Starling House by Alix E. Harrow

[Tricia]

Starling House is a contemporary gothic fantasy set in a small, run down Kentucky mining town. The story revolves around Opal, a fierce, funny young woman who has been raising her younger brother Jasper since their mother died. Living in a crowded motel room together, Opal is trying to scrape together enough money to send Jasper to a private school and give him the kind of opportunities she never had. Because of the high pay, and against her better judgment, she takes a job as a housekeeper at the Starling House, a creepy old mansion that once belonged to a famous children’s book author, and which has given Opal nightmares since she was a child. This book has many of the classic gothic novel tropes, including a generational curse, long buried family secrets, and a sentient old house. It is also enriched by an added layer of critique aimed at the ways in which the prominent wealthy families in this town have long profited from the legacy of slavery, and at the expense of the town’s struggling mine workers. What I liked most about the book is Opal, who is a funny, brave and endearingly prickly character. An enjoyable new book from the author of The Once and Future Witches.

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store by James McBride

[Tricia]

James McBride is a wonderful, complex storyteller. If you’ve read his novels The Good Lord Bird and Deacon King Kong, you already know how gifted he is at creating a rich of community of characters, interweaving satire and social commentary, all while taking you on a wild, entertaining ride. The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, his newest novel, is no exception. This novel is loosely based on the life of McBride’s grandmother, brought to life in this book in the character of Chona Ludlow, who along with her husband Moshe, runs the Heaven and Earth Grocery Store in the Chicken Hill neighborhood of Pottstown, PA, a historically Black and Jewish neighborhood. Set mostly in the 1920s, the story circles through a rich and diverse cast of characters, ostensibly moving toward solving a murder that is revealed at the beginning of the novel. However the murder is almost beside the point in this novel. What matters is the community, and the many, complicated, longstanding ways in which these characters are both connected and separated. Alongside the racial, ethnic, and economic factors that unite and divide members of this community, the shared experience of disability impacts several of the main characters in the book, including Chona, Doc Roberts, who marches in the KKK parade in town, and Dodo, a young Black orphan who is deaf due to an explosion. McBride has said that his work at a camp for young people with disabilities was another inspiration for this book, and the friendship between Dodo and Monkey Pants, a young man with Cerebral Palsy that Dodo befriends while institutionalized in an absolutely terrifying asylum, are in many ways the heart of the story. James McBride’s books have a way of staying with me long after I’ve read them, and I am sure that I will be thinking about this complicated, funny, heartbreaking novel for quite a while.

Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher

[Heather]

Thornhedge, a new novella by T. Kingfisher, may not be immediately familiar as a retelling of the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty, but that’s because this story is told from the point of view of the fairy that “cursed” the beautiful princess, even though she had her reasons.

Rest assured that the story is mostly how you’ve heard it before: at a celebration of the birth of the princess, a fairy comes to give the baby a gift. But other fairies are involved and then things go wrong, and eventually the princess falls into a deep sleep while briars and thorns grow around her tower, shielding her from the world around her. Waking her is not an option and she might very well have been forgotten about forever, except for a legend that has persisted for 200 years. It’s this legend that brings this particular knight to these particular woods to try and find the tower and wake the princess. But instead of fining a princess to rescue, he finds Toadling, a not-quite fairy who has been using her not-very-strong water magic to keep the princess asleep all these years. She’s not much of a fairy, but he’s not much of a knight either, so the two form a sort of friendship that becomes something that Toadling has needed all these years, and the very thing that’s needed to break this curse for good.

Fans of Kingfisher’s fairy tale retellings likely know that these stories typically turn a familiar tale on its head, and Thornhedge is no different in that respect. The best fairy tale retellings give you the opportunity to examine the story in a new light and take a critical look at the actions of some of these characters, and Kingfisher is a deft hand at creating these opportunities.  And, then you start to realize that their motives might be a little less pure (or, in Toadling’s case, a little less evil) than you’d originally been told. Why lock a princess in a tower away from the world for hundreds of years?  You might think you know, but what if the fairy wasn’t all that evil and the reason actually is to protect the evil princess?  Could the curse actually be on the poor fairy who has to stay by the tower for hundreds of years just to keep the magic flowing?

If you’re a Kingfisher fan, this novella is for you. If you’re not a Kingfisher fan, this novella could be the gateway that makes you one, so give it a try!  It’s available in our catalog as an eaudiobook via Libby, so download it now!

The Weaver and the Witch Queen by Genevieve Gornichec

[Crystal]

The Weaver and the Witch Queen is a reimagined tale centering on characters of the Norse and Icelandic sagas.  In Genevieve Gornichec’s first book, the New York Times bestselling, The Witch’s Heart she explored the story of Loki’s wife, the witch, Angrboda.  In this tale, she centers her story once again on the women, focusing mostly on Gunhild, ‘The Mother of Kings.”  Gunhild’s father is a local noble, and she  comes of age in the time of King Harald, the first leader to unite Norway as a country.  During a festival when she is twelve, she seals a life-long blood pact with her best friends, sisters Oddny and Signy. They vow to  always be there for each other, no matter what.  This occurs after Gunhild disobeys her mother and seeks her and her friend’s future from the traveling Seer; and it is revealed how closely and darkly their fates are entwined.  What follows is a story about sisterhood, honor, and fate.  Gornichec is a historian in Norse mythology and history, and her detailed descriptions truly capture the essence of the Viking age, with its violence, blood debts, revenge, and the vying for power between King Harald’s many sons.  The story mostly centers on Oddny and Gunhild, with a strong focus on the early exploits of King Eirk, otherwise known as Eric Bloodaxe.  I would classify this book as Historical Fantasy, though the fantasy elements are small.  This is a great read for anyone interested in the sagas, vikings, and the women who helped change the political landscape of Scandinavia.