Hey'a, all! While I'm technically still on hiatus (and hard at work trying to finish the second draft of Gilded in Ice), I'm breaking my silence to spotlight some summer releases I'm looking forward to. This group isn't quite as exciting as the spring list is, but there's still some books with good potential on here.
Summer 2021 Reads
1. Curse of the Specter Queen by Jenny Elder Moke (June 1). It's an archeological historical-fantasy adventure set in Ireland in the 1920s — obviously, I'm interested. The main character, Sam, sounds like she has a great deal of potential for awesomeness. Plus, I feel like this type of story — hunting down an ancient something-or-another before someone else can use it for evil — is getting more and more rare, so it's nice to see it still exists.
2. Fire with Fire by Destiny Soria (June 8). I always love a good sister story, and a sister story that happens to be urban fantasy with dragons? Even better! I'm a little concerned since I've heard one of the protagonists is bi, but if I can find it at the library, I'll probably give it a chance anyway.
3. Sisters of the Snake by Sasha Nanua and Sarena Nanau (June 15). Speaking of sister stories . . . this is apparently a genderbent prince-and-pauper-inspired story set in a world similar to India? So that sounds cool. And it's written by a pair of sisters, which is pretty cool!
4. Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim (July 6). I am of the opinion that the Six Ravens/Seven Swans fairytale is tragically overlooked by fairy tale retelling authors, so I'm glad to see it's getting some love! And I'm also excited for another Asian-inspired fairy tale, especially since I've heard such good things about the author's other books.
5. Half Sick of Shadows by Laura Sebastian (July 6). This one's an Arthurian retelling focusing on Elaine, who tends to get overlooked in a lot of modern King Arthur stories. Early reviews are a bit mixed, but we'll see what people are saying once the book is actually out. I'm still hopeful it'll be good.
6. The Endless Skies by Shannon Price (August 17). Fun fact: I initially thought this was in the same sequel as Sky in the Deep because the covers look similar enough to be part of the same series. They are not, however, and I think The Endless Skies sounds cooler. (It has floating cities! And shapeshifting flying lions!)
7. Never Say You Can't Survive by Charlie Jane Anders (August 17). Anders posted chapters of this book on the Tor Publishing blog, and most of them were pretty insightful. She covers both how to tell a good story and how to, y'know, be a writer in a way that's healthy and successful. (In the "You actually do things without going crazy" sense, not the "You make a million dollars sense.") I don't agree with her on all points of her baseline philosophy, but she still has good insights.
8. A Snake Falls to Earth by Darcie Little Badger (August 17). I'm not sure where this falls on the continuum between magical realism and contemporary fantasy, but it draws on Lipan mythology (and storytelling structure? not sure what that means), so that should be cool. And stories of the old magical world being pulled together with the modern world always have a lot of potential!
What book releases are you excited for this summer? Please tell me in the comments!
Thanks for reading!
