Book cover of A Dark and Hollow Star

Book description

“Beautifully written and deliciously complex…I couldn’t get enough.” —Nicki Pau Preto, author of the Crown of Feathers series

The Cruel Prince meets City of Bones in this thrilling urban fantasy set in the magical underworld of Toronto that follows a queer cast of characters racing to stop a serial killer…

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Why read it?

2 authors picked A Dark and Hollow Star as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

This Final Fantasy and DnD-inspired contemporary fantasy has 5 POVs, but we’re really here for prickly leather queen Nausicaä. Nos is a sarcastic ex-Fury with a short temper, a sword, and a serious grudge against the Deities who exiled her to the mortal realm. She’s old, she’s cranky, and she’s totally soft for Arlo, an adorable half-fae girl on a mission to uncover the mystery behind unsolved magic murders in Toronto. I seriously can’t resist a grump and sunshine team-up. 

Ashley Shuttleworth’s debut, A Dark and Hollow Star, features four POV characters, and one of them, Arlo, continues the trend of being half-human, half-something else. Arlo’s father is human, but her mother is a high-ranking member of a Faerie Court. That means Arlo is technically something like faerie royalty, even though her status in the faerie world is uncertain. Over the course of the book, Arlo must deal with her growing relationship with Nausicaä, a disgraced Fury, while also trying to prove she has enough magic to avoid being cast out of faerie society to live her life as a…

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Book cover of December on 5C4

December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

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