Miranda and Caliban: The Magic Beneath The Tempest Synopsis: Start with Shakespeare's Tempest. Add a girl growing up in isolation on an enchanted island, hidden away by her father, a powerful magus determined to keep her safe at any cost. What of Miranda, the dutiful daughter shaped by his will? What of Caliban, the so-called savage bound to serve him? Start with Miranda and Caliban. In this luminous retelling, Jacqueline Carey turns the lens. Miranda is tenderhearted, lovi

February and March turned into an unexpectedly thematic reading months. I didn’t plan it, but every book circled the same gravitational pull: power—who holds it, how it’s performed, and what it costs. From royal image-making and wartime espionage to witch hunts, tech-world manipulation, magical systems, and a futuristic homicide detective who never lets go of a case … the throughline was unmistakable. Some books dazzled. Some frustrated me. A few did both in the same breath.

I've loved ancient Egypt for as long as I can remember. The theology, the magick, the sense that the universe runs on laws both visible and hidden. It shaped me as a reader and eventually as a writer. So when I say Pauline Gedge gets it right in The Scroll of Saqqara, I say that as someone who has spent years walking those sands in books, in imagination, and in real life. So, what about this book? Amazon sez Prince Khaemwaset, son of Ramesses II and revered physician, longs f

January reading happens under strange conditions. The light is thin. The nights are long. And when I’m deep in a manuscript, I read the way a witch reads signs—carefully, skeptically, looking for truth beneath the surface. This was not a month of comfort reading. It was a month of assessment. Of watching how stories are built, where they falter, and whether they keep their promises. Some books offered momentum. Some offered meaning. One offered what can only be described as l

December reading always sounds ambitious. . .in theory. In practice? Between holidays, end-of-year chaos, and the small matter of diving headfirst into drafting the next Wheel of the Year Mysteries book, my reading time shrank faster than daylight before the solstice. While everyone else was wrapped in Yule vibes, I was already sneaking glances ahead to Litha—sun, fire, and long days where secrets don’t stay buried for long. So this month’s reads skewed toward the cozy, the w

Alchemised A thousand-page dark fantasy of necromancy, alchemy, and missing memories… that somehow still didn’t reveal its own. It’s atmospheric and ambitious, but often repetitive. And if someone hadn’t whispered “Harry Potter fanfic,” I never would’ve spotted it. But I did finish all 1,000 pages, which is an accomplishment worthy of a solid three stars and a very long nap. Boleyn Traitor Yes, yes, I always insist I’m over Tudor fiction … and then a book like this comes alon