Book picks similar to
Winemaker of the North by J.T. Williams
fantasy
dnf
fiction
first-reads
Song of the Forever Rains
E.J. Mellow - 2021
Many whisper of its existence, but few have found this place, where magic and pleasure abound. There, the mysterious Thief King reigns supreme with the help of the Mousai, a trio of revered and feared sorceresses.Larkyra Bassette may be the youngest of the Mousai, but when she sings her voice has the power to slay monsters. When it’s discovered the Duke of Lachlan is siphoning a poisonous drug from the Thief Kingdom and using it to abuse his tenants, Larkyra is offered her first solo mission to stop the duke. Eager to prove herself, Larkyra accepts by posing as the duke’s potential bride. But her plans grow complicated when she finds herself drawn to Lord Darius Mekenna, Lachlan’s rightful heir. Soon she suspects Darius has his own motivations for ridding Lachlan of the corrupt duke. Larkyra and Darius must learn to trust each other if there is to be any hope of saving the people of Lachlan—and themselves.Welcome to the world of Aadilor, where lords and ladies can be murderers and thieves, and the most alluring notes are often the deadliest. Dare to listen?
On Borrowed Luck
T.J. Muir - 2017
Foreign. Out of Luck. Scrappy but small, Kirrin gets beat up. A lot. So, when he hides from the local bullies in a powerful man's carriage, he's inadvertently transported to a vast rural estate. Far from home and hungry, Kirrin is caught stealing from the kitchen and fears the worst. But the So’har Hak’kar is impressed with Kirrin’s tenacity and quick wit. Instead of having him criminally punished, the great ruler sentences Kirrin to serve him while learning to fight, move with stealth, and solve intellectual puzzles. Unfortunately, Kirrin doesn’t realize he’s being trained as the lord’s personal assassin until he accidentally kills his first victim. Now, Kirrin’s family is at risk. His life is at risk. He struggles with who he's becoming. After all, he's living a life on borrowed luck. But borrowed luck never lasts.
Kilenya Chronicles Books 1-3
Andrea Pearson - 2018
He goes to school, works his after-hours job hard, and does what he can to keep his family above water. So after a mysterious girl tells him he's a prince from another world, he laughs the story off as fiction. But when his family is kidnapped by very-real attackers, Jacob has no choice but to team up with the girl to get them back… In just 48 hours, Jacob must cross worlds to retrieve a magical key and rescue his family. With only the girl's misfit band of traveling companions and his own untested abilities at hand, the quest seems doomed to fail. But this is one job he can't bear to lose. To save his family and the kingdom, he'll have to live up to his princely legacy… Kilenya Chronicles Books 1-3 is the first three books in a series of teen epic fantasy. If you like original magic systems, imaginative monsters, and fast-paced action, then you'll love Andrea Pearson's series. Buy Kilenya Chronicles Books 1-3 today to join an epic quest fit for a prince.
The Sparks
Kyle Prue - 2017
A will of iron does not break. Victory lies within the ashes. The Vapros, the Taurlum, and the Celerius: three dynasties bound by an ancient promise, and given superhuman abilities to protect the city of Altryon from the dangerous world beyond its walls. The Vapros have the ability to teleport and turn their enemies to ash, the Celerius have super speed and the ability to heal from any wound, the Taurlum have skin like steel and godlike strength. Centuries of petty infighting have turned the families against each other, resulting in a secret war. A powerful emperor now rules over all, as the families have weakened by massive casualties. 16-year-old Neil Vapros desperately wants to become an assassin, to please his hyper critical father. After failing his first mission, Neil learns that a sinister new force has awakened. This mysterious new power threatens to shatter the established order and threaten the lives of everyone in Altryon--regardless of their family name or allegiance.
Radiant
Karina Sumner-Smith - 2014
Born without the power that everyone else takes for granted, Xhea is an outcast—no way to earn a living, buy food, or change the life that fate has dealt her. Yet she has a unique talent: the ability to see ghosts and the tethers that bind them to the living world, which she uses to scratch out a bare existence in the ruins beneath the City’s floating Towers.When a rich City man comes to her with a young woman’s ghost tethered to his chest, Xhea has no idea that this ghost will change everything. The ghost, Shai, is a Radiant, a rare person who generates so much power that the Towers use it to fuel their magic, heedless of the pain such use causes. Shai’s home Tower is desperate to get the ghost back and force her into a body—any body—so that it can regain its position, while the Tower’s rivals seek the ghost to use her magic for their own ends. Caught between a multitude of enemies and desperate to save Shai, Xhea thinks herself powerless—until a strange magic wakes within her. Magic dark and slow, like rising smoke, like seeping oil. A magic whose very touch brings death.With two extremely strong female protagonists, Radiant is a story of fighting for what you believe in and finding strength that you never thought you had.
Three Dark Crowns
Kendare Blake - 2016
Mirabella is a fierce elemental, able to spark hungry flames or vicious storms at the snap of her fingers. Katharine is a poisoner, one who can ingest the deadliest poisons without so much as a stomachache. Arsinoe, a naturalist, is said to have the ability to bloom the reddest rose and control the fiercest of lions.But becoming the Queen Crowned isn’t solely a matter of royal birth. Each sister has to fight for it. And it’s not just a game of win or lose…it’s life or death. The night the sisters turn sixteen, the battle begins.The last queen standing gets the crown.
To Kill a Fae
Jamie A. Waters - 2019
All Sabine had to do was keep her head down, avoid telling anyone about her past, and above all else -- not let her glamour drop.Even the best-laid plans eventually fall apart.When a charismatic stranger arrives in the city, Sabine finds herself unwittingly drawn to him and the power she can sense hidden within him. Keeping her distance is nearly impossible, especially after a life debt is called due and she’s tasked into helping steal a rare artifact.Sabine is the only one who can break the magical barriers protecting the item, but that means revealing the truth about her identity and exposing her darkest secrets. Unfortunately, the Fae aren’t the only ones hunting her.And the most dangerous monsters aren’t always confined to the dark.
Bitterwood
James Maxey - 2007
But he is getting old and the hate that he has carried in his heart since a group of dragon-soldiers killed his family is beginning to fade. When he kills the royal prince dragon, the king decides the only retribution is genocide of the human race. Bitterwood is forced to enter the Free City, the grand trap designed to eradicate mankind, with thousands of others. Can he lead from within, or can a select few dragons unite to stop the king's madness from becoming reality. Full of rich characters and drama, this is an amazingly astute vision of our own culture by way of a feudal kingdom where dragons rule, and humans are used as workers or pets.
First World
Jaymin Eve - 2013
An epic journey. If the Seventine are released, will anyone survive?Abigail Swish might not love her life, living in gang-ridden New York in 2035 and training to fight and survive with Compound 23. But she is grateful for a few things, especially her no-filter-between-brain-and-mouth best friend Lucy and her escape each night into a dream world far different from her own. In fact, sometimes she lives for the fleeting moments she spends at night with the man who fuels every romantic fantasy she’s ever had. But each morning reality returns. She could just cry. But she won’t of course; tears don’t change a damn thing.Then without any warning, a month before her eighteenth birthday, everything does change. A guardian finds her. He explains, in a strangely familiar accent, that she was stashed on Earth for safekeeping and has been lost to her family ever since. And it is time to return home. To the First World; a land of unimagined beauty. Abigail and Lucy find themselves escaping New York, ending up on another planet and traversing through an unforgiving wilderness. Yeah, because that sort of thing just happens every day. Luckily an unexpected saviour arrives; the man from her dream-world. Brace is six-and-a-half feet of gorgeous perfectness, wrapped in an arrogance like no other. Unable to trust his assistance, and unsure which of her instincts to follow - kiss him or punch him in the mouth - Abigail eventually accepts his help to find her family. And what a family. Enter Josian, her father; larger than life and apparently not even human. He is Walker, a planet-less race revered as gods, causing mischief and mayhem through-out this star-system. Unfortunately, there is no time for a cosy reunion, since no one explained that by returning to First World her half-Walker genetics would act as a catalyst setting forth a chain of events which could spell disaster for not only her existence but that of all worlds.First World is book one in the Walker Saga, a seven-book paranormal fantasy series.Spurn - A Walker Saga Book Two release date set for September 2013.
The Cracked Slipper
Stephanie Alexander - 2012
Unfortunately, Prince Charming has a loose grip on his temper, a looser grip on his marriage vows, and a tight grip on the bottle. Eight years of mistreatment, isolation and clandestine book learning hardly prepare Eleanor for life at Eclatant Palace, where women are seen, not heard. According to Eleanor’s eavesdropping parrot, no one at court appreciates her unladylike tendency to voice her opinion. To make matter worse, her royal fiancé spends his last night of bachelorhood on a drunken whoring spree. Before the ink dries on her marriage proclamation Eleanor realizes that she loves her husband's best friend, former soldier Dorian Finley.Eleanor can’t resist Dorian’s honesty, or his unusual admiration for her intelligence, and soon both are caught in a dangerous obsession. She drowns her confusion in charitable endeavors, but the people’s love can’t protect her from her feelings. When a magical crime endangers the bond between unicorns, dragons, and the royal family, a falsely accused Eleanor must clear her own name to save her life. The road toward vindication will force a choice between hard-won security and an impossible love.The Cracked Slipper is a book club friendly fairytale retelling in the vein of Gregory Maguire, with a dash of romance. Set in a pseudo-renaissance, corset-and-petticoats enchanted kingdom, The Cracked Slipper brings a magical twist to women’s fiction.
We Hunt the Flame
Hafsah Faizal - 2019
People died because he lived.Zafira is the Hunter, disguising herself as a man when she braves the cursed forest of the Arz to feed her people. Nasir is the Prince of Death, assassinating those foolish enough to defy his autocratic father, the sultan. If Zafira was exposed as a girl, all of her achievements would be rejected; if Nasir displayed his compassion, his father would punish him in the most brutal of ways. Both Zafira and Nasir are legends in the kingdom of Arawiya--but neither wants to be.War is brewing, and the Arz sweeps closer with each passing day, engulfing the land in shadow. When Zafira embarks on a quest to uncover a lost artifact that can restore magic to her suffering world and stop the Arz, Nasir is sent by the sultan on a similar mission: retrieve the artifact and kill the Hunter. But an ancient evil stirs as their journey unfolds--and the prize they seek may pose a threat greater than either can imagine.
The Wall
Jen Minkman - 2013
The endless surface of the water extends to the horizon, whichever way I look.Our world is small. We’re on our own, and we only have ourselves to depend on. We rely on the Force deep within us as taught to us by our forefathers.If I were to walk westward from here, I’d come across a barrier - the Wall. Behind it, there are Fools. At least, that's what everyone says. I’ve never seen one.'Leia lives on an island where children leave their parents to take care of themselves when they’re just ten years old. Across the island runs a Wall that no one has ever crossed. The Fools living behind it should be shunned because they believe in salvation from across the sea. That's what The Book says, the only thing left to the Eastern Islanders by their ancestors.But when a strange man washes ashore and Leia meets a Fool face to face, her life will never be the same again. Walt, the boy from the other side of the Wall, isn’t as foolish as she was always led to believe. And as Leia and Walt set out to bring the truth about both their societies to light, all the things they once took for granted fall by the wayside.Their island world is about to change... for better or for worse.
Shadow Frost
Coco Ma - 2019
Some say it is an invulnerable demon summoned from the deepest abysses of the Immortal Realm. Many soldiers from the royal guard are sent out to hunt it down.Not one has ever returned. When Asterin Faelenhart, Princess of Axaria and heir to the throne, discovers that she may hold the key to defeating the mysterious demon terrorizing her kingdom, she vows not to rest until the beast is slain. With the help of her friends and the powers she wields — though has yet to fully understand — Asterin sets out to complete a single task. The task that countless, trained soldiers have failed. To kill it. But as they hunt for the demon, they unearth a plot to assassinate the Princess herself instead. Asterin and her companions begin to wonder how much of their lives have been lies, especially when they realize that the center of the web of deceit might very well be themselves. With no one else to turn to, they are forced to decide just how much they are willing to sacrifice to protect the only world they have ever known. That is, of course… if the demon doesn’t get to them first.From young author Coco Ma comes a dazzling new tale of adventure, power, and betrayal, weaving together a stunning world of magic with a killer cast in an explosive, unforgettable debut.
Heart Of Destiny
Susan Faw - 2017
Magic exiled. Magic murdered. During the Great Purge, all magic was destroyed and those who could wield it were driven into exile. From that time on, the world of Gaia churned on in relative peace and prosperity. When the emperor of the central Citadel suddenly dies, his apprentice takes his place. Benevolent and loved, the new emperor is a benign ruler, bridging the age-old conflicts between the provinces. The citadel is a symbolic as well as a physical barrier to maintaining the fragile peace. However, the brazen kidnapping of ten young women shatters the accord, and the councillors of the provinces gather at the Citadel to demand that justice be served. It is a flame dropped into dry tinder. Rife with suspicion and hatred, each province accuses its neighbour of treachery. But the emperor has other plans. He alone knows who is responsible for the kidnapping of the young women, and he has no intention of sharing that knowledge. Where magic is involved, there can only be one conqueror. The fight for ultimate control of magic has begun. Purchase this thrilling first novel of The Heart of The Citadel today, and strap in for an amazingly magical ride!
The Prince of Korin
Melody J. Bremen - 2021
Nor does he want to be one.He spends his days in the royal library, poring over old manuscripts, studying archaic languages and playing chess. He’s never been like Krollis, his fearless twin brother, who is an expert swordsman and hunts wild beasts in the forests.When an army of vizzens, the fearsome old enemy of Korin, attacks from the east and Krollis disappears, Endomer is left in charge of the country. He struggles to find a way to save his people while his soldiers are dying and his citizens are forced to flee. As he fights to gain the respect of the palace court, he discovers a threat coming from within the palace walls. There is no one he can trust.He isn’t only fighting for his country – he’s fighting for his life.Fans of Megan Whalen Turner and Jennifer A. Nielsen will enjoy this story of political intrigue and betrayal.