The heart wants what the heart wants, and our hearts want books.

The following post includes affiliate links. More details here.  As you’re doing your Amazon shopping, we’d be ever so grateful if you’d use our affiliate link to do so as it helps pay the bills around here!

Dear readers, we have reached that point in our Virtual Book Club experience.  The point of “will they finish in time?”  Here’s hoping for yes, but you have to sign up here and virtually show up on Friday, October 21, 2022 at 7:30pm Central to find out.  It’s also suggested you read The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman and come with festive attire and beverages, but you do you darlings, and we’ll get as far as we can with these ding dang dead trees we’re reading.  

There’s always a spider in YA fantasy books, I’m convinced.  I said it about the two books that come before this one, and I say it again now.  In Akata Woman by Nnedi Okorafor, we rejoin Sunny, Orlu, Chichi, and Sasha on another adventure, this one prompted by, you guessed it, a giant spider.  Or, more accurately, a spirit / god who’s presenting itself as a giant spider.  *Cringe*  As one who’s read Akata Witch and Akata Warrior might imagine, Akata Witch opens with our group starting to test for the next level as Leopard People, and a new, challenging hero’s journey to provide the adventure for our plot.  

I thought Akata Woman would be a few years down the line and feature a more grown up version of our ensemble.  That really wasn’t it though, and, as the author’s note says, the world of the Leopard People just wasn’t done with Okorafor yet, and I’m here for it.  We got another adventure, and learned more about our cast, the Nimm women, and Sunny’s family in the process.  I learned more about Nigerian history, and spoiler alert, the book ends as the pandemic is beginning.  

I’m giving Akata Woman four emphatic stars because it’s a well written, gorgeously plotted, picturesque, fun hang of a book featuring a fantastic ensemble cast of magical young people.  It was a window into their lives, and recent history, and I highly recommend it to others, but please do read these amazing books in order, as it’ll just make more sense that way.  

What’s a really fun, beautifully written novel that’s also taught you a thing or two?

~Nikki

Back in October of 2020, when we did our first ever month dedicated to witches, we read what we then thought was a duology by Hugo, Nebula, Locus, and World Fantasy award winning author Nnedi Okorafor. I am so excited that Dr. Okorafor (if you remember from all the way two years ago, Okorafor has a PhD in literature) settled in to write about these four young people on the verge of adulthood during the lock-downs of 2020. Now collectively called The Nsibidi Scripts, these books follow four young and magically powerful teenagers through their formative childhood years. Please remember that even though she has titled the books with the word Akata, it is a slur that means “bush animal” that would be used to describe Black Americans or or other foreign-born blacks. Sunny and Chichi discuss how much Sunny hates the term, but in a jovial way that only best friends can call each other derogatory terms, and in so doing reclaim them.

What I really noticed in this third book was that even though the four main characters are still very much a cohesive, powerful Oha coven, they have each grown into their own differing powers. Sasha, Orlu, Chichi, and Sunny each depend upon the others’ skills to enhance their own, and upon occasion to save the entire group from getting into even bigger trouble. It’s a way for each of them to take responsibility for perhaps not only for themselves, but for the whole coven. Each character also has to come to terms with their places in the world, as members of their respective families no matter that family’s past, as well as citizens of the world and as Leopard People. I really loved how we as readers see this journey that they are on individually and how it strengthens their bonds so that they can go on this epic quest to ‘save the world.’

One of my favorite quotations from Akata Woman, a solid four star read for me, too, was this from near the end when the coven is receiving their magical rewards that fall from the sky: “The bruise was already a deep red. Sugar Cream had said there was always a consequence for holding [time still] for an extended period of time, but Sunny would never have imagined the consequence would be so . . . petty.” And isn’t that usually the way with life, it never goes as we expected it and it can sometimes surprise you with the consequences.

Here’s to the rest of witchy month being filled with only pleasant consequences.

~Ashley

PLEASE SUPPORT US WHEN YOU SHOP BY FIRST CLICKING ON THE IMAGES BELOW:

The following post includes affiliate links. More details here.  As you’re doing your Amazon shopping, we’d be ever so grateful if you’d use our affiliate link to do so as it helps pay the bills around here!

We are counting down the days until Virtual Book Club with you lovelies, and yet, neither of us has started.  That’s right, we’re dead treeing it (or perhaps audio), and will be starting the week off.  We appreciate your witchy Ts & Ps darlings, and send you ours as well, while you’re finishing up reading The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman so we can gather as a coven group to discuss it on Friday, October 21, 2022 at 7:30pm Central.  Don’t forget to sign up here and gather your festive attire and potions beverages.

Oh darling readers, how I loathe the way life interferes with my reading plans.  Last week was a comedy of errors and I did not get to consume read this week’s title as I prefer.  I want it stated for the record that fact may affect my feelings here.  

Let’s start with the story – The League of Gentlewoman Witches by India Holton is the second in a series, (and yes, we skipped the first, more to come on that), set in Victorian London, with some adventures through other parts of England as well.  We have pirates who fly battlehouses through the air, and women who are certainly not witches because witchcraft is illegal (except of course they are), a prophecy, and a museum exhibit that contains certain relics of old.  Naturally, antics ensue, with fabulous “hold my beer” style energy that is just magnificent.  Our pirate hero is super grumpy, our witchy hero (because I loathe gendered words, especially in English) is sheltered sunshine.  Yes dear readers, this is a romance, complete with HEA, open door scenes, and upstairs / downstairs fun.  The antics include a heist, a domineering aunt, and more, but spoilers are the worst.  

The League of Gentlewoman Witches is a really fun hang, with picturesque writing, snarky dialogue, so many hat tips to my beloved Jane Austen, and it really ticked a lot of my boxes (witches, magic, historic, fantastic inn scene, a readerly main character, etc.).  It’s a layered story once you dig into it, with some really complex, interesting characters.  While my reading experience, due to life being too much last week (late evening appliance deliveries, trying to catch up on work before some time off, and last minute family trip preparations, all at the same time), wasn’t everything I wanted, I think when I get around to reading the first in the series, I’ll enjoy it a lot more, and hopefully the third book even more.  (I have my suspicions about the main characters of the first in the series and most definitely look forward to picking it up when it becomes available.  Yes, I know I could read the marketing copy, but that doesn’t mean I’ll remember it, and does feel a bit like cheating.)  I’m giving The League of Gentlewoman Witches 3.5 stars and rounding up because my week was a struggle bus.  

What’s a novel that real life got in the way of you enjoying to its fullest?

~Nikki 

India Holton is the author of the Dangerous Damsels series. As Nikki mentioned above, The League of Gentlewomen Witches is book two. It is preceded by The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels and followed by the anticipated 2023 release of The Secret Service of Tea and Treason. Holton lives in New Zealand in a cottage by the sea where her writing is fueled by “tea, buttered scones, and thunderstorms.” The Dangerous Damsels series is described as “books about unconventional women and charming rogues … think slow burn romance with literal explosions.”

And that brings me to the first bit of what disarmed me (ha!) about The League of Gentlewomen Witches, the literal explosions. I was not prepared for the multiple types of magical and actual violent explosions that take place as distractions for thievery and to hide illegal use of witchcraft. I don’t know what I went in expecting but to be thrown into the world of the Wicken League and Wisteria Society like I had a whole book’s worth of background was a bit of a struggle to get through. Not that it was overly difficult from context clues, but there was a little bit of a struggle for me. I was also distracted by the epigraphs at the beginning of the chapters that were written like headlines in the gossip pages, but that actually gave away the plot before it happened. Once I started ignoring them, around chapter 5 or so, my reading became more enjoyable and the story progressed in the fashion in which it was written. I highly recommend ignoring the epigraphs in this case, but that is not usual for me. I did enjoy Holton’s word play, like when the bust of Melpomene is broken in the British Museum and our heroine says “Tragic.” (Melpomene being the muse of Tragedy.) This was quality. It happened two more times with two more muses, but I won’t spoil their identities in this post, let me know if you find them.

Overall, my expectations were met. There were witches and magic and pirates and romance and adventure, even though I wasn’t expecting the literal explosions to happen as often as they did. I’m giving  The League of Gentlewomen Witches a three star review. Will I read the other titles in the series, more than likely yes, but I’m not clamoring for them, and I definitely don’t foresee me re-reading them in the future. It was a solid, magical, romantic comedy of manners and mayhem. Would definitely recommend for those readers who loved Pride and Prejudice and Zombies for many of the same reasons.

What book recently disarmed you with the plot devices or plays on words that the author used?

~Ashley

PLEASE SUPPORT US WHEN YOU SHOP BY FIRST CLICKING ON THE IMAGES BELOW:

The following post includes affiliate links. More details here.  As you’re doing your Amazon shopping, we’d be ever so grateful if you’d use our affiliate link to do so as it helps pay the bills around here!

Darling readers, we are so close to starting October’s Virtual Book Club pick, The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman, and hope that you are too.  If you’re counting, as of this publishing, we have just over two weeks until we gather with our brooms beverages and festive attire on Friday, October 21, 2022 at 7:30pm Central to discuss this deep dive into one of our favorite witchy families, the Owens Family.  Please sign up here, so we know you’re coming and you can get the Google Meets Link!

Where we live this time of year, we have nice, crisp, fall mornings, and hot, steamy, summer afternoons, so color me delighted when I realized that in The Nature of Witches by Rachel Griffin, the witches have seasonal power that feels like the seasons.  Most witches align with one season, but Clara, our protagonist, is an Everwitch, and as such, her power changes to match the current season, all year long.  She doesn’t have the ebbs and flows other witches who are tied to one season do throughout the year, and strengthen and weaken depending on proximity to their season.  And, she’s the first Ever in a very long time, supposedly born for such a time as this when the shaders (non-magical people) have bled the earth of all it has, and the atmosphere has become too much for the witches to control, even with their magic.  Because Evers are so rare, no one really knows how to train them to control their powers, or how they can use their power for the greater good.  Combine all of this this with a teenager about to graduate school who thinks she’s killed the people closest to her by not having control, her ex-girl friend she pushed away to protect her from said power, several adults who mean well, and one calming, attractive research assistant, and that my friends is the making of a really fun, quick novel.  

The best part of The Nature of Witches isn’t the fantastic, inventive plot, it’s the atmospheric writing.  This novel takes us throughout all four seasons, and the way Griffin writes about how the magic feels is just breathtaking!  It is everything this shader thinks seasonal magic would feel like.  As we just transitioned from summer to fall (sometimes in a day) here, 

Summer magic is big and bold, taking advantage of the heavy dose of sunlight. It feels like a flood, one I’m constantly worried I’ll drown in.

Autumn magic builds on an undercurrent of thankfulness and sorrow, a symphony of contrasting emotions that’s easy to get lost in. Thankfulness for the harvest and the fruits of the earth. Sorrow because death is on the horizon. 

The Nature of Witches by Rachel Griffin is a coming of age / trusting oneself book, and also a book about relationships, or perhaps its one and the same.  As communal people, we all need to be in relationship with others who will support us, both calmly and more forcefully, and I really enjoyed how each was demonstrated, as well as romantic and friendly / familial love, both in healthy ways, which we all need to see more.  

I’m giving The Nature of Witches by Rachel Griffin four solid stars and definitely looking into Griffin’s other work (which is also about witches).  The plot is interesting, the pacing is fantastic, and the writing is glorious.  I had no idea this was a YA book and it didn’t have the angsty feeling of many YA books, but it did have the struggle to find and trust oneself, which felt really supportive to read during this real life season of business.  

What’s a book you knew (or remembered) nothing about and really enjoyed reading?

~Nikki

Rachel Griffin is a nature lover born and raised in the pacific northwest and “hopes more vampires settle down in her beloved state of Washington.” She is the New York Times bestselling author of YA novels The Nature of Witches, Wild is the Witch, and Bring Me Your Midnight, releasing in 2023. Before settling down to that writing life outside of Seattle with her husband and dog, she received a bachelor of science in diagnostic ultrasound from Seattle University, and additionally collects houseplants.

I was so very pleasantly surprised with this YA novel. It was so lyrical, so magical, so inventive, that it didn’t feel like your typical YA novel. As Nikki mentioned above, there were a lot of big internal feelings for our protagonist, but those feelings were almost secondary to the big save the world vibes. And even though we do experience all four seasons in The Nature of Witches, it brings me big autumn energy, like most witchy books do. This was one of my favorite quotes: “If spring is a whispered promise that everything can be made new, autumn is a brilliant sacrifice born of love. Because if the autumn did not love the spring, it would not fall to winter just so the spring could rise.” What a beautiful homage to the seasons, both those of nature and of life! 

But, it wouldn’t be a Heart.Wants.Books. Review if we didn’t tell you a wee story about our buddy reading experience. After I had started the book, a few chapters ahead of Nikki, I texted her that there’s a really cool name up in here! After a bit, she asks if it was “Nikki” I said, good guess, but no…it was Nox! Clara, our Everwitch protagonist, has a black cat named Equinox, Nox for short, and it just gave me all the feels for my own little shadow-cat. Here’s a picture of my handsome boy, Nox Underfoot of the Leaky-Eye. (Don’t ask, it’s Adam’s fault.)

The Nature of Witches was such a delightfully quick read of perfection, I am also giving Rachel Griffin’s debut novel a four starred review. It was the best way to celebrate the beginning of the season..both fall and our witchy season!

~Ashley

PLEASE SUPPORT US WHEN YOU SHOP BY FIRST CLICKING ON THE IMAGES BELOW: