Charlotte Kersten

A few years ago, I started collecting a giant list of fantasy/sci-fi books focused heavily on themes of trauma and recovery due to that being an area of passion for me and one I was focusing heavily on while working on my own writing. The list has gotten longer and longer, but I’ve been chipping away at it and I thought I’d check in to talk about some of the most notable books I’ve read so far!

Favorites I’ve read so far:

• The Alchemy of Stone by Ekaterina Sedia
  • An automaton alchemist grapples for freedom from her creator in a Victorian-esque city on the edge of revolution.
  • I absolutely adored the sweet, earnest main character, the unique setting/magic, and the bittersweet ending.
  • Full review
• The Enchanted by Rene Denfeld
  • Magical realism about a man on death row reflecting on the world’s beauty and an investigator trying to save another inmate’s life before he is executed.
  • The writing is amazing and it explores violence, punishment, and the humanity of “monsters” in a way that feels extremely relevant and resonant to me. Highly recommended to anyone who liked Notes on an Execution by Danya Kukafka. 
  • Full review
• How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu
  • A series of interconnected short stories following characters in a world transformed by a deadly pandemic, stretching hundreds of years into the future.
  • The author’s vision of a world transformed by death and capitalism is fascinating, some of the stories are extraordinarily beautiful, and I loved the hints towards the ultimate speculative elements that tie things together.
  • Full review
• Heart’s Blood by Juliet Marillier
  • A Beauty and the Beast retelling set in ancient Ireland where a scribe has to unravel the curse on the man she loves and his castle.
  • Juliet Marillier’s romances always make me cry (on a spectrum from sniffling to hysterical sobbing) but the elements of the two slowly, gently coming to trust and support each other through their respective struggles/fears might make this my favorite of her romances that I’ve read so far.
  • Full review
• The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet
  • A girl discovers that she is a seer and gets entrapped in her mad teacher’s horrific scheme to ignite a war with their magic; she fights to stop him and free herself from his power.
  • This is very, very dark and ultimately tragic, but the depiction of the main character’s struggle and resistance is written with what I think is incredible power and I think about the book’s ending almost every day.
  • Full review
• Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan
  • A retelling of the fairy tale Snow White and Rose Red where an abused girl escapes into a strange world where she can raise her daughters in peace and safety. The real world starts to encroach, and they all have to decide what kind of world they want to live in.
  • The relationships that form between the main character, her daughters and several other women in the book are wonderful and I love how it explores living a life that is safe vs authentic. It’s strange and painful and deeply compassionate toward its main character.
  • Full review
• Archivist Wasp series by Nicole Kornher-Stace
  • In a post-apocalyptic world filled with many dangers, the main character runs away from her cult and teams up with the ghost of a supersoldier who will help her survive in exchange for her helping him find another ghost whom he can barely remember.
  • I love how strange and interesting the world and magic are, and the relationships between the main character, the supersoldier ghost and the character they set out to rescue are incredible.
  • First book review, second book review
• Tehanu by Ursula Le Guin
  • Tenar from The Tombs of Atuan is now a middle-aged widow. She takes in a little girl who was abused and develops a relationship with the wizard Ged after he loses his power; together, they create a new kind of life.
  • Le Guin’s goal was to explore Earthsea from the perspective of those without power who had been overlooked in her previous books, and what follows is an incredible meditation on power, gender, trauma healing, and how the world can change for the better when oppression is so deeply entrenched.
  • Full review
• Thorn by Intisar Khanani
  • A YA retelling of The Goose Girl in a Middle Eastern-inspired setting where a timid princess must find her inner strength to claim her place and do what is right.
  • All of Khanani’s books are focused on brave, deeply principled girls finding ways to fight against injustice, but I love the main character’s quiet, gradual transformation in this book, the lovely writing, and the understated romance.
  • Full review
• The Red Abbey Chronicles by Maria Turtschaninoff
  • The Red Abbey is a haven of learning for women in a violent world. This trilogy explores the lives of the women who escaped from an evil king’s possession to create the abbey, life at the abbey, and the adventures of one of its students, Maresi, when she returns to her home village to try to share what she learned.
  • These books are passionate about the relationship between feminism and education and talk about women’s experiences of oppression and resilience with a lot of insight and care. They are also very beautifully written and atmospheric.
  • First book review, second book review, third book review

Honorable mentions that almost made the cut for favorites: The Forgotten Beasts of Eld by Patricia McKillip, The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold, Damsel by Elana K Arnold

Least favorite books I’ve read so far:

• The Haunting of Alejandra by V Castro
  • A severely depressed housewife realizes that the women in her family are being haunted by La Llorona and she works with her therapist to free herself and protect her children.
  • This felt like a very early draft because of how a rough the writing and characterization were and how clumsy/heavy-handed the themes were. I think it could have eventually become good because of the strong premise but it needed a lot more refining to get there.
  • Full review
• Rose Madder by Stephen King
  • A woman flees her monstrous husband and creates a new life for herself with the help of a strange, magical painting.
  • This was way too long, extremely boring in parts, and much too focused on the lame instalove romance between the main character and this guy she meets after running away. I was just lowkey irritated all throughout reading it.
  • Full review
• The Surface Breaks by Louise O’Neill
  • A YA retelling of The Little Mermaid 
  • This was super heavy-handed in its feminism but simultaneously very muddled in how it conveyed its messages, which ended up undermining what it was trying to do quite a bit. The writing was strange and most of the book is just the main character bandaging her rotting feet while she pines after a random boy.
  • Full review
• Daughter of the Blood by Anne Bishop
  • The ruler of Hell and his sons fight to protect a young girl who is destined to the the Witch who will save the world…or something!
  • ???????? This was just hilariously bad WTF-ery through and through with comically gratuitous sexual violence and torture directed at every single character on every possible occasion with zero insight and the creepiest EVER not-even-pseudo-pedophilic relationship between an ancient dude the author is clearly desperately horny for and a special, prophesied girl.
  • Full review
• Wolfsong by TJ Klune
  • It’s Twilight fanfiction but just with gay werewolves, basically.
  • I haven’t been this annoyed by a book in a long time; I just found everything about it deeply grating and off-putting. The weird obsessive primal mate age-gap romance, the juvenile attempts at humor, the repetitive writing…just not for me in any way at all.
  • Full review
• Gild by Raven Kennedy
  • A romantasy retelling of King Midas where a woman who can turn anything to gold eventually fights to free herself from the evil king whose consort she has been for years. 
  • Second place for hilariously bad WTF-ery, ALSO featuring comically gratuitous sexual violence (albeit with a little more introspection about it than Daughter of the Blood); it quickly jumps on the possessive alpha Fae mate bandwagon and has very awkward purple prose.
  • Full review
• A Court of Thorns and Roses series by Sarah J Maas
  • A Beauty and the Beast/Ballad of Tam Lin retelling with Fae expands in scope to an epic war and orgasms that cause avalanches.
  • Just know that Rhysand remains my mortal enemy but I’m like 10% more normal about it now since my rant about him went viral and I got some external validation
  • No reviews, only Rhysand rant
• Lady Macbeth by Ava Reid
  • Fails as a Macbeth retelling, a feminist story, a story about sexual violence, a romance, and a book in general…I haven’t been this actively irritated by a book in a long time because of the massive gap between what it thinks it’s doing and what it does
  • Full review

Special shoutout – not my absolute favorites, but books that I enjoyed and think are particularly unique/cool/underrated

• The Balance Academy series by SE Robertson
  • Follows the development of a friendship between two healers forced to work together in a traveling caravan; they ultimately settle in the same town and continue to learn and grow together.
  • Thoughtful, cozy, deep characterization, explorations of culture clash, art, religion, mental health and making the world a better place. The blossoming relationship between the two main characters feels incredibly earned and real. My claim to fame is that I got to beta read the third book and it was super fun!
  • First book review, second book review
• Black Wine by Candas Jane Dorsey
  • Unravels the mysterious past of an enslaved girl with no memories as a revolution unfolds in a violent, bizarre world.
  • Super weird, fascinating writing, world and exploration of cultures, and the story that’s ultimately revealed is very powerful. That being said, definitely not for the faint of heart and I still don’t understand what happens at the very end.
  • Full review
• God Stalk by PC Hodgell
  • A girl with no memory finds herself exploring a strange city full of forgotten gods to learn more about her past and destiny.
  • THANK YOU to whoever told me this would fill the Planescape: Torment-shaped hole in my heart. It’s a perfect fit for anyone who loves weird labyrinthine cities full of strange characters and secrets. I’m not quite sure why it was rec’d for this reading project yet, but I will be reading on to find out.
  • Full review
• Black Water Sister by Zen Cho
  • A closeted millennial woman reluctantly moves back to Malaysia with her family and realizes she’s being haunted by the ghost of her intractable grandmother. She has to help her grandmother take down a gang leader and survive the world of spirits in the process.
  • I love Zen Cho’s wry, clever writing and how she writes “difficult” women with so much finesse and affection, and I like how this uses ghosts/haunting to explore the legacy of violence against women.
  • Full review
• Cloud and Ashes by Greer Gilman
  • This is a collection of short stories and a novella about the intricate mythology Greer Gilman created in a world somewhat analogous to ancient England. All I can really say “plot-wise” is that a girl escapes her strange existence as a sacrifice and the world changes because of it.
  • The writing in this is very archaic and difficult to understand, especially the dialogue, but it’s also unlike anything I’ve ever read and completely extraordinary. I read this with a friend and we spent a lot of time piecing together the mythology and magic together.
  • Mini-review
• Slow River by Nicola Griffith
  • After being kidnapped as ransom for her wealthy family, the main character finds her way out of a toxic relationship with a deeply magnetic woman and finds a life for herself working at a water plant in a sci-fi future.
  • I absorbed absolutely nothing about how the book’s water plant works (Griffith goes into this in a lot of detail) but I really liked how the book explored the main character’s complicated family dynamics and gradual process of finding peace with herself after leaving her partner.
  • Full review
• Midnight Robber by Nalo Hopkinson
  • Exiled on a prison colony world with her abusive father, a girl finds refuge with the world’s alien creatures and takes on the identity of the mythical Midnight Robber to fight for justice.
  • I love how this blended Caribbean myths and very unique sci-fi elements, especially how the writing included Anglopatwa and folk tales throughout. The main character grows and uses the Midnight Robber secret identity in a very interesting way.
  • Full review
• The Sparrow and Children of God by Mary Doria Russell
  • Follows a disastrous Jesuit mission to an alien planet after scientists discover the planet transmitting music. The mission’s impact has massive consequences for humans and the aliens they meet alike.
  • I love the main character, his deep struggle with faith, and the amount of thought the author clearly put into devising the alien society they encounter.
  • The Sparrow review, Children of God review

Dissenting opinions – stuff I didn’t really like that’s really popular/beloved/hyped

• Ava Reid’s books
  • All of her books are described as lush, atmospheric  Gothic fantasies about young women who claw their way to survivorhood and I WANT TO LOVE THEM SO MUCH but have been disappointed so far. While there are some things I like, I find the author’s exploration of themes disappointingly limited and the romance subplots invariably frustrating.
  • My full essay about this ; I also have reviews of each of their books individually
• Girls of Paper and Fire series by Natasha Ngan
  • A teenage girl is chosen to be a concubine for the cruel Demon King in a world where humans are subjugated by demons. She is swept up into the rebellion against his rule while falling in love with one of her fellow concubines. 
  • The first book is definitely the strongest, but it’s limited by its reliance on YA cliches and the following books feel very aimless/poorly-plotted in comparison. I do really like the final book’s ultimate conclusion, though.
  • First book review, second book review, third book review
• Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
  • Feminist litfic/specfic collection
  • I think I‘ve lost any Cool Girl Credibility I ever had because I didn’t love this. 😦 It’s clearly very well-written and some parts are quite powerful, but it just didn’t really click for me. I was bored by all the sex and felt that some of the stories were stronger in premise than execution.
  • Mini-review
• Circe by Madeline Miller
  • Retelling of the life of the witch Circe from Greek mythology
  • I did enjoy this book overall, but I agree with those who argue that it’s very limited as a “feminist retelling” and I personally found the exploration of Circe’s sexual assault to be very limited as well given how often I’d seen the book lauded for that particular element.
  • Full review
• Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor
  • Lazlo Strange is a young librarian sent on an expedition to a strange magical city, and his magical dreaming abilities help him connect with the city’s young survivors and learn about its downfall
  • This focused way too much on its bland instalove romance to the detriment of the interesting parts about how the city was tyrannized and how its inhabitants are rebuilding now
  • Full review

Mini honorable mentions:

• Exploration of trauma/recovery is one smaller element or one character perspective in a much larger story, but it was still great
  • Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik
  • Six of Crows series by Leigh Bardugo
• Someone LIED and told me this was SFF or it was mislabeled on Goodreads, but it was still great
  • The Raging Quiet by Sheryl Jordan
  • Kingdom of Little Wounds by Susann Cokal
  • Cereus Blooms at Night by Shani Mootoo
  • Poor Deer by Claire Oshetsky

Here’s to continuing to make a dent in the massive TBR I’ve accumulated for this project!