#this is the tip of the iceberg tbh and i feel like i've missed some really obvious ones

[gravitasmalfunction]

Hi how are you! I'm super curious about what books you like to read and some recent faves maybe? (I'm totally not just trying to get recs)

Ah! I am flattered and also so sorry in advance (insert the "oh good, you will regret this" meme here).

I haven't been reading much lately, because cdramas, but I will claim Vanessa Len's debut Only a Monster and its sequel in the in-progress series, Never a Hero, as my most recent faves. It's got urban fantasy, time travel, parallel world sort of stuff going on with a young adult/coming of age, finding and reconciling oneself as a product of two very different cultures, sort of story. It's clever and emotional and romantic and exciting and tragic and basically I loved it. I can't wait for the next one.

Cut to spare the unwilling from scrolling-induced RSI:

My Libby app also reminds me that I enjoyed Lex Croucher's most recent historical romance, Trouble, very much, along with the earlier ones, Infamous and Reputation. Croucher is funny and I like her approach to addressing the social justice issues inherent to the genre and setting of the (nominally) regency romance. My favourite regencies are funny - see also Faro's Daughter, The Corinthian and Sylvester by Georgette Heyer. Amanda Quick's regencies are also usually good for this, too.

I have only read three Kylie Chan books (martial arts fantasy) but I ate them up with a spoon and also was mad at myself for not realising sooner that it's a series of serieses, but I read all of Earth to Hell, Hell to Heaven and Heaven to Wudang in three days straight. There's at least one series before that one and at least another one after, but it was perfectly enjoyable from where I started except now I know spoilers for the earlier books. But that's a me problem.

The Locked Tomb series by Tamsyn Muir - a recent enough fave and a rec, if you like your orphans traumatised, your sci-fi magical and your world-building drip fed by a capable and merciless author. If you don't entirely hate it on first read you have much enjoyment coming on second and third reads. The series is not yet finished but there is already several lifetimes of fanworks to tide us over until the next book(s) come out.

Some older faves, in no particular order:

Martha Wells' standalone fantasy novels, and her Ill-Rien novels. The Wheel of the Infinite and The City of Bones are very enjoyable standalones. And The Element of Fire is just *chef's kiss* if you're an enjoyer of angry, feral young women characters and hot, competent men with swords who can actually take directions.

Douglas Adams' everything, and most especially the Dirk Gently books.

Tom Robbins. How to explain Tom Robbins. The universe said to itself sometime in the early 20th century, let's make an American guy who can write women because he genuinely respects and loves them, and he will also write the goofiest, weirdest, most high-concept, new-age, sexual, gross, magical realist fiction the Pacific North-West in the 1970s and 80s will ever produce. Still Life With Woodpecker is essentially a journal of the author's experience with his new typewriter inserted into the body of his latest novel, a modern fairytale involving environmentalism and pyramids. Jitterbug Perfume is a historical fantastical epic about sex, immortality, beets and fragrance, amongst other things. Half Asleep In Frog Pyjamas is about a stockbroker and a psychic and frogs, among other things.

And to finish, I will rec Iain M Banks. The Algebraist is a standalone sci-fi novel and if you like it, you will almost certainly like the Culture series. The Culture series doesn't have to be read in publication order, or even in-universe chronological order; each book is standalone in its own right, but some reference in-universe historical events that are the subject of one or more of the other books. For first-time readers, I would recommend The Player of Games to start with. As well as being a fun story, I think it's a good introduction to the concept of the Culture, and if you enjoy the themes and motifs etc you will see them again in other Culture books. In no particular order, some of my faves are Excession, Inversions, Surface Detail, The Hydrogen Sonata, and Matter.

If you like any of these in particular, let me know, and I can dig around for some more recs like them!

Happy reading!