Book picks similar to
The Island by Alison Croggon


fantasy
young-adult
short-stories
high-fantasy

Family Ties


Jessica Shirvington - 2014
    So here it is – a little side story from the world of exiled angels and Grigori. I hope you enjoy it!!A FREE SHORT STORYhttps://www.goodreads.com/author_blog...

Into the Garden


Joelle Charbonneau - 2017
    Now that her parents have passed, there is nothing waiting for her at home but her lecherous uncle and his sinister plans. So when a stoic young guard, assigned by her uncle to deliver her back home without incident, reveals a secret about his own dark past, Betrice seizes the opportunity to harness their combined power into a plan to leave Eden forever.But for once, Betrice’s uncle is not the only man lying in wait on the road home—King Adham and his son Prince Ulron are her uncle’s guests, and when Betrice’s escape plot backfires, she may just find herself in a position she never could have foreseen.

Sparks Rise


Alexandra Bracken - 2014
    Sam didn’t think things could get worse at Thurmond rehabilitation camp. Then the Reds arrive. Everyone assumed the kids with firepower had been killed years ago. Instead they were taken away, brainwashed, and returned as terrifyingly effective guards. To her horror, Sam recognizes one of them: Lucas, the one spark of light in Sam’s dark childhood. Lucas has a deadly secret–he beat the brutal training that turned his fellow Reds into mindless drones. When Sam defends herself against an attack by a vile PSF guard and faces a harrowing punishment, Lucas must risk his everything to save her. Includes a bonus preview chapter from the final Darkest Minds novel, In the Afterlight.

Warlord's Shadow


Frost Kay - 2019
    Just being born royalty painted a target on Maeve's back.Despite the deadly games, failed assassination attempts, and a truly monstrous parentage, Maeve discovered her true family; her brother and her dragon. They should've been enough to protect the kingdoms from devil growing in their midst. But that's the funny thing about love, it's blind.It took one moment for Maeve to lose everything she loved, and one more for her to irrecoverably change. Sometimes to destroy a monster, one had to become something worse. Every villain has his handmaiden, and the Warlord was no exception.The fairy-tales had it wrong. Monster's weren't born, they were made.In this heart - wrenching novella of the Internationally Bestselling Series The Aermian Feuds, Maeve will set in place a rebellion that will span hundreds of years and shake the very foundation of everything you thought you knew.

Hall of Smoke


H.M. Long - 2021
    Banished for disobeying her goddess's command to murder a traveller, she prays for forgiveness alone on a mountainside.While she is gone, raiders raze her village and obliterate the Eangi priesthood. Grieving and alone, Hessa - the last Eangi - must find the traveller, atone for her weakness and secure her place with her loved ones in the High Halls. As clans from the north and legionaries from the south tear through her homeland, slaughtering everyone in their path, Hessa strives to win back her goddess' favour. Beset by zealot soldiers, deceitful gods, and newly-awakened demons at every turn, Hessa burns her path towards redemption and revenge. But her journey reveals a harrowing truth: the gods are dying and the High Halls of the afterlife are fading. Soon Hessa's trust in her goddess weakens with every unheeded prayer.Thrust into a battle between the gods of the Old World and the New, Hessa realizes there is far more on the line than securing a life beyond her own death. Bigger, older powers slumber beneath the surface of her world. And they're about to wake up.

Cast in Moonlight


Michelle Sagara - 2001
    She also has a smart mouth, sharp wits and mysterious markings on her skin. All of which make her perfect bait for a child prostitution sting in the city of Elantra - if she survives her first meeting with the Hawks!Join Kaylin for more adventures in the Chronicles of Elantra.Cast in Moonlight can be read in the anthology Harvest Moon.

The Light Keepers


Mande Matthews - 2012
    Her well-intentioned mother locks her away from society in order to protect her from an evil that seeks to use Astrid's abilities for his own means. But the resulting loneliness drives Astrid deeper into the shadowwalk—a power she is forbidden to use, a magic that lands her directly into the arms of the Shadow. This short prequel to the ShadowLight Saga offers a revealing glimpse into the history of the beautiful and mysterious warrior maiden known as Swan, called Astrid in this prequel. It takes place a few moons before Bonded begins and is a self-contained novelette of approximately 10,000 words. Includes bonus chapter preview of Bonded, Book One of the ShadowLight Saga.

Ink Mage


Victor Gischler - 2013
    Kindle Serials are stories published in episodes, with future episodes delivered every two weeks (to be complete January, 2014).The city of Klaar has never fallen. No enemy has ever made it across the Long Bridge or penetrated the city’s mighty walls. Even when a powerful invading army shows up at the gates, the duke and his daughter, Rina Veraiin, are certain that it poses little threat.But they are cruelly betrayed from within and, in a horrific spasm of violence, the city is brought to its knees.With the help of her bodyguard, Kork, the battle-trained young Rina narrowly escapes the slaughter and makes her way to the lair of an ancient sorcerer—the Ink Mage—who gifts her with a strange, beautiful set of magical tattoos.Now a duchess in exile, Rina sets out on a quest to reclaim what is rightfully hers, aided by a motley assortment of followers who will help her in her cause—some for noble reasons and others for their own dark purposes.With the enemy’s agents nipping at her heels, Rina must learn to harness her new and startling magical powers if she is to assert her rightful place as ruler of Klaar.Episode ListAn additional episode will be delivered every two weeks until the book is complete. New episodes will be added to the same book on your Kindle, keeping your place and retaining your notes and highlights. You'll be notified via email when a new episode has been delivered.

Juice Like Wounds


Seanan McGuire - 2020
    All too often these go unreported—perhaps because the adventurers in question fail to return to the main narrative due to death or other distractions, and sometimes because the chronicler of the events decide to edit out that part of that particular history for reasons of their own (historians are never infallible)—but occasionally we get another window into our heroes' world. In Juice Like Wounds we once again get to meet Lundy, and some of her companions. Lundy's main adventure is detailed in In an Absent Dream (which is nominated for a Hugo Award, this year!) and you should definitely read that. Before or after this tale is up to you. Remember: side quests are fun. For the reader, at least...

Never to Sleep


Rachel Vincent - 2012
    Not after all the work she's put into cultivating the right look, and friends, and reputation. But then, Sophie sees something so frightening she lets out a blood-curdling scream--and finds herself stuck in a bizarre parallel world where nothing is safe and deadly creatures lurk just out of sight, waiting for her to close her eyes and sleep...forever.Could this world be real? Or does insanity run in the family...?

Thomas’s First Memory of the Flare


James Dashner - 2011
    Short flashback that occurs between "The Scorch Trials" and "The Death Cure."

The Armored Saint


Myke Cole - 2018
    After witnessing a horrendous slaughter, the village girl Heloise opposes the Order, and risks bringing their wrath down on herself, her family, and her village.

Cole… Meet Ali


Gena Showalter - 2014
    Published on Gena Showalter's blogI promised to rewrite the scene where Ali and Cole meet in Alice in Zombieland from Cole's point of view, and today I'm delivering.Are you curious to know what thoughts rolled through Cole's head when he first met Ali? Read on!

Stolen Goblin Bride


Emma Hamm - 2021
    Don't talk to the goblins. Don't look at the goblins. Above all else, don't buy or trade with the goblins.Then, one day before market, she sees a young rat faced boy selling a necklace that looks eerily like her mother's, what's a young girl to do? Of course she tries to buy it, but he won't sell it to her. So she steals it because it's her mother's necklace.Lux knows the rules. He's a jeweler and he can sell his wares to those who want to faithfully buy them. Something doesn't feel right about selling this particular piece to the beautiful young woman who immediately steals his heart. So he doesn't.But when he realizes the mortal girl stole from him, he's forced to enact magic that can't be unwritten. Stealing from a goblin always has a price.

Beyond the Black Door


A.M. Strickland - 2019
    Some are beautiful gardens, others are frightening dungeons. Soulwalkers―like Kamai and her mother―can journey into other people's souls while they sleep.But no matter where Kamai visits, she sees the black door. It follows her into every soul, and her mother has told her to never, ever open it.When Kamai touches the door, it is warm and beating, like it has a pulse. When she puts her ear to it, she hears her own name whispered from the other side. And when tragedy strikes, Kamai does the unthinkable: she opens the door.A.M. Strickland's imaginative dark fantasy features court intrigue and romance, a main character coming to terms with her asexuality, and twists and turns as a seductive mystery unfolds that endangers not just Kamai's own soul, but the entire kingdom ...