Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Books On My Winter 2025-2026 to-Read List.
I’m not sure how it’s winter already — I’m still not done with my fall TBR list! I ended up reading 7 of my 10 fall TBR books; of the three remaining, there are two I’m still fairly committed to reading (eventually), and one I’m not feeling especially drawn to at the moment. For my winter TBR post, I’m featuring an entirely new batch of books… but I’ll probably try to squeeze in those other two fall books down the road too!
Onward to the winter list…
I’ll have a slew of new releases and ARCs to read from about February onward, but before then, I’m going to try to focus on books I’ve been meaning to get to for a while… with maybe one or two new releases mixed in as well. I’ll save the rest of my upcoming new releases for January’s “most anticipated” TTT topic, and meanwhile…
Here are a batch of books I’m really looking forward to reading this winter:
Murder at Haven’s Rock (Haven’s Rock, #1) by Kelley Armstrong: After finishing the Rockton series, I’m dying to start this spin-off!
Through Gates of Garnet and Gold (Wayward Children, #11) by Seanan McGuire: Reading the newest book in this terrific series has become a favorite January tradition.
Anne of a Different Island by Virginia Kantra: On a light note, a retelling of Anne of Green Gables sounds delightful.
The Names by Florence Knapp: One of several 2025 releases that I just didn’t get manage to get to.
These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean: I’ve heard good things!
The Correspondent by Virginia Evans: The word-of-mouth on this book is really drawing me to it.
This Is a Love Story by Jessica Soffer: A book that keeps popping up on my “recommended for you” lists.
The Safekeep by Yael Van Der Wouden: Sounds like an intense, immersive read.
Spectacular Things by Beck Dorey-Stein: I grabbed a copy on a whim thanks to a Kindle price drop, and still haven’t started it.
The Guest in Room 120 by Sara Ackerman: I’ve only read a couple of this author’s books, but I’ve been wanting to read more.
What books will be keeping you warm this winter? Share your links, and I’ll come check out your top 10!
Title: Silver and Lead Series: October Daye, #19 Author: Seanan McGuire Publisher: Tor Books Publication date: September 30, 2025 Print length: 400 pages Genre: Urban fantasy Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4.5 out of 5.
Seanan McGuire’s New York Times bestselling and Hugo Award-nominated October Daye series continues as Toby Daye is thrust once again into danger… and this time she has more than ever to protect.
Something is rotten in Faerie. In the aftermath of Titania’s reality-warping enchantment, things are returning to what passes for normal in the Kingdom in the Mists―until it’s discovered that the royal vaults have been looted, and several powerful magical artifacts are missing. None are things that can be safely left unsecured, and some have the potential to do almost as much damage as Titania did, and having them in the wrong hands could prove just as disastrous
At least the theft means that Sir October “Toby” Daye, Knight errant and Hero of the Realm, finally has an excuse to get out of the house. Sure, she’s eight and a half months pregnant, but that doesn’t mean she can’t take care of herself. But with the sea witch offering to stand godmother to Toby’s child, maybe there are greater dangers ahead for Toby and her family than it appears….
Old enemies will resurface, new enemies will disguise themselves as friends, and Queen Windermere must try to keep her Hero on the case without getting herself gutted by the increasingly irritated local King of Cats. Sometimes, what’s been lost can be the most dangerous threat of all.
What can you say about a series that’s now 19 books long… and going strong? Quite a lot actually… but the short version is: The October Daye series remains sharp, exciting, and as immersive as ever — and it’s never too late to jump in! (But start at the beginning, of course.)
In 2023, author Seanan McGuire published TWO new volumes in the series (Sleep No More and The Innocent Sleep), focusing on the same set of cataclysmic events, but told first through the POV of our usual narrator, Toby (October) herself, and then through the POV of Toby’s husband, Tybalt. Both were excellent… and I suppose it’s understandable that we had a two-year wait for another book in the series. (Understandable — hey, get some rest, Seanan McGuire! — but painful as a reader to have to wait to see what happens next!!).
But now, Toby is back! The ripple effects of the disasters from the previous books are still being felt by our beloved characters, in all sorts of distressing ways. Quick recap: Toby is a changeling (part fae, part human), a knight and hero of the realm, and both daughter and niece of First Borns, the most powerful fae other than the big three (Oberon, Titania, and Maeve) themselves. When Titania reemerged into the world and decided to recraft it as she wished, Toby and all those around her were trapped in an illusion that transformed their lives and relationships. Now that Titania’s illusions have been broken, they’re all still recovering from what that experience did to them.
Further complicating Toby’s life, as the book opens, is the fact that she’s in her final month of pregnancy, and her already traumatized family won’t let her do anything — not even get off the couch to grab her own snacks. For a woman who lives her life carrying out dangerous quests, being coddled and confined is beyond frustrating, and while she knows her family is acting from a place of love, she still can’t stand it.
“I’ve got another few weeks of this, you know,” I said. “You don’t want to use up all your fretting on me before the baby even gets here.”
“I promise, I have more fretting in me than you can imagine,” he said.
The action in Silver and Lead kicks off when Toby is summoned to Queen Arden’s court to give testimony against one of the more evil people in the series, the false Queen. Once there, Arden tells Toby that many dangerous artifacts were looted from the royal treasury while Titania’s illusions were in place, and while she’d love to wait until after Toby has the baby to send her back into action, these items could be disastrous in the wrong hands. There’s no time to lose in getting them back. Before Toby can commit one way or the other to this new quest, she discovers that the false Queen is actually someone enchanted to appear to be the false Queen, and that the actual false Queen herself is nowhere to be found.
From here, Toby sets out to gather evidence… cautiously. She won’t endanger herself or the baby; she’s just going to do a bit of detective work on behalf of the realm. Of course, nothing goes according to plan, and she and her household end up in mortal peril, facing unexpected adversaries with truly evil intentions.
The action in Silver and Lead escalates dramatically, and the sense of menace and danger go higher and higher with each chapter. I was on the edge of my seat and practically screaming by the time I got past the first third or so of the book and simply could not put it down. I was terrified for the characters, enthralled by each new development, and scared to death that this was finally something that Toby couldn’t get out of. (Well, I assumed she’d get out of it, as the series isn’t over… but it’s all definitely very tense and frightening!)
At the same time, Silver and Lead is actually very funny at times!
“Look. My hormones are all over the place. Yesterday I burnt a piece of toast and I started crying because what if I’d hurt the bread’s feelings.
Having Toby — eight and a half months pregnant — waddling off on a quest, needing to pee every few minutes, complaining about her aching knees, and in general suffering all the indignities and physical impacts of a late pregnancy is just so incredibly entertaining. This is a woman who’s practically indestructible, and yet people have to help her up the stairs. Good stuff.
The ending of Silver and Lead is quite satisfying, but leaves the door open for yet more drama — because in the world of October Daye, no one gets to just sit and be happy for very long. This book’s main plot is tied up well, but the final pages let us know that bad things — potentially, very bad things — are just around the corner.
As always, I’m left dying to see what’s next… and dreading a year of waiting for the next book.
Silver and Lead is an excellent edition to a can’t-miss fantasy series. I’ll give the same push I give every time I talk about these books: Go pick up a copy of Rosemary and Rue. I’m betting that once you get a taste of October’s world, you won’t want to stop.
As is the custom throughout this series, Silver and Lead includes a novella at the end. This one, Seas and Shores, focuses on Simon, Toby’s father figure — a man with whom Toby has one of the most complicated relationships in the series. The novella is narrated by Simon, and takes place at the same time as the events of Silver and Lead, as Simon heads back to his new home in the Undersea. Seas and Shores is a relatively quiet story, and it’s quite lovely. Simon is a man who’s been through a lot of trauma, and this novella shows the next stage in his attempts to build a good life for himself and those he loves. After the extreme dangers in Silver and Lead, it’s nice to finish on a sweet, happy note.
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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Most Anticipated Books Releasing in the Second Half of 2025.
All of a sudden it’s summer, and… whoosh!… time is flying by. It’s hard to think about the 2nd half of 2025 already, when I’ve barely kept up with my reading plans from the 1st half.
Here are ten books scheduled for release from July through December that I’m looking forward to:
A Witch’s Guide to Magical Innkeeping by Sangu Mandanna (7/15/2025)
The Last Wizards’ Ball(Gunnie Rose, #6) by Charlaine Harris (7/55/2025)
Hemlock & Silver by T. Kingfisher (8/19/2025)
Play Nice by Rachel Harrison (9/9/2025)
The Poisoned King (Impossible Creatures, #2) by Katherine Rundell (9/11/2025)
The Shattering Peace (Old Man’s War, #7) by John Scalzi (9/19/2025)
Silver and Lead (October Daye, #19) by Seanan McGuire (9/30/2025)
The Haunting of Payne’s Hollow by Kelley Armstrong (10/14/2025)
The Keeper of Magical Things by Julie Leong (10/14/2025)
Blind Date with a Werewolf by Patricia Briggs (10/21/2025)
What upcoming new releases are you most excited for? Please share your TTT links!
Title: Overgrowth Author: Mira Grant Publisher: Tor Nightfire Publication date: May 6, 2025 Length: 480 pages Genre: Science fiction / horror Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4.5 out of 5.
Annihilation meets Day of the Triffids in this full-on body horror/alien invasion apocalypse.
This is just a story. It can’t hurt you anymore.
Since she was three years old, Anastasia Miller has been telling anyone who would listen that she’s an alien disguised as a human being, and that the armada that left her on Earth is coming for her. Since she was three years old, no one has been willing to listen.
Now, with an alien signal from the stars being broadcast around the world, humanity is finally starting to realize that it’s already been warned, and it may be too late. The invasion is coming, Stasia’s biological family is on the way to bring her home, and very few family reunions are willing to cross the gulf of space for just one misplaced child.
What happens when you know what’s coming, and just refuse to listen?
Mira Grant is the horror pen name for prolific author Seanan McGuire… and basically, I’ll read pretty much whatever she writes, under whichever name. With Mira Grant books, you can count on a certain ickiness (I mean, one of her series has to do with tapeworms!), but always with a strong foundation in character development and relationships.
Here, in Overgrowth, the aliens are coming… although many of their children are already here. Set about five years from now, we follow unfolding events through the eyes of main character Stasia (Anastasia) Miller, a customer service rep and self-described misanthrope who has fewer than a handful of friends, a boyfriend she loves very much, and a cat named Seymour.
Also, since the age of three, Stasia has been telling anyone who’s asked (and even those who haven’t) that she’s an alien, and that her people will be coming to bring her home. You can imagine the flurry of notes from teachers, progressing over time from praise for her precocious imagination to concern about how her insistence on these bizarre fantasies is leading to ostracism by her classmates.
Despite years of therapy as a child, and several managers telling me the joke has gotten old and I’d have an easier time getting promoted if I’d knock it off, I’ve never been able to swallow the urge to tell everyone I spend any extended period of time with that hey, by the way, I’m here because the invasion is coning, and people should probably know. It’s like a nervous tic. Hi, nice to meet you, my name’s Anastasia, I’m secretly an intelligent alien plant and one day everything you love will be devoured.
But as we readers know from the start, it’s not fantasy or imagination. At the age of three, little Anastasia wandered into the woods behind her home, and never came back. Instead, she was consumed and then replaced by an alien plant. The child who came out of the woods was not the child who went into them. But no one has ever actually believed her when she’s insisted on what she is.
We were the changelings of the science fiction age, and that made us both terrifying and untrue.
As the story unfolds, an astronomer releases a recording of a signal that’s definitely alien, causing a massive uproar and worldwide panic. Stasia and her boyfriend Graham decide to go investigate, because there’s something in that signal that seems to be triggering a change in Stasia. Events are set in motion that connect Stasia to others like her. As the invasion gets closer, the alien-humans start to physically change, and they’re targeted by secretive government agents for research and imprisonment. Meanwhile, Stasia has started being able to communicate with her people through a quasi-dream state, and realizes that hard choices are coming. Who does she side with? To whom does her loyalty belong? Can she be blamed for something that she had no control over? And if her friends stick with her, does that make them traitors to their own species?
Overgrowth is complex and multi-faceted, and there’s so much more going on than I can possibly describe. It’s a long book, and requires focus — but it’s absolutely worth the effort. I could not put it down, and could barely come up for air.
There are elements that puzzled me throughout, but the author sticks the landing and ties all the hints and loose plot point together by the end in a way that answers all of my nagging questions. The action is consistently well thought out, the characters are fascinating, and the story arc builds in ways that are unexpected, even as we know that the invasion is inevitable.
The author makes some interesting points about identity and acceptance. Stasia’s boyfriend is a trans man. Even having met him before he transitioned, Stasia immediately accepted his identity.
This could be the moment when I lost him. Because I had always believed him when he told me he was a man, and we had always pretended his belief in me was the same thing, but it wasn’t, was it? It wasn’t the same thing at all. Gender was a social construct and a part of the soul, and humans had always been capable of getting it wrong. I, though…
I was something alien and new, and while we had built a relationship on believing each other, our secrets weren’t the same at all.
Only Graham was still looking at me the way he always had, with love and sincere concern, like he believed I was a human being and deserved to be treasured like one. Or… maybe he’d never believed I was a human being. Maybe I’d been lucky enough to fall in love with one of the only people in the world who understood what it was to tell the truth about your identity, over and over again, until you found the few people who could believe in you.
Stasia’s transformation from weird human who says she’s an alien into a person who realizes that her truth has been more true than she ever knew is startling and evocative and powerful. As she becomes more and more “other”, she has to deal with a changing biology as well as complicated thoughts and feelings about family and survival.
This book is hard to slot neatly into a specific genre. The blurb refers to it as “body horror”, which doesn’t feel entirely accurate to me. I think of body horror as being much more extreme — mutilation, grotesque changes, lots of gore. Here, yes, Stasia’s body changes, but it’s more interesting than gross. There are violent moments with bloody/gory results, but overall, I’d categorize this book as much more heavily science fiction than horror.
However you might describe or shelve it, Overgrowth is fascinating. Stasia is an amazing main character, and I loved seeing her journey. The alien invasion is strange and different and scary, and the plotlines are tightly built and well described. This is a terrific read, and I recommend it highly for anyone who doesn’t mind the idea of creepy plants taking over the world.
Invasion of the Body Snatchers + Little Shop of Horrors. What could go wrong?
Purchase links: Amazon – Bookshop.org – Libro.fm Disclaimer: When you make a purchase through one of these affiliate links, I may earn a small commission, at no additional cost to you.
For more by this author, check out these outstanding books:
Seanan McGuire’s excellent October Daye series is one of my absolute favorites, and I’ve been pining for more in that world for over a year now!
To recap, books 17 and 18, Sleep No More and The Innocent Sleep, were released one month apart in fall 2023, and tell essentially the same story, but from two different characters’ perspectives. They were awesome… and they’ve left us all hanging ever since!
Today, I got access to the ARC for the next book in the series, and I am beyond delighted! Here’s a quick peek:
Book #19, Silver and Lead, will be released September 30th:
Seanan McGuire’s New York Times bestselling and Hugo Award-nominated October Daye series continues as Toby Daye is thrust once again into danger… and this time she has more than ever to protect.
Something is rotten in Faerie. In the aftermath of Titania’s reality-warping enchantment, things are returning to what passes for normal in the Kingdom in the Mists—until it’s discovered that the royal vaults have been looted, and several powerful magical artifacts are missing. None are things that can be safely left unsecured, and some have the potential to do almost as much damage as Titania did, and having them in the wrong hands could prove just as disastrous.
At least the theft means that Sir October “Toby” Daye, Knight errant and Hero of the Realm, finally has an excuse to get out of the house. Sure, she’s eight and a half months pregnant, but that doesn’t mean she can’t take care of herself. But with the sea witch offering to stand godmother to Toby’s child, maybe there are greater dangers ahead for Toby and her family than it appears….
Old enemies will resurface, new enemies will disguise themselves as friends, and Queen Windermere must try to keep her Hero on the case without getting herself gutted by the increasingly irritated local King of Cats. Sometimes, what’s been lost can be the most dangerous threat of all.
I can’t wait! But I will… I’m going to try to hold off until closer to the release date, and meanwhile, plan to do a reread of the previous two books. I’m thrilled to be re-entering Toby’s world!
As I was finishing up this post, two exciting pieces of book news crossed my radar, and they’re too good not to share! So while not related to October Daye, they’re both about new books in long-term series… and both are huge!
First:
The next (and final) book in the world of His Dark Materials has been announced!
The Rose Field, book #3 in The Book of Dust series (following La Belle Sauvage, published 2017, and The Secret Commonwealth, published 2019) will be release in fall 2025.
Author Philip Pullman has revealed details of the sixth and final book in his series about Lyra Silvertongue, the character at the heart of His Dark Materials and The Book of Dust trilogies.
The Rose Field will be published on 23 October, and will follow his heroine’s story up to her early 20s.
She was 11 when she was introduced in the best-selling and award-winning first His Dark Materials book, Northern Lights, in 1995.
Pullman, 78, said he was “relieved” to have “come out of the end alive and able to see it being made into a book and published”.
The Rose Field has a scheduled publication date of October 23, 2025. While a cover has not yet been revealed, the publisher’s site has this blurb:
The breathtaking conclusion to Philip Pullman’s Book of Dust! This landmark trilogy, set in the world readers first glimpsed in The Golden Compass, continues the story of Lyra: “one of fantasy’s most indelible heroines” (The New York Times Magazine).
“It’s a stunning achievement, this universe Pullman has created and continues to build on.” —The New York Times
Picking up right where The Secret Commonwealth left off, this story finds Lyra alone in a city haunted by daemons, searching for her beloved Pan. Malcolm Polstead isn’t far behind, searching for Lyra. And they are both racing toward the desert of Karamakan, following the trail of roses said to hold the secret of Dust.
Their allies and enemies are converging on the mysterious red building at the heart of the desert: Marcel Delamare and the military might of the Magisterium; the radical Men from the Mountains; scientists, scholars and spies; troops of witches and other people of the air. And awaiting them all is a previously unseen and chilling new threat that will change everything.
The intertwining odysseys of Malcolm and Lyra, their journeys both internal and external, will test their limits and challenge even their most dearly held beliefs.
As ever, Philip Pullman is using the language of fantasy to illuminate our world and to explore the deepest questions of what it means to be alive and awake to all the splendors and horrors around us. The extraordinary novels of The Book of Dust speak powerfully to today’s readers and will take their place alongside the forever-favorites of His Dark Materials.
Of course, this means that I’ll need to reread (at least) The Secret Commonwealth before October. My reading life has suddenly gotten a whole lot busier!
Title: Installment Immortality Series: Incryptid, #14 Author: Seanan McGuire Publisher: Tor Books Publication date: March 11, 2025 Length: 432 pages Genre: Urban fantasy Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Seanan McGuire’s New York Times-bestselling and Hugo Award-nominated InCryptid series continues with a whirlwind adventure….
After four generations of caring for the Price family, Mary Dunlavy has more than earned a break from the ongoing war with the Covenant of St. George. Instead, what she’s getting is a new employer, in the form of the anima mundi, Earth’s living soul made manifest, and a new assignment: to hunt down the Covenant agents on the East Coast and make them stop imprisoning America’s ghosts.
All in a day’s work for a phantom nanny, even one who’d really rather be teaching her youngest charges how to read.
One ghost can’t take on the entire Covenant without backup, which is how she winds up on a road trip with the still-mourning Elsie and the slowly collapsing Arthur, both of whom are reeling in their own way from the loss of their mother. New allies and new enemies await in Worcester, Massachusetts, where the path of the haunting leads.
With the anima mundi demanding results and Mary’s newfound freedom at stake, it’s down to Mary to make sure that everyone gets out of this adventure alive.
It’s been a long afterlife, but Mary Dunlavy’s not ready to be exorcised quite yet.
When you’re on the 14th book in an ongoing series, it feels practically impossible to talk about it in a way that will make sense to anyone who hasn’t been along for the journey. And in fact, even though I have read every one of these books, I needed a serious refresher before feeling ready to dive in. Um, what happened last time around? The details are a little fuzzy…
Fortunately, the narrator of Installment Immortality, ghost babysitter Mary Dunlavy, is just bouncing back from a major trauma and missed quite a bit, so her opening in the first chapter is quite helpful:
All right, this is where I recap. Because we’re dealing with five generations of family history here, and that’s a lot, even when you’ve been there from the beginning. I can’t count on anyone having been here from the beginning anymore, myself included, so I’ll give you the basic shape of things and hope that will be enough to ground you in this glorious ghost story already in progress.
Thanks, Mary!
The first chapter is Mary giving us a speed-recap, and it was just what I needed. (That, plus keeping the Incryptids wiki page bookmarked for easy reference.)
A brief explanation on the series (from my review of one of the earlier books):
The InCryptid series is a big, sprawling, interconnected story about the varied and sundry members of the Price/Healy clan — humans (mostly) who specialize in cryptozoology, the study and preservation of non-human people who live among us here on Earth. The arch-enemies of the Price gang (and all non-human species) is the Covenant, a powerful organization dedicated to hunting down and eliminating all cryptids — ostensibly to protect humans, but really, at this point, it’s more from deeply ingrained hatred and a desire to rid the world of everything non-human.
The series has had several different narrators, most of whom get a couple of books in a row before we move on to the next. Installment Immortality is Mary’s second book, and she picks up right where she left off in the previous book, Aftermarket Afterlife.
The Price-Healy family has inflicted serious harm on the Covenant, and now the Covenant wants payback. They’re trying to get it by rounding up and either destroying or weaponizing ghosts, and Mary’s new boss — the anima mundi, the living spirit of the world — wants it stopped before irreversible damage is done. Mary is tasked with finding these wannabe ghostbusters and doing whatever it takes to shut them down.
Meanwhile, the family is in tatters, having suffered two devastating losses in the last book. No one is operating at full speed, but Mary recognizes that siblings Elsie and Arthur need both a distraction and a purpose, and the three set off on a road trip to carry out her mission.
As we get into the main action of the story, the pace quickens and the stakes get higher and higher. Without going too far into the details, I’ll just say that the suspense becomes intense, and I was on the edge of my seat! You might think that when a main character is a ghost and therefore already dead, there wouldn’t be much risk… and you’d be wrong. Mary faces incredible danger, but her devotion to her kids (yes, Elsie and Arthur are adults, but once Mary has been someone’s babysitter, they’re always going to be her kids, no matter their age) keeps her focuses on her mission and determined to do whatever it takes to protect them.
Installment Immortality is another terrific addition to a great series. It can feel somewhat dense at times — there is A LOT to keep track of. But it’s worth it. With a series this big and sprawling, the mythology and interconnectedness is intense (and seriously, those wikis are essential!), but the emotional payoff of seeing the latest developments for characters we’ve had this much time to get to know and love is really rewarding.
Obviously, starting an ongoing series at book 14 is not going to be a satisfying reading experience. Each book builds upon the one before — so really, the only way to enjoy it is to start at the beginning (Discount Armageddon)… and then keep going!
As for me, I’m all in, and can’t wait for #15!
As with other books in the Incryptid series, this one includes a novella at the end, Mourner’s Waltz. The story features the same main character as in the previous novella, picking up the story several months later. There are strong emotional beats plus a nifty adventure. I can’t talk about it without major spoilers, but it was engaging and lovely… and makes me hope that the next main Incryptid book will bring this character back to center stage.
Title: Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear Series: Wayward Children, #10 Author: Seanan McGuire Publisher: Tor Publication date: January 7, 2025 Length: 160 pages Genre: Fantasy Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4.5 out of 5.
Giant turtles, impossible ships, and tidal rivers ridden by a Drowned girl in search of a family in the latest in the bestselling Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning Wayward Children series from Seanan McGuire.
Nadya had three mothers: the one who bore her, the country that poisoned her, and the one who adopted her.
Nadya never considered herself less than whole, not until her adoptive parents fitted her with a prosthetic arm against her will, seeking to replace the one she’d been missing from birth.
It was cumbersome; it was uncomfortable; it was wrong.
It wasn’t her.
Frustrated and unable to express why, Nadya began to wander, until the day she fell through a door into Belyrreka, the Land Beneath the Lake–and found herself in a world of water, filled with child-eating amphibians, majestic giant turtles, and impossible ships that sailed as happily beneath the surface as on top. In Belyrreka, she found herself understood for who she was: a Drowned Girl, who had made her way to her real home, accepted by the river and its people.
But even in Belyrreka, there are dangers, and trials, and Nadya would soon find herself fighting to keep hold of everything she had come to treasure.
Adrift in Currents Clear and Clean is the 10th book in Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series, and I’m pleased to say that the series is going strong. In fact, Adrift stands out as one of the best in the series, as far as I’m concerned.
In this 10th book, the story never actually ventures into Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children, the setting that anchors the series and creates a connection between all of the books and their characters. Instead, Adrift tells the story of one particular Wayward Child, Nadya, and what happens to her in the world of Belyrreka.
Nadya is not a new character — although, if you’re like me, it might take more than a slight hint to put the pieces together. Readers of the series were introduced to Nadya in the 3rd book, Beneath the Sugar Sky. In that book, Nadya was a student at Eleanor West’s home, having gone through a portal to another world and then been returned to our own. Nadya, like the other characters in the series, was left to yearn for the world that feels like her true home and wait for the day when that world might call her back.
Adrift in Currents Clear and Clean takes us back to Nadya’s origin story. Abandoned at birth, Nadya is raised in a Russian orphanage — a bright child who thrives on caring for the other children and helping them find forever homes.
She was young and sweet and innocent and hard, in the way of children raised in job lots rather than individually; she was doing her best to be a good person, and to figure out what that meant in the context of the world she knew and had and understood.
Born without a right arm below the elbow, Nadya has never felt that she was disabled or missing anything at all; this is who she is, and she manages perfectly well. But at age nine, Nadya is finally adopted herself, by an American missionary couple who see taking in an imperfect child as a good deed. They don’t love her for herself; they love having her as proof of their own goodness.
Nadya’s new life in American is filled with things and luxuries that she wouldn’t have had in the land of her birth, and she knows that she must be compliant and grateful at all times — until the day that her adoptive parents take her to the doctor to receive a prosthetic arm. Nadya doesn’t want it — she’s fine as she is — but her objections don’t matter. She’s forced into wearing the prosthetic, which is clunky and hurts her skin. Now, for the first time, children at school see her as other; she’s not Nadya their playmate any longer, but the girl with the strange fake arm.
Miserable, Nadya goes for a walk to her favorite place, the turtle pond near her home. When she sees a strange shadow on the water that looks almost like a door, she leans in for a closer look, and falls in. Instead of drowning, Nadya wakes on the shores of a strange river in a strange world — and finds a wonderful place where she belongs, finds purpose and connection and true family, and knows that she’s finally home.
Nadya’s life in Belyrreka is wondrous. It’s a world of water — people live beneath the river and the lake, in cities where water has different weights. Some water is for breathing, some for swimming. Heavier water is deeper, and people ride boats and turtles through the lighter water to the dry world above, where they fish and farm and bring back sustenance to the cities. I can understand why Nadya would never want to leave Belyrreka — I would willingly have read much, much more about it.
Of course, if you’ve read Beneath the Sugar Sky, you’ll know that in that book, Nadya is introduced as a girl who returned from a watery world — so Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear is a prequel, of sorts, to that book. We read Adrift knowing that Nadya will inevitably be wrenched away from Belyrreka. Seeing her happiness in this world is a special kind of sadness for the reader; we know that her time is limited, even if she does not.
Beneath the Sugar Sky also provides a coda to Nadya’s story in Adrift. When I finished Adrift — with a lump in my throat — I went back to Beneath the Sugar Sky and read the conclusion of Nadya’s part of that story. Without saying too much, I’ll just note that the payoff made my tears goes away!
Many readers note having uneven experiences with the Wayward Children series. For me, it’s been generally wonderful all the way through, although yes, some books in the series are more memorable or powerful or affecting than others. We all have our favorites — and now that I’ve read Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear, I can say with certainty that it’s one of the best.
As I’ve said with my review of each books in the series, I highly recommend starting at the beginning and continuing from there. Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear is a self-contained story that can be read on its own; there are no other characters or plotlines in it that require knowledge of earlier events in the series. Still, I recommend reading it as part of the whole, in order to get the full impact.
Nadya’s story is incredibly moving, and the world of Belyrreka is a delight. Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear is a terrific addition to an inventive, always-changing series. Don’t miss it.
Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Books on My Winter 2024-2025 to-Read List.
I’ll have a slew of new releases and ARCs to read from about February onward, but before then, I’m going to try to focus on books I’ve been meaning to get to for a while… with maybe one or two new releases mixed in as well.
My top 10 books on my winter TBR:
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley: I keep saying this is a priority read, and yet I still haven’t read it! I’d like to get to it before the end of 2024… but the clock is ticking.
The Naturalist Society by Carrie Vaughn: A new release from a favorite author! I haven’t seen any chatter about it yet, but it sounds so interesting.
The Wishing Game by Meg Shaffer: Another one I’ve been wanting to get to. I loved this author’s more recent book, The Lost Story.
Adrift in Currents Clean and Clear by Seanan McGuire: The 10th Wayward Children book will be released in January. I’m always up for another book in this series.
Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix: Upcoming new release for January. I love the sound of it.
The Bones Beneath My Skin by TJ Klune: This backlist title is being reissued (with a gorgeous new cover) in Februrary — meanwhile, I have the Kindle version, and can’t wait to dive in.
The Truth According to Ember by Danica Nava: My library hold is (finally) almost ready!
Hogfather by Terry Pratchett: It’s been a while since I’ve picked up a Discworld book, but this one seems like a great choice for this time of year!
Ready or Not by Cara Bastone: I stumbled across a description of this romance, and it caught my attention… and was available from the library when I went looking for it.
A Darkness Absolute by Kelley Armstrong: This is the 2nd book in the Rockton series; I’m about 50% through with book #1 (City of the Lost), and I know I’ll want to keep going!
What books will be keeping you warm this winter? Share your links, and I’ll come check out your top 10!
Title: Aftermarket Afterlife Series: Incryptid, #13 Author: Seanan McGuire Publisher: DAW Publication date: March 5, 2024 Length: 368 pages Genre: Urban fantasy Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley Rating:
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Seanan McGuire’s New York Times -bestselling and Hugo Award-nominated urban fantasy InCryptid series continues with the thirteenth book following the Price family, cryptozoologists who study and protect the creatures living in secret all around us
Mary Dunlavy didn’t intend to become a professional babysitter. Of course, she didn’t intend to die, either, or to become a crossroads ghost. As a babysitting ghost, she’s been caring for the Price family for four generations, and she’s planning to keep doing the job for the better part of forever.
With her first charge finally back from her decades-long cross-dimensional field trip, with a long-lost husband and adopted daughter in tow, it’s time for Mary to oversee the world’s most chaotic family reunion. And that’s before the Covenant of St. George launches a full scale strike against the cryptids of Manhattan, followed quickly by an attack on the Campbell Family Carnival.
It’s going to take every advantage and every ally they have for the Prices to survive what’s coming—and for Mary, to avoid finding out the answer to a question she’s never wanted to know: where does a babysitting ghost go when she runs out of people to take care of?
In the 13th installment in the weird and wonderful world of Seanan McGuire’s InCryptid series, the Price-Healy family is back… and things are not going well at all.
My recap from the previous book in the series still holds true:
The InCryptid series is a big, sprawling, interconnected story about the varied and sundry members of the Price/Healy clan — humans (mostly) who specialize in cryptozoology, the study and preservation of non-human people who live among us here on Earth. The arch-enemies of the Price gang (and all non-human species) is the Covenant, a powerful organization dedicated to hunting down and eliminating all cryptids — ostensibly to protect humans, but really, at this point, it’s more from deeply ingrained hatred and a desire to rid the world of everything non-human.
The series covers a lot of ground, and as it’s progressed, different family members have had the starring roles in different books. We’ve had books mainly focused on siblings Verity, Alex, and Antimony, and also their cousin Sarah, and their grandparents Alice and Thomas, but Aftermarket Afterlife is the first book where the family babysitter, Mary Dunlavy, is in the central role.
Up to now, Mary has been a featured side character, always present one way or another in the family’s lives, but usually never in more than a few key scenes from book to book. In Aftermarket Afterlife, we’re finally able to experience the Price-Healy clan through Mary’s eyes, and it’s a fascinating journey.
Mary died about a hundred years earlier, but that hasn’t stopped her from carrying out her duties as the family’s babysitter. She may be a ghost, but she’s good at her job! By appearance, she’s a teen girl (with startling white hair and eerie eyes), and her afterlife’s purpose is caring for the children of the Price family… even when those children are now fully grown and have children of their own. Mary can assume solid form (so she can tend the children in her care), but can also discorporate to pass through other dimensions. Most important among her ghostly abilities, she can hear when one of her children calls for her no matter where they are, and can instantly blink out from wherever she is and appear by their side.
In Aftermarket Afterlife, the Covenant is amping up their attacks on cryptid locations in North America, zeroing in on known and suspected allies of the Price clan. It’s only a matter of time before they find the family’s secret compound outside of Portland. The Prices are seemingly outnumbered, but they don’t give up easily, and soon Mary becomes essential to the family’s plan to take the fight to the Covenant.
“Hi. I’m the babysitter. And you scared my kids.”
This book starts a bit slowly, as Mary blips from one point to another, gathering intel and figuring out where everyone is. Pretty much all the family members we’ve come to know over the course of the series show up in this one, so there’s a lot of setting the scene before the action before more sharply focused. By the midpoint, however, it’s full speed ahead. The family suffers some tragic losses, and as they’re left reeling, Mary’s role as caregiver becomes even more important.
I do love this series, although thirteen books in, there is a LOT to remember and keep track of. As the various characters have changed and evolved over the series, and different higher powers have come and gone, the underlying mythology has gotten even more complicated.
“I liked it better when we weren’t all wrapped up in gods and weird divinities,” said Sam.
Honestly, same. There are more godly beings affecting the world of the Incryptid series, and it can be a little mind-boggling at times.
Aftermarket Afterlife is a particularly entertaining outing — I really enjoyed Mary as narrator. Her worldview, as a ghost, is of course quite different from that of the living family members.
You might think being dead would make death easier for me to deal with. You would be so very wrong.
I won’t go too far into plot details. For those who’ve kept up with the series, you’ll want to see it unfold without knowing much in advance. For those unfamiliar with the series, this is all likely sounding like gibberish anyway!
Aftermarket Afterlife is another terrific adventure with the Price-Healy family. I loved getting to see so many of my favorite characters once again, and really enjoyed getting to know Mary so much more through this story. The book ends with the family essentially in the middle of a war against the Covenant, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
As with other books in the Incryptid series, this one includes a novella at the end, Dreaming of You in Freefall, which takes place shortly after the events of Aftermarket Afterlife. There’s absolutely nothing I can say about it without divulging a major spoiler from the main book — but trust me, it’s a really good one, and you’ll want to read it right away.
The Incryptid series is not one to jump into at a random point. There’s so much backstory to learn, so many family members, and so many types of cryptids, as well as an overarching plot that’s been building from the beginning of the series. I do hope more people will read the Incryptid books… but if you do decide to give them a try, start with book #1, Discount Armageddon.
Title: Mislaid in Parts Half-Known Series: Wayward Children, #9 Author: Seanan McGuire Publisher: Tor Publication date: January 9, 2024 Length: 160 pages Genre: Fantasy Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4.5 out of 5.
Dinosaurs and portals, and a girl who can find both in the latest book in the Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning series.
Antsy is the latest student to pass through the doors at Eleanor West’s School for Wayward Children.
When her fellow students realize that Antsy’s talent for finding absolutely anything may extend to doors, she’s forced to flee in the company of a small group of friends, looking for a way back to the Shop Where the Lost Things Go to be sure that Vineta and Hudson are keeping their promise.
Along the way, temptations are dangled, decisions are reinforced, and a departure to a world populated by dinosaurs brings untold dangers and one or two other surprises!
A story that reminds us that finding what you want doesn’t always mean finding what you need.
What can you say about the 9th book in a series? Other than that’s it’s terrific, of course! The book opens with a paragraph that beautifully sums up the overarching plot of the series:
Children of the doors know about being mislaid. They are well-acquainted with stepping through an opening or following a passage that should lead from here to there, and finding themselves someplace entirely else, someplace entirely new. It is possibly their only truly unifying experience, the one thing they have so completely in common that there’s no need to even question it: once upon a time, they took an impossible step, opened an impossible portal, and ended up in a terribly, horribly possible place.
As the newest Wayward Children book, Mislaid in Parts Half-Known keeps the overarching storylines of the series moving forward while introducing some new twists, rules, and situations for the characters to deal with. Some of the installments in the series have more of a stand-alone feel, although they’re all connected, but this is not one of those. Mislaid is absolutely a sequel, mainly in regard to book #8 and its main character Antsy, but it also continues the stories of several other characters, and it’s helpful (I’d even say critical) to be familiar with them.
The previous book, Lost in the Moment and Found, focused on a young girl named Antsy, who runs away from a dangerous situation in her home and finds herself in the world of a store that’s actually a nexus point between worlds. Antsy’s new home in the store is mostly delightful — she’s safe, after all, and has the opportunity to visit countless new worlds through the portal doors that appear and disappear. But, as she discovers by the end of the book, there’s a price to be paid, and the book ends with Antsy returning, quite changed, to her home world and finding her way to Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children.
In Mislaid in Parts Half-Known, Antsy is settling in at the school, but doesn’t actually quite fit. She’s actually much younger than the other students, and their portal worlds are all so different that she can’t seem to connect with many of them. When a particularly dangerous student threatens Antsy’s safety, she and a handful of others escape through another door and begin a new quest.
Readers of the prior books in the series will be familiar with Antsy’s companions — Sumi, Kade, Christopher, Cora and a few newer faces too. As they flee, they’re also searching for possibilities. Most of the students yearn to return “home” — that is, to their lost worlds beyond the doors — and Antsy has the unique ability to find any door. So if they can actually go home, should they?
There are some interesting discussions about what it means to be sure about a choice, and how they’ll know when or if they’re ready, as well as conversations about whether someone truly still belongs in the place they consider home. These introspective bits are lovely, as the various characters get a chance to shine and express themselves, even in the midst of fleeing from dangerous goblins and dinosaurs.
Yes, dinosaurs. The cover doesn’t lie! The group does visit a primeval world populated by dinosaurs, and it’s amazing. I’m not going into further detail — read it and find out!
The challenge I had with this book, as hinted at earlier, is keeping track of the characters. Yes, I’ve read the entire series so far, but since they’re released at a rate of one per year, it’s been a few years since I’ve thought about some of these characters. Thank goodness there are wikis out there! I definitely had to go look up some backstories. At some point, rereading the whole series from the beginning might be a good idea!
If you’ve been curious about the Wayward Children series, I would recommend against starting with this book. It won’t make any sense! It’s such a great series, though, that I would strongly recommend picking up a copy of Every Heart a Doorway — I bet you’ll want to keep going!
I really enjoyed Mislaid in Parts Half-Known. It ends with certain characters spinning off into new directions, and leaves much still to be discovered in the wider world of the school. I can’t wait to find out where Wayward Children goes next.
Bookshelf Fantasies 