New author alert! Snowy Wings Publishing is pleased to announce that we will be publishing REBEL WING, the first book in a young adult sci-fi romance saga by Tracy Banghart, in September 2024.
📚 Hey! I'm diving back into the wonderful world of books this year and I need your help! 🌟 I'm on the lookout for some fantastic reads, and I'd love your recommendations.
I'm particularly drawn to young adult novels, science fiction, and thrillers. If you have any absolute favourites or hidden gems in these genres, drop them in the comments below! 📖
The wait is over! 📣 ONE WORLD (Iamos Trilogy, Book 3) by @lyssachiavari is now available in eBook, paperback and hardback! This Atlantis-inspired time travel saga with a queer cast (including two MCs on the ace spectrum) is perfect for binge-reading. Learn more here: https://www.snowywingspublishing.com/book/one-world/
𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Queen of Shadows
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: Throne of Glass (Book 5/8)
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫: Sarah J. Maas
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Young Adult, Fantasy
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: October 19, 2023 @ 11:57 PM
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: ★★☆☆☆
At first I thought that once I read this book, maybe it'll clear out what Empire of Storms was all about and maybe once I finish, it would make me less angry. It did not. The shift between this and Empire of the Storms hurts because this book was as close to the original story as it can get, there was the idea and there was character. There was a yearning for love and intimacy that was never present in the next book. There were emotions, despite being the emotions that you wouldn't understand why the character is feeling that way, you'd still go along with it because those parts are what makes them a character, the way they act and feel predictable and unpredictable at the same time makes them sound realistic and grounded with how we perceive parts of people and their own ways of feeling and living. There were parts of this book that was never present in Empire of Storms and it just cemented my anger.
Chaol is present in this book and this is the part where he and Aelin meet each other again, and oh boy, I love the way that their characters had this friction because of how Chaol is going through this arc of trying his best to find where he must stand in the conflict and Aelin heartbroken because the person that she once loved sees her as a threat and as monster. They never miss, when they're together it's always so personal and character driven and I love every bit of it. This is also the part where they break up and it kinda pisses me off on how it was only a single page long when the author can manage to write 17 pages long of unfiltered sex scenes. It's weird but okay, sure why not.
𝖳𝗋𝗂𝗀𝗀𝖾𝗋 𝗐𝖺𝗋𝗇𝗂𝗇𝗀: 𝖲𝗍𝗂𝗅𝗅𝖻𝗂𝗋𝗍𝗁, Asterin Blackbeak, Manon's cousin reveals that she fell in love with a mortal man and got pregnant. She carried the baby full-term, which is rare for witches. But the baby was stillborn. Manon’s grandmother was furious and beat her, branded her with the words “unclean,” and cast her out of Blackbeak Keep. I did not expect such a thing to happen in a book like this, it is not that shocking at least to me because it is a story about war and all that, but something like this in a YA book caught me off guard. Not to say YA mustn't include topics like these but the way that it goes:
In the middle of it all, why must you add in the description of her breast? Not to say that you can't and you shouldn't, but it made it sound so weird especially when the scene is literally about the trauma that a woman went through in giving birth that also led to her family casting her away. That it was the moment that I realized, SJM would randomly describe boobs in random. Even with the way that Aelin wears a necklace, boobs would be shoved it there for no reason. I would understand it if it was for imagery, but the way that it's phrased and handled in context sounds more like the way that men write women more than anything.
Which is absolutely hilarious to me because in the following book, she exactly becomes that foolish and stupidly unaware because they had sex in the middle of a war on a beach. It altered my brain chemistry in a way that shouldn't be. And this is the first and last time that the book acknowledges the age difference between the two, hell, it ain't even an age difference at this point, it's a whole century gap. The Twilight era never disappeared, it only evolved. Dear heavens... This is one of the main reasons why I took out a star from my rating, it could've been an easy three stars but this had to be in the story.
One of the things that I adored about this book though was about Chaol and Dorian, their bond was solidified in this part. I don't want to get too detailed in case someone wishes to read the series P̶l̶e̶a̶s̶e̶ d̶o̶n̶'t̶ h̶a̶v̶e̶ m̶e̶r̶c̶y̶ o̶n̶ y̶o̶u̶r̶s̶e̶l̶f̶ but when one of them was severely hurt to the point of death, but they weren't actually dead, one of them thought that they were and they lose absolutely every bit of patience and sense of honor in their soul and they go absolute apeshit. Like YES! THE TROPE OF ALL TIME. I love them your honor, they deserve the world. 𝗜 𝗹𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗼𝗳 𝗱𝘆𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗰 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘁 𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗺𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸.
What if you could avenge your own murder? A brilliant young woman gets a second chance at life in this debut YA tale of vengeance, court intrigue, and romance, inspired by classic Chinese tropes.
For fans of Kara Thomas and Courtney Summers comes a supernatural horror that reminds us family can be our saving grace or our biggest curse. Set one-hundred years after the Borden murders, this propulsive thriller imagines what a similar trial might look like today.
If you want to give yourself goose-bumps, you may discover the name brand is hard to find. The "Fright Time" series offered 3 stories each for triple the thrills! These and many more frightening fables for young monster hunters are available here now!
𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Heir of Fire
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: Throne of Glass (Book 3/8)
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫: Sarah J. Maas
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Young Adult, Fantasy
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: October 3, 2023 @ 8:00 PM
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: ★★☆☆☆
Let's start of by saying that this book didn't have to be 500 pages long. The amount of pages added to this compared to the first two book is absolutely wild and one of the main reasons as to why, in my opinion, is the constant repetition. It was present in the former books but it went nuts in this one, almost in every scene there'd be one. I understand that it's supposed to be an author's way to add emphasis but it only made the story such a slog. It even sounded weird at times, there was one part where the book is trying to describe the temperature of the water that Celeana was in and it goes “It was warm. Not boiling, but warm.” I could say it might have been funny if it weren't for the fact that it made the book unnecessarily lengthy. “The darkness was this and that, and that and this with like those and these.” “The hurt was this and that, and that and this with like those and these.” 😭
This would most likely come off as a personal thing but first part of this book did not need to exist. Celeana meeting Rowan, a fae with ice magic and training with him while they try to make the most out of their toxicity that they throw to each other back and forth could have easily saved this book a good 300 pages or so. Also there are a bunch of new characters which, I never really cared about because I never saw their appeal besides Manon Blackbeak, the last remaining witch. They even added in Sorscha a healer and Dorian's lover only to have her killed in the very end of the book because we got to give the men character development. Fridging of all time.
Chaol was thrown to the side by Celeana because even after their last scene from the second book, even after she told him that she would still choose him no matter what happens, the story keeps on giving these weird implications between her and Rowan. Like, I understand that the feelings we have for people change overtime but the way that Celeana suddenly thought about what she might actually feel about Chaol sounded more like the story will force her to be with Rowan; a man who did everything to break her. We can all have our asshole characters, that I agree with, but he never apologized for his actions. Never once did he try to talk to Celeana about their past b̶l̶o̶o̶d̶y̶ indifferences. Him taking care of her as she was healing doesn't immediately sweep his wrongdoings under a rug. I hope that the series never continues down the path where I fear it's taking, because Heaven forbid another white man releasing all his anger on a woman and then have those atrocities immediately redeemed because he has a sad backstory.
Meanwhile Chaol had one of the best developments so far b̶e̶h̶i̶n̶d̶ C̶e̶l̶e̶a̶n̶a̶ o̶f̶ c̶o̶u̶r̶s̶e̶ he started to question all of what surrounds him, the throne and the kingdom when everything that he had ever done was for it. He pretty much gives off golden retriever vibes, I will absolutely lose it if Celeana ends up with Rowan than Chaol. I also like the way that Celeana is written to have hardships regarding her emotional and mental baggage, it doesn't just go away or gets resolved in an instant where most of the time in Y/A fiction books, the trauma inflicted to a character never seems to have this effort to understand and confront it. At worst, they're just forgotten. So I appreciate Celeana having to deal with the struggles of hurt that she kept locked inside her and having to deal with them in a more natural way, in a way that shows process.
Hopefully, the fourth book won't hurt that much. 🙏🏼 See you then.
ﮩ٨ـﮩﮩ٨ـ♡ﮩ٨ـﮩﮩ٨ـ
𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Crown of Midnight
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: Throne of Glass (Book 2/8)
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫: Sarah J. Maas
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Young Adult, Fantasy
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: October 1, 2023 @ 12:46 AM
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: ★★✬☆☆
｡ﾟﾟ･｡･ﾟﾟ｡
ﾟ。𝙈𝙞𝙣𝙤𝙧 𝙎𝙥𝙤𝙞𝙡𝙚𝙧𝙨 𝘼𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙙
ﾟ･｡･
The book is separated to two parts, which I have no idea why to be honest. This is the first time I've encountered a book that is split this way (Don't you dare mention Twilight), at first I thought it was because the two parts showed two different plots or at least two different tones, which is true in some degree but to me it still stands as a single book.
So, the book starts of with Celeana a year later into being the King's champion and she is tasked to kill someone. It's the same formula with the first book, being there's this one goal but something happens (another mystery) that shakes the plot to make it seem more interesting I guess, there's a lot more pining and longing (big fan 😩) and a cliffhanger to promote the next book. There's another ball scene where they have to dance, and the pacing never changed from the first book. This one is just as slow.
I appreciate the part where Celeana is given a chance to get angry. Like full on, “I will make sure that your soul reaches hell” kind of angry and yes, I need more of women in fictional like that. More of that please. But the reason why felt such emotions was because of Nehemiah's death, it's actually the main reasons as to why it took me three days to finish the book. It shouldn't have been so surprising and yet I still find it hard to accept.
Before, I rooted for Nehemia and Celeana's friendship. I wanted to see more of them together and how their relationship affected one another, Nehemia had potential and she was killed off for a cheap plot twist and to benefit the progression of the main character which is so tiring to read because Nehemia was the only person of color in the series. Man, it's exhausting...
Only 3 more days until the release of SUNBOLT (The Sunbolt Chronicles, Book 1) by Intisar Khanani! Mark your calendars for September 19th, 2023—an epic adventure awaits!
Have you been looking forward to reading SHADOW THIEF, the all-new prequel to SUNBOLT by Intisar Khanani? If so, you're in luck, because it's coming in just 3 more days!
This YA fantasy is perfect for fans of Robin McKinley and Tamora Pierce. Kirkus Reviews called it “A compelling story that will leave readers anticipating the sequel.”
I've got a small number of paperback copies of FOURTH WORLD that I'm giving away in advance of the last book in the series coming out this fall. Billed as Atlantis on Mars with time travel (and chock-full of #asexual and otherwise #queer characters)! This would also be a great gift for a teen in your life or a donation to an LGBT teen center. I'm giving these away for free but I can only ship to US addresses. Let me know if you're interested! @lgbtqbookstodon#bookstodon#YAbooks
Tomorrow Begins Now is a very interesting nonfiction book focusing on how teenagers impacted civil rights and social justice in the United States between the 1950s and 2020s.
When Elizabeth makes a discovery that throws her entire identity into question, she uses a time machine found in an abandoned house. As she catapults through time, she encounters a mysterious abandoned child, an elite gymnast preparing for Olympic Trials, and an enigmatic woman who seems to know more than she’s revealing.
Queer Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Filipino folklore in this horror comedy about a high school stage manager who accidentally sells her soul to a demon.
In this sprawling fantasy inspired by Filipino folklore, to protect herself and her family, Rosha must impersonate the most powerful man in the empire.