Inkmistress


Audrey Coulthurst - 2018
    To keep her power secret, she leads a quiet life as a healer on a remote mountain, content to help the people in her care and spend time with Ina, the mortal girl she loves.But Asra’s peaceful life is upended when bandits threaten Ina’s village and the king does nothing to help. Desperate to protect her people, Ina begs Asra for assistance in finding her manifest—the animal she’ll be able to change into as her rite of passage to adulthood. Asra uses her blood magic to help Ina, but her spell goes horribly wrong and the bandits destroy the village, killing Ina’s family.Unaware that Asra is at fault, Ina swears revenge on the king and takes a savage dragon as her manifest. To stop her, Asra must embark on a journey across the kingdom, becoming a player in lethal games of power among assassins, gods, and even the king himself.Most frightening of all, she discovers the dark secrets of her own mysterious history—and the terrible, powerful legacy she carries in her blood.

The Unspoken Name


A.K. Larkwood - 2020
    She will climb the mountain, enter the Shrine of the Unspoken, and gain the most honored title: sacrifice. On the day of her foretold death, however, a powerful mage offers her a new fate.Csorwe leaves her home, her destiny, and her god to become the wizard's loyal sword-hand -- stealing, spying, and killing to help him reclaim his seat of power in the homeland from which he was exiled.But Csorwe and the wizard will soon learn – gods remember, and if you live long enough, all debts come due.

Keeper of the Dawn


Dianna Gunn - 2017
    That’s before the unthinkable happens, and Lai fails the trials she has trained for her entire life. She makes the only choice she believes she can: she runs away. From her isolated desert homeland, Lai rides north to the colder, stranger kingdom of Alanum—a land where magic, and female warriors, are not commonplace. Here, she hears tales about a mountain city of women guardians and steel forgers, worshiping goddesses who sound very similar to Lai's own. Determined to learn more about these women, these Keepers of the Dawn, Lai travels onward to find their temple. She is determined to make up for her past failure, and will do whatever it takes to join their sacred order. Falling in love with another initiate was not part of the plan. Keeper of the Dawn is a tale of new beginnings, second chances, and the endurance of hope.

The Sons of Thestian


M.E. Vaughan - 2015
    With the King on his death-bed, and the tyrannical Queen in power, the Kingdom of Harmatia lies in peril. Fleeing the city in fear of his life, Jionathan is shadowed by Rufus Merle, a young, secretive Magi tasked with bringing him home. Now, with the help of a fearsome Sidhe warrior named Fae, they must traverse a dangerous faerie-wood together. Against bandits, faeries and cursed priestesses, these unlikely friends travel a path fraught with danger, not least from the blood-thirsty Night Patrol and the dark conspiracy that shrouds them.

Nottingham: The True Story of Robyn Hood


Anna Burke - 2020
    All she really wants to do is provide for her family and stay out of trouble, but when the Sheriff of Nottingham levies the largest tax in the history of England, she’s forced to take matters into her own hands. Relying on the help of her band of merry women and the Sheriff’s intriguing—and off limits—daughter, Marian, Robyn must find a way to pull off the biggest heist Sherwood has ever seen.With both heart and freedom at stake, just how much will she risk to ensure the safety of the ones she loves?

Squire Derel


Rachel Ford - 2020
    She was never meant to be a squire. She was supposed to marry well, and raise sons who would become knight protectors.Ana had other plans. After years of hard work, Squire Ana Derel has earned the respect of her peers. She's a crack shot, and lethal with a blade. She's weeks away from earning her own knighthood.Then a deadly ambush leaves her charred, defeated and wanting justice. With the South readying for war, and the North demanding answers, Squire Derel finds herself alone in the epicenter of the coming storm. Alone, until she meets the enigmatic Knight of the Shire. Will their unlikely friendship be enough to prevent a war? Or will war consume them too?

The Winter Duke


Claire Eliza Bartlett - 2020
    Not her books or science experiments, not her family's icy castle atop a frozen lake, not even the tantalizingly close Kylma Below, a mesmerizing underwater kingdom that provides her family with magic. But just as escape is within reach, her parents and twelve siblings fall under a strange sleeping sickness.In the space of a single night, Ekata inherits the title of duke, her brother's warrior bride, and ever-encroaching challengers from without—and within—her own ministry. Nothing has prepared Ekata for diplomacy, for war, for love...or for a crown she has never wanted. If Kylma Above is to survive, Ekata must seize her family's power. And if Ekata is to survive, she must quickly decide how she will wield it.Part Sleeping Beauty, part Anastasia, with a thrilling political mystery, The Winter Duke is a spellbinding story about choosing what's right in the face of danger.

Huntress


Malinda Lo - 2011
    The sun hasn't shone in years, and crops are failing. Worse yet, strange and hostile creatures have begun to appear. The people's survival hangs in the balance.To solve the crisis, the oracle stones are cast, and Kaede and Taisin, two seventeen-year-old girls, are picked to go on a dangerous and unheard-of journey to Tanlili, the city of the Fairy Queen. Taisin is a sage, thrumming with magic, and Kaede is of the earth, without a speck of the otherworldly. And yet the two girls' destinies are drawn together during the mission. As members of their party succumb to unearthly attacks and fairy tricks, the two come to rely on each other and even begin to fall in love. But the Kingdom needs only one huntress to save it, and what it takes could tear Kaede and Taisin apart forever.The exciting adventure prequel to Malinda Lo's highly acclaimed novel Ash is overflowing with lush Chinese influences and details inspired by the I Ching, and is filled with action and romance.

In the Vanishers’ Palace


Aliette de Bodard - 2018
    A woman, betrayed, terrified, sold into indenture to pay her village's debts and struggling to survive in a spirit world.A dragon, among the last of her kind, cold and aloof but desperately trying to make a difference.When failed scholar Yên is sold to Vu Côn, one of the last dragons walking the earth, she expects to be tortured or killed for Vu Côn's amusement. But Vu Côn, it turns out, has a use for Yên: she needs a scholar to tutor her two unruly children. She takes Yên back to her home, a vast, vertiginous palace-prison where every door can lead to death. Vu Côn seems stern and unbending, but as the days pass Yên comes to see her kinder and caring side. She finds herself dangerously attracted to the dragon who is her master and jailer. In the end, Yên will have to decide where her own happiness lies—and whether it will survive the revelation of Vu Côn’s dark, unspeakable secrets...

Malice


Heather WalterHeather Walter - 2021
    But in this darkly magical retelling of “Sleeping Beauty,” true love is more than a simple fairy tale. Once upon a time, there was a wicked fairy who, in an act of vengeance, cursed a line of princesses to die. A curse that could only be broken by true love’s kiss. You’ve heard this before, haven’t you? The handsome prince. The happily-ever-after. Utter nonsense. Let me tell you, no one in Briar actually cares about what happens to its princesses. Not the way they care about their jewels and elaborate parties and charm-granting elixirs. I thought I didn’t care, either. Until I met her. Princess Aurora. The last heir to Briar’s throne. Kind. Gracious. The future queen her realm needs. One who isn’t bothered that I am Alyce, the Dark Grace, abhorred and feared for the mysterious dark magic that runs in my veins. Humiliated and shamed by the same nobles who pay me to bottle hexes and then brand me a monster. Aurora says I should be proud of my gifts. That she . . . cares for me. Even though it was a power like mine that was responsible for her curse. But with less than a year until that curse will kill her, any future I might see with Aurora is swiftly disintegrating—and she can’t stand to kiss yet another insipid prince. I want to help her. If my power began her curse, perhaps it’s what can lift it. Perhaps, together, we could forge a new world. Nonsense again. Because we all know how this story ends, don’t we? Aurora is the beautiful princess. And I— I am the villain.

The Exile and the Sorcerer


Jane Fletcher - 2006
    Exiled in a dangerous and confusing world filled with monsters, bandits, and sorcerers, Tevi battles demons within and without as she searches for her place in the strange new world.Jemeryl has her future planned out - a future that will involve minimal contact with ordinary folk who do not understand sorcerers. Her ambition is to lead a solitary life within the Coven and to devote herself to the study of magic. It is all very straightforward - until she meets Tevi.Two unlikely allies join forces to defeat an insidious evil and on the journey find one another.

Princess of Dorsa


Eliza Andrews - 2018
     Princess Natasia is the eldest child of the Emperor Andreth, ruler of the Four Realms. If she were a boy, she’d be the unquestioned heir to the throne. But as a girl, her main duty in life is to marry someone her father can shape into his successor. Everything changes when an unknown would-be assassin nearly takes Tasia’s life. Someone wants to destabilize the Empire — but who? Was the assassin aligned with the power-hungry Western lords, who have always rebelled against the Emperor? Was he hired by the barbarians in the East, who are fighting against the Empire’s subjugation? Or was he a member of the mysterious Cult of Culo? Unsure of whom he can trust, the Emperor realizes that his daughter might be his best option for an heir. There hasn't been a female heir to the throne in living memory, but as palace intrigue becomes increasingly dangerous, the reckless, rebellious, and stubborn princess suddenly has to face the responsibility of learning to lead. Will she rise to the occasion? Or will the Empire fall at the hands of one of its many enemies? For fans of epic fantasy… with an LGBTQ twist.

The Tiger's Daughter


K. Arsenault Rivera - 2017
    Now, their border walls begin to crumble, and villages fall to demons swarming out of the forests.Away on the silver steppes, the remaining tribes of nomadic Qorin retreat and protect their own, having bartered a treaty with the empire, exchanging inheritance through the dynasties. It is up to two young warriors, raised together across borders since their prophesied birth, to save the world from the encroaching demons.This is the story of an infamous Qorin warrior, Barsalayaa Shefali, a spoiled divine warrior empress, O-Shizuka, and a power that can reach through time and space to save a land from a truly insidious evil.

Ship of Smoke and Steel


Django Wexler - 2019
    When her ability to access the Well of Combat is discovered by the Empire—an ability she should have declared and placed at His Imperial Majesty's service—she's sent on an impossible mission: steal Soliton, a legendary ghost ship—a ship from which no one has ever returned. If she fails, her sister’s life is forfeit.

Wench


Maxine Kaplan - 2021
    She broke up her first fight at 11. By the time she was a teenager she knew everything about the place, and she could run it with her eyes closed. She’d never let anyone—whether it be a drunkard or a captain of the queen’s guard—take advantage of her. But when her guardian dies, she might lose it all: the bar, her home, her purpose in life. So she heads out on a quest to petition the queen to keep the tavern in her name—dodging unscrupulous guards, a band of thieves, and a powerful, enchanted feather that seems drawn to her. Fast-paced, magical, and unapologetically feminist, Wench is epic fantasy like you’ve never seen it before.Content warning: Some magic in the book involves self-harm.