Wayward Reviews

Hello my lovelies,

How are you? Did you enjoy your January? Mine has been focused mainly on work and being gentle with myself, I have been journalling every day, napping when I need it and feeding myself delicious food. But now I am getting reading to go on a big holiday at the end of February – well go visit my family back in New Zealand. Which means two 27 hours flights to get to NZ and back to England!

So I am taking this chance to shop my TBR, if you have read my 2023 Reading Goals then you know that I am not buying a lot of books this year – I also plan to find ways to read more (aren’t we all!?). I just had this epiphany that since I am going on holiday why not haul some of my books from FairyLoot & Illumicrate?

This brings me to my holiday book haul.

As much as I wanted to do a theme for this, I thought that it would just end up complicating things and my enthusiasm would dip. Therefore I have literally gone to my bookshelf and shopped for any FairyLoot and Illumicrate books that grab my eye…oh, I also picked up one book from Abraxas Boxes but I only got two books from that subscription before they discontinued.

Fairyloot

Her Majesty’s Royal Coven

The first in a supernatural new series from the author of Wonderland, Her Majesty’s Royal Coven follows a top secret government department of witches and the deadly threat to the nation that they must confront.

Hidden among us is a secret coven of witches. They are Her Majesty’s Royal Coven. They protect crown and country from magical forces and otherworldly evil. But their greatest enemy will come from within.

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy

Hart is a marshal, tasked with patrolling the strange and magical wilds of Tanria. It’s an unforgiving job, and Hart’s got nothing but time to ponder his loneliness.

Mercy never has a moment to herself. She’s been single-handedly keeping Birdsall & Son Undertakers afloat in defiance of sullen jerks like Hart, who seems to have a gift for showing up right when her patience is thinnest.

After yet another exasperating run-in with Mercy, Hart finds himself penning a letter addressed simply to “A Friend”. Much to his surprise, an anonymous letter comes back in return, and a tentative friendship is born.

Illumicrate

The Whispering Dark

Delaney Meyers-Petrov is tired of being seen as fragile just because she’s Deaf. So when she’s accepted into a prestigious program at Godbole University that trains students to slip between parallel worlds, she’s excited for the chance to prove herself. But her semester gets off to a rocky start as she faces professors who won’t accommodate her disability, and a pretentious upperclassman fascinated by Delaney’s unusual talents.

Colton Price died when he was nine years old. Quite impossibly, he woke several weeks later at the feet of a green-eyed little girl. Now, twelve years later, Delaney Meyers-Petrov has stumbled back into his orbit, but Colton’s been ordered to keep far away from the new girl… and the voices she hears calling to her from the shadows.

Book of Night

In Charlie Hall’s world, shadows can be altered, for entertainment and cosmetic preferences—but also to increase power and influence. You can alter someone’s feelings—and memories—but manipulating shadows has a cost, with the potential to take hours or days from your life. Your shadow holds all the parts of you that you want to keep hidden—a second self, standing just to your left, walking behind you into lit rooms. And sometimes, it has a life of its own. 

Abraxas Boxes

Blood and Moonlight

Rising above the city of Collis is the holy Sanctum. And watching over its spires is Catrin, an orphan girl with unique skills–for she alone can spot the building’s flaws in construction before they turn deadly. 

 But when Catrin witnesses a murderer escaping the scene of his crime, she’s pulled into the web of a dangerous man who will definitely strike again. Assigned to capture the culprit is the mysterious, brilliant, and enigmatic Simon, whose insights into the mind of a killer are frighteningly accurate. 

 As the grisly crimes continue, Catrin finds herself caught between murderer and detective while hiding her own secret–a supernatural sight granted by the moon, destined to make her an outcast, and the only thing that might save her and those she loves from becoming the next victims… 

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Viewing all of these books, I do have a dark fantasy theme going on here. But I don’t mind, I feel renewed about trying to get through my subscription box books. I know Book of Night and The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy were controversial as many people were either disappointed in the book selected to be redesigned or that the book itself was underwhelming.

What do you think of my book choice? Have you read these books?

Till next time.