Top 5 Tuesday is created and run by Shanah at Bionic Book Worm. You can join the fun by checking out the topics for the month here.

Hi everyone,

I am a fool and because we had a public holiday on Monday I totally lost track of days and forgot it was Tuesday. So Happy Top 5 Wednesday?! The world clock tells me it is still Tuesday somewhere in the world, so I’m going to write this so fast to get it in time! Continuing last week’s theme, this week we are looking at authors from F-J.

Authors beginning with F

Fonda Lee

Fonda Lee is an author pretty new to me. I started (and finished) her two novels Jade City and Jade War in January this year, they were my first reads of the year! They had been on my tbr for soooo long and I finally decided to tackle all the massive fantasy tomes on my shelf, starting with these. And I loved them! Filled with twists and turns, characters you expect to be around for a while suddenly…aren’t, incredible worldbuilding and magic system, and morally grey characters. I just LOVE. This is a fantasy series not to miss. Bring on the end to the trilogy in 2021!

Authors beginning with G

Sophie Gonzales

Enter the reimagined queer 90s romcom you’ve always dreamed of! Sophie Gonzales’ Only Mostly Devastated is one of the funniest, most joyful, sassy books I’ve read. Described as a queer Grease meets Clueless, it is the YA romcom I wanted in my youth. It is just the most fun. Ollie, the main character, is so sarcastic, he is a character after my own heart. I’m lucky enough to live in Melbourne, and so tomorrow get to go meet Sophie at her book launch. But if YA contemporary, queer romance, or 90s romcoms are your thing, then this book is for you! Check out my full rave review of this one here!

Authors beginning with H

Shaun David Hutchinson

We are the Ants is the only book I’ve read from Shaun David Hutchinson so far, but I already know he is an author I’m going to love reading more from. We Are the Ants was such an emotional read, Hutchinson has such an honest and relatable way of discussing mental health, I fell in love with the book and loved every second. I’m not usually a memoir reader, but Brave Face is one I really want to read as it talks about Hutchinson’s experience with mental health issues. I also am incredibly excited for his queer political romance The State of Us releasing this year!

Authors beginning with I

Ivy Pochoda & Jordan Ifueko

‘I’ was the first of the letters I really struggled with. So whilst I couldn’t think of any authors I’ve read beginning with I, I could think of two books releasing this year I wanted to shout out. Ivy Pochodo’s These Women is a serial killer literary thriller. A story about female empowerment, focusing on five women all connected to a dangerous, obsessive man. It sounds thoroughly dark and intriguing and oh so thrilling.

Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko is the very different, debut YA fantasy about a woman sent to the city to compete to join the Crown Prince’s circle of advisors, but who is bound by a magical wish to kill him once she gains his trust.

Authors beginning with J

Joan He & N.K Jemisin

Two authors, one new to me last year, another I have loved for years! So of course I had to talk about them both. Joan He’s Descendant of the Crane was one of my favourite books last year. It is a detailed, political fantasy, a murder mystery with magic, and the most twisty YA fantasies you’ve ever read. It was incredible work for a debut author, and He’s second novel, The Ones We’re Meant to Find, somehow sounds even more incredible. It’s described as We Were Liars meets Black Mirror, and is about a girl living on a deserted island with no memory of who she is, and a girl trying to save an Earth ravaged by natural disasters. And He says it is even more twisty than her first, which I can’t even comprehend.

N.K Jemisin is certainly no stranger to fantasy readers. She is one of the biggest names in fantasy, most well known for her Broken Earth series, the queer as fuck, science as fuck, utterly captivating, geological masterpiece. It is, and will likely remain forever, one of my favourite fantasy series. N.K Jemisin also has a new book coming at the end of this month, The City We Became, based on a previous short story, about cities with souls. And New York has five of them.

That’s it for this week. Next week I will definitely not forget what day Tuesday is and have to stay up late to write this post and thus be exhausted at work tomorrow, definitely not.