May 2023 TBR

My goal this year is to keep my TBR’s more manageable. So… I only have 5 books on this month’s TBR, but it was really hard deciding what to put on here. I wanted to add a lot more books, but I was sure only to put the books that I wanted to read the most this month. One of my new “rules” for my TBR’s this year is that I have to own the book before I am allowed to put it on here. This way I am not adding more than I can handle, at least that is the goal.

Full disclosure, I have changed this list at least 3 times since the first of the month, so I am not sure how this is going to go.

Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson | The Stormlight Archive #2 | Epic Fantasy | Add to Goodreads

Expected by his enemies to die the miserable death of a military slave, Kaladin survived to be given command of the royal bodyguards, a controversial first for a low-status “darkeyes.” Now he must protect the king and Dalinar from every common peril as well as the distinctly uncommon threat of the Assassin, all while secretly struggling to master remarkable new powers that are somehow linked to his honorspren, Syl.

The Assassin, Szeth, is active again, murdering rulers all over the world of Roshar, using his baffling powers to thwart every bodyguard and elude all pursuers. Among his prime targets is Highprince Dalinar, widely considered the power behind the Alethi throne. His leading role in the war would seem reason enough, but the Assassin’s master has much deeper motives.

Brilliant but troubled Shallan strives along a parallel path. Despite being broken in ways she refuses to acknowledge, she bears a terrible burden: to somehow prevent the return of the legendary Voidbringers and the civilization-ending Desolation that will follow. The secrets she needs can be found at the Shattered Plains, but just arriving there proves more difficult than she could have imagined.

Meanwhile, at the heart of the Shattered Plains, the Parshendi are making an epochal decision. Hard pressed by years of Alethi attacks, their numbers ever shrinking, they are convinced by their war leader, Eshonai, to risk everything on a desperate gamble with the very supernatural forces they once fled. The possible consequences for Parshendi and humans alike, indeed, for Roshar itself, are as dangerous as they are incalculable.

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The Magician’s Daughter by H.G. Parry | Historical Fantasy | Add to Goodreads

It is 1912, and for the last seventy years magic has all but disappeared from the world. Yet magic is all Biddy has ever known.

Orphaned in a shipwreck as a baby, Biddy grew up on Hy-Brasil, a legendary island off the coast of Ireland hidden by magic and glimpsed by rare travelers who return with stories of wild black rabbits and a lone magician in a castle. To Biddy, the island is her home, a place of ancient trees and sea-salt air and mysteries, and the magician, Rowan, is her guardian. She loves both, but as her seventeenth birthday approaches, she is stifled by her solitude and frustrated by Rowan’s refusal to let her leave. He himself leaves almost every night, transforming into a raven and flying to the mainland, and never tells her where or why he goes.

One night, Rowan fails to come home from his mysterious travels. When Biddy ventures into his nightmares to rescue him, she learns not only where he goes every night, but the terrible things that happened in the last days of magic that caused Rowan to flee to Hy-Brasil. Rowan has powerful enemies who threaten the safety of the island. Biddy’s determination to protect her home and her guardian takes her away from the safety of Hy-Brasil, to the poorhouses of Whitechapel, a secret castle beneath London streets, the ruins of an ancient civilization, and finally to a desperate chance to restore lost magic. But the closer she comes to answers, the more she comes to question everything she has ever believed about Rowan, her origins, and the cost of bringing magic back into the world.

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I picked this one up from a local author. I am not sure how I am going to feel about it, but I guess we will see.

Red Sword by Norman Wood | Red Sword #1 | Espionage Thriller | Add to Goodreads

The Russian military and KGB’s planned coup and assassination of General Secretary Gorbachev threatened to disrupt the tenuous end of the Cold War with the United States. President Reagan would have none of it. Thwarting those Russian conspirators, who called themselves Red Sword, fell into the CIA’s lap. But rather than use a seasoned agent, the CIA considered rookie Nathan West.

Would West be up to the task? He had the smarts. And as a former West Virginia State Trooper, he had some experience. But this job was in a whole other league. The CIA’s rigorous—and severe—program would test West’s mettle, stamina, and courage in what becomes a cat-and-mouse game.

Based on actual events in the late 1980s, Norman Wood’s Red Sword keeps tension high and never holds back.

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Kitsune: A Little Mermaid Retelling by Nicolette Andrews | Tales of Akatsuki #1 | Fantasy, Retelling, Romance | Add to Goodreads

Rescuing him was a mistake. Falling in love was unthinkable. Because to save her own life, she has to destroy his.

Rin is an immortal kitsune, or at least she was until a witch’s curse turned her human. To regain her yokai powers and avoid being turned into a fox, she must make the lord’s son fall in love with her before the next full moon. Her kind has been seducing humans for centuries, and it should be easy, as long as he doesn’t find out she’s a kitsune… except that the curse also took her voice.

Hikaru is betrothed to the daughter of a rival lord, and he will fulfill his duty, protecting his clan from others and from the yokai. But when he’s saved by a mysterious red-haired woman, he can’t forget her, try as he might. Then she turns up at his door… Only it can’t be his savior, because this woman has ebony hair, but there’s something inexplicably bewitching about her. Yet his father’s treaty depends on his marriage to another, and even an innocent dalliance could ruin everything.

Falling in love is dangerous for them both. Not only are they from different worlds, but their time together can only end in heartache. Hikaru’s marriage means security for his clan, and Rin must destroy it or be turned into a fox. And truly loving Hikaru means revealing she’s one of the hated yokai and an immortal. Will they risk it all for love? Or will their two worlds rip them apart for good?

Fans of fairy tale retellings, anime, and manga love Kitsune: A Little Mermaid Retelling, an old tale retold from a fresh perspective.

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Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros | The Empyrean #1 | Fantasy Romance | Add to Goodreads

Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders from USA Today bestselling author Rebecca Yarros

Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders.

But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away…because dragons don’t bond to “fragile” humans. They incinerate them.

With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant.

She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise.

Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom’s protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret.

Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die.

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What are you hoping to read this month?