Cassandra Clare's New Fantasy Series!

 December’s Top Book Pick!

 

New York Times Best-selling Author Cassandra Clare launches a new epic fantasy series with Sword Catcher, Book One, The Chronicles of Castellane.

 

“It began with a crime. The theft of a boy.”

 

So begins the tale of Kel, a boy stolen from an orphanage to become the secret Sword Catcher—the body double for the sole royal heir, Prince Conor of Aurelian. All the trappings of royal life, including abundance and hedonistic thrills, and Kel’s growing closeness to Conor, are countered by the weight of living a lie and knowing his destiny is to die for Conor.

 

 Like Kel, Lin Caster is an outcast. A rare female doctor, Lin is      forced to live behind walls within the city because she is an Ashkar. After the Sundering, only the Ashkar possessed the last vestiges of magic, and all magical creatures disappeared overnight. But neither charmed talismans nor Lin’s extensive medical skill have succeeded in healing her best friend.

 

 After an assassination attempt, Kel, Conor, and Lin’s lives become entwined in a dangerous web of forbidden love, secrets, conspiracies, and betrayal.

 

Clare employs enviable writing to breathe life into disparate characters and factions. Her complex world building may send the spatially challenged (like me) puzzling over the included map. But once the pieces come together, readers will find this hefty book difficult to put down and eager for the sequel.

Wishing you all a wondrous holiday season. Be sure to take some time for yourself to snuggle up with a good book!

 

CopyrightⒸ2023 By Ariella Moon

Review: The Fourth Wing (Empyrean Book 1)

I loved this Coming of Age, Fish Out of Water, and Redemption story set in Rebecca Yarros's magical Fourth Wing. Every page, sometimes every paragraph, is filled with internal or external conflict as Violet Sorrengail, whose mother is the commanding general of the Basgiath War College, forces her bookish daughter into the brutal Dragon Riders Quadrant. Violet faces daily life or death situations - because of her mother, because of her small size and fragile condition, and because of Xaden Riorson and other marked separatists cadets whose parents were executed as traitors during the rebellion.

Violet must draw upon the knowledge she acquired in the Archives to outsmart and outwit her deadly opponents and be chosen by a dragon. But her greatest threat - her wingleader, Xander Riorson - may not be exactly what Violet first thought.

Normally, I shy away from books littered with F-bombs. The word often appears gratuitous and indicating a lack of imagination. But in Fourth Wing, the expletives felt organic and appropriate.

I look forward to reading the next book in the Empyrean series!

If you would like to delve into The Two Realms fantasy series, 

The Beltane Escape, The Viking Mist, and the Lady of the Lake companion novella, 

The Amber Elixir, are now available to read for free with Kindle Unlimited. Also available in paperback.

Happy summer reading!

~Ariella