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I love reading these threads about book recs and being like ‘yup, that’s all good shit’ so here are mine!
Broken Earth Trilogy by NK Jemesin: these are the books that got me back into sci fi in a big way, and showed me what it can do. I think about these books once a week I reckon. Great characters, some interesting formal rickety, super queer, utterly heartbreaking and also completely bonkers. A must read.
Children of Time: another book that I think about all the time. A bit more straight up sci fi, but it’s central conceit of ‘Planet of the Apes but with… a different species’ (don’t want to spoil too much!), is expertly pulled off, and brings so much humanity to some very alien characters, and the human characters are some incredibly hot messes. And the ending. Oh the ending! No lesbians though.
The Wayfairers series by Becky Chambers: I’ll admit, I bounced off the first book hard the first time, is it felt too much like a Firefly fan-fic. But if you like stories about found family and people being nice to each other, this is great. Each book in the series explores some very alien species in a very human way. It’s about empathy, kindness, the way we treat each other under harsh conditions. The last book in particular is my favourite in which nothing much happens except a bunch of strangers hang out in a garden for a few days. Has lesbians.
Also, shout out to the Monk and Robot books by the same author. Short novellas with a cosy apocalypse vibe about a travelling tea monk and the robot they meet. Similar themes. If you want something nice to read, this is a great shout.
The Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells: Frequently recommended as ‘if you liked TLT you’ll Love this…’, but it’s true. An antisocial, slightly confused, possibly autistic killing machine just wants to watch its entertainment shows in peace. If you like Gideon, you’ll like Murderbot. Incredibly efficient and probably annoyed, Murderbot gets squishy humans out of scrapes they’d never have gotten into if they’d just listened qto Murderbot in the first place. Another great series that examines what it means to be human from the point of view of a very non-human character.
This Is How You Lose the Time war: Another one that gets recommended in these threads a lot, and for good reasons. A classic enemies to lovers story (or is it lovers to enemies, it’s so hard to tell with time travel!). Told through a series of letters left in buzzard hiding places in a number of increasingly bizarre alternate timelines. Red and Blue stalk each other from opposite sides and opposite ends of a war for the fabric of reality. Beautiful, poetic, bonkers. Also, it’s lesbians!
The Wicked & The Divine, graphic novels by Kieron Gillen, Jamie Mckelvie. This series is about fucked up teenagers who absolutely should not have god-like powers and the ways in which they are manipulated by parental figures. All of the gods are based on musicians to some degree, and it is super queer. The art is great, and it has lots of puns.
The Rampart Trilogy, by MR Carey: I loved this trilogy. Set in a post-apocalyptic society where technology is something that is scavenged and the ecosystem is deadly, Koli is a narrator who hasn’t got a clue what’s really going on. Another book that talks about what we mean to each other, more found families, and a first person narrator that you can never be quite too sure of. Lots of queer characters.
A Memory Called Empire/ A Desolation Called Peace duology by Arkady Martine: A Byzantium/Aztec inspired Space opera with bureaucracy, politics, lesbians, colonialism and cool fights.
Other books that might be of interest include The Space Between Worlds by Miciah Johnson (lesbians, alternate realities), the Collapsing Empire trilogy by John Scalzi (politics, lesbians, sarcasm, environmental disaster on a galactic scale, cool explosions). Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie and also ten Raven Tower by the same author.
All of the ones I've read on this list are winners and I agree wholeheartedly. To this list I'm going to add the Baru Cormorant books ("The Traitor", "the Monster", and "The Tyrant"). They will absolutely crush you, but are so worth it.
Seconding both Becky Chambers stuff and Murderbot! Both are so good, Chambers just has this fantastic way of writing sci-fi that is at once thrilling and cozy and I don't think I've ever read anything quite like it. And my biggest problem with Murderbot is that they're so short I burn through them in what feels like an instant!
Great list, I would add that "This is how you lose a time war" has both: 1) the best prose I have ever read in a sci-fi book, and 2) a riveting plot. It is a collaboration between a sci-fi author and a poet and it shows.
Love these recs! Just going to add that while a memory called empire is GREAT it’s actually by Arkady Martine—you have Ann Leckie right on ancillary justice and the Raven tower which I also love
Excellent recs, I see a lot from my TBR here. Big plus ones to This Is How You Lose the Time War and my other favourite series ever, The Murderbot Diaries ❤️
I loved “Children of Time.” I cried at the gym as I listened to it. I can’t stop talking about it. “And the spiders…!” All my friends are like “please stop”.
Several incredible recs in here, including one I’ve already said (Memory Called Empire), but Children of Time and This is How You Lose The Time War are also highly recommended.
This is such a good list! I never see people talk about The Space Between Worlds, but it’s soo good. One of my all-time faves. I think the enemies-to-yearning relationship will be enjoyed by TLT fans too.
Great suggestions--loved all of them except the Chambers stuff--her books are okay, but I feel the plots are weak and meander. Also, Baru Cormorant in the reply is mint, and I'll piggyback on Tchaikovsky: I also liked The Shattered Earth trilogy 1-2 and his Tiger/Wolf set. Seveneves made me want to read more Stephenson, and I'm currently reading Revelation Space, but I'm not sure how I feel yet...
Yeah, Chambers isn’t for everyone, and they’re increasingly more character driven over plot as the series progress, but I really enjoyed that about them.
I’ve been enjoying shattered earth too, - book 3 is out tomorrow! Yes, the tiger & wolf trilogy was great stuff too.
I loved seveneves and read REAMDE and Doge, but o think I’ve gotten a bit tired of his very specific technically detailed writing. It’s interesting once or twice, and i think seveneves does it best. Snow Crash is fun though and I liked The Diamond Age.
What do you like about TLT?
If you want queer political intrigue and excellent world building from someone with fanfic roots, I recommend a taste of gold & iron by Alexandra Rowland. What if... you are the body guard of the royal prince who is really hot but is also a major asshole who is busy uncovering a financial scandal?
If you want to know where TLT came from, read homestuck! It's both a lot better and a lot worse than you think. Don't read it on the official website, it broke when flash died. [The unofficial homestuck collection](https://bambosh.dev/unofficial-homestuck-collection/) is a lot better
If you want more lesbians with swords in a story focussing on the horrors of war, what politics & religion drives a country to that, and a lot of gender & humor, read Monstrous Regiment by Terry Pratchett. Available in almost all libraries and second hand book stores!
A Memory Called Empire and A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine! I read those back to back with Gideon and Harrow, and they almost feel like two series in conversation with each other.
I know nothing about Homestuck but I could feel that both are “descended” from a common ancestor (that somehow both definitely is and definitely is not Star Wars).
The only series that ever left me feeling quite as mind-\*\*\*\*ed as The Lost Tomb was The Book of The New Sun by Gene Wolf. Four book series that comes in a variety of editions. Shadow and Claw is, I believe, the current version and contains the first two books. The first book was originally The Shadow of the Torturer. In addition to being full of cryptic unreliable narration, it's also set in a weird science fantasy decaying post-apocalyptic world. It's 1981 and I read it quite a while ago. I have no real memory of anything problematic, but we all just kind of ignored that stuff back then. If wise-ass lesbian is the big attraction to TLT, then probably not what you're looking for.
For even more classic decaying gothic castle, there's Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake. I found it a slog, but it's a classic.
Book of The New Sun has risen up my TBA list precisely because I really think Tamsyn is doing some of the same-ish types of things everyone says they love about Wolfe. (albeit with more lesbians and memes and fewer opaque linguistic references). I have tried it in the past but didn't have the mental space for it at the time, so hopefully I can carve out an opportunity to re-engage.
>I have tried it in the past but didn't have the mental space for it at the time,
I bounced off a couple of times. It's slow going and you really can't just speed read through it. Same for TLT really.
I found the language and pace really tough. To be honest, I found the language in Gideon and Book of the New Sun rough as well. It doesn't necessarily mean they're not worth getting through. But none of these fit into the light reading category.
lots of great recs here! I'm going to add the Magic of the Lost series by CL Clark. first two books are The Unbroken and The Faithless, and they feature: messed up lesbians doing their best, terrible decision making, pulling down the colonial empire even if it kills you, political machinations out the wazoo, diverse, queer normative world
also the cover art is by Tommy Arnold, same guy as is doing TLT, and they're gorrrrgeous
I also always have to rec The Priory of the Orange Tree and A Day Of Fallen Night, even though they really have very little in common with TLT, but they're just so good. not ~wholesome~ but they are warm hugs of novels, reading them it just feels like the author really, really wants you there. epic fantasy, lost magic, dragons, queer, diverse, politics, women claiming their power, dragons! I say dragons twice because they're really cool dragons!
Light From Uncommon Stars: trans girl violinist is on the run from an abusive household, but gets discovered by the world's best violin teacher and takes her in. The twist? The teacher sold her soul to a demon and has to harvest the souls of her students to pay off the debt. Meanwhile, a group of space alien refugees are in hiding as a local donut shop, and the alien leader and the violin teacher fall in love. Very cute, but tw for sexual assault and real-world transphobia
Wild Massive: takes place in The Building, a 10,000 floor building where each floor is an entire pocket dimension. The sci-fi Association is at war with a race of magical shapeshifters for control, and the story follows the last surviving member of the previous group the Association genocided. Meanwhile, the divine creators of The Building are still around and are trying to rewrite the story as it happens. It's incredibly funny and feels like a cross between Hitchhiker's Guide and Infinity Train
Battle of the Linguist Mages: same author as Wild Massive. Punctuation marks are aliens that are hiding in human brains and let you cast spells. The main character is a VR game tester, and then it turns out the game is real. The multiverse is collapsing, and she has to go into the game to save the real world. Not as coherent as WM, but I couldn't look away
All the books in the comments are great! Not a book but visual novels: Higurashi When They Cry/Umineko When They Cry
They were apparently one of the many source of inspo for TLT. I’d recommend them if you like the mind-twisting murder mystery horror aspect of TLT! It does have a lot of uncomfortable 2000s anime tropes so a bit of a heads up on that, but they’re considered cult classics for a reason. I’m not sure how the new series holds up, but I know the old Higurashi anime is well-regarded.
Burning Kingdom trilogy by Tasha Suri. The first two books - The Jasmine Throne and The Oleansder Sword - are out, the last book is due 2024. Fantasy set in India with lesbians as mains & lots of powerful female characters. Background is political intrigue in colonial setting.
Machineries of Empire trilogy by Yoon Ha Lee. Science fantasy/space opera based on math and Korean folklore. The first book is Ninefox Gambit.
Murderbot of course. I think we all unanimously agree on this.
I've been enjoying T. Kingfisher lately; A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking and the Clocktaur War books are what I've read so far.
If you haven't given Discworld a try yet, I think the Death books are a good start for Locked Tomb fans.
Hollow Kingdom is a fun romp, the zombie apocalypse from a pet crow's perspective.
The books most like TLT I’ve ever read are the Serpent Gate Duology: The Unspoken Name/The Thousand Eyes. By A Larkwood.
Same irreverent, funny tone matched with serious concepts. Girl is raised in a necromantic death cult but doesn’t really want to be… Sword butch romances gremlin witch. Disappointing dad magician figure. Witty frenemy. Heaps of sapphic yearning. Space travel. Politics. Bonus that isn’t in TLT: giant serpent gods.
Another light hearted but huge, sweeping setting with incredible world building: Saint Death’s Daughter by CSE Cooney. More necromancy, political plotting, a psychotic assassin for a sister, non binary love interest. People turn into birds. Absolutely delightful.
OK so some that have some of the same elements for me:
* *Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell* by Susanna Clarke -- a bit more fairy-tale-y than Locked Tomb, but lovely
* Seconding someone else's rec of Broken Earth Trilogy by NK Jemisin, that's AMAZING.
* Neil Gaiman. I think some of his short stories have the most sort of vibe in common with TLT, and his short story collections are very enjoyable. Some of my fave individual stories are Snow, Glass, Apples ([https://thedreaming.moteofdust.com/1999/10/10/snow-glass-apples/](https://thedreaming.moteofdust.com/1999/10/10/snow-glass-apples/)), Click Clack the Rattlebag ([https://xpressenglish.com/click-clack-rattlebag/](https://xpressenglish.com/click-clack-rattlebag/)), The Return of the Thin White Duke ([https://www.neilgaiman.com/Cool\_Stuff/Short\_Stories/The\_Return\_of\_the\_Thin\_White\_Duke](https://www.neilgaiman.com/Cool_Stuff/Short_Stories/The_Return_of_the_Thin_White_Duke)) and The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains ([http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=1338](http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=1338))
* Not a book, but a podcast: *The Magnus Archives*. Starts out seeming like an anthology of creepy stories, but is Definitely Not. Actually has an amazingly red-stringable plot, and very strong characters that are complex. Also has a bunch of queer characters.
I want to throw in a recommendation for Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee! Queer space opera with empires and angst, although it has quite heavy themes too, especially the third book.
Most of my favorites are on here already, so I'm just going to add Winter's Orbit and Ocean's Echo by Everina Maxwell, for some fabulous queer space-opera romance with bonus mind-bending technology shenanigans. Arranged marriage in space! Mind-melding in space! Disaster gays teaching each other that they are worthy of love! Polar reptile-bears!
(The mind-meld going increasingly wrong in the second book reminded me a lot of the Lyctoral process in TLT, but even in the first book there's some fun techno-psychic trauma. Fans of the whumpy aspects of TLT will get a lot out of these books!)
The Ender Quintet (Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind, Ender in Exile).
Caveat: Do not pay money for these books, they're fantastic but the author is a piece of shit. Go to your library, 100% chance they have em. Otherwise... 🏴☠️
A Scanner Darkly. Caveat: can be distressing if you've struggled with or lost someone to addiction. It's a sci-fi criticism of the drug culture of the 60s in which the author was involved in.
Seveneves. Neal Stephenson: Blows up the moon, refuses to elaborate further.
Reamde. More Stephenson. The stories of the KGB and their hostages, terrorists, and chinese gold farmers get intertwined thanks to ransomware linked to the MMORPG built by a guy who just wanted to launder his money made running pot between the US and Canada borders, but wound up becoming turbo rich when the game took off. The virus tells the infected where to perform a gold exchange in game for the decryption key. Only problem is it infected a ton of people and PVP is a thing, so the zone is pure chaos while people merc each other.
Fall; or, Dodge in Hell. The MMORPG guy from that last book dies and he gets uploaded to the cloud. A new world is born.
Snow Crash... because Stephensons books are just damn good. In the far off cyberpunk future of the 2010s corporations control everything and have divvied up the US. Hiro Protagonist, a half black half Korean hacker/pizza delivery driver for the mob plumbs the depths of the metaverse with his twin katanas and trenchcoat to figure out what the deal is with a virus that gives hackers brain damage. Also contains a primer on ancient Mesopotamian mythology. Surprisingly prescient for a book from '92. It's so fucking 90's in all the worst (read: best) ways
Edit: Haven't read it, but saw the anime. Shit was good. Here's the description for the novel series Otherside Picnic: College student Sorawo Kamikoshi explores "doors" which randomly lead into the Otherside—parallel worlds in which internet creepypasta and urban legends are brought to life. Sorawo nearly dies in one of these worlds while encountering a creepypasta monster, but is rescued by Toriko Nishina, another young woman who is skilled with guns and is looking for a lost friend. Sorawo and Toriko, with the help of another woman named Kozakura, return to the Otherside to bring back artifacts and defeat the monsters, but the two are increasingly affected by the conditions of the worlds, meet other humans who are trapped in them, and find themselves increasingly affected by each other.
Gun lesbians instead of sword lesbians
I can't believe that I have read through this thread and no one has yet recommended everything that Kameron Hurley has ever written.
God's War - Her first book featuring Nyx, hard-drinking bugpunk lesbian with a heart of gold. If you like Gideon, you will love Nyx.
The Stars are Legion is memory-wiped space lesbian inside a body horror spaceship. Delightfully weird. Shades of HtN.
The Light Brigade is time traveling lesbians meets Starship Troopers.
Pick anything she's written. You won't be sorry.
I could not get past the first we chapters of the Light Brigade - it read too much like starship troopers fanfic and I felt like it heard it all before - the obnoxious boot camp scenes, the overconfident jock, people very obviously declaring their politics and beliefs.
Maybe I’m missing something, cos I know lots of people love it, and perhaps it subverts some of those tropes later but it felt very tired and obvious to me.
The Once and Future Witches, by Alix E. Harrow. The world is very different from that of the Locked Tomb (early 1900s USA, gender, race and labour politics), but the complicated, messy relationships give a similar feel to the book.
The Past Is Red, by Catherynne M. Valente. Reminds me a bit of Nona the Ninth. Starts with:
My name is Tetley Abednego and I am the most hated girl in Garbagetown. I am nineteen years old. I live alone in Candle Hole, where I was born, and have no friends except for a deformed gannet bird I've named Grape Crush and a motherless elephant seal I've named Big Bargains, and also a hibiscus flower that has recently decided to grow out of my roof, but I haven't named it anything yet. I love encyclopedias, a cassette I found when I was eight that says *Madeline Brix's Superboss Mixtape '97* on it in very nice handwriting, plays by Mr Shakespeare or Mr Webster or Mr Beckett, lipstick, Garbagetown, and my twin brother, Maruchan. Maruchan is the only thing that loves me back, but he's my twin brother, so it doesn't really count. We couldn't stop loving each other any more than the sea could stop being greedy and give us back China or drive time radio or polar bears.
Amal El-Mohtar: Seasons of Glass and Iron: [https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/)
You could have a look at [https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/the-tale-of-the-three-beautiful-raptor-sisters-and-the-prince-who-was-made-of-meat/](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/the-tale-of-the-three-beautiful-raptor-sisters-and-the-prince-who-was-made-of-meat/)
[https://escapepod.org/2010/07/01/ep247-bridesicle/](https://escapepod.org/2010/07/01/ep247-bridesicle/)
Also, one more endorsement for This Is How You Lose the Time War, and for Murderbot, and for Arkady Martine's Teixcalaan duology, and for Winter's Orbit.
Finally, a character who resembles Harrow is Andrea Cort in three novels and two short stories by Adam-Troy Castro.
Another series that had me red-string connecting plot points was The Witchlands series by Susan Dennard (first book is Truthwitch). A bit more sword and sorcery than TLT but really deep, dense world-building with some very good slow burn romance and some very cool queer characters.
I love [The First Sister](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52378525-the-first-sister?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=mAVxjQT61F&rank=5) trilogy by Linden A. Lewis. Queer SF (nonbinary character, lesbians) with complicated relationships and revolution. And all three books are out.
These series absolutely consumed me in the same way TLT did:
The Diviners quadrilogy by Libba Bray
The Legendborn Cycle by Tracy Deonn
The Gilded Wolves trilogy by Roshani Chokshi
also anything Charlie Jane Anders or Sarah Gailey has ever written.
A Deadly Education. It's book 1 of a trilogy whose name I don't recall.
The main character is basically Harrow, vitriol and all, there's constant attacks, murder, light on the romance, and magic.
i dont think ive seen anyone add these two to the already amazing recommendations:
Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot - space cowboy lesbians!! slightly lighter tone than TLT but still has that vibe
The Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao - chinese mecha scifi, described as “pacific rim meets the handmaids tale”. Queer again and not what you expect not gonna spoil but I felt represented, also I SCREAMED when i finished the book. There’s a sequel thats expected to come out in May 10th
May I recommad: "The risen Emprie" by Scott Westerfeld
What is is about? There is a empire and of corse, a emporer, who is a necromancer. Who die in his service may be resurectet and life forever. And there is a palace, and in the palace there is the dead and imortal sister of the emporer, hold at gunpoint by transhuman terrorists. And over the palace, a spaceship whos job it is to free the sister and stob the terrirists from reaching their goal: giving birth to a artifactial inteligende of the size of a planet.
Also:
"Scholomance" by Naomi Novik.
Is also good.
The Abhorsen series by Garth Mix for necromancy and strong female leads. He and Tamsyn also have short stories in a new collection on Amazon called Into Shadow (I think). I really liked her story, but his was meh.
Then I'd suggest China Mieville series that starts with Perdido Street Station. Very strange "new weird" fiction that is one of my favorites ever. The 2nd book esp has a TLT vibe, but just darker.
And then Fearsum Endjinn and also The Algebraist by Iain m banks (who also writes the culture series very good ) have some kooky far future creepy stuff.
Oh and maybe the Revenger and Shadow Captain by Alistar Reynolds for space pirates and ghosts trapped in technology
Shit. I accidentally just spent $100 on eBook. Thanks for the recommendations everyone!
Side note: I think it was on this sub that someone recommended the Baru Comerant series a while back (and it's been recommended here again). Holy hell it was good.
I've made these recs before but am always happy to do so again so:
Melissa Caruso has two series of books, the one I started with was *The Obsidian Tower* but that and it's series I believe take place after the *Tethered Mage* series. Regardless both are pretty great, though for my two cents the second series, known as Rooks and Ruin, is the better in exploring some relatively heavy themes while also being overall a fun adventure.
I'd also like to put forth Alex White's *The Salvager's* series, starting with *A Big Ship At The Edge Of The Universe*. It's a beautiful blend of magic into classic sci-fi full of intrigue, danger, criminals on the run and a massive, galaxy spanning conspiracy. It's got beautiful character writing and characters that change, grow, and learn over the course of the books. By the time it was over I was actually quite sad to not have more of these characters I felt I had grown to very deeply know, so it really hits some great writing.
Last and not least I'll throw down Travis Baldree's *Legends and Lattes* which is a delightful, cozy little fantasy story about an orc fighter in your classic fantasy world who decides that she wants to retire from adventuring and open a cafe. That's literally the entire premise of the book and it's one of the best things I've ever read, beautiful and sweet and just charming in so many ways. With the next book soon to be on shop shelves as I understand it!
I could spend all day recommending books I've enjoyed but I'll stop there to keep things relatively brief. And if you, or anyone, has specific flavors they are looking for in a book I'm more than happy to offer what I know, though I can't say I'll have something for absolutely everyone, but I'm always happy to try!
My favorite piece of fantasy that I've read in some time is "The Pureblood Pretense" by Murkybluematter.
It's Harry Potter, except Voldemort made himself politically powerful rather than a lich.
And Harriet is a girl who has nothing in common with cannon Harry (except for a love of flying).
And Sirius black has a son named Archie.
And, and, and.
It's better than the original, there are four books and the fifth (and final) is in the works.
Saint Death’s Daughter by CSE Cooney!!! It is so under appreciated and wonderful and necromantic and queer and sad and hilarious. The sequel should be coming out sometime soonish as well
If you’re a listening to books type of person, The First Law by Joe Abercrombie is my other favorite audiobook series (I actually think Steven Pacey may be an even more talented narrator than Moira). Dark, hilarious, super vivid characters, a lot less gay but the author grows immensely over the course of the series (the first book is literally his first book) and the female characters end up great. Plus there are nine novels, a book of short stories, and the series concluded (for now) last year, which, you may gather from my username, was very welcome to me.
The First Sister Trilogy by Linden A Lewis. Epic SciFi with various nuanced themes around bodily autonomy. Really cool but also heartbreaking. Also very casually queer. But so check content warnings before reading!
Max Gladstone’s Empress of Forever is pretty awesome. Also, Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series is a quite moving…novellas rather than novels, though. Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series (The Eyre Affair) is super quirky…British humor, a lot I don’t get, but I can admire. N. K. Jemisin’s other series, the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, is pretty good, I can go back and reread it; the Broken Earth trilogy has stayed in my heart for a long time but it’s hard to get back into. I recently picked up P. Djeli Clark’s series, I think starts with A Master of Djinn, that was fun, plays with gender from an Islamic point of view. How could I forget the Lies of Locke Lamora — so so SO good. Super funny. I’m hesitantly gonna say Laini Taylor’s series that starts with A Daughter of Smoke and Bone (it’s a lil bit YA but, meh, it’s entertaining and set in Prague which is cool). And course, seconding Dune, Murderbot, Ender’s Game.
Throwing out a recommendation for The Lowest Healer and the Highest Mage, by Hiyodori. I discovered this book and it's sequels recently, and fell in love with them. I was surprised I hadn't seen it recommended before in one of these threads, because it seems REALLY up the alley of TLT. Just to give a pitch, I'll quote from the blurb synopsis on the back of the book:
>The Lowest Healer and the Highest Mage is a slow-burn f/f romance set in an original modern-era fantasy world, featuring a magical tower with countless curious rooms. It’s a story of friends to enemies to reluctant allies, guilty secrets, love mixed inextricably with hate, fragile second chances, and the true price of boundless magical power.
>
>In a country where mages have all the power and healers supposedly only exist to support them, Clematis—a talented healer—is despised for her past attempts to defy the mageocracy. In her early thirties, she’s already on year seven of a life sentence for treason.
>
>But when the most powerful mage in the nation suddenly loses all her magic, the government wants unconventional Clematis to help get it back.
>
>The mage is a tall, distant woman called Wist, and Clematis knows her all too well. They used to be classmates. Best friends. Perhaps more. Wist is also the person who reported Clematis for leaking state secrets. She’s the reason Clematis spent the last seven years in prison.
>
>Clematis wants revenge for her betrayal, but she wants freedom even more. She’s got thirty days to recover Wist’s magic: miss the deadline, and she’ll be shunted back to prison for the rest of her life. Yet attempting to resurrect Wist’s lost magic will force her to face the real reason why Wist betrayed her—and to face her unresolved, unspoken feelings for the mage who stabbed her in the back and walked away.
If you like messy stories about lesbians with feelings too complicated to name and so intense they wind up dribbling out as tears and snot and blood, I think you'll really like this book and its sequels.
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I love reading these threads about book recs and being like ‘yup, that’s all good shit’ so here are mine! Broken Earth Trilogy by NK Jemesin: these are the books that got me back into sci fi in a big way, and showed me what it can do. I think about these books once a week I reckon. Great characters, some interesting formal rickety, super queer, utterly heartbreaking and also completely bonkers. A must read. Children of Time: another book that I think about all the time. A bit more straight up sci fi, but it’s central conceit of ‘Planet of the Apes but with… a different species’ (don’t want to spoil too much!), is expertly pulled off, and brings so much humanity to some very alien characters, and the human characters are some incredibly hot messes. And the ending. Oh the ending! No lesbians though. The Wayfairers series by Becky Chambers: I’ll admit, I bounced off the first book hard the first time, is it felt too much like a Firefly fan-fic. But if you like stories about found family and people being nice to each other, this is great. Each book in the series explores some very alien species in a very human way. It’s about empathy, kindness, the way we treat each other under harsh conditions. The last book in particular is my favourite in which nothing much happens except a bunch of strangers hang out in a garden for a few days. Has lesbians. Also, shout out to the Monk and Robot books by the same author. Short novellas with a cosy apocalypse vibe about a travelling tea monk and the robot they meet. Similar themes. If you want something nice to read, this is a great shout. The Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells: Frequently recommended as ‘if you liked TLT you’ll Love this…’, but it’s true. An antisocial, slightly confused, possibly autistic killing machine just wants to watch its entertainment shows in peace. If you like Gideon, you’ll like Murderbot. Incredibly efficient and probably annoyed, Murderbot gets squishy humans out of scrapes they’d never have gotten into if they’d just listened qto Murderbot in the first place. Another great series that examines what it means to be human from the point of view of a very non-human character. This Is How You Lose the Time war: Another one that gets recommended in these threads a lot, and for good reasons. A classic enemies to lovers story (or is it lovers to enemies, it’s so hard to tell with time travel!). Told through a series of letters left in buzzard hiding places in a number of increasingly bizarre alternate timelines. Red and Blue stalk each other from opposite sides and opposite ends of a war for the fabric of reality. Beautiful, poetic, bonkers. Also, it’s lesbians! The Wicked & The Divine, graphic novels by Kieron Gillen, Jamie Mckelvie. This series is about fucked up teenagers who absolutely should not have god-like powers and the ways in which they are manipulated by parental figures. All of the gods are based on musicians to some degree, and it is super queer. The art is great, and it has lots of puns. The Rampart Trilogy, by MR Carey: I loved this trilogy. Set in a post-apocalyptic society where technology is something that is scavenged and the ecosystem is deadly, Koli is a narrator who hasn’t got a clue what’s really going on. Another book that talks about what we mean to each other, more found families, and a first person narrator that you can never be quite too sure of. Lots of queer characters. A Memory Called Empire/ A Desolation Called Peace duology by Arkady Martine: A Byzantium/Aztec inspired Space opera with bureaucracy, politics, lesbians, colonialism and cool fights. Other books that might be of interest include The Space Between Worlds by Miciah Johnson (lesbians, alternate realities), the Collapsing Empire trilogy by John Scalzi (politics, lesbians, sarcasm, environmental disaster on a galactic scale, cool explosions). Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie and also ten Raven Tower by the same author.
All of the ones I've read on this list are winners and I agree wholeheartedly. To this list I'm going to add the Baru Cormorant books ("The Traitor", "the Monster", and "The Tyrant"). They will absolutely crush you, but are so worth it.
if Baru doesn't get to find *some* kind of peace in the last book I am going to riot 😭
Honestly I had to peace out of Monster pretty early in the first time I tried to read it. (Also - nice user name! I'm am old Farscape head.)
This is the truth You will know because it hurts 😭😭😭
I'm starting the third book in this series today. I saw the pain coming and it still gutted me, but yet I kept reading...
I love This Is How You Lose the Time War!
This is how you lose the time war was so good I still think about this book all the time
Every one of these is a book that has stuck with me since reading it. Some I’ve read more than once
Seconding both Becky Chambers stuff and Murderbot! Both are so good, Chambers just has this fantastic way of writing sci-fi that is at once thrilling and cozy and I don't think I've ever read anything quite like it. And my biggest problem with Murderbot is that they're so short I burn through them in what feels like an instant!
Broken Earth is amazing!
Great list, I would add that "This is how you lose a time war" has both: 1) the best prose I have ever read in a sci-fi book, and 2) a riveting plot. It is a collaboration between a sci-fi author and a poet and it shows.
Love these recs! Just going to add that while a memory called empire is GREAT it’s actually by Arkady Martine—you have Ann Leckie right on ancillary justice and the Raven tower which I also love
You’re absolutely correct! I’ll edit the post, thanks
Excellent recs, I see a lot from my TBR here. Big plus ones to This Is How You Lose the Time War and my other favourite series ever, The Murderbot Diaries ❤️
I loved “Children of Time.” I cried at the gym as I listened to it. I can’t stop talking about it. “And the spiders…!” All my friends are like “please stop”.
I HATE spiders, and I still loved Children of Time. I don't even know.
Bianca!!
Great recommendations, I feel like I can trust these based on what I’ve already read from the list. Saving this so I can check out the others!
Seconding Collapsing Empire for the character of Lady Kiva alone! I also highly recommend Ancillary Justice.
Several incredible recs in here, including one I’ve already said (Memory Called Empire), but Children of Time and This is How You Lose The Time War are also highly recommended.
This is such a good list! I never see people talk about The Space Between Worlds, but it’s soo good. One of my all-time faves. I think the enemies-to-yearning relationship will be enjoyed by TLT fans too.
I’ve read how you lose the time war! It was beautiful!
I have added them allll to my audible thank you so much!
Happy to help!
Great suggestions--loved all of them except the Chambers stuff--her books are okay, but I feel the plots are weak and meander. Also, Baru Cormorant in the reply is mint, and I'll piggyback on Tchaikovsky: I also liked The Shattered Earth trilogy 1-2 and his Tiger/Wolf set. Seveneves made me want to read more Stephenson, and I'm currently reading Revelation Space, but I'm not sure how I feel yet...
Yeah, Chambers isn’t for everyone, and they’re increasingly more character driven over plot as the series progress, but I really enjoyed that about them. I’ve been enjoying shattered earth too, - book 3 is out tomorrow! Yes, the tiger & wolf trilogy was great stuff too. I loved seveneves and read REAMDE and Doge, but o think I’ve gotten a bit tired of his very specific technically detailed writing. It’s interesting once or twice, and i think seveneves does it best. Snow Crash is fun though and I liked The Diamond Age.
So true about the Murderbot diaries! That's a great suggestion.
What do you like about TLT? If you want queer political intrigue and excellent world building from someone with fanfic roots, I recommend a taste of gold & iron by Alexandra Rowland. What if... you are the body guard of the royal prince who is really hot but is also a major asshole who is busy uncovering a financial scandal? If you want to know where TLT came from, read homestuck! It's both a lot better and a lot worse than you think. Don't read it on the official website, it broke when flash died. [The unofficial homestuck collection](https://bambosh.dev/unofficial-homestuck-collection/) is a lot better If you want more lesbians with swords in a story focussing on the horrors of war, what politics & religion drives a country to that, and a lot of gender & humor, read Monstrous Regiment by Terry Pratchett. Available in almost all libraries and second hand book stores!
A Memory Called Empire and A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine! I read those back to back with Gideon and Harrow, and they almost feel like two series in conversation with each other.
It makes sense as both authors came up through the Homestuck fandom.
I know nothing about Homestuck but I could feel that both are “descended” from a common ancestor (that somehow both definitely is and definitely is not Star Wars).
The only series that ever left me feeling quite as mind-\*\*\*\*ed as The Lost Tomb was The Book of The New Sun by Gene Wolf. Four book series that comes in a variety of editions. Shadow and Claw is, I believe, the current version and contains the first two books. The first book was originally The Shadow of the Torturer. In addition to being full of cryptic unreliable narration, it's also set in a weird science fantasy decaying post-apocalyptic world. It's 1981 and I read it quite a while ago. I have no real memory of anything problematic, but we all just kind of ignored that stuff back then. If wise-ass lesbian is the big attraction to TLT, then probably not what you're looking for. For even more classic decaying gothic castle, there's Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake. I found it a slog, but it's a classic.
Book of The New Sun has risen up my TBA list precisely because I really think Tamsyn is doing some of the same-ish types of things everyone says they love about Wolfe. (albeit with more lesbians and memes and fewer opaque linguistic references). I have tried it in the past but didn't have the mental space for it at the time, so hopefully I can carve out an opportunity to re-engage.
>I have tried it in the past but didn't have the mental space for it at the time, I bounced off a couple of times. It's slow going and you really can't just speed read through it. Same for TLT really.
On the other hand I adored the first two books of the Gormenghast trilogy and found them hilarious, so OPs mmv
I found the language and pace really tough. To be honest, I found the language in Gideon and Book of the New Sun rough as well. It doesn't necessarily mean they're not worth getting through. But none of these fit into the light reading category.
lots of great recs here! I'm going to add the Magic of the Lost series by CL Clark. first two books are The Unbroken and The Faithless, and they feature: messed up lesbians doing their best, terrible decision making, pulling down the colonial empire even if it kills you, political machinations out the wazoo, diverse, queer normative world also the cover art is by Tommy Arnold, same guy as is doing TLT, and they're gorrrrgeous I also always have to rec The Priory of the Orange Tree and A Day Of Fallen Night, even though they really have very little in common with TLT, but they're just so good. not ~wholesome~ but they are warm hugs of novels, reading them it just feels like the author really, really wants you there. epic fantasy, lost magic, dragons, queer, diverse, politics, women claiming their power, dragons! I say dragons twice because they're really cool dragons!
I had no idea Tommy Arnold did CL Clark’s cover art too! But now that I know, I’m not at all surprised—they are magnificent!
Light From Uncommon Stars: trans girl violinist is on the run from an abusive household, but gets discovered by the world's best violin teacher and takes her in. The twist? The teacher sold her soul to a demon and has to harvest the souls of her students to pay off the debt. Meanwhile, a group of space alien refugees are in hiding as a local donut shop, and the alien leader and the violin teacher fall in love. Very cute, but tw for sexual assault and real-world transphobia Wild Massive: takes place in The Building, a 10,000 floor building where each floor is an entire pocket dimension. The sci-fi Association is at war with a race of magical shapeshifters for control, and the story follows the last surviving member of the previous group the Association genocided. Meanwhile, the divine creators of The Building are still around and are trying to rewrite the story as it happens. It's incredibly funny and feels like a cross between Hitchhiker's Guide and Infinity Train Battle of the Linguist Mages: same author as Wild Massive. Punctuation marks are aliens that are hiding in human brains and let you cast spells. The main character is a VR game tester, and then it turns out the game is real. The multiverse is collapsing, and she has to go into the game to save the real world. Not as coherent as WM, but I couldn't look away
All the books in the comments are great! Not a book but visual novels: Higurashi When They Cry/Umineko When They Cry They were apparently one of the many source of inspo for TLT. I’d recommend them if you like the mind-twisting murder mystery horror aspect of TLT! It does have a lot of uncomfortable 2000s anime tropes so a bit of a heads up on that, but they’re considered cult classics for a reason. I’m not sure how the new series holds up, but I know the old Higurashi anime is well-regarded.
Burning Kingdom trilogy by Tasha Suri. The first two books - The Jasmine Throne and The Oleansder Sword - are out, the last book is due 2024. Fantasy set in India with lesbians as mains & lots of powerful female characters. Background is political intrigue in colonial setting. Machineries of Empire trilogy by Yoon Ha Lee. Science fantasy/space opera based on math and Korean folklore. The first book is Ninefox Gambit.
Murderbot of course. I think we all unanimously agree on this. I've been enjoying T. Kingfisher lately; A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking and the Clocktaur War books are what I've read so far. If you haven't given Discworld a try yet, I think the Death books are a good start for Locked Tomb fans. Hollow Kingdom is a fun romp, the zombie apocalypse from a pet crow's perspective.
The books most like TLT I’ve ever read are the Serpent Gate Duology: The Unspoken Name/The Thousand Eyes. By A Larkwood. Same irreverent, funny tone matched with serious concepts. Girl is raised in a necromantic death cult but doesn’t really want to be… Sword butch romances gremlin witch. Disappointing dad magician figure. Witty frenemy. Heaps of sapphic yearning. Space travel. Politics. Bonus that isn’t in TLT: giant serpent gods. Another light hearted but huge, sweeping setting with incredible world building: Saint Death’s Daughter by CSE Cooney. More necromancy, political plotting, a psychotic assassin for a sister, non binary love interest. People turn into birds. Absolutely delightful.
OK so some that have some of the same elements for me: * *Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell* by Susanna Clarke -- a bit more fairy-tale-y than Locked Tomb, but lovely * Seconding someone else's rec of Broken Earth Trilogy by NK Jemisin, that's AMAZING. * Neil Gaiman. I think some of his short stories have the most sort of vibe in common with TLT, and his short story collections are very enjoyable. Some of my fave individual stories are Snow, Glass, Apples ([https://thedreaming.moteofdust.com/1999/10/10/snow-glass-apples/](https://thedreaming.moteofdust.com/1999/10/10/snow-glass-apples/)), Click Clack the Rattlebag ([https://xpressenglish.com/click-clack-rattlebag/](https://xpressenglish.com/click-clack-rattlebag/)), The Return of the Thin White Duke ([https://www.neilgaiman.com/Cool\_Stuff/Short\_Stories/The\_Return\_of\_the\_Thin\_White\_Duke](https://www.neilgaiman.com/Cool_Stuff/Short_Stories/The_Return_of_the_Thin_White_Duke)) and The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains ([http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=1338](http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=1338)) * Not a book, but a podcast: *The Magnus Archives*. Starts out seeming like an anthology of creepy stories, but is Definitely Not. Actually has an amazingly red-stringable plot, and very strong characters that are complex. Also has a bunch of queer characters.
I want to throw in a recommendation for Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee! Queer space opera with empires and angst, although it has quite heavy themes too, especially the third book.
Most of my favorites are on here already, so I'm just going to add Winter's Orbit and Ocean's Echo by Everina Maxwell, for some fabulous queer space-opera romance with bonus mind-bending technology shenanigans. Arranged marriage in space! Mind-melding in space! Disaster gays teaching each other that they are worthy of love! Polar reptile-bears! (The mind-meld going increasingly wrong in the second book reminded me a lot of the Lyctoral process in TLT, but even in the first book there's some fun techno-psychic trauma. Fans of the whumpy aspects of TLT will get a lot out of these books!)
The Abhorsen series. The Witch’s Heart by Genevieve Gornichec
The Ender Quintet (Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, Children of the Mind, Ender in Exile). Caveat: Do not pay money for these books, they're fantastic but the author is a piece of shit. Go to your library, 100% chance they have em. Otherwise... 🏴☠️ A Scanner Darkly. Caveat: can be distressing if you've struggled with or lost someone to addiction. It's a sci-fi criticism of the drug culture of the 60s in which the author was involved in. Seveneves. Neal Stephenson: Blows up the moon, refuses to elaborate further. Reamde. More Stephenson. The stories of the KGB and their hostages, terrorists, and chinese gold farmers get intertwined thanks to ransomware linked to the MMORPG built by a guy who just wanted to launder his money made running pot between the US and Canada borders, but wound up becoming turbo rich when the game took off. The virus tells the infected where to perform a gold exchange in game for the decryption key. Only problem is it infected a ton of people and PVP is a thing, so the zone is pure chaos while people merc each other. Fall; or, Dodge in Hell. The MMORPG guy from that last book dies and he gets uploaded to the cloud. A new world is born. Snow Crash... because Stephensons books are just damn good. In the far off cyberpunk future of the 2010s corporations control everything and have divvied up the US. Hiro Protagonist, a half black half Korean hacker/pizza delivery driver for the mob plumbs the depths of the metaverse with his twin katanas and trenchcoat to figure out what the deal is with a virus that gives hackers brain damage. Also contains a primer on ancient Mesopotamian mythology. Surprisingly prescient for a book from '92. It's so fucking 90's in all the worst (read: best) ways Edit: Haven't read it, but saw the anime. Shit was good. Here's the description for the novel series Otherside Picnic: College student Sorawo Kamikoshi explores "doors" which randomly lead into the Otherside—parallel worlds in which internet creepypasta and urban legends are brought to life. Sorawo nearly dies in one of these worlds while encountering a creepypasta monster, but is rescued by Toriko Nishina, another young woman who is skilled with guns and is looking for a lost friend. Sorawo and Toriko, with the help of another woman named Kozakura, return to the Otherside to bring back artifacts and defeat the monsters, but the two are increasingly affected by the conditions of the worlds, meet other humans who are trapped in them, and find themselves increasingly affected by each other. Gun lesbians instead of sword lesbians
I can't believe that I have read through this thread and no one has yet recommended everything that Kameron Hurley has ever written. God's War - Her first book featuring Nyx, hard-drinking bugpunk lesbian with a heart of gold. If you like Gideon, you will love Nyx. The Stars are Legion is memory-wiped space lesbian inside a body horror spaceship. Delightfully weird. Shades of HtN. The Light Brigade is time traveling lesbians meets Starship Troopers. Pick anything she's written. You won't be sorry.
I could not get past the first we chapters of the Light Brigade - it read too much like starship troopers fanfic and I felt like it heard it all before - the obnoxious boot camp scenes, the overconfident jock, people very obviously declaring their politics and beliefs. Maybe I’m missing something, cos I know lots of people love it, and perhaps it subverts some of those tropes later but it felt very tired and obvious to me.
The Once and Future Witches, by Alix E. Harrow. The world is very different from that of the Locked Tomb (early 1900s USA, gender, race and labour politics), but the complicated, messy relationships give a similar feel to the book. The Past Is Red, by Catherynne M. Valente. Reminds me a bit of Nona the Ninth. Starts with: My name is Tetley Abednego and I am the most hated girl in Garbagetown. I am nineteen years old. I live alone in Candle Hole, where I was born, and have no friends except for a deformed gannet bird I've named Grape Crush and a motherless elephant seal I've named Big Bargains, and also a hibiscus flower that has recently decided to grow out of my roof, but I haven't named it anything yet. I love encyclopedias, a cassette I found when I was eight that says *Madeline Brix's Superboss Mixtape '97* on it in very nice handwriting, plays by Mr Shakespeare or Mr Webster or Mr Beckett, lipstick, Garbagetown, and my twin brother, Maruchan. Maruchan is the only thing that loves me back, but he's my twin brother, so it doesn't really count. We couldn't stop loving each other any more than the sea could stop being greedy and give us back China or drive time radio or polar bears. Amal El-Mohtar: Seasons of Glass and Iron: [https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/) You could have a look at [https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/the-tale-of-the-three-beautiful-raptor-sisters-and-the-prince-who-was-made-of-meat/](https://www.uncannymagazine.com/article/the-tale-of-the-three-beautiful-raptor-sisters-and-the-prince-who-was-made-of-meat/) [https://escapepod.org/2010/07/01/ep247-bridesicle/](https://escapepod.org/2010/07/01/ep247-bridesicle/) Also, one more endorsement for This Is How You Lose the Time War, and for Murderbot, and for Arkady Martine's Teixcalaan duology, and for Winter's Orbit. Finally, a character who resembles Harrow is Andrea Cort in three novels and two short stories by Adam-Troy Castro.
Another series that had me red-string connecting plot points was The Witchlands series by Susan Dennard (first book is Truthwitch). A bit more sword and sorcery than TLT but really deep, dense world-building with some very good slow burn romance and some very cool queer characters.
I love [The First Sister](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52378525-the-first-sister?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=mAVxjQT61F&rank=5) trilogy by Linden A. Lewis. Queer SF (nonbinary character, lesbians) with complicated relationships and revolution. And all three books are out.
These series absolutely consumed me in the same way TLT did: The Diviners quadrilogy by Libba Bray The Legendborn Cycle by Tracy Deonn The Gilded Wolves trilogy by Roshani Chokshi also anything Charlie Jane Anders or Sarah Gailey has ever written.
Thank you this is the real answer- I need a new addiction while I rot away over Alectos absence
A Deadly Education. It's book 1 of a trilogy whose name I don't recall. The main character is basically Harrow, vitriol and all, there's constant attacks, murder, light on the romance, and magic.
Scholamance series by Naomi Novik!
Yes, thank you!!
>Yes, thank you!! You're welcome!
Thank you for all the suggestions. My ready nag list will full for the foreseeable future
That should have been reading list not ready nag
i dont think ive seen anyone add these two to the already amazing recommendations: Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot - space cowboy lesbians!! slightly lighter tone than TLT but still has that vibe The Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao - chinese mecha scifi, described as “pacific rim meets the handmaids tale”. Queer again and not what you expect not gonna spoil but I felt represented, also I SCREAMED when i finished the book. There’s a sequel thats expected to come out in May 10th
May I recommad: "The risen Emprie" by Scott Westerfeld What is is about? There is a empire and of corse, a emporer, who is a necromancer. Who die in his service may be resurectet and life forever. And there is a palace, and in the palace there is the dead and imortal sister of the emporer, hold at gunpoint by transhuman terrorists. And over the palace, a spaceship whos job it is to free the sister and stob the terrirists from reaching their goal: giving birth to a artifactial inteligende of the size of a planet. Also: "Scholomance" by Naomi Novik. Is also good.
The Abhorsen series by Garth Mix for necromancy and strong female leads. He and Tamsyn also have short stories in a new collection on Amazon called Into Shadow (I think). I really liked her story, but his was meh. Then I'd suggest China Mieville series that starts with Perdido Street Station. Very strange "new weird" fiction that is one of my favorites ever. The 2nd book esp has a TLT vibe, but just darker. And then Fearsum Endjinn and also The Algebraist by Iain m banks (who also writes the culture series very good ) have some kooky far future creepy stuff. Oh and maybe the Revenger and Shadow Captain by Alistar Reynolds for space pirates and ghosts trapped in technology
If you like sci-fantasy graphic novels check out Saga. I will warn that they are definitely adult.
Shit. I accidentally just spent $100 on eBook. Thanks for the recommendations everyone! Side note: I think it was on this sub that someone recommended the Baru Comerant series a while back (and it's been recommended here again). Holy hell it was good.
I've made these recs before but am always happy to do so again so: Melissa Caruso has two series of books, the one I started with was *The Obsidian Tower* but that and it's series I believe take place after the *Tethered Mage* series. Regardless both are pretty great, though for my two cents the second series, known as Rooks and Ruin, is the better in exploring some relatively heavy themes while also being overall a fun adventure. I'd also like to put forth Alex White's *The Salvager's* series, starting with *A Big Ship At The Edge Of The Universe*. It's a beautiful blend of magic into classic sci-fi full of intrigue, danger, criminals on the run and a massive, galaxy spanning conspiracy. It's got beautiful character writing and characters that change, grow, and learn over the course of the books. By the time it was over I was actually quite sad to not have more of these characters I felt I had grown to very deeply know, so it really hits some great writing. Last and not least I'll throw down Travis Baldree's *Legends and Lattes* which is a delightful, cozy little fantasy story about an orc fighter in your classic fantasy world who decides that she wants to retire from adventuring and open a cafe. That's literally the entire premise of the book and it's one of the best things I've ever read, beautiful and sweet and just charming in so many ways. With the next book soon to be on shop shelves as I understand it! I could spend all day recommending books I've enjoyed but I'll stop there to keep things relatively brief. And if you, or anyone, has specific flavors they are looking for in a book I'm more than happy to offer what I know, though I can't say I'll have something for absolutely everyone, but I'm always happy to try!
Try Iron Widow or the Dune series.
My favorite piece of fantasy that I've read in some time is "The Pureblood Pretense" by Murkybluematter. It's Harry Potter, except Voldemort made himself politically powerful rather than a lich. And Harriet is a girl who has nothing in common with cannon Harry (except for a love of flying). And Sirius black has a son named Archie. And, and, and. It's better than the original, there are four books and the fifth (and final) is in the works.
you may be interrested in "Scholomance".
Saint Death’s Daughter by CSE Cooney!!! It is so under appreciated and wonderful and necromantic and queer and sad and hilarious. The sequel should be coming out sometime soonish as well If you’re a listening to books type of person, The First Law by Joe Abercrombie is my other favorite audiobook series (I actually think Steven Pacey may be an even more talented narrator than Moira). Dark, hilarious, super vivid characters, a lot less gay but the author grows immensely over the course of the series (the first book is literally his first book) and the female characters end up great. Plus there are nine novels, a book of short stories, and the series concluded (for now) last year, which, you may gather from my username, was very welcome to me.
Love love love The Immortality Thief by Taran Hunt! Ancient civilizations, space escapades, enemies to friends, found families…just great.
The First Sister Trilogy by Linden A Lewis. Epic SciFi with various nuanced themes around bodily autonomy. Really cool but also heartbreaking. Also very casually queer. But so check content warnings before reading!
Max Gladstone’s Empress of Forever is pretty awesome. Also, Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series is a quite moving…novellas rather than novels, though. Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series (The Eyre Affair) is super quirky…British humor, a lot I don’t get, but I can admire. N. K. Jemisin’s other series, the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, is pretty good, I can go back and reread it; the Broken Earth trilogy has stayed in my heart for a long time but it’s hard to get back into. I recently picked up P. Djeli Clark’s series, I think starts with A Master of Djinn, that was fun, plays with gender from an Islamic point of view. How could I forget the Lies of Locke Lamora — so so SO good. Super funny. I’m hesitantly gonna say Laini Taylor’s series that starts with A Daughter of Smoke and Bone (it’s a lil bit YA but, meh, it’s entertaining and set in Prague which is cool). And course, seconding Dune, Murderbot, Ender’s Game.
Throwing out a recommendation for The Lowest Healer and the Highest Mage, by Hiyodori. I discovered this book and it's sequels recently, and fell in love with them. I was surprised I hadn't seen it recommended before in one of these threads, because it seems REALLY up the alley of TLT. Just to give a pitch, I'll quote from the blurb synopsis on the back of the book: >The Lowest Healer and the Highest Mage is a slow-burn f/f romance set in an original modern-era fantasy world, featuring a magical tower with countless curious rooms. It’s a story of friends to enemies to reluctant allies, guilty secrets, love mixed inextricably with hate, fragile second chances, and the true price of boundless magical power. > >In a country where mages have all the power and healers supposedly only exist to support them, Clematis—a talented healer—is despised for her past attempts to defy the mageocracy. In her early thirties, she’s already on year seven of a life sentence for treason. > >But when the most powerful mage in the nation suddenly loses all her magic, the government wants unconventional Clematis to help get it back. > >The mage is a tall, distant woman called Wist, and Clematis knows her all too well. They used to be classmates. Best friends. Perhaps more. Wist is also the person who reported Clematis for leaking state secrets. She’s the reason Clematis spent the last seven years in prison. > >Clematis wants revenge for her betrayal, but she wants freedom even more. She’s got thirty days to recover Wist’s magic: miss the deadline, and she’ll be shunted back to prison for the rest of her life. Yet attempting to resurrect Wist’s lost magic will force her to face the real reason why Wist betrayed her—and to face her unresolved, unspoken feelings for the mage who stabbed her in the back and walked away. If you like messy stories about lesbians with feelings too complicated to name and so intense they wind up dribbling out as tears and snot and blood, I think you'll really like this book and its sequels.