Bex Benjamin’s The Last Place on Earth
I don’t know how Bex Benjamin seamlessly meshes a sexy lesbian romance between a cold-blooded mercenary leader and a journalist with a zombie apocalypse, but the second book in this series is just as good as the first. I’m very invested in the characters, there’s some fun action moments and a couple of good twists. VERY entertaining. I will be eagerly awaiting book three. A/A-.
Tashan Mehta’s Mad Sisters of Esi
This book is VERY cool and a little weird! It’s fantasy and sci-fi??? There’s a pair of sisters raised inside a whale swimming through the universe, full of infinite worlds. There’s another pair of sisters, one who created the whale, and one who created a museum of collective memory—and also an island where her descendants are fated to await her long-lost sister. There’s stories and folklore and academic papers. It’s slow and dreamlike, a little bit more than I prefer, if I’m honest—I was impatient by the end—but really INTERESTING. A/A-.
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A review copy was provided by the publisher. This book will be released in August.
Justina Ireland's Mission to Disaster
Another middle grade High Republic book (with weirdly clunky writing, like it was aimed at an even younger audience) featuring the cool young Jedi Knight from the last couple books and her emotion-sensing Padawan, off on a rescue mission when their science nerd friend is kidnapped by the bad guys. (Who are kidnapping kids to serve as recruits or slaves, yikes.) I kind of want to see how the Jedi finally take down these bad guys (I mean assuming the Jedi get a win for once) but I can’t figure out which book comes next! It’s very annoying. B/B+.
