#stephanie burgis

[wearethekat]

February Book Reviews: Wooing the Witch Queen by Stephanie Burgis

I've always liked Burgis' work, and this romantasy was one of my anticipated titles for 2025. In Wooing the Witch Queen, abused puppet ruler Archduke Felix flees the control of his regent and attempts to beg sanctuary at the court of his country's rival, the wicked Queen Saskia. Unfortunately, in an unexpected turn of events, Saskia mistakes him as a dark wizard applying to be her librarian and installs him the castle.

Wooing the Witch Queen was an absolute souffle and a delight to read. Burgis nearly dodges the clichéd (and heavily traditionally gendered) traditional m/f romance dynamic. Here, Queen Saskia is bi with a female ex she's still friends with, and shy Felix is explicitly into the dark Queen, beautiful and terrible as the dawn thing. I also think the sillier farce elements were handled well--yes, it is absurd that Saskia mistakes her apparent archnemesis for a librarian applicant and an evil wizard. But it's convincing enough misunderstanding that you don't question it. Poor Felix tries to sort out the confusion several times, only to walk into Saskia going on about how much she hates the Archduke, which understandably keeps him from confessing.

The political background was a touch thin, but solid enough to support a plot that's mostly romance. In this book, the focus is on personal relationships rather than systemic issues or political machinations. Saskia's alliance with two other queens is because they are personally friends and get together to hang out. Felix's loss of control of his realm is because his regent has abused him since he was a child. And so on and so forth.

Overall, a delight . Highly recommended for romance fans who enjoyed T Kingfisher's romantasy or books by Sharon Shinn. It's clear that Burgis left the ending open to do a romance for each of the other two queens who are friends with Saskia, and I look forward to reading them.

[checkoutmybookshelf]

You Have My Attention: The Harwood Spellbook First Lines

Stephanie Burgis's reimagined, magical, and gender role-swapped regency fantasy novella series is honestly one of my favorites. They're sweet and fluffy and a truly delight to read. But as with any author, Burgis has to catch her readers with those first few sentences. So let's see how she does it!

The evening of the Spring Equinox was cool and balmy, just as the weather wizards had--for once!--reliably predicted. The glittering guest list for the Harwoods' annual ball was exactly to Amy Standish's design. As she prepared to descend into the lake that gently rippled, reflecting the full moon and stars, outside the grandeur of Harwood House, Amy knew she had organized the most important night of her life to absolute perfection. The only tiny, insignificant task left to do was to propose marriage to the right man by the end of this evening. Then she would finally win everything she had ever dreamed of, and it would be utterly perfect. She knew it.

-- Spellswept

Of course, a sensible woman would never have accepted the invitation in the first place. To attend a week-long house party filled with bickering gentleman magicians, ruthless cutthroat lady politicians, and worst of all, my own infuriating ex-fiancé? Scarcely two months after I had scandalized all of our most intimate friends by jilting him? Utter madness.

-- Snowspelled

It was bad enough to be deprived of my new husband before our wedding night. It was utterly unjust to be tormented by nightmares weeks afterward as I slept, still alone, in our marital bed. For the ninth morning in a row, I woke up gasping and clawing at my throat, fighting to yank piercing thorns out from my skin...thorns that, of course, existed nowhere but in my dreams.

-- Thornbound

Dressing for a ball would always be a challenge for any lady who found it easier to analyze--from memory--an obscure spell from two centuries ago than to remember which sleeve lengths were currently fashionable across the nation. But dressing for a ball at Angland's first women's college of magic, where at least half the dancers were certain to add competitive spellwork to their costume and the enigmatic local fey were likely to make an appearance? That raised the standards--and the stakes--enormously.

-- Moontangled

There was this much to be said, Honoria supposed, for comprehensive public and personal ruin: once all that she'd ever cared about had been ripped from her grasp, she no longer had anything left to fear.

-- Spellcloaked

There was a fine line between ambition and foolishness, and I had spent most of my life walking it. Still, as looked around the crowded, fey-lit dining tables at Thornfell College of Magic for Young Women on the eve of our second Winter Solstice, I was forced to admit that--just this once--I might have aimed my goals a bit too high.

-- Frostgilded

[fairytalejello]

My Little Pony Color Challenge - A Real Page Turner

The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart and The Girl with the Dragon Heart by Stephanie Burgis were both so much fun. 💜

[blog-i-carry-your-heart-with-me]

I am a sucker for truly soft, adoring, devoted male love interests. I am even more of a sucker for women with tremendous power getting to keep it all. Which is to say, this was absolutely my cup of tea.

[nzbookwyrm]

February 2025

[jonathanpongratz]

Book Review: The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart (Tales from the Chocolate Heart #1)

  Hello chocoholics and chocolatiers! It’s time for another book review. This time I chose to read The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart (Tales from the Chocolate Heart #1) by Stephanie Burgis. I needed some cozy fantasy for my grad school assignment, and this one definitely fit the bill. I mean, who doesn’t like chocolate? Let’s get this review started!     Blurb Aventurine is a brave young dragon…

[terapsina]

Book asks: 12, 23, 26

Ask Game

12. which book will you read next?

My to-be-read list is quite extensive so I haven't settled on my next book but it's probably going to be one of these three.

It kinda depends on what my mood's going to be after I finish the middle grade audiobook I'm currently listening to.

If I feel like a light, fun adventure with a woman who was the brightest magician of her age until she lost her magic (and was the only woman accepted in the Victorian(ish)-time magic university) but now has opened a school for female magicians? Then the second book in The Harwood Spellbook series.

(also depends if I'm feeling like audiobook or not, the narrator in the first book was excellent so I'm planning to read the second book by listening too).

If however I want something heavier and completely new then Elatsoe looks like it's a very interesting read. A queer fantasy book focusing on a main character from a Lipan Apache family who can raise the ghosts of dead animals? Sign me up.

But yeah, I feel like that one will require more mental and emotional space in me, so I'll need to be in the right frame of mind.

And finally, if I feel like checking out the newest Brandon Sanderson book (which I've heard is getting excellent reviews). I'll read Yumi and the Nightmare Painter.

23. what book to movie adaptation do you love?

The Martian by Andy Weir. Great book, great movie. Had a lot of fun with both.

-

Matilda by Roald Dahl. I've got a special place in my heart for that book because it's actually the first book I ever read. And the movie was everything that kid!me wanted it to be (including the ending, I'm still glad they changed Matilda's ending to not losing her power).

-

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. And its absolutely perfect 2005 adaptation (though this is a bit of a cheat as I watched the movie first, but as it inspired me to immediately go read the book I'm going to count it).

26. do you use libby? (or other)

No. It's unfortunately unavailable in my country.

I do subscribe to Scribd, but I know that's not the same.

[autumn2may]

Today our judges review Stephanie Burgis' Scales and Sensibility for this year's Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off (SPFBO) finals! 🐉

Background image by Ivana Djudic.

[bookcoversonly]

Title: Frostgilded | Author: Stephanie Burgis | Publisher: Five Fathoms Press (2020)

[ghosthermione-reads]

Wooing the Witch Queen

I originally knew Stephanie Burgis as a children's writer, but I've been reading her romances for a while now and they never fail to disappoint. I especially like the recurring trope of "Person is rumoured to be a complete monster but is actually a cutie patootie"!

The Plot

Queen Saskia is the wicked sorceress everyone fears. After successfully wrestling the throne from her evil uncle, she only wants one thing: to keep her people safe from the empire next door. For that, she needs to spend more time in her laboratory experimenting with her spells. She definitely doesn’t have time to bring order to her chaotic library of magic.

When a mysterious dark wizard arrives at her castle, Saskia hires him as her new librarian on the spot. “Fabian” is sweet and a little nerdy, and his requests seem a little strange – what in the name of Divine Elva is a fountain pen? – but he’s getting the job done. And if he writes her flirtatious poetry and his innocent touch makes her skin singe, well…

Little does Saskia know that the "wizard" she’s falling for is actually an Imperial archduke in disguise, with no magical training whatsoever. On the run, with perilous secrets on his trail and a fast growing yearning for the wicked sorceress, he's in danger from her enemies and her newfound allies, too. When his identity is finally revealed, will their love save or doom each other? 

The Review

I won an ARC in Stephanie Burgis's newsletter raffle, and I couldn't wait to get to it! I'm very happy she's getting published by Tor, as her books deserve it.

It's sweet, it's fast paced enough and yet you still get to see cute little scenes, there's books and a pet raven involved, and the two main characters are each loads of fun. At the same time, it deals with the heavy issue of abusive families, in a way that I found quite cathartic.

Also, this reader enjoys bisexual main characters in romance, who don't end up "choosing" a side when they pick a love interest! it shouldn't need saying but it still does sooooo this book gets all the points.

I'm looking forward to the two more books hinted at in the series! I forgot how reading ARCs means you have to wait longer for the next one...

[emiline-northeto]

I had a lovely time this week getting into an October mood rereading Good Neighbors: The Full Collection, by Stephanie Burgis. It's a charming and delightful closed-door romance (four connected stories) between a metal-working magic user and a necromancer and there's a lot of found family and found community. The main romance is f/m, and there are side queer romances. One of the things I really like about these stories is there is a lot of kindness and goodness in them, and people banding together against cruelty and evil.

Now onto a reread of "Dangerous Flames", which is another story in the same universe, with an f/f romance.

(Stephanie Burgis originally published the four stories separately, and one of the individual stories is called "Good Neighbors", so if you want to read all four, excluding "Dangerous Flames" which isn't in the full collection version as it was published later and focuses on secondary characters, make sure your get Good Neighbors: The Full Collection and not just "Good Neighbors").

[wearethekat]

November Book Reviews: A Marriage of Undead Inconvenience by Stephanie Burgis

I decided to read this novella since I've enjoyed Burgis' middle-grade and I was interested to see what her works for adults would be like. Ferocious academic Margaret has been forced into marriage by her unpleasant family—to a grouchy vampire, who she finds has also been blackmailed into marriage.

This was a fun little souffle of a book, just right at the novella length. Arranged political marriage is my kryptonite trope, and it was played nicely here. Margaret is a doctoral student, and her practicality and single-minded devotion to her research—to the extent of dangerously ignoring faculty politics—is a delight. Lord Riven is less of an original personality, but he's sensible and tends more towards at being annoyed at being woken up for this nonsense vampire rather than the pushy and possessive type. The pair's eventual unravelling of the plot behind their Situation (tm) is very satisfying.

Recommended if you'd enjoy a light romance in a fantasy setting with some great characters.

[checkoutmybookshelf]

Sometimes That Hard Left is the Best Choice

Gender swapping is an I-don't-think-uncommon media trope at this point. However, this book doesn't swap genders, it swaps gender roles, which I actually think is even more interesting. Add that to a regency setting, magic, and the aftermath of a terrible, academically hunristic accident and you kind of tick several of my very specific boxes. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this novella. Let's talk Snowspelled.

So in honor of our protagonist, let's be a little bit academic and define our terms. Gender swapping is when a character is imagined in a different gender (most typically a make to female or vice versa swap in traditionally published literature but can and should be conceived to be a swap from one gender identity to another, inclusive of trans and nonbinary gender idenities) in a retelling, revival, adaptation, or even fanfic. This is about reimagining characters.

Gender role swapping, on the other hand, is about how society imagines gender roles. Gender roles are generally (and broadly) described as a series of traits and/or attitudes that a specific gender should ideally have or embody according to a specific culture's norms. Again, this is often imagined on a male/female binary, but can and should be imagined more broadly and inclusively for nonbinary, trans, and intersex gender identities. So to put it simply, while a gender swap is about individual characters on an individual level (and such a character may also take on the gender role of their new gender or not, as the author and story desire), a gender role swapped story is society focused. The characters are whatever genders they are, but the roles are what change. So for Snowspelled, this means that in a regency setting and culture, it's MEN who can be compromised, not women. Men are not expected to be involved in politics, women are. The society and societal expectations have changed from real-world standard, rather than a character being reimagined.

So when Cassandra Harwood is her society's first female magic user educated at the major institution and also the first female magic user to burn herself out, she is transgressing the gender roles of her society. She is also in just so, so much pain because she burned herself out via academic hubris and a desire to be recognized for her own merits that was so strong it turned self-damaging. In the process, she also jilted her fiancé Rajaram Wrexham, convinced her brother and sister-in-law that if she wasn't watched she would try to do more magic and actually kill herself this time, and lost her entire raison d'etre. Cassandra is not ok, and thanks to that, she ends up accidentally making a deal with a HELLA sketchy fae lord who is super excited to take her back to faerieland and hunt her for sport when she fails.

Wrexham is objectively not having that though. He is still head over heels for Cassandra, despite being pushed away HARD, and he is very much here to help her figure out how not to end up hunted to death. Also here to help Cassandra are Amy (her pregnant sister-in-law), Jonathan (her brother), and Misses Fennell and Banks (a couple who are working toward becoming the new political power couple but need training first). Admittedly, Misses Fennell and Banks are less explicitly there to help, but they are the route to Cassandra finding a new purpose in life.

Overall, I adored the gender role swap conceit of this book paired with the recovery from a catastrophic error. Cassandra was an immediately sympathetic protagonist to follow, and watching her pull herself out of the hole she dug without judgement and while letting go of her own self-loathing was really compelling. I felt like I only got a little bit of a taste of the world, but the worldbuilding was compelling enough that I very much wanted more, and will absolutely be reading the rest of the books in the series.

[betterbooksandthings]

"Windswept hair, bone-chilling cauldrons, and more magic than you know what to do with are par for the course with delightful witchy romances. Fall is the season of the witch, and these romances will satisfy your every witchy desire.

Witch romances might as well be as old as time itself. Sundry medieval history of witchcraft books lists the many times witchy women have been accused of tempting men (and demons) with their feminine wiles. Witches have been figures of prophecy, power, and more generalized magic in poems, plays, and literature for a reason. They work as an easy shorthand for mystical danger. Witches pop up again and again in romance because of this history.

After all, women who have access to uncontrolled power falling in love is an endlessly interesting combination. With the most recent wave of paranormals coming back to haunt everyone’s bookshelves, there are more witchy romances than ever. The real trick is knowing which ones are worth your time. Because I love them, there is nothing more disappointing than reading witchy romances and not enjoying them.

I like a witch romance where their powers are relevant to the story and have an impact on both the witch’s character and their eventual romantic relationship with whomever they fall in love with. As a fan of early 2000s paranormal, I tend to like a bit of plot too. The following delightful witchy romances are a mere sampling of my favorites, but I hope you have a fun time with them nonetheless."

[pendragyn]

Kobo sure knows how to grab my attention lol dragons and Seanan and Joy, oh my!

[nzbookwyrm]

August 2024