Review: Assistant to the Villain

September 11, 2025September 11, 2025 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Assistant to the Villain
Author: Hannah Nicole Maehrer
Series: Assistant to the Villain
About this book:

ASSISTANT WANTED: Notorious, high-ranking villain seeks loyal, levelheaded assistant for unspecified office duties, supporting staff for random mayhem and terror, and other Dark Things In General. Discretion a must. Excellent benefits.

With ailing family to support, Evie Sage’s employment status isn’t just important, it’s vital. So when a mishap with Rennedawn’s most infamous Villain results in a job offer―naturally, she says yes. No job is perfect, of course, but even less so when you develop a teeny crush on your terrifying, temperamental, and undeniably hot boss. Don’t find evil so attractive, Evie.

But just when she’s getting used to severed heads suspended from the ceiling and the odd squish of an errant eyeball beneath her heel, Evie suspects this dungeon has a huge rat…and not just the literal kind. Because something rotten is growing in the kingdom of Rennedawn, and someone wants to take the Villain―and his entire nefarious empire―out.

Now Evie must not only resist drooling over her boss but also figure out exactly who is sabotaging his work…and ensure he makes them pay.

After all, a good job is hard to find.

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Book List 2025 · Lists · Reviews

Review: Go Luck Yourself

September 7, 2025October 27, 2025 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Nightmare Before Kissmas
Author: Sara Raasch
Series: Royals and Romance
About this Book: Here
Source: My local library.
Would I buy it? Abso-freaking-lutely.

My Thoguhts: Sara Raasch gave Kris his own book. I screamed. I shouted. I kicked my legs in glee.

This is not the same Kris you meet in Nightmare Before Kissmas, this is more mischievous version who plays pranks on people who aren’t his brother Coal. And I love him for it.

He also loves a private study space. Can’t blame him there.

This book sure has a somewhat explosive beginning and I am most definitely not going to complain about that either.

Kris is easy to identify with, unsure of what he wants to do with his life and finding himself on the path of what’s expected of him instead of leaning into his likely dream.

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Book List 2025 · Lists · Reviews

Review: Nightmare Before Kissmas

September 3, 2025October 27, 2025 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Nightmare Before Kissmas
Author: Sara Raasch
Series: Royals and Romance
About this Book: Here
Source: My local library.
Would I buy it? Abso-freaking-lutely. Just waiting for the money to do so.

My Thoughts:

These characters were so completely and utterly easy to fall in love with.

Nicholas aka Coal is grumpy, sad, and completely hilarious and easy to love. He is not dedicated to anything except his brother and the seeming destruction of his life including kissing a hot as hell stranger behind a bar. He is the epitome of longing, constantly thinking about this strange, mysterious bar worker. He loves Christmas, in the same way that I love the winter holidays, when it’s filled with memories of family, of giving and warmth and joy, and less about competition in giving the best present, or who can win in the corporate world.

Hex. What can I say about Hex? I adore him? He’s lowkey hilarious and no one would expect it from him which is actually somehow even better. He wears CORSET VESTS. I adore a man that cares about fashion. His angst became my angst, his jokes made me laugh out loud and god, the love he feels for his holiday and family just made me want to swoon.

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Book List 2025 · Reviews

Review: The Mask of Fear

February 23, 2025October 16, 2025 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: The Mask of Fear
Author: Alexander Freed
Series: Star Wars: Reign of the Empire (Book 1)
Release Date: February 25, 2025
About this Book: Here
Source: My shelf
Would I buy it as a gift for someone? Abso-freaking-lutely. In fact I already have.

My Thoughts:

You might want to smack Bail Organa after reading parts of this book. It’s honestly amazing the rebellion got off the ground at all, if he was involved in it in the state that he’s in in this book. The dude is straight up a Jedi fanboy, which I feel, but this is not the level-headed Bail Organa you see in Revenge of the Sith, nor is it the one you see in Star Wars: Rebels or even the one that you get a glimpse of in Kenobi. This is Bail Organa cranked up to eleven, uncaring about anything except how to take down the ever-so-powerful Palpatine, somehow even if it gets him and everyone around him in deep Kark.

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Uncategorized

Title: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches

January 3, 2024November 4, 2024 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches
Author: Sangu Mandanna
Source: My local library
Genre: Cozy fantasy
Trigger Warnings: None I can recall
Explicit? Nope
Summary: As one of the few witches in Britain, Mika Moon knows she has to hide her magic, keep her head down, and stay away from other witches so their powers don’t mingle and draw attention. And as an orphan who lost her parents at a young age and was raised by strangers, she’s used to being alone and she follows the rules…with one exception: an online account, where she posts videos pretending to be a witch. She thinks no one will take it seriously.

But someone does. An unexpected message arrives, begging her to travel to the remote and mysterious Nowhere House to teach three young witches how to control their magic. It breaks all of the rules, but Mika goes anyway, and is immediately tangled up in the lives and secrets of not only her three charges, but also an absent archaeologist, a retired actor, two long-suffering caretakers, and…Jamie. The handsome and prickly librarian of Nowhere House would do anything to protect the children, and as far as he’s concerned, a stranger like Mika is a threat. An irritatingly appealing threat.

As Mika begins to find her place at Nowhere House, the thought of belonging somewhere begins to feel like a real possibility. But magic isn’t the only danger in the world, and when a threat comes knocking at their door, Mika will need to decide whether to risk everything to protect a found family she didn’t know she was looking for….

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Book List 2023 · Reviews

Bloodmarked by Tracy Deonn

March 23, 2023March 23, 2023 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Bloodmarked
Author: Tracy Deonn
Series: Legendborn
Source: Netgalley. I received a free copy of this book for an honest review.
Genre: Fantasy
Explicit? No
Trigger Warnings: Racism, Violence
Summary: The shadows have risen, and the line is law.

All Bree wanted was to uncover the truth behind her mother’s death. So she infiltrated the Legendborn Order, a secret society descended from King Arthur’s knights—only to discover her own ancestral power. Now, Bree has become someone new:

A Medium. A Bloodcrafter. A Scion.

But the ancient war between demons and the Order is rising to a deadly peak. And Nick, the Legendborn boy Bree fell in love with, has been kidnapped.

Bree wants to fight, but the Regents who rule the Order won’t let her. To them, she is an unknown girl with unheard-of power, and as the living anchor for the spell that preserves the Legendborn cycle, she must be protected.

When the Regents reveal they will do whatever it takes to hide the war, Bree and her friends must go on the run to rescue Nick themselves. But enemies are everywhere, Bree’s powers are unpredictable and dangerous, and she can’t escape her growing attraction to Selwyn, the mage sworn to protect Nick until death.

If Bree has any hope of saving herself and the people she loves, she must learn to control her powers from the ancestors who wielded them first—without losing herself in the process.

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Book List 2021 · Reviews

Review: Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune

November 3, 2021 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Under the Whispering Door

Author: TJ Klune

Genre: LGBTQIA+, Fantasy

TW: Suicide, heavy on the death.

Summary:

When a reaper comes to collect Wallace Price from his own funeral, Wallace suspects he really might be dead.

Instead of leading him directly to the afterlife, the reaper takes him to a small village. On the outskirts, off the path through the woods, tucked between mountains, is a particular tea shop, run by a man named Hugo. Hugo is the tea shop’s owner to locals and the ferryman to souls who need to cross over.

But Wallace isn’t ready to abandon the life he barely lived. With Hugo’s help he finally starts to learn about all the things he missed in life.

When the Manager, a curious and powerful being, arrives at the tea shop and gives Wallace one week to cross over, Wallace sets about living a lifetime in seven days.

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Book List 2020 · Reviews

Review: The Hanged Man by K.D. Edwards

September 12, 2020 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: The Hanged Man

Author: K.D. Edwards

Genre: Urban Fantasy, Magical Realism

Series: The Tarot Sequence

Purchase: Indigo (Affiliate Link)

Summary:

The last member of a murdered House tries to protect his ward from forced marriage to a monster while uncovering clues to his own past.

The Tarot Sequence imagines a modern-day Atlantis off the coast of Massachusetts, governed by powerful Courts based on the traditional Tarot deck.

Rune Saint John, last child of the fallen Sun Throne, is backed into a fight of high court magic and political appetites in a desperate bid to protect his ward, Max, from a forced marital alliance with the Hanged Man.

Rune’s resistance will take him to the island’s dankest corners, including a red light district made of moored ghost ships; a surreal skyscraper farm; and the floor of the ruling Convocation, where a gathering of Arcana will change Rune’s life forever.

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Book List 2020 · Reviews

Review: The Last Sun by K.D. Edwards

August 21, 2020August 21, 2020 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: The Last Sun

Author: K.D. Edwards

Genre: Fantasy

Series: The Tarot Sequence

Summary:

Rune Saint John, last child of the fallen Sun Court, is hired to search for Lady Judgment’s missing son, Addam, on New Atlantis, the island city where the Atlanteans moved after ordinary humans destroyed their original home.

With his companion and bodyguard, Brand, he questions Addam’s relatives and business contacts through the highest ranks of the nobles of New Atlantis. But as they investigate, they uncover more than a missing man: a legendary creature connected to the secret of the massacre of Rune’s Court.

In looking for Addam, can Rune find the truth behind his family’s death and the torments of his past?

Purchase: Indigo. (Affiliate link)

My Thoughts

Book List 2020 · Reviews

Review: Legendborn

June 17, 2020March 22, 2023 Ashley LPLeave a comment

Title: Legendborn
Author: Tracy Deonn
Genre: Fantasy, Arthurian
Release Date: 15 September 2020
To preorder: Indigo

Summary: Filled with mystery and an intriguingly rich magic system, Tracy Deonn’s YA contemporary fantasy Legendborn offers the dark allure of City of Bones with a modern-day twist on a classic legend and a lot of Southern Black Girl Magic.

After her mother dies in an accident, sixteen-year-old Bree Matthews wants nothing to do with her previous life, family memories, or her childhood home. A residential program for bright high schoolers at a local university seems like the perfect escape—until Bree witnesses a magical attack her very first night on campus.

A flying demon feeding on human energies.

A secret society of so called “Legendborn” students that hunt the creatures down.

And a teenage mage who calls himself a “Merlin” and who attempts—and fails—to wipe Bree’s memory of everything she saw.

The mage’s failure reveals Bree’s own, unique magic and unlocks a buried memory with a hidden connection: the night her mother died, another Merlin was at the hospital. Now that she knows there’s more to her mother’s death than what’s on the police report, Bree will do whatever it takes to find out the truth, even if that means infiltrating the Legendborn by becoming one of their initiates. But when the Legendborn reveal themselves as the descendants of King Arthur and his knights and explain that a magical war is coming, Bree has to decide how far she’ll go for the truth and whether she should use her magic to take the society down—or join the fight.

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