Queen of Coin and Whispers by Helen Corcoran

“She loved me as I loved her, fierce as a bloodied blade.”
★★★★★

Queen of Coin and Whispers is a sapphic YA fantasy novel by Helen Corcoran that focuses on political intrigue instead of magic. Corcoran has described Queen as “a low-fantasy novel with a historical basis,” because elements of the novel are inspired by Elizabethan spycraft, which is basically the coolest thing I’ve ever heard (check out this Twitter thread where she goes into more detail on her research). 

Queen was one of my most anticipated Summer releases, and I was lucky enough to win a physical copy in a giveaway hosted by my friend Manon (aka @themaliciousreader). It took a few weeks to arrive via Book Depository, but once I started reading I devoured it in less than 48 hours and loved every minute of it! 

Queen follows two leads alternating between their perspectives:

• Lia is the newly ascended queen of a struggling kingdom. The throne she inherited has become mired in corruption, and she vows to right the wrongs of her predecessors and be the ruler her people deserve. 
• Xania is a member of the lower court who spends her days working in the royal treasury, biding her time until the opportunity arises to avenge her father’s death (which was, Xania suspects, actually a murder). 

The paths of these two girls would normally not cross, but they find themselves working together (and eventually, developing feelings for one another) when their mutual friend, Matthias, recommends that Xania become Lia’s spymaster – a highly important, secretive, and dangerous position known as Master of Whispers. 

I found myself totally immersed and invested in this world and the characters that inhabit it. Corcoran has developed an incredibly well thought out system of government, which I honestly found to be more interesting than many magic systems in high fantasy novels.

And we haven’t even truly discussed the romance yet! I absolutely loved Lia & Xania together, and I found myself squealing like a schoolgirl when Lia made the first move, flirting by loaning Xania a lesbian romance novel. Queen was a relatively slow burn, but not so slow that the characters don’t get together til the very end, which I appreciated. 

My only real gripe is that Queen felt like it should have been a New Adult book. It didn’t click with me how young the two leads were until the scene on Xania’s eighteenth birthday, and it was honestly sort of jarring. I know the point is that Lia and Xania are young women whom people underestimate, but that sentiment would still have remained had they been in the early twenties instead. Especially because it seems like Xania had had her job in the treasury for several years at the start of the book, which would imply she’d started at 15-16? 

Anyway, all in all Queen of Coin and Whispers was an absolute joy to read, and while the ending and epilogue were more than sufficient, I found myself not ready to part with Lia & Xania. Luckily, Helen Corcoran wasn’t ready to part with them either and has released a set of four, free prequel stories which you can find here! I’ve been saving them to use as a special treat, but I have no doubt they’ll be just as enjoyable as the novel!  

Synopsis:
When teenage queen Lia inherits her corrupt uncle’s bankrupt kingdom, she brings a new spymaster into the fold … Xania, who takes the job to avenge her murdered father.

Faced with dangerous plots and hidden enemies, can Lia and Xania learn to rely on each other, as they discover that all is not fair in love and treason?

In a world where the throne means both power and duty, they must decide what to sacrifice for their country – and for each other…

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Queen of Coin and Whispers At A Glance
Genre: YA, Fantasy of Manners (with prominent f/f romance subplot)
Themes/Tropes: Queer Royals, Political Intrigue, Rich Girl/Poor Girl (sort of)
LGBT Rep? Yes! Lesbian MC, with lesbian, bi, & gay side characters
OwnVoices? Yep
Content Warnings (CWs): Murder/Violence, instance of psychological abuse (might be forgetting some, I forgot to jot them down because I was so engrossed in the story, sorry!) 

The Fate of Stars by SD Simper

“I would rather die a thousand deaths than have never met you.”
★★★★★

I’ve been putting a lot of pressure on myself regarding this review. I’ve spent weeks hyping up The Fate of Stars almost daily on social media, hosted a giveaway for a special edition copy of it, and even conducted a Zoom interview with the author, SD Simper, to talk about it. After all that, I began to wonder if I could even come up with anything worthwhile to say that I haven’t already said. As it turns out, I needn’t have worried. 

The Fate of Stars by SD Simper is the first book in her sapphic mermaid trilogy, Sea & Stars. Let’s start with a refresher on the premise.

Synopsis:
“A devout mermaid. A disgraced princess. A feud as ancient as the gods.

Worlds collide when Tallora is kidnapped from her ocean home and forced to be a pet to a tyrannical foreign empire. Her only hope for rescue lies with a sworn enemy—Princess Dauriel, infamous for her stone heart and conflicted past. But when Dauriel’s kingdom comes to the cusp of war, could their uneasy alliance be the key to defeating a common foe? Or will their growing feelings for each other lead them to ruin?

From the world of FALLEN GODS comes a tale of ancient magic and cutthroat politics—and finding redemption through love.”

So, what happens when a bisexual mermaid and stone butch princess whose paths were never supposed to cross meet and fall in love? Read this book and find out! The Fate of Stars is everything I could’ve ever wanted in a f/f fantasy novel. Magic, mermaids, and enemies to lovers? Sign me the fuck up, honestly. I could write an essay length review of the banter alone, but I’ll spare you (for now). 

On a more serious note, I loved this book and story. One thing that really stood out to me was that the author handled the inherent power imbalance in the relationship with such nuance, and even had the characters explicitly discuss it between themselves! I’ve never seen that in a book like this, and it was much appreciated.

The Fate of Stars is available now on Kindle Unlimited! 

The other two books in the Sea & Stars trilogy, Heart of Silver Flame (Book 2) and Death’s Abyss (Book 3) are available for pre-order, and will be out in June & July, respectively.

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The Fate of Stars At a Glance:
Genre: High Fantasy, Lesbian Romance
Themes/Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Swords & Sorcery, Butch/Femme, Taming the Beast/Thawing the Ice Queen
LGBT Rep? Yep! The main character, Tallora, is a bisexual mermaid. Her eventual love interest is a stone butch lesbian.
Own Voices? Yes!
Content Warnings (CW): References to suicide, infertility (and trauma surrounding it), emotionally abusive parents, a few instances of graphic violence, threats of sexual assault (but no actual assault)

Note: In the interest of full disclosure, I was a beta reader for the entire Sea & Stars trilogy, but I’d honestly be raving about The Fate of Stars just as much if I hadn’t been. 

Also, how gorgeous is this special edition alternate cover?

In the Dream House: A Memoir by Carmen Maria Machado

“Putting language to something for which you have no language is no easy feat.”
★★★★★

In the Dream House is such an excellent, beautifully written book that I don’t feel capable of writing a review that does it justice. 

Machado’s writing is lyrical and complex and layered, and hearing her read it aloud in audiobook form was transformative for me. She recounts the tale of her own same sex intimate partner abuse, seamlessly weaving in references to history, pop culture, and archival works. The entire time I listened I just kept getting the feeling that I was experiencing something groundbreaking and vitally important. Everyone should read In the Dream House, no matter their age, sexual orientation, race, gender, or typical reading preferences.

Synopsis:
“In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado’s engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming.

And it’s that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope—the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman—through which Machado holds the events up to the light and examines them from different angles. She looks back at her religious adolescence, unpacks the stereotype of lesbian relationships as safe and utopian, and widens the view with essayistic explorations of the history and reality of abuse in queer relationships.

Machado’s dire narrative is leavened with her characteristic wit, playfulness, and openness to inquiry. She casts a critical eye over legal proceedings, fairy tales, Star Trek, and Disney villains, as well as iconic works of film and fiction. The result is a wrenching, riveting book that explodes our ideas about what a memoir can do and be.”

Final thoughts: In the Dream House is a brilliant piece of literature, but it is also extraordinarily heavy and difficult to read. I highly recommend you check it out, but please read with care. I found it helpful to take my time with this one and limited myself to a few chapters per day.

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Note: I haven’t formally reviewed any non-fiction books yet, but the ‘at a glance’ template I use for fiction didn’t feel right for Dream House, so I’ve adjusted it slightly.

In the Dream House At a Glance:
Genre: Memoir
LGBT Rep? Yes. In the Dream House explores Machado’s personal experience of being in an abusive relationship with another woman.
Own Voices? Yes. Machado is also a WOC (woman of color).
Content Warnings (CWs): Descriptions of intimate partner abuse (both emotional & physical), trauma, gaslighting. Honestly, it’s a very heavy book and it would be impossible to fit all of the CWs into a short list. Read it, but read with care.