Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons).

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons).

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup... July hiatus edition.

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons).

Brief notice that I'm taking a break in July from new reviews to give me a breather and a chance to figure out the review schedule for the rest of 2023. My pattern of three reviews a week was leftover from my breakneck pace of book reading in 2022, and I need to readjust to my actual 2023 reading cadence. I'll have some other posts like essays and book-related thoughts, but I've done so much re-reading lately to get a mental break that my queue of new books ready for review has dwindled to almost nothing.

There will still be a newsletter! However, the next couple of issues will have fewer reviews.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons).

Recent Reviews

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Reviews forthcoming for FLIGHT & ANCHOR by Nicole Kornher-Stace, THE MYSTERIES OF THORN MANOR by Margaret Rogerson, and THE BONE SHARD EMPEROR by Andrea Stewart.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Recently I figured out that I have dysgraphia, a condition which affects writing (deeply ironic, I know). As soon as I found out I switched to dictating my reviews on my phone and then cleaning them up on the computer, and I immediately saw an improvement in the volume and quality of my thoughts about the books. There are some scheduled reviews which I wrote before figuring this out, but hopefully there will be a marked difference in my reviews going forwards.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Reviews forthcoming for IRON HEART by Nina Varela, PAGE by Tamora Pierce, and BLOODMARKED by Tracy Deonn.

HEART OF THE SUN WARRIOR by Sue Lynn Tan, book 2 of The Celestial Kingdom Duology is Fantasy/Romance marketed as Adult. Xingyin leaves the moon once again to try and protect her home and untangle her parents' legacy. Told in First Person with Single POV.

A RESTLESS TRUTH by Freya Marske, book 2 of The Last Binding is Fantasy/Historical/Romance, with queer character(s), marketed as Adult. Maud tries to find a piece of the Last Contract after its holder is murdered on the ship journey back from America. Told in Third Person with Ensemble POVs.

PTOLEMY'S GATE by Jonathan Stroud, book 3 of Bartimaeus is Fantasy marketed as Young Adult. Bartimaeus has been kept in service by Nathaniel and his essence wears thin. Told in First/Third Person with Ensemble POVs.

CRIER'S WAR by Nina Varela, book 1 of Crier's War is Fantasy/Romance, with queer character(s), marketed as Young Adult. Crier is one of the Automae, Made to carry on her father's legacy, but she finds herself falling in love with a human servant rather than the Made her father chose. Told in Third Person with Dual POVs.

INTO THE WINDWRACKED WILDS by A. Deborah Baker, book 3 of The Up and Under is Fantasy marketed as Middle Grade. Avery and Zib enter the Land of Air, and discover what they're willing to give up to regain important things which were lost. Told in Third Person with an Omniscient Narrator.

FIRST TEST by Tamora Pierce, book 1 of Protector of the Small is Fantasy marketed as Young Adult. Keladry is accepted as a probationary page and deals with bullying as she pursues her dream of being a knight. Told in Third Person with an Omniscient Narrator.

DNFs

I made it a ways into my ARC of She is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran before figuring out that I wasn't into it. I do agree with the blurb that people who like Mexican Gothic may enjoy it, it just wasn't a fit for me.

I tried a bunch of books where I got only a few pages in before stopping, here's that list:

• Twisted Pretty Things by Ariana Nash

• Lord of Eternal Night by Ben Alderson

• The Cerulean by Amy Ewing

• Reforged by Seth Haddon

• Hamlet, Prince of Robots by M. Darusha Wehm

• Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi

• The Book of Azrael by Amber Nicole

I wrote a formal DNF review for The Burning Sky by Sherry Thomas.

No Review (Nonfiction, Graphic Novels, etc.)

I read a graphic novella called "Conversion Disorder" which is a very cool take on the conversion of Paul.

I also finished a nonfiction book by Erik Davis called "High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experiences in the Seventies", which is about Philip K. Dick, Terence McKenna, and Robert Anton Wilson.

Current Reads

I'm reading a book about recent supreme court cases. I'm also re-reading KING OF THE RISING BY Kacen Callender, THE VEILED THRONE by Ken Liu and WAR GIRLS by Tochi Onyebuchi.

I'm almost done with BLOODMARKED by Tracy Deonn, the excellent sequel to LEGENDBORN.

In Case You Missed It

This time last year I read Juniper & Thorn by Ava Reid.

Pluggables and Podcast News

If you're looking for a place to buy any of the books I've reviewed, please consider our Bookshop page (if you use our links to purchase any books we get a small commission). Let us know if there's a category you'd like to see curated and we'll see if we can get some titles together.

The 2023 prompts are now available from the annual reading challenge! It runs from January 1st to December 31st this year. Find info and links here.

As for the podcast, hopefully you're enjoying our most recent episode discussing THE GRACE OF KINGS by Ken Liu. If you'd like to receive episodes early, as well as bonus content, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Patrons receive this newsletter one week early, as well as a list of upcoming podcast episodes.

Patrons pledging $20 or more each month receive a bonus episode. Patrons pledging $50 or more can vote once per month on what we'll cover in the podcast. You can find all of those polls here. Patrons at any level receive the booklist with our planned episodes for up to three months at a time.

Thanks for reading, the next roundup will be in two weeks!

-Robin

Co-host of Books That Burn

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Apologies for the wonky podcast release schedule lately, we're working on being more regular and we appreciate you bearing with us.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

We're excited to learn that the HarperCollins Union Strike has ended with a deal! We're not affiliated with them but supported the strike and refrained from reviewing HarperCollins books during the three-month strike, as requested of reviewers by the union.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Reviews forthcoming for TRAVELERS ALONG THE WAY by Aminah Mae Safi, BLOOD HEIR by Ilona Andrews, and WOLF-SPEAKER by Tamora Pierce.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Recent Reviews

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

The HarperCollins union strike is ongoing and we support their efforts. To this end, we're continuing to withhold written reviews of HarperCollins books until the conclusion of the strike, and we're refraining from podcast episodes covering HarperCollins books (with the exception of one forthcoming episode recorded before the beginning of the strike).

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

The details of the 2023 reading challenge are now available! You can find the details on the Carrd for the challenge, or join in on TheStoryGraph.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

The details of the 2023 reading challenge are now available! You can find the details on the Carrd for the challenge, or join in on TheStoryGraph.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. The newest transcript for our episode discussing THE KINGDOM OF GODS by N.K. Jemisin is now available.

News and Events

With Twitter's implosion, we've joined Tumblr. Here's the link to the Reviews That Burn Tumblr (where Robin hangs out), and here's the one for the podcast generally (a bit less active).

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. The newest transcript for our episode discussing THE KINGDOM OF GODS by N.K. Jemisin is now available.

News and Events

With Twitter's implosion (I genuinely don't know if it'll still work by the time this posts on Buttondown), we've joined Tumblr. Here's the link to the Reviews That Burn Tumblr (where Robin hangs out), and here's the one for the podcast generally (a bit less active).

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. The newest transcript for our episode discussing THE BROKEN KINGDOMS by N.K. Jemisin is now available.

News and Events

The review blog now has an "ARC" tag so you can easily find books which we reviewed after receiving a copy from the author and/or publisher. Occasionally this will also cover books which we received for review purposes from a third party, such as the Hugo-nominated works provided to Hugo voters each year.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. The newest transcript for our episode discussing THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS by N.K. Jemisin is now available.

News and Events

Our shift to bi-monthly episodes is complete! You'll get two podcast episodes per month going forward. The plan is loosely that Patrons will receive episodes on the first and third Mondays, with the public release of those same episodes on the second and fourth Mondays. This will have some variation, especially when the first Monday is only a day or two into the month.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Our shift to bi-monthly episodes is complete! You'll get two podcast episodes per month going forward. The plan is loosely that Patrons will receive episodes on the first and third Mondays, with the public release of those same episodes on the second and fourth Mondays. This will have some variation, especially when the first Monday is a day or two into the month.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Our shift to bi-monthly episodes is complete! You'll get two podcast episodes per month going forward. The plan is loosely that Patrons will receive episodes on the first and third Mondays, with the public release of those same episodes on the second and fourth Mondays.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. This month there's a newly-released transcript for OATH OF GOLD by Elizabeth Moon, that means transcripts for episodes covering all three books in The Deed of Paksenarrion trilogy are now available.

News and Events

We've decided to move to a twice-monthly release schedule for our regular episodes, with Patrons receiving up to one bonus episodes per month depending on their reward tier (Patrons will receive more details in a post before the end of the month). Thank you for bearing with us while we work this out, we love making the podcast and want to have a release schedule that fits with our changing lives.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. This month there's a newly-released transcript for OATH OF GOLD by Elizabeth Moon, that means transcripts for episodes covering all three books in The Deed of Paksenarrion trilogy are now available.

News and Events

We've decided to move to a twice-monthly release schedule for our regular episodes, with Patrons receiving up to one bonus episodes per month depending on their reward tier (Patrons will receive more details in a post before the end of the month). Thank you for bearing with us while we work this out, we love making the podcast and want to have a release schedule that fits with our changing lives.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I (Robin) am in the end-stages of a multi-state move. My microphone has been located, but I almost immediately had to travel for work, then I'm traveling again to help a family member.

Hello Everyone! I hope you enjoyed receiving the Late July Reviews ahead of time last week. It was an accident with the newsletter scheduling so I wanted to send something at the official time so you're not confused by what would otherwise be a three-week gap between emails. Please enjoy Folio being lovely on the new futon.

Robin

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I (Robin) am in the end-stages of a multi-state move. My partner and I have been in the new apartment for a few weeks and our things finally arrived from the movers. We're setting up the new space and hopefully soon I'll locate my microphone (which is pretty important for the podcast).

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I've moved and we're in the new apartment but (as on mid-July) our things haven't arrived yet, so that's been interesting.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I'm moving this month, and it's looking like the newsletters will proceed uninterrupted. However, the podcast schedule will be a bit wonky for the next couple of months, and one review spot is being replaced with a personal essay about a book I re-read for the first time in years. Nicole also has a bunch of stuff going on, and we're going to have a monthly episode schedule through August to allow us some flexibility.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I'm moving this month, and it might affect 1-2 of the newsletters but so far I've managed to keep content queueing so hopefully there won't be a disruption. This also means the podcast schedule will be a bit wonky for the next couple of months. Nicole has a bunch of stuff going on, and we're going to have a monthly episode schedule through August to allow us some flexibility.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I'll be moving in late June/early July, so I'm trying to plan newsletter content for a few weeks when I'll probably be reading but won't have the time to write reviews. I might curate a list of recommendations by genre, or do something else to highlight older reviews. It'll affect 1-2 of the newsletters, but shouldn't affect more than that. This also means the podcast schedule will be a bit wonky for the next couple of months. Nicole has a bunch of stuff going on, and we're going to have a monthly episode schedule through August to allow us some flexibility.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

I (Robin) was a guest on Fables and Reflections last month, discussing The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. You can find Robin's written review of the book at this link.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

I had an exciting moment recently! I joined Reddit because I want to recommend books to people and there's an entire subreddit where people ask for book recommendations, so it all works out. Since I started a spreadsheet tracking characteristics of the books I'm reading (in order to generate the blurb paragraphs I use), I was able to give someone a recommendation based on POV style, genre, etc. with just a couple of filter settings on the spreadsheet! It's a small moment of usefulness, but I enjoyed it.

News and Events

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Robin was a guest on Fables and Reflections, discussing The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. You can find Robin's written review of the book at this link.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. We recently added a transcript for one of our older episodes and redesigned the look of the site, so it's a good time to check in.

News and Events

No news at the moment.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. We recently added a transcript for one of our older episodes and redesigned the look of the site, so it's a good time to check in.

I was in a weird reading slump for the last several weeks where almost the only thing I could handle was re-reads. I think I'm coming out of it, but that (and the recent release of the newest Incryptid book) is part of why I discussed reading the entire Incryptid series during the last few newsletters. For a while I could only read things that I'd read before or things by an author whose writing I trust, like Seanan McGuire (she's very clear about what will and will not be in her work, which lets me know whether I should be able to handle even her books that are new to me).

I think I'm mostly out of the slump but I am considering having a pause where one of the upcoming editions of the newsletter is a reruns edition with links to reviews from before the newsletter started. Hopefully I won't need that, but we'll see how it goes.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast. We recently added a transcript for one of our older episodes and redesigned the look of the site, so it's a good time to check in.

News and Events

Our podcast network, Certain Point of View, is doing a celebration of all things Batman for the first two weeks of March! Check out #DarkKnightFortnight for more info and related tweets.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

Our podcast network, Certain Point of View, is doing a celebration of all things Batman for the first two weeks of March! Check out #DarkKnightFortnight for more info and related tweets.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

No major news at the moment!

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

No major news at the moment!

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

News and Events

The 2022 prompts are now available from the annual reading challenge! It runs from January 1st to December 31st each year. Find info and links here.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Upcoming events

Our livestreams are being replaced as a monthly event by the opportunity to vote on books in my reading queue. You can find those links at the end of the newsletter.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Upcoming events

Our livestreams are being replaced as a monthly event by the opportunity to vote on books in my reading queue. You can find those links at the end of the newsletter.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Upcoming events

Our livestreams are being replaced as a monthly event by the opportunity to vote on books in my reading queue. You can find those links at the end of the newsletter.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to Transcripts That Burn for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Upcoming events

The livestream is on the last Saturday of every month, which means this month it's on November 27th at 6PM Pacific / 8PM Central / 9PM Eastern. You can watch it on Twitch or Youtube. This is a very important livestream because it's our last regularly scheduled one. The livestreams were originally intended as a reward for our $5+ Patrons, and that reward is being replaced by the opportunity to vote on books in my reading queue.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to for all available transcripts of the podcast.

Greetings

Welcome to the Books That Burn Fortnightly Roundup! Releasing every two weeks (one week early for Patrons). Remember to head to for all available transcripts of the podcast.