Imperfect Match


Jordan Castillo Price - 2018
    It’s the reason he’s still in college, regardless of his good academic performance. He’s switched his major repeatedly and stalled on his Master’s thesis, but there’s only so much longer he can hold out. Because once he graduates, the Algorithm must be triggered.Everyone in Lee’s family has allowed the Algorithm to match them with a spouse. As has everyone on his block. His neighborhood. In fact, everyone he’s ever known. Pairing with his own chosen match seems inevitable…until, at his sister’s wedding, he meets Roman.The waiter lives in the Taxable District, a run-down neighborhood that’s only a brief train ride away, but feels like another world. The seedy District is governed by different standards—different expectations—so it’s not exactly a surprise that Roman isn’t married. But it’s definitely a shock to taste his lips.One forbidden encounter has Lee reeling. He questions everything. His past. His future. And especially the Algorithm. He longs for the freedom to choose not only his own partner, but his own destiny. When defying the Algorithm will cost everything—family, home, and even livelihood—is Lee strong enough to take another path? If you enjoy journeys of self-discovery with a futuristic bent, you'll love this standalone character-driven adventure.

The Root


Na'amen Gobert Tilahun - 2016
    Then Erik learned he was Blooded: descended from the Gods.Struggling with a power he doesn’t understand and can barely control, Erik discovers that a secret government agency is selling off Blooded like lab rats to a rival branch of preternatural beings in ’Zebub—San Francisco’s mirror city in an alternate dimension.Lil, a timid apprentice in ’Zebub, is searching for answers to her parents’ sudden and mysterious deaths. Surrounded by those who wish her harm and view her as a lesser being, Lil delves into a forgotten history that those in power will go to dangerous lengths to keep buried.What neither Erik nor Lil realize is that a darkness is coming, something none have faced in living memory. It eats. It hunts. And it knows them. In The Root, the dark and surging urban fantasy debut from Na’amen Tilahun, two worlds must come together if even a remnant of one is to survive.

Stranger


Rachel Manija Brown - 2014
    Governments collapsed and people scattered, to rebuild where they could. A mutation, "the Change,” arose, granting some people unique powers. Though the area once called Los Angeles retains its cultural diversity, its technological marvels have faded into legend. "Las Anclas" now resembles a Wild West frontier town… where the Sheriff possesses superhuman strength, the doctor can warp time to heal his patients, and the distant ruins of an ancient city bristle with deadly crystalline trees that take their jewel-like colors from the clothes of the people they killed.Teenage prospector Ross Juarez’s best find ever – an ancient book he doesn’t know how to read – nearly costs him his life when a bounty hunter is set on him to kill him and steal the book. Ross barely makes it to Las Anclas, bringing with him a precious artifact, a power no one has ever had before, and a whole lot of trouble.

Snow White and Her Huntress


Emma Dean - 2020
    Though every indication tells her the queen will not give up her power easily. She assigns one of her terrifying huntresses to Snow to keep an eye on her, all in the name of protection.Her huntress, Devana, is the most beautiful woman Snow has ever laid eyes on. She's strong and fearless and every day by her side is torture. The queen wants Snow to marry a prince, but all Snow can think about is the woman by her side all day and night, silent and stern. Does she see Snow the way she sees her? It's impossible to tell.The true test comes when the queen demands Snow White's heart and she assigns the task to Devana, offering freedom in exchange for the fairest heart. Will the huntress kill the princess to gain her freedom, or will she give in to the pull between the two of them?

Robbergirl


S.T. Gibson - 2019
    When her men ambush a girl on the road with hair pale as death and a raven perched on her shoulder, Helvig cannot resist bringing home a truly unique prize: a genuine witch. Drawn irresistibly into the other woman’s web, Helvig soon learns of Gerda’s reason for walking the icy border roads alone: to find the Queen who lives at the top of the world and kill her. Anyone else would be smart enough not to believe a children’s story, but Helvig is plagued by enchantments of her own, and she struggles to guard the sins of her past while growing closer to Gerda.As Christmastide gives way to the thin-veiled days when ghosts are at their most vengeful, the two women find themselves on a journey to a final confrontation that will either redeem them or destroy them entirely.It's DEATHLESS meets OF FIRE AND STARS in this coming of age fable.

The Winged Histories


Sofia Samatar - 2016
    As war erupts and their families are torn apart, they fear they may disappear into the unwritten pages of history. Using the sword and the pen, the body and the voice, they struggle not just to survive, but to make history.Sofia Samatar is the author of the Crawford, British Fantasy, and World Fantasy award-winning novel A Stranger in Olondria. She also received the John W. Campbell Award. She has written for the Guardian, Strange Horizons, Lightspeed, and many other publications. She lives in California. Her website is sofiasamatar.com.Praise for A Stranger in Olondria:"A book about the love of books. Her sentences are intoxicating and one can easily be lost in their intricacy. . . . Samatar's beautifully written book is one that will be treasured by book lovers everywhere."— Raul M. Chapa, BookPeople, Austin, Texas

The Rules of Ever After


Killian B. Brewer - 2015
    A fateful, sleepless night on top of a pea set under twenty mattresses brings the two young men together and sends them on a quest out into the kingdoms.On their travels, they encounter meddlesome fairies, an ambitious stepmother, disgruntled princesses and vengeful kings as they learn about life, love, friendship, and family. Most of all, the two young men must learn to know themselves and how to write their own rules of ever after.The Rules of Ever After is the debut novel from Duet Books, an imprint for Young Adult LGBTQ fiction from Interlude Press.

The Heart of the Circle


Keren Landsman - 2018
    In Israel, the Sons of Simeon, a group of religious extremists, persecute sorcerers while the government turns a blind eye. After a march for equal rights ends in brutal murder, empath, moodifier and reluctant waiter Reed becomes the next target. While his sorcerous and normie friends seek out his future killers, Reed complicates everything by falling hopelessly in love. As the battle for survival grows ever more personal, can Reed protect himself and his friends as the Sons of Simeon close in around them?File Under: Fantasy [ Love Squared - Stuck in the Margins - Emotional Injection - Fight the Power ]

In the Company of Women


Kate Christie - 2015
    Caroline “CJ” Jamieson gave up studying history and joined the Women’s Army Corps to live it instead. Along with her new WAC friends, she is ready to do her part to help boys like her brothers, fighting in the European and Pacific theaters, make it home sooner.The Army, however, has derailed her plans. Instead of the California post she anticipated, west Texas cacti and an artillery training base are the unexpected sights on her new horizons. Not one to question orders, she’s not sure how her skills in airplane engine maintenance will be of use in this desolate region.But when CJ meets fellow WAC enlistee Brady Buchanan, Fort Bliss might live up to its name.

The Wishing Heart


J.C. Welker - 2017
    Now every magical being in the city wants the vase for himself.Thrust into a game of cat and mouse in a world she never knew existed, Rebel must use her uncanny skills to find a way to free Anjeline the Wishmaker.But wishes have consequences. And contracts. Anjeline's freedom could unravel a love like Rebel has never known, or it could come at the cost of Rebel's heart...

When Fox is a Thousand


Larissa Lai - 1993
    Larissa Lai interweaves three narrative voices and their attendant cultures: an elusive fox growing toward wisdom and her 1000 birthday, the ninth-century Taoist poet/nun Yu Hsuan-Chi (a real person executed in China for murder), and the oddly named Artemis, a young Asian-American woman living in contemporary Vancouver.With beautiful and enchanting prose, and a sure narrative hand, Lai combines Chinese mythology, the sexual politics of medieval China, and modern-day Vancouver to masterfully revise the myth of the Fox (a figure who can inhibit women’s bodies in order to cause mischief).

Under the Whispering Door


T.J. Klune - 2021
    On the outskirts, off the path through the woods, tucked between mountains, is a particular tea shop, run by a man named Hugo. Hugo is the tea shop's owner to locals and the ferryman to souls who need to cross over.But Wallace isn't ready to abandon the life he barely lived. With Hugo's help he finally starts to learn about all the things he missed in life.When the Manager, a curious and powerful being, arrives at the tea shop and gives Wallace one week to cross over, Wallace sets about living a lifetime in seven days.Under the Whispering Door is a contemporary fantasy about a ghost who refuses to cross over and the ferryman he falls in love with.

Silver in the Wood


Emily Tesh - 2019
    Tobias, tethered to the forest, does not dwell on his past life, but he lives a perfectly unremarkable existence with his cottage, his cat, and his dryads.When Greenhollow Hall acquires a handsome, intensely curious new owner in Henry Silver, everything changes. Old secrets better left buried are dug up, and Tobias is forced to reckon with his troubled past—both the green magic of the woods, and the dark things that rest in its heart.

In the Shadow of Spindrift House


Mira Grant - 2019
    The natural world is a place of curves and softened edges, of gentle mists and welcoming spirals. Nature remembers deviation; nature does not forgive.For Harlowe Upton-Jones, life has never been a straight line. Shipped off to live with her paternal grandparents after a mysterious cult killed her mother and father, she has grown up chasing the question behind the curve, becoming part of a tight-knit teen detective agency. But “teen” is a limited time offer, and when her friends start looking for adult professions, it’s up to Harlowe to find them one last case so that they can go out in a blaze of glory.Welcome to Spindrift House.The stories and legends surrounding the decrepit property are countless and contradictory, but one thing is clear: there are people willing to pay a great deal to determine the legal ownership of the house. When Harlowe and her friends agree to investigate the mystery behind the manor, they do so on the assumption that they’ll be going down in history as the ones who determined who built Spindrift House—and why. The house has secrets. They have the skills. They have a plan. They have everything they need to solve the mystery.Everything they need except for time. Because Spindrift House keeps its secrets for a reason, and it has no intention of letting them go.Nature abhors a straight line.Here’s where the story bends.

The Stars and Everything in Between


Victoria Lee - 2020
    They have a house in Lakewood, they have a dog and jobs that don’t involve killing people and maybe, just maybe, a chance at a happy endingBut Lehrer’s trial is fast-approaching, and with it comes all the dark memories Noam and Dara have tried so hard to bury. Can their relationship survive the truth about what happened to both of them in Level IV?