Things are heating up! And that includes crime—here are my reads of the week, plus lots of excellent book mail.

This week’s reads:

• Wisdom Corner by David Heska Wanbli Weiden (finished): Virgil Wounded Horse is trying to escape his vigilante past on the Rosebud Indian Reservation. This was an enjoyable action-packed thriller with strong cultural themes and a flawed but compassionate protagonist. It moves along pretty quickly and works well as standalone.

• The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith (finished): A disturbing yet captivating read. Highsmith taps into not just the psyche of a sociopath, but the incessant trust of everyone in his circle—showing us just how trusting we can be, especially when nudged in the direction of what we want to believe is the truth. Timeless. This is the Read Herring Book Club’s July pick.

• You’ll Be Sorry by Lisa Gardner (currently reading): A creepy, decades-old unsolved crime in rural New Hampshire. I am loving the multi-POV and eerie vibes of this so far.

• We Chase Shadows by Richard Osman (currently reading): I couldn’t resist starting this one. I always know I’m going to laugh with Osman. Rosie remains a favorite, but I’m starting to really love Felicity as well.

This week’s book mail:

• Tell Me Something True by Michael Robotham (out January 5): Small-town Australian suspense for which I have read nothing but rave reviews.

• Vice and Virtue by Libby Klein (out now): A special box to celebrate a rock-themed cozy mystery! This looks so, so cute and hilarious.

• Murder in the Crooked House by Soji Shimada (out now): After loving The Tokyo Zodiac Murders, I was stoked to receive its sequel.

• Sex on Murder Island by Jo Firestone (out now): Another sequel score!! I freaking loved Luella van Horn and Murder on Sex Island and I hope this one makes me laugh just as hard.

• The Wedding Week by Aisha Saeed (out now): Long-buried secrets resurface when a woman returns home for her sister’s lavish resort wedding in the Everglades.

• Liberty Street by Heather Marshall (out now): One journalist’s harrowing journey into an infamous real-life 1960s women’s prison—and the detective who uncovers her story decades later.

• Nine Lives by Catherine Steadman (out now): When she begins to peer into the lives of her glamorous neighbors, one woman discovers a terrifying secret in this riveting psychological thriller with nine lives worth of twists. (Previously, I enjoyed the author’s The Family Game.)

• Perfect Life by Meredith Lavender and Kendall Shores (out now): Following a shocking murder, a woman must face the husband she thought she knew in this twisty, sizzling novel from the bestselling authors of Happy Wife.

• The Intrigue by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (out now): A 1940s noir novel about a handsome con man and the two women who get in his way.

Thank you to Atlantic Crime, Libby Klein, Pushkin Vertigo, and Bantam Books for these gifted books.

Yours mysteriously,

Manon

I want to talk about a complicated issue without people assuming I mean the worst version of what I'm actually trying to say.

I've talked about this on TikTok before, but I'm revisiting it because I don't think I articulated my thoughts clearly.

And I want to be clear: I'm speaking specifically about being Black in the Black BookTok space, not about white readers or their experiences.

I've seen comments on Black BookTokkers' accounts where people say they will unfollow creators who they feel aren't reading or recommending enough Black books. (And that's fair; people are allowed to follow creators who align with their values.)

I've even had someone comment on one of my own videos asking, "What's the point of being on Black BookTok if you aren't making videos on Black authors?"

But I've also seen posts like, "Me when I see a Black BookTokker who only reads Kennedy Ryan," or people saying they check a Black BookTokker's shelves to make sure they have Black authors.

And I saw one black book content creator say that black booktokkers are mean.

And it made me sit with a bigger question:

How do we advocate for better representation without turning advocacy into a purity test that pushes people away?

Because I want to be clear: reading diversely matters.

Black authors continue to face systemic barriers within publishing that impact visibility, marketing, and opportunities. When someone has a platform, especially within the Black community, I do think there is power in using that platform to uplift Black voices and share these stories.

But I also think we have to acknowledge that online, we only see a small piece of someone's life.

We don't know their full lived experiences, what books they read privately, or what stories have impacted them outside of what they post.

And sometimes I worry that we've lost some of that nuance. That we can reduce an entire person down to whether or not we see them reading or recommending certain books.

At what point does encouragement become a test? Who decides when someone has read "enough" Black books to be considered someone who belongs?

Because sometimes it feels like the conversation shifts from "let's encourage people to read diversely" to "are you reading enough of the right books to prove you belong?"

And as someone who does read a lot of Black romance, I find myself conflicted.

Because why do we keep creating these tests where if someone doesn't pass, they're pushed out?

I understand the frustration. I understand the exhaustion of constantly having to explain why representation matters.

But I also wonder if shame is the best way to create change.

There are systemic reasons these books aren't always placed directly in front of readers. Sometimes finding new authors and stories requires intentional effort, and that work is valuable. But it can also be unfamiliar, especially when mainstream publishing has historically done a lot of the organizing and recommending for readers.

So how do we create a space where people are encouraged to learn instead of afraid to participate?

Because at the end of the day, I think we'd all benefit from focusing less on proving who is doing it "right" and more on continuing to uplift amazing authors and stories.

I'm curious, what do you think?

Summary
Why must Palestinians prove their humanity? And what are the implications of such an infuriatingly impossible task? With fearless prose and lyrical precision, Mohammed El-Kurd refuses a life spent in cross-examination. Rather than asking the oppressed to perform a perfect victimhood, El-Kurd asks friends and foes alike to look Palestinians in the eye, forgoing both deference and condemnation.

How we see Palestine reveals how we see each other; how we see everything else. Masterfully combining candid testimony, history, and reportage, Perfect Victims presents a powerfully simple demand: dignity for the Palestinian.

Review
A book filled with unapologetic candor and wit that makes you come to terms with your own mentality and beliefs in regards to Palestine. This is a must read.


What I learned

• El-Kurd argues that repeated exposure to images of Palestinian suffering has normalized atrocities that would once have shocked the world. I've learned more about this mentality when I read "Regarding the Pain of Others" by Susan Sontag. I have a lot of thoughts on this subject.

  
  "Are we too aquainted with the horrific? What was once horrifying, what was once a harbinger of doom, now blends into the terrain of boring scarecrow."
  
  

• Something that's discussed in this book as well as a few others on this topic ("One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This"), is the violence of language during this genocide. The headlines we see lack agency. People "die," buildings "collapse," or civilians are "caught in crossfire"instead of explicitly identifying who carried out the violence.
  

• The thesis of this book is incredibly powerful as it argues that Palestinians have to prove their humanity rather than be perceived as humans. They're held to an impossible standard (by design) to be expected to be patient, peaceful, articulate, and morally flawless in the face of genocide. Any perceived imperfection is used to undermine sympathy for their humanity.

"On the contrary, our death is sustenance for the world we live in, necessary to maintain things as they are. Our blood is the price of our colonizers sense of 'security'."

"You need to be polite in your suffering, should you be granted the right to a roof over your head. Crass statements are corrosive to your plight, even when such statements are about those who first steal your home and then loot your tent. The violence inflicted upon our lands and our bodies, we are told, is secondary to the blemishes tarnishing our image, the blemishes that stand between us and justice, it seems. The smears we live to scrub clean."

• Golda Meir is often displayed as a hero or peacemaker. In fact, a library is named after her at my hometown's university. However, her reality was violent and she blamed Palestinains for forcing her to kill their children:

"When peace comes we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to fogive them for having forced us to kill their sons...This was Golda Meir's vile catchphrase, and it has reverberated ever since. But Golda Meir could have spared our children. No one forced her. She chose to kill our children."

• The Palestinian Authority (which were founded as part of the Oslo Accords in the 90's) functions in collaboration with Israeli counterparts. One example is in the killing of Nizar Banat, a dissident political leader. Protests broke out and the PA beat up and used tear gas on the protestors.

I did it. I finally finished The Faithful and the Fallen with the ending of Wrath by John Gwynne. This series was a rollercoaster for me and I have a lot of things to say - good and bad - that might upset folks. Here's the thing, I won't lie about things I read even if I feel bad for saying some of them.

Let me quickly recap because I read the first two before I started writing out my feelings and thoughts.

• Malice: I struggled with Malice. The first half I almost put it down and I was actually shocked people loved it so much. Still, I see it on people's favorites list and it evokes a visceral reaction in me. The second half, however, proved me wrong. It picked up in huge ways I really needed. So much of Malice was Corban training and losing, repeat. The latter half, though, was all plot and story and action and moved at a much better pace.

• Valour: I liked Valour so much more, but it still had the same pacing issue. There were so many repeated motifs and settings. Run, rest, be discovered, repeat was the entire book. The exception for me was Maquin and his storyline. I lived for Maquin and Fidele's storyline in this book, it was exactly the deviation from the formula I needed.

• Ruin: Ruin was the best of the series to me. A great balance of action, plot, characters, development, and motion that I really enjoyed. It slogged itself down at times, but overall this was the strongest book in the series!

One thing I've felt about this series is every single book could've done with a 30% trim and been so much stronger and better paced for it. Each book had 20-30% in it that was just repetitive or bland or didn't serve the story or anything to me. Some of the POVs reached a point of comical versions of an archetype that if we had trimmed them back or done with one less, it would have sung.

Wrath, for me, suffered from the same problem. I'll start with the things I disliked and get those out of the way. Wrath was, overall, good. A good ending to a very popular series, in my opinion. However, there were a lot of cyclical moments in this book that pulled me out of feeling like I was reading a Book 4 story while characters do Book 1 things. Most prominent for me is Camlin and Rafe. Camlin has multiple chances to kill Rafe and after everything he has been through and how Camlin has grown and developed, he opts to... let him go? Many, many times. Camlin is the one character who has consistently believed in just taking action and putting someone down because they're a threat. Until it came to Rafe. Which, of course, bit him in the ass. Not once - multiple times. That was the infuriating bit. I could have forgiven once, but it was thrice that Camlin was making Book 1 choices in Book 4. That detracted from his character to me and undid what had been careful and smart development.

The other example I have is the repeating Maquin-Fidele-Lykos saga. At a certain point, when they get captured for the fifth time, all I'm hearing is yakkity sax. That repeated capturing over and over actually turned Lykos from Book 2's scariest villain into a comedy trope to me. It deflated the threat of Lykos and made his character feel... silly. It also undermined Fidele's smarts and her coming into her power when, in the end, she didn't overcome Lykos at all and was exactly who she was when he bewitched her. And Maquin - GOAT and true hero of the tale - Three Stooges-tier repetitive failure to kill him. He's deadly and skilled and the best warrior they have, but comically stumbles over a root or gets elbowed in the back right when he's going in for the kill. There's a point at which I just don't care anymore and I reached that point with the Lykos cycle.

My other issue stems sometimes from Gwynne's writing style. The man can write the heck out of a fight scene. Like. The absolute heck. But I can feel it in everything else that he doesn't like writing the journeying parts to get to the fight scenes. Moving around the map had a tendency to feel rushed and everything I needed to create a scene or space was left too open for me to feel grounded in the locations, but the fights were so well coordinated I could visualize them the entire time.

Now onto the good bits.

Camlin "For Love of the Game" whatever his last name is remains one of my favorite characters. I loved him and Edana's friendship and how his loyalty was born from just wanting something different for his life. He turns into the cool adoptive forest dad and ends up with a beautiful ending I really loved for him.

Veradis, my son, finally got it together and has his "wait is this play about us" moment in Ruin that he carried into this one. His desperation to find his friend again in Nathair and the gutting knowledge he can't was a phenomenal trajectory for him. I love this idiot because even with Nathair's betrayal and breaking his oath, he remains a loyal and moralistic man to his core. He understands that his role within his oath to protect Nathair means, in this moment, from Nathair himself.

Maquin's ending though. Loved it. Won't say anything else.

One character who surprised me with how much they grew on me? Corban. I kinda felt like Corban was boring. In Valour I would heavy sigh at his chapters, I can't lie. But in Wrath, I really loved reading his character. He comes into his own and all the things that made him who he was pulled together here. Gwynne wrote him not as a reluctant hero, but as a man choosing to be heroic. There's a huge difference! Corban spoke to his fear and how it was fear that made him brave. He cares about his people beyond just his friends. He doesn't want power, he wants peace, but he recognizes the necessity of violence to obtain that peace.

Wrath, overall, gave me a satisfying ending. I felt the twist was handled really well, the characters were where they should have been, and everything tied up nicely without feeling forced. Every ending felt earned. I did enjoy the series, but it has its flaws. It's good, not great, but I'm locked in now so I guess I have to dive into Era 2.

I posted about adding exclusive written content for Tier 1 members and beyond and I figured it's only fair folks get the chance to see the stuff I plan to write and what they can anticipate.

Currently, I have two dueling works-in-progress I will be sharing chapter by chapter. I'll be open for feedback, changes, criticism, etc. on both projects and figured I'd let people decide which one they want to follow and go for that since they're both so different.

The first project I'm posting about is this one: The Book of Icarus. It's a blend of Catholicism, Celtic folklore, and Greek mythology about two disgraced exorcists who discover one of their own who they thought was missing might not, in fact, be missing at all. Icarus and Maren unravel something the Church has been hiding from them for over a decade and have to choose a side in the war between faith and fae.

The second project I'm posing about is currently unnamed. That's how new it is. Maybe I'll open the floor and let readers help me decide on a name so I can stop calling it Unnamed Fantasy WIP. This one is very different from The Book of Icarus. It's an epic character-driven fantasy meant to evoke classic juggernauts like Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones where the world is huge, the characters are the focus, and we start returning old, forgotten fantasy creatures to our beloved genre.

It turns out life doesn't end when you close the Tempest Gate and save the world. Keelie Sharp, unfortunately, would rather not talk about all that. She's a simple woman who kills people for money and accepts that her childhood dreams will only ever stay dreams. Until, of course, her patron sends her and the one person she can't stand into the heart of the kingdom to find out what exactly the Dawn Emperor is doing in the dungeons. While she avoids a face from her past, a nosy prince, and an Emperor who may or may not be going mad, she begins to wonder if she really wants to know the answer.

So. Without further blathering. Enjoy the first chapter of The Book of Icarus and decide if you'd like to keep enjoying future chapters exclusively reserved for Tier 1 subscribers.

Chapter 1

Exorcising demons was killing Icarus Ulrich slowly and painfully. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back, chest heaving, the knife wound in his forearm a distant pulsing memory. The pile of ash erupted in a dim blue flame and reclaimed his attention. Vial in hand, he dipped it into the fire and captured the shimmering sludge within. When he straightened, he found the elderly couple staring at him wide-eyed in the doorway. He politely palmed the vial into his pocket and gave them a sharp nod. 

“My secretary will be in touch for payment,” he didn’t wait for them to respond and shoved his way past.

The cold Dublin air bit at his skin despite his effort to sink back into the high coat collar of his long, wool coat. His stride was long and fast, escaping the shadow of the cramped row house until he found an alley he could use. He cracked open an ampule and let the iridescent liquid drip into one eye, then the other. Blinking, he leaned into the stone wall and slid to the ground. 

The numbing wash of pleasure flooded his veins, empty smile on his lips. He knew what he looked like to any passers-by: sclera flaring brilliant blue, expression slack and joyful, skin just slightly thin enough to show his pulsing veins for anyone who cared to look hard enough. Fifteen minutes passed and the world ate away at the feeling until his vision cleared and his head was sharp again. He rubbed his eyes with a calloused hand, resting against his knees while the effects wore off in full. 

Two more weeks until he would have to do that again. Two more weeks until the Rot tried to claim him and he fought back valiantly with a substance that would drive him mad someday if he let it. He shoved off the damp flagstone and brushed off the back of his coat halfheartedly. He needed a cigarette. Fumbling for a moment while the Eidolon wore off, he found a rogue tobacco soldier in his pocket and the last gasp of a matchbook with it.

It burned his lungs deliciously while he walked the uneven cobbles and slithered around the iron poles of unlit gaslamps lining the street. The rattle and shout of horses and hawkers crashed into him like a wave when he spilled out onto the main thoroughfare into the lifeblood of industry. He tugged the white Roman collar free and shoved it in the pocket with the vial. People tended to stare more when they spotted a priest with a cigarette between his lips and he did not much enjoy being stared at. He kept his head down while he walked, mindful that he would have to dispose of his vice--one of many, if he were being honest--far enough from his destination to avoid being chastised by his loving colleagues.

He flicked the butt away, lamenting the loss of a third of it, and patted his coat until he found what he needed. Keys jangled in his hands when he reached the iron-barred door of the office tucked away on the busy Temple Bar street corner. It was not his first choice, Temple Bar, but nothing matched the price so this was where they were forced to set up shop. 

Inside, a fire warmed the small offices upstairs against the prewinter chill. Heat carried all the way to the paned front door and he shut it quickly to stop it from escaping. He stamped the city off his boots and shrugged his coat onto a hook. A crackling, wizened voice called down from the top of the stairs, “Back so soon?”

He grunted affirmation and ran a hand through slightly-too-long hair the color of sodden wheat, “Hadn’t attached to the place too hard, one foot still in the Veil.”

His boots fell heavy on the wooden stairs, amber lamps stretched his shadow too long across the floor. The woman at the desk was older than she had any right to be, but more reliable than the younger ones who had come before her. Edith was never late and always methodically locked everything up at the end of the day. Her calendars were clean, easy to read, and she had no problem shaking down clients who thought they could avoid the whole “half later” part of the “half now, half later” contracts they signed. Icarus liked her very, very much.

“Maren back yet?” He asked with a glance to the dark office nearest them. He knew the answer, the ask was a reflex.

Edith shook her perfectly pinned white head and peered over thick spectacles, “No. Any minute now. You have a visitor.”

She jerked her chin towards his office. He paused, “Who?”

“Father Reed,” came a familiar strained voice behind the cracked door. Floorboards creaked under the man’s feet when he rose and widened it. His face was drawn, eyes tired. He had the ever-increasing hunch of someone who saw too much too often. 

Icarus took a deep breath and attempted--poorly--to hide a sigh. He placed the vial firmly on Edith’s desk, “Make sure Maren distills that. I’m running low. Father, lovely to see you.”

“I’m most definitely sure it is not,” Reed smiled warmly and moved out of Icarus’s way, closing the door behind him. He remained on his feet when Icarus sat behind the weathered wooden desk.

When Reed didn’t immediately explain himself, Icarus prompted him, “What brings you to the dregs of exorcist society?”

He exhaled and finally sank down into the chair opposite. He leaned on the simple silver-handled cane he carried and brushed imaginary lint from his sleeve. Though he liked Father Reed, Icarus had little patience for the Church’s unexpected visits. It took the older priest a long, studious moment of silence before he decided to speak. Icarus hid his growing irritation in the grip on his pencil while he filled out the remaining fields for his most recent client. 

“There’s a case I’d like you to take. North of the city in Baldongan,” Reed examined his gloves. He wasn’t making eye contact, already the sign of something peculiar that set Icarus on edge.

Storm-blue eyes snapped to him so sharp they could cut glass, “You, not we. Not a Church-sanctioned house call?”

He extended a hand for the yellowed folder Reed passed him and leafed through it. Eyebrow arched, he studied the details. Nothing stuck out to him as unusual. A woman showing early signs of possession, no spatial distortions, no evidence of anything other than a run-of-the-mill Bánánach trying to force its way in. The grainy black and white photo showed a buoyant woman in her late teens or early twenties, the one behind it a more recent version of her that looked a hundred years older. Jarring, but all the signs of a standard possession.

“This is child’s play. A baby Caldrist could do this. You don’t need a Nytherist to slap a Bánánach around,” he dropped the folder with a clap. “Rejected until you tell me why this one specifically.”

Icarus leaned back and steepled his fingers across his chest, boots thudding when they landed on the desk. The priest frowned at the impropriety, but ignored it. They had known each other long enough that Reed expected rudeness without being affected anymore. At one point, they had even been friends, “You think I didn’t already send one to handle it? The last thing I’d like to do is contract your services, you know that. The local bishop asked me to discreetly send someone more… gifted.”

Icarus smirked, “And you had to admit that someone was me? I’m flattered. What about it’s different? You sure your Caldrist wasn’t just incompetent?”

“I’m sure,” he shot back with a warning look. “Father Simon was efficient and effective, but this… whatever it is… couldn’t be shaken. It’s all the signs of a Bánánach, but it threw him clear across the room and broke his leg. Then it blew out all the windows and blacked out the town. Bánánach can’t do that.”

“So you misclassified a demon,” Icarus shrugged. “Happens to the best of us. Well. The best of you lot anyway.”

“Icarus,” Reed warned again, “don’t make me regret asking you. Just go investigate, at the very least. If it’s something Simon screwed up, I’ll double your contract fee for the inconvenience.”

That made him pause. He did not like the Church, but he did like the Church’s money. He ran his tongue along his teeth and glanced at the clock ticking away at the back wall. Maren should be back by now. He would want her input on it, but Reed seemed twitchy about this case for some reason. It was unlike the man to hide his nerves, which made Icarus all the more intrigued. He sighed dramatically and dropped his feet to the floor. He put on a good show of thinking it through, bobbing his head eventually in a halfhearted nod.

“Fine,” he thrust a hand at Reed, “I’ll take your ridiculously simple case and prove the Church fucked it up.”

“Language, Father Icarus.” Reed shook the outstretched hand in the style of makeshift deal that had often been made about these things between them. 

“Father feels a bit formal,” Icarus scrunched his face to hide his disdain. He got feet to show Reed the door, “Perhaps Brother? Cousin, maybe? Hell, Uncle might be more fitting.”

Reed shot him a confusing paternal look and paused at Edith’s desk. He had taken a shine to her since she started two years back and it was very much reciprocated. The older woman beamed at the opportunity to settle contract terms with him. Beside her desk stood a figure Icarus was grateful to see again. She was only shoulder height to him, but that wasn’t her fault. Icarus had always been tall. Her limbs were long, body catlike, dark almost eyes perpetually narrowed as though she constantly scrutinized everything they settled on. She did, so it was fitting. She kept her straight, black hair pulled into a low ponytail secured at the nape of her neck. Her arms were folded over her black shirt, Roman collar flashing white in sharp contrast to the dark. She liked her collar. She also didn’t smoke.

He gave her a half smile, the best he could do, and she tilted her head at him. A silent conversation played out between them--what was Father Reed doing there, he would tell her in a moment, she hoped he got a good price, he absolutely did. 

Reed started when he noticed her and offered a small smile, “Father Maren! My apologies, I didn’t see you, my dear. You’ve always been so quiet.”

It was true. Maren had a magical way of going unnoticed when she wanted to, which was essentially all the time. Her expression stayed unchanged, but it relaxed when she looked at the old man, “A pleasure, as always, Father. I look forward to Icarus’s debrief.”

They exchanged a pleasant farewell and waited until the small bell stopped tinkling before sealing themselves away in Icarus’s office. She never rounded on him, Maren was not the kind to get worked up easily. She would study, ask questions, be thoughtful. Explosive response was Icarus’s specialty. He leaned against the edge of his desk and passed her the file, waiting for her to finish her methodical evaluation. 

“And the Church wants us to look into this?” She read through it again, her tone wary, “Seems fairly rudimentary.”

He shrugged, “Beneath us, but he’ll double the fee if it turns out to be incompetence. So, there’s that.”

“Hm,” she nodded, “and we do like money.”

“How’d it go in Clondalkin?” He watched her ever-placid expression, always hoping someday she would give something more away to him.

She put the file back down on his desk, “Fine. Nothing a Sídhe Binding couldn’t handle. Yours?”

“Throw some Pale Doctrine and blood into a seal and that tends to do the trick. Left you some raw Eidolon to distill, did Edith give it?” At her affirmative, he relaxed, “I’m nearly out. I’d like to live a bit longer before Rot takes me, if you don’t mind.”

“Never do,” she kept her focus on the closed file with suspicion. “Why do you think they asked for us?”

He breathed a laugh, “They didn’t. Reed did. That’s the strangest bit of it. He’s selling it as Church business and I’m fairly sure the Church doesn’t have the faintest idea.”

Maren watched the frosted window behind him and listened to the sounds of the city. Carriages rolling, steam trams in the distance screaming along the rails, voices muffled by the early evening fog. She turned, hands shoved into her pockets, and went to leave the room. 

“Tomorrow at seven there’s an early train north,” she paused to look back at him, her tone firm from giving the same lecture too many times. “Do not be late, Icarus. Repeat it back. Do not be late.”

He rolled his eyes, hands up in defeat, “I won’t be late, Father Maren.”

He was absolutely going to be late. 

***

When he showed up promptly at half past, Maren was ready for him. She said nothing of it and hoisted her bag over her shoulder. He trailed after her through the hissing, steaming station disappointed by her lack of disappointment. When he glanced at the ticket she gave him, he made a noise.

“You tricky bastard. Eight. Not seven,” he brandished the ticket in the air and laughed. “You’ve known me too long, my friend.”

He could have sworn he saw a smile on her impassive face, but he knew better than to draw attention to it. He kept his coat wrapped and his scarf tight, the flash of his white collar hidden underneath the dark red wool. Maren stood like a statue beside him, her dark hair barely affected by the morning breeze. They waited on the brass and tile platform in silence, watching the trains pulled in and out along flickering copper wires overhead. Amber light from ornate gaslamps wavered uneasily in the receding dark. 

He eyed the ticker above the platform and watched the letters flutter and change. Their train drew in with a sigh--a testament to industrial engineering at its finest. Rich red and gold paints along its body, an interior of plush rose velvet in the second class car, and glorious heat that gallantly kept the Ireland cold at bay. 

Icarus settled into his seat and shed his coat down to his black clerical shirt and collar, relishing the warmth in the air when he hung it on the communal hook. Maren did the same, but with far less flourish. They settled in companionable silence and waited until the train jerked away from the platform before she spoke. 

“What do you suppose it means, that Reed is asking this and not the Church?” She mused, hand-sharpened pencil scratching away at a leatherbound journal full of secrets and sketches he had never concerned himself with knowing. 

He shrugged and stretched out long, arms folded, “No idea, but I’m looking forward to the double fee.”

His hand slipped into his pocket and he drew out a silver flask. Maren made a disapproving sound when he shook it at her in offering. He uncapped it and drained enough to make the passage of time more bearable. Then a bit more to make it nonexistent. 

Hello my Bindery Babes! I know it's only been a few weeks since we voted on what to read for August, but I want to give our library Sapph-Litties extra time to reserve our September read if need be.

I usually have Sapph-Lit picks planned out at least three months in advance, but I feel like time has been flying and it's been hard to keep up this summer especially! This is me setting the intention to plan better as we go into our last four reads of 2026, all of which are FICTION.

As always, I've compiled a longlist of books I'm seeing all over social and on bookstore shelves as of late. Scroll through the covers to see what stands out to you and click into them to learn more about them. These are titles that are exciting to me and I want to introduce you to!

If there is anything in here that speaks to you, shout it out in the comments, and even better, if there's a title you don't see please share that too!

Have a WONDERFUL weekend my Sapph-Litties -- love you all so much and thank you for being here! Let's end this summer with a BANGER of a read xoxo Nina

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• 📖 My August Reads (9-Image Story Template)

• ✨ August Wrap-Up (6-Image Story Template)

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📚 August 64 Template & Mockups Pack

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📚 My August Reads (12-Image Story Template)

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📖 My August Reads (9-Image Story Template)

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✨ August Wrap-Up (6-Image Story Template)

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It's time to refresh your Bookstagram for a brand-new month! Our FREE August Canva Templates are now available for all The Prequels members.

Whether you're tracking your monthly reading or sharing your August wrap-up, these editable Canva templates make it easy to create beautiful, engaging bookish content in just minutes.

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• 📚 My August Reads (9-Image Story Template)

• ✨ Additional exclusive Canva resources released throughout the month.

Upgrade to The First Editions today to unlock the complete August Canva collection and enjoy new exclusive resources every month.

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Into the Drowning Deep is one of my absolute horror books, so when Mira Grant (Seanan McGuire) agrees to blurb, I almost passed out!

These are the gems that were offered:

And we have a preorder update…. We are at 757!!! Only 243 left to hit 1,000!

you guys I am so excited for Tatiana, this community and this book! I’m so glad you’re here!

I just received the most amazing gift! 💝 one of my customers and her daughter got this for me and it truly has made my day!

It could not have come at a better time, when I really needed a moment to see all the good in the world ❤️

“Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love.“ —Gandalf

new youtube video is UP for my full color cuties
https://youtu.be/MRy4BG_KFQ4

Hi folks! I'm so excited to help reveal the cover for London Sperry's new rom-com CITY PEOPLE, publishing April 6, 2027 from Penguin Random House.

Rebel Ever After listeners will remember London from our episode last August about her debut romance PASSION PROJECT and her quest to write a self-destructive, grieving baddie who deserves love. We had a wonderfully silly conversation despite the heavy subject matter.

I asked London what the REA community will enjoy about her sophomore novel. She texted me,

"City People deals with the stories that we tell ourselves about who we are, and what it means when you start to question those stories. It’s about change and growth, but mostly, it’s about letting go. It’s also about loving your gramma.

I hope REA listeners enjoy a man who thinks consent, pet names, and being berated by unlikeable female leads are sexy; an intergenerational female-only family; and a woman who wouldn’t know what she’s avoiding if you drew a map for her."

City People is available for pre-order wherever books are sold. You can pick it up from the Rebel Ever After affiliate store here.

About the book

A woman desperate to hold onto her Brooklyn brownstone can’t ignore her chemistry with the one man standing in her way, in this poignant enemies-to-lovers rom-com by the author of Passion Project.

Teddi Cooper, third-generation New Yorker, has breathed city air since the day she was born. Her life is perfectly syncopated with the beautiful, chaotic tempo of Brooklyn, from the moment she steps out the door of the brownstone she shares with her grandmother, to the moment she falls asleep with taxi horns blaring into the frenetic night.

So when Gram announces that she’s selling the brownstone and moving to Florida, the rhythm of Teddi’s life descends into cacophony. How could Gram not see that leaving NYC would be a betrayal of their very identities? If Gram needs a reminder of who she is, Teddi will do anything to show her—including coordinating a reunion show of the Broadway musical that made Gram famous before she gave up life in the spotlight. And to lay the pressure on thick, Teddi even gets Gram’s former co-star Hal Harrison on board.

The show is barely off the ground before Teddi comes head-to-head with Hal’s talent agent Reid Fletcher, who refuses to let Hal partake. Reid is charming, smart-mouthed, and absolutely infuriating, but Teddi knows a thing or two about digging her heels in.  As Teddi squares off against Reid over email, in the theater, and even through a heated game of tennis, she’s prompted to wonder if her dogged stubbornness is holding her back. Who would she be if she wasn’t determined to control Gram’s next move, to be a New Yorker at any cost? Is it possible that her identity is larger than the city she’s built her life around? And, most frightening of all, could her new life have room in it for someone else?

July's SRG Salon was a hoot

It could've also been titled "everything is a scam (&everyone is a scammer)". We talked about:

• the world cup is not about soccer (T-Pain DoorDash tweets were fake)

• Alix Earle's Reale Actives vs Hailey Bieber's Rhode

• The "privilege" of getting to see the odyssey in imax

• bandwagon culture (exemplified by knicks merch). i hate it. I hate 'just let people like what the like' apologists. This is why we have disney adults.

• The ethics of celebs endorsing GLP-1s

• HUM by Helen Phillips came up because there's a dystopian-but-real scene where the character gets in a cab and can't mute the ads unless she pays a fee (Cat made a good point that we are basically here already paying for streaming WITH ads)

• "Low T" (as in testosterone) being totally misunderstood

• The "Enhanced Games" (where you are allowed/supposed to take performance enhancing drugs)

• the "spectrum" of authenticity-- this struck me as oxymoronic because shouldn't something either be authentic or not? how can it be semi-authentic? imagine a counterfeit handbag -- but it's made with leather from the same factory that the real ones come from, by a craftsman trained alongside the authentic craftsman. this feels like a theseus' ship for birkinheads

• so much more

It was such a fecund topic and the convos that I sat in on meandered widely--very entertaining.

Suggested media/reading

• caroline calloway's ozempic essay

• The Feed Is Fake essay in Vulture

• Publishing has a hologram problem LitHub

• reaction to the essay^^ tiktok

• Everyone is an influencer reel

• I Don’t Want to Be Friends With a Corporation Substack

• Reddit Corporate brands being “relatable” on social media and infiltrating

• Ingrid Goes West (movie starring Aubrey Plaza & Elizabeth Olsen)

• Even NFL players have to be influencers tiktok

• It’s Hard Making Friends When Everyone Wants to be Famous substack

• Elmo's Knicks PR crisis... which was just promo?

• Elmo forced to respond to criticism ... which was just ads for the world cup?

• Reaction to said criticism tiktok

• Conan on press tour culture tiktok

• Do You Have to Become a Content Creator to Make It in the Arts? substack

• Confessions of an AI Clickbait Kingpin WIRED

• Gen z knows brands are trying to be friends IG post

• Intellectual influencers, the cool vs the rich, & the allure of a private life substack

• art galleries are turning into failed luxury brands reel

• gen z does not want to be influencers anymore cosmo (if you have a WSJ subscription read this, same info)

• food influencer parody tiktok

• slop economy tiktok (this creator tries to walk a fine line between being critical vs endorsing AI)

• being part of the digital circus IG post (comments section>post)

• not every brand/celeb is a morality compass reel

Discussion questions

• What’s the most obvious ad you’ve seen recently that still worked on you?

• Is the best marketing simply content that doesn’t feel like advertising?

• Is it possible to be a sellout anymore?

• When is content just a vehicle for monetization? Marvel, Coachella, Meghan Trainor’s flop album—are these designed primarily as vehicles to sell merch/make tiktoks (or to exist as “art”)?

• What is your reaction when an influencer you like gets their first brand partnership?

• What's "wrong" with watching ads? There are entire coffee table books that treat ads as an art form.

• Does "stealth marketing" erode media literacy?

• If you enjoy the content, does it matter that it’s an ad?

• If an ad is entertaining (think: comedian podcast where they turn the ad into a bit that is actually funny), does that make it less intrusive?

• Are you more critical when individuals turn themselves into brands, or when brands try to act like people?

• Do you feel like you have “succumbed” when influencers/ads work on you?

The night before my first in-person author event, I tried to stay as busy as possible. I worked, watched distracting shows, and made graphics for social media. Basically, anything that might keep me from thinking too hard about what I had agreed to do.

I took the muscle relaxer that usually helps me sleep, but I still tossed and turned. I felt like Owen Wilson in Armageddon when he says he is 98 percent excited and 2 percent scared, or maybe 2 percent excited and 98 percent scared. That was me. I knew both feelings were in there somewhere, but I could not have told you which one was winning.

Since I am nocturnal, I woke up around noon the next day. I was more nauseous than usual and immediately started trying to get everything ready: my outfit, makeup, nausea medication, books, pens, markers, and bookmarks. I checked everything more than once because my brain had apparently decided this was the moment to stop trusting itself.

My partner and I finally left for the bookstore. The drive was about forty minutes, so I put on a Charli xcx playlist and sang the entire way there. Singing is one of the best ways I have found to calm my nervous system, and I was going to need all the help I could get.

When we arrived, it felt like there was a bowling ball sitting in my stomach. I was already dragging, so I walked around the bookstore for a while and acquired an iced latte, which was probably not the most logical treatment for anxiety and nausea, but it felt necessary.

Then it was almost time for me to be introduced.

I waited backstage and peeked out at the audience. There were about ten people, and a few of them were cradling my book in their arms.

My book.

That part still does not feel real.

I had prepared several sections to read and practiced them ahead of time, but I had not actually timed any of it. We had promoted the event as a reading, signing, and Q&A, so I assumed people would have questions and that the conversation would fill the rest of the hour.

I came out, said hello, and told everyone I would begin with a reading.

For the first few minutes, I shakily read the opening paragraphs of Hiding Lies. I had somehow forgotten exactly how dark the beginning was, so I might reconsider starting with that section in the future.

As I sat there reading, terrified and sick to my stomach, one thought became very clear:

I never wanted to do another event again.

I finished the first section and tried asking if anyone had questions.

No one answered.

I read another passage, this time from Adam’s point of view. I had not prepared anything to say about it, but I started explaining what I had been thinking while writing the scene. That broke the silence a little, but when I looked at the time, it was only 7:20.

I had no idea what I was supposed to do next.

I asked again if anyone had questions.

Crickets.

Then my partner, bless his heart, called out, “Why don’t you talk about how you wrote it?”

Something immediately changed.

I began telling everyone about the life of Hiding Lies, how the story had developed, and everything that had gone into making the book. As I spoke, I saw people smiling and nodding. My nerves started to fall away.

Questions came. Then comments. Then more questions.

What followed was forty-five minutes of an intimate, incredible conversation with readers.

People told me that my book had made them feel seen and understood. One woman in particular shared that she had experienced feelings similar to the ones I had while writing it. It was incredibly brave of her to say that in a room full of people.

I have never experienced a connection like that before.

I definitely want to experience it again.

By the end of the night, I had gone from thinking I would never do another event to immediately understanding why authors keep doing them, even when they are difficult, exhausting, expensive, and terrifying.

I am going to keep trying to arrange events, beginning here in the Pacific Northwest, where I live. I would also love to do one larger event or small tour each year. My health and finances will always have to be a major part of those decisions, and I have to be realistic about what I can manage.

But I am so grateful that I was finally able to give Hiding Lies the event it deserved.

I got to talk openly about what the book means to me. I got to hear what it meant to readers. I got to nerd out about Small Town Slasher, slashers, horror, and writing with people who genuinely wanted to be there.

For the first twenty minutes, I thought the night was confirming every fear I had.

Instead, it became one of the most meaningful experiences I have had as an author.