Happy last Wednesday of the month, and welcome to another WWW Wednesday! I enjoyed doing this challenge from Taking on a World of Words a handful of times last year, and thought it might be fun to partake once a month in 2024. I didn’t think it was possible, but I have surpassed the total number of books read in January. I revisited a bestselling fantasy series, started a long-awaited new release, and delved into some important life topics. Hope you enjoy!
WWW Wednesday
WWW Wednesday is a weekly challenge or tag for bookish bloggers. It’s used to share:
- What you’ve just finished reading
- What you’re currently reading
- What you plan to read next
What I just finished reading
So Let Them Burn – Kamilah Cole
This is one of the books that I’d really like to purchase an actual copy of at some point. I loved how the author takes real-world issues and deals with them in a fantasy setting. When it’s done well, this is one of my favorite things an author can do, and this author did so well! While there is a female-female romantic relationship in the book , it isn’t overdone in my opinion, and I so loved the rest of the story.
Whip-smart and immersive, this Jamaican-inspired fantasy follows a gods-blessed heroine who’s forced to choose between saving her sister or protecting her homeland.
Faron Vincent can channel the power of the gods. Five years ago, she used her divine magic to liberate her island from its enemies, the dragon-riding Langley Empire. But now, at seventeen, Faron is all powered up with no wars to fight. She’s a legend to her people and a nuisance to her neighbors.
When she’s forced to attend an international peace summit, Faron expects that she will perform tricks like a trained pet and then go home. She doesn’t expect her older sister, Elara, forming an unprecedented bond with an enemy dragon—or the gods claiming the only way to break that bond is to kill her sister.
As Faron’s desperation to find another solution takes her down a dark path, and Elara discovers the shocking secrets at the heart of the Langley Empire, both must make difficult choices that will shape each other’s lives, as well as the fate of their world.
The Book That Broke the World – Mark Lawrence
We fight for the people we love. We fight for the ideas we want to be true.
Evar and Livira stand side by side and yet far beyond each other’s reach. Evar is forced to flee the library, driven before an implacable foe. Livira, trapped in a ghost world, has to recover her book if she’s to return to her life. While Evar’s journey leads him outside into the vastness of a world he’s never seen, Livira’s destination lies deep inside her own writing, where she must wrestle with her stories in order to reclaim the volume in which they were written.
And all the while, the library quietly weaves thread to thread, bringing the scattered elements of Livira’s old life – friends and foe alike – back together beneath new skies.
Long ago, a lie was told, and with the passing years it has grown and spread, a small push leading to a chain of desperate consequences. Now, as one edifice topples into the next with ever-growing violence, it threatens to break the world. The secret war that defines the library has chosen its champions and set them on the board. The time has come when they must fight for what they believe, or lose everything.
The Library Trilogy is about many things: adventure, discovery, and romance, but it’s also a love letter to books and the places where they live. The focus is on one vast and timeless library, but the love expands to encompass smaller more personal collections, and bookshops of all shades too.
At the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness – Andrew Peterson
Found this series at the Mardel and decided to go ahead and buy it — and got an autograph from the producer of the animated series on the same day! Had heard good things about these books, and they did not disappoint. Although you can tell it’s written for children, I loved all the quips and clever details that the author included. He even has footnotes! So nerdy and cool XD.
Once, in a cottage above the cliffs on the Dark Sea of Darkness, there lived three children and their trusty dog Nugget. Janner Igiby, his brother Tink, their crippled sister Leeli are gifted children as all children are, loved well by a noble mother and ex-pirate grandfather. But they will need all their gifts and all that love to survive the evil pursuit of the venomous Fangs of Dang who have crossed the dark sea to rule the land with malice and pursue the Igibys who hold the secret to the lost legend and jewels of good King Wingfeather of the Shining Isle of Anniera.
Andrew Peterson spins a quirky and riveting tale of the Igibys’ extraordinary journey from Glipwood’s Dragon Day Festival and a secret hidden in the Books and Crannies Bookstore, past the terrifying Black Carriage, clutches of the horned hounds and loathsome toothy cows surrounding AnkleJelly Manor, through the Glipwood Forest and mysterious treehouse of Peet the Sock Man (known for a little softshoe and wearing tattered socks on his hands and arms), to the very edge of the Ice Prairies.
Full of characters rich in heart, smarts, and courage, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness presents a world of wonder and a tale children of all ages will cherish, families can read aloud, and readers’ groups are sure to discuss for its layers of meaning about life’s true treasure and tangle of the beautiful and horrible, temporal and eternal, and good and bad.
So This is Love – Elizabeth Lim
I listened to this audiobook mostly because I was running out of things to read (imagine that lol), and I absolutely loved it! the author did a really great job of dealing with all the issues traditional fairy tales have (“WHY would you get engaged to a man YOU JUST MET?!” for example), and it had a couple of really lovely moments in it. I also read a couple more books in the Disney Twisted Tales series, but this one is by far my favorite.
Unable to prove that she’s the missing princess, and unable to bear life under Lady Tremaine any longer, Cinderella starts work at the palace as a seamstress. However, when Cinderella finds herself witness to a grand conspiracy to take the king – and the prince – out of power, she is faced with questions of love and loyalty to the kingdom. Cinderella must find a way to stop the villains of past and present… before it’s too late.
Goodreads
What I’m currently reading
How Harry Cast His Spell – John Granger
Found this one at HPB while I was hunting for Maze Runner books and I’m super excited about it; this guy does what I do here, but in a whole book! So cool!
More than any other book of the last fifty years (and perhaps ever), the Harry Potter novels have captured the imagination of children and adults around the world. Yet no one has ever been able to unlock the secret of Harry’s wild popularity . . . until now. Updated and expanded since its original publication as Looking for God in Harry Potter (and now containing final conclusions based on the entire series), How Harry Cast His Spell explains why the books meet our longing to experience the truths of life, love, and death; help us better understand life and our role in the universe; and encourage us to discover and develop our own gifts and abilities.
Goodreads
Song of Silver, Flame Like Night – Amélie When Zhao
In a fallen kingdom, one girl carries the key to discovering the secrets of her nation’s past—and unleashing the demons that sleep at its heart. An epic fantasy series inspired by the mythology and folklore of ancient China.
Once, Lan had a different name. Now she goes by the one the Elantian colonizers gave her when they invaded her kingdom, killed her mother, and outlawed her people’s magic. She spends her nights as a songgirl in Haak’gong, a city transformed by the conquerors, and her days scavenging for what she can find of the past. Anything to understand the strange mark burned into her arm by her mother in her last act before she died.
The mark is mysterious—an untranslatable Hin character—and no one but Lan can see it. Until the night a boy appears at her teahouse and saves her life.
Zen is a practitioner—one of the fabled magicians of the Last Kingdom. Their magic was rumored to have been drawn from the demons they communed with. Magic believed to be long lost. Now it must be hidden from the Elantians at all costs.
When Zen comes across Lan, he recognizes what she is: a practitioner with a powerful ability hidden in the mark on her arm. He’s never seen anything like it—but he knows that if there are answers, they lie deep in the pine forests and misty mountains of the Last Kingdom, with an order of practitioning masters planning to overthrow the Elantian regime.
Both Lan and Zen have secrets buried deep within—secrets they must hide from others, and secrets that they themselves have yet to discover. Fate has connected them, but their destiny remains unwritten. Both hold the power to liberate their land. And both hold the power to destroy the world.
Now the battle for the Last Kingdom begins.
What I want to read next
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faerie
I found this book at a small local book store (the second one actually lol), and love the premise of it. To me, it sounds like a female-and-faerie version of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Since I’m disappointed that we’ll probably never have closure of that particular storyline, this book series sounds like a delightful alternative.
A curmudgeonly professor journeys to a small town in the far north to study faerie folklore and discovers dark fae magic, friendship, and love in the start of a heartwarming and enchanting new fantasy series.
Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world’s first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party–or even get invited to one. And she prefers the company of her books, her dog, and the Fair Folk.
So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of Emily’s research, and utterly confound and frustrate her.
But as Emily gets closer and closer to uncovering the secrets of the Hidden Ones–the most elusive of all faeries–lurking in the shadowy forest outside the town, she also finds herself on the trail of another mystery: Who is Wendell Bambleby, and what does he really want? To find the answer, she’ll have to unlock the greatest mystery of all–her own heart.
Storm Runner – J. C. Cervantes
Zane has always enjoyed exploring the dormant volcano near his home in New Mexico, even though hiking it is challenging. He’d much rather hang out there with his dog, Rosie, than go to middle school, where kids call him Sir Limps a Lot, McGimpster, or Uno — for his one good leg. What Zane doesn’t know is that the volcano is a gateway to another world and he is at the center of a powerful prophecy.
A new girl at school, Brooks, informs him that he’s destined to release an evil god from the ancient Maya relic he is imprisoned in — unless she can find and remove it first. Together they return to the volcano, where all kinds of crazy happens. Brooks turns into a hawk, a demon attacks them in a cave, and Rosie gives her all while trying to protect Zane. When Zane decides to save his dog no matter the cost, he is thrust into an adventure full of surprising discoveries, dangerous secrets, and an all-out war between the gods, one of whom happens to be his father. To survive, Zane will have to become the Storm Runner. But how can he run when he can’t even walk well without a cane?
Feisty heroes, tricky gods, murderous demons, and spirited giants are just some of the pleasures that await in this fresh and funny take on Maya mythology, as rich and delicious as a mug of authentic hot chocolate.
Give Me A Sign – Anna Sortino
Lilah is stuck in the middle. At least, that’s what having a hearing loss seems like sometimes—when you don’t feel “deaf enough” to identify as Deaf or hearing enough to meet the world’s expectations. But this summer, Lilah is ready for a change.
When Lilah becomes a counselor at a summer camp for the deaf and blind, her plan is to brush up on her ASL. Once there, she also finds a community. There are cute British lifeguards who break hearts but not rules, a YouTuber who’s just a bit desperate for clout, the campers Lilah’s responsible for (and overwhelmed by)—and then there’s Isaac, the dreamy Deaf counselor who volunteers to help Lilah with her signing.
Romance was never on the agenda, and Lilah’s not positive Isaac likes her that way. But all signs seem to point to love. Unless she’s reading them wrong? One thing’s for sure: Lilah wanted change, and things here are certainly different than what she’s used to.
In her sweet and swoony debut, Anna Sortino delivers a poignant coming-of-age story and a revelatory exploration of Deaf culture, its vastness, and its beautiful complexities.
The Story of With
I was recommended this book by one of the Christian authors I follow on Instagram, and I really, really want to read it!
We go through the day without much much hope, without dreams being realized, without deep friendships, and without experiencing the active presence of God. We’re told to run faster, do more, chase success. But we know deep down that isn’t the answer.
There is a better way to live, love, and create.
You don’t need to downsize your dreams. You don’t need more lessons. You need an awakened heart. And that starts by realizing the very things you’re most passionate about are actually your invitation into a life of deeper identity, intimacy, and imagination with God. As you discover who you were created to be, you’ll join a growing bohemian fellowship pursuing their heart and art in new ways.
The Story of With is your roadmap for understanding your story (it’s far more mythic than you might think) and dreaming bigger dreams. It’s a fantastical allegory fused with practical application that offers fresh perspective, restored hope, and a rebirth of creativity. It’s a journey into greater freedom, bigger dreams, and truer success.
Conclusion
I hope you’ve enjoyed this month’s WWW Wednesday post. What are you currently reading? Have any recommendations for me? I’d love to add to my mental TBR pile!
Happy reading!
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