reading wednesday
Wed, Feb. 5th, 2025 04:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tozkaJanuary was a month of reading only fanfics (and one DNF'd book right at the end), but so far February is going much better! This week I read the following books (both queer fantasy/romances which is basically all I read nowadays, just fyi):
A Taste of Gold and Iron by Alexandra Rowland (2022). Summary: "Kadou, the shy prince of Arasht, finds himself at odds with one of the most powerful ambassadors at court—the body-father of the queen's new child—in an altercation which results in his humiliation.
To prove his loyalty to the queen, his sister, Kadou takes responsibility for the investigation of a break-in at one of their guilds, with the help of his newly appointed bodyguard, the coldly handsome Evemer, who seems to tolerate him at best. In Arasht, where princes can touch-taste precious metals with their fingers and myth runs side by side with history, counterfeiting is heresy, and the conspiracy they discover could cripple the kingdom’s financial standing and bring about its ruin."
Loved this! It's been on my TBR for a while and I'd heard many good things about it, which are all true. A good mix of politics, royal intrigue (murder attempts and counterfeit gold!), and romance.
I really liked the two leads. They're similar in that they're very into doing their duty, but otherwise they feel like distinct people who handle things very differently. Evemer is very strict and pretends he doesn't have emotions, but of course he does and eventually he's able to show that after some prodding from Kadou. Meanwhile, Kadou has an anxiety disorder which affects how he sees his interactions with people and makes him get in his own way a lot. Eventually, with help from Evermer, he figures out he has support from his friends and family.
I also liked the interactions between Kadou and his sister. They have some bumps because she's the sultan and has to do sultan-level thinking, but that can conflict with family (and does). But she's never made into a villain or anything, and it was a really nice aspect of the book.
It's a very sweet romance, but the book itself isn't saccharine. It's cozy-adjacent, perhaps, but there's too many murder attempts to make it a true cozy fantasy (/romance). But it reminds me a bit of The Goblin Emperor in tone/scope, if that rings any bells.
The Compact by Miriam Benisse (2025). Summary: "The compact has stood for ages, a secret between the royal families of the continent and the Verndari, who guard the pass. When the Verndari send to the Dovos to fulfill a little used clause of the compact - the request to supply a bride - the Dovos respond by sending not a daughter, but a son. In a land where ice and death are old friends, can the Verndari heir and the Dovos' black sheep find their way to keeping the peace, or will the alliance that has kept the world safe for centuries crumble around them?"
Fairly good overall its tropes worked against it, because it felt very similar to many other books with arranged marriaged between royalty. If you've read even a few books like this before, you're probably going to recognize the plot beats and the "twists" and not be surprised at all.
However, I did like the interactions between the two protagonists. Their personalities and character flaws were very well-fleshed out, and they're different enough in personality that the misunderstandings (the kind typical to romance books) felt legit and not forced. Once they worked through them, then those same differences lead them to a stronger relationship, which I loved! As a bonus, the sex scenes were also very well-written and not extraneous to the storyline.
There were a few developmental issues outside of the romance plot. For instance, the political intrigue aspect fell apart almost immediately. There were a few "we're watching you" scenes between the king's men and the new husband, then nothing for ages, and then suddenly the new husband won over everyone (how?) and they were cool with him.
Another problem: one of the antagonists just disappeared for like 100 pages and didn't do anything again until the end, after building him up as a major player. I also felt that the zombie (or vampire?) villains weren't really present, as we didn't "meet" them in person until the end, either.
Despite all that, I don't think it was a bad book, and I'd read other books by this author. Maybe not this particular series, however. (The sequel comes out in December.)
What have you read this week?
[Not cross-posted but mentioned in:![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
booknook in the weekly thread]
A Taste of Gold and Iron by Alexandra Rowland (2022). Summary: "Kadou, the shy prince of Arasht, finds himself at odds with one of the most powerful ambassadors at court—the body-father of the queen's new child—in an altercation which results in his humiliation.
To prove his loyalty to the queen, his sister, Kadou takes responsibility for the investigation of a break-in at one of their guilds, with the help of his newly appointed bodyguard, the coldly handsome Evemer, who seems to tolerate him at best. In Arasht, where princes can touch-taste precious metals with their fingers and myth runs side by side with history, counterfeiting is heresy, and the conspiracy they discover could cripple the kingdom’s financial standing and bring about its ruin."
Loved this! It's been on my TBR for a while and I'd heard many good things about it, which are all true. A good mix of politics, royal intrigue (murder attempts and counterfeit gold!), and romance.
I really liked the two leads. They're similar in that they're very into doing their duty, but otherwise they feel like distinct people who handle things very differently. Evemer is very strict and pretends he doesn't have emotions, but of course he does and eventually he's able to show that after some prodding from Kadou. Meanwhile, Kadou has an anxiety disorder which affects how he sees his interactions with people and makes him get in his own way a lot. Eventually, with help from Evermer, he figures out he has support from his friends and family.
I also liked the interactions between Kadou and his sister. They have some bumps because she's the sultan and has to do sultan-level thinking, but that can conflict with family (and does). But she's never made into a villain or anything, and it was a really nice aspect of the book.
It's a very sweet romance, but the book itself isn't saccharine. It's cozy-adjacent, perhaps, but there's too many murder attempts to make it a true cozy fantasy (/romance). But it reminds me a bit of The Goblin Emperor in tone/scope, if that rings any bells.
The Compact by Miriam Benisse (2025). Summary: "The compact has stood for ages, a secret between the royal families of the continent and the Verndari, who guard the pass. When the Verndari send to the Dovos to fulfill a little used clause of the compact - the request to supply a bride - the Dovos respond by sending not a daughter, but a son. In a land where ice and death are old friends, can the Verndari heir and the Dovos' black sheep find their way to keeping the peace, or will the alliance that has kept the world safe for centuries crumble around them?"
Fairly good overall its tropes worked against it, because it felt very similar to many other books with arranged marriaged between royalty. If you've read even a few books like this before, you're probably going to recognize the plot beats and the "twists" and not be surprised at all.
However, I did like the interactions between the two protagonists. Their personalities and character flaws were very well-fleshed out, and they're different enough in personality that the misunderstandings (the kind typical to romance books) felt legit and not forced. Once they worked through them, then those same differences lead them to a stronger relationship, which I loved! As a bonus, the sex scenes were also very well-written and not extraneous to the storyline.
There were a few developmental issues outside of the romance plot. For instance, the political intrigue aspect fell apart almost immediately. There were a few "we're watching you" scenes between the king's men and the new husband, then nothing for ages, and then suddenly the new husband won over everyone (how?) and they were cool with him.
Another problem: one of the antagonists just disappeared for like 100 pages and didn't do anything again until the end, after building him up as a major player. I also felt that the zombie (or vampire?) villains weren't really present, as we didn't "meet" them in person until the end, either.
Despite all that, I don't think it was a bad book, and I'd read other books by this author. Maybe not this particular series, however. (The sequel comes out in December.)
What have you read this week?
[Not cross-posted but mentioned in:
booknook in the weekly thread]
no subject
Date: Feb. 6th, 2025 04:09 pm (UTC)I've started Our Deadly Designs by Kalyn Josephson, second book in a Jewish-inspired fantasy duology about golems and the price of a soul. Very much enjoying it.
Otherwise, fanfic.