Fae and her insane court are hard on his heels.

I really loved this one, and it’s making re-asses my views about gothic fantasy, I might actually like it. I think it had all the hallmarks of a gothic novel, most of the book is quite claustrophobic, set in this huge mysterious manor. Loved it. And the land of Fae is a big like dark, grown-up Wonderland, and that feeling only deepened through the book. The way the world works with a pendulum sun swinging through the sky was super intersting to me.

The main character’s brother is a missionary priest, so a lot of the book focusses on missionarism  which I liked, the way it was presented. And another aspect was trying to fit the newly discovered fae in the Christan religious mythos and that was also very interesting.

I also found the audiobook narration and perfect fit and I think it enhanced the gothic atmosphere.

Content warning: highlight to read incest