May 14, 2024 • 22 mins
In this episode of Tell Me What to Read host Ben Hunter sits down with fellow book experts Steph and Krystal to chat about our May Book of the Month, Safe Haven by Shankari Chandran!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is tell Me What to Read, a podcast from
the booksellers at book Toopia, where every week I chat
to some enthusiastic readers about the books they love and
why you might love them too. I'm Ben Hunter and
I'm recording this on unseated woe Wood Country. We pay
respects to Elvis past and present, and extend that respect
to any First Nations people listening with us today. On
today's show, we're going to be racing through our new
(00:33):
May book of the Month. It's a terrific, terrific novel,
and we're going to be diving into some new fantasy
slash fantasy romance fiction. And to do all of that,
I have a couple of brilliant people in the room
with me, Stephanie Gregor and Crystal Campbell. How are you
both good? How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Ben?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
I'm feeling excited. I'm feeling good.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Me too, super pumped fresh.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Off watching Eurovision and I'm just jazzed of so much.
So many genres just smashed together in one event of
musical chaos.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And that's exactly what we're going to do on the
podcast today, but with books.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Well said, eurobook Vision Vision, I did see a TikTok
of someone doing like the filming of the Eurovision and
it was like from the other side, so rather than
like the cool filming you wouldee, is the actual video
of the cameraman. I'm like behind the see this guy talented.
Like the moves he did with that camera.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It was there was a lot of production that goes
into a very short and very frazzling extravagance. Anyway, I
could talk about Eurovision all us, I'm not going to.
I want to talk about may book in the month.
It is Safe Haven by Shanku Chandran and this book
is gorgeous and special and I think you should read it.
(01:53):
Let me take you into why so. Uh. Shanku Chandren
broke out very significantly. She is an author and a
human rights lawy, a very busy woman. But she broke
out with a book called Chai Time at the Simon
Gardens and that was the Miles Franklin winner last year.
(02:14):
And that is a big book that takes a very
It takes a lot of big themes around migration, displacement
and war and crams it into a really beautiful and
human and domestic kind of setting. And Safe Haven comes
(02:37):
kind of Hot Off on the heels of the success
of that book. Safe Haven is a mystery and a
romance and like a bit of a political thriller, and
it is set on a offshore detention centers. That's my
(03:00):
elevator pitch for it. It has two perspectives that are
very This one is like a really rapid fire thrilling read,
whereas Chai Time was more of a slow burn. So
this is a much more accessible novel, which I as
a bookseller, I'm really excited about because I just feel
like I can just get into people's hands. It's got
(03:21):
a gorgeous cover and yes, this book it follows two women,
Fena and Lucky. So Fena is a former asylum seeker
who is helping the asylums community in Australia when she
gets rounded up by the immigration cops and taken to
(03:41):
this place. And Lucky is an investigator who is looking
into a suspicious death of a security guard on this island.
A lot's going to happen and it's really hard to
go even further into it without it. It's an awesome book.
(04:02):
You should read it. Have I sold you?
Speaker 3 (04:05):
I have it on my list already. I literally I
literally was talking to someone the other day about books
that are like jumping up my priority list, and this
one did after you talked about it in office, Ben, Like,
as soon as you sold it the first time to
us at the office, it jumped straight up my list.
And what sold me was the fact that it has
(04:25):
a more thriller element to it than her previous title,
because I feel like, again it is going to be
more palatable for me as a thriller reader. So yeah,
I'm very excited. It's definitely jumped up my list thanks
to Ben selling it to us.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
I've got one Dick, No, I would definitely read it
as well. Yeah, I've wanted to reach High Time at
Cinnamon Gardens for ages as well. Have you read that one, Ben, Yes.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I have. Yeah, she's a really clever writer. And getting
to speak to her when she signed some copies there
are limited signed copies of safe Haven on the book
to w website at the my when she signed, she
was really interesting to speak to. She is a very yeah,
just frank, down to earth, and she comes from a
(05:10):
legal background, so she's she will grill you, I love you.
But she's just so open and conversational and so so smart.
I just yeah, I'm a fan, as you can tell,
which is good. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
You literally haven't stopped smiling since she said, let me
tell you about this book.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
All right, So I'm here to get educated now on
new entrance into the very combative world of fantasy publishing.
There are some new ones that are getting very, very
highly hyped, and they are hitting into this ven diagram
of fannessy and romance, which Iron Flame and Fourth Wing
(05:55):
have sort of drastically exploded in the past twelve months.
Tell me about these new books. What have you guys
been reading.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Hmm, well, okay, I'll go first. I've been reading the
amazing When the Moon Hatched by Sarah A. Parker. So
for a background, Sarah A. Parker is an Ossie romanticy author,
and she's just skyrocketed over the past a couple months
or so with her debut book, When the Moon Hatched,
(06:23):
and it's doing incredibly well and it's beautiful, it's fun.
The world building is fantastic. It's very much in that
like Fourth Wing Iron Flame world of classic romanticy with
like elves and fairies and things like that. I got
so yes, dragons and yeah, really leaning into that Sarah
J Mass stuff too with like there's elves and fairies
in this one and all sorts of magical realms and
(06:46):
basically our main character Rave Rave. I don't know how
to pronounce it because I read it and I read
it as Raeves. I'm just gonna say Reeve. Sorry, Sarah,
it correct me if I'm wrong. She's like, this is
sass for this like rebel group. So she goes around
just like you know, kicking butts and taking names, and
(07:07):
then she gets kidnapped by a different group and she's
being held prisoner and she meets this like fallen dragon
writer guy. So that's the kind of premise of it,
without you know, spoiling anything. But the cool thing about
this one is the world building is just on part
it's beautiful. It's like, I guess a lot of the
(07:30):
time when you do read a romanticy, you kind of
go into it thinking it's just going to be full
on romance with like none of the fantasy, Like maybe
it's like an elf, but yeah, it's like, oh, this
girl has magical powers but we don't know why, or
like just a random magical character. No, this is actually
the opposite. So the whole kind of first part of
the book is really building up this fantasy world, and
(07:52):
it's building up the main character and like magic and
elves and all of the realm staff and beautiful maps
and things and what's really cool. As well as that,
Sarah puts like letters and images and stuff throughout the book,
so you get like a lot of visual representations of
different things. Yeah, so it's got this really rich world.
And then against that backdrop is the actual romance. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
I think it's more fantasy than romance, is what you
would say if you were going to genrealize it.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Definitely a mixture of both, So don't worry, romance fans.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
I'm still love Oh You've like I was already interested
in this, but you guys, every single time we come
on this podcast just make me want to walk straight
out the door and pick up the book. You guys
have been talking about instantly, and this is no different.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yes. Oh, and we do have the deluxe hardcover that
will be coming at the end of this year, so
you can always pre order that if you want a
fancy foiled edge version.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
And I'm excited to see that in person. Me too,
because we had a signing for the paperback edition. Those
signed copies sold that very quickly, so quick. But the
paperback by itself was just really beautiful, like so much
foil and gold and embossed detail and illustration. The book
(09:10):
has illustration at the top of every chapter. It's really
really well done.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah, it's beautiful.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It is.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
The paperback squads and I'm decited.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
The other thing that interests me about this book and
Sarah Parker as a Aussie author, is she was she
was huge as an independent publishing deal. So thousands of
people were just raving about the book on Goodreads, yes,
and then suddenly a million dollar deal with major publisher
and kind of ripped the rug out of it and gone,
(09:42):
don't tell this cheap online anymore. We're going to do
this as our own thing.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Yeah. And it's it's really interesting too with that, right,
because I think a lot of people now are saying
like everything is the next Fourth Wing or everything's the
next Iron Flame, just just gets thrown around so much,
which you can understand why because it's done so well.
But I actually think When the Moon Hatched is a
pretty worthy comparison to those to those kind of blockbuster
(10:07):
romanticies that we had last year, so yeah, really excited.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
The other one that's really taking off at the moment,
Crystal is five Broken Blades. Is that the correct title?
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (10:18):
By my call in, I keep seeing this cover just
popping up on my screen, going bestseller best'll.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Yeah, I ended up picking up this one instead of
When the Moon Hatch because I kind of had both
of them staring me dead in the face. And this
one is very much five people that are all liars, thieves, criminals.
I guess it's probably the gist, and they've all received
a random letter to say, we need you to come
(10:44):
and help us kill the king. The king is one
of those treacherous terrible kings. Under his rule, everything's kind
of gone wrong, but he's a god king and apparently
he's unkillable. But these five people now need to kind
of like learn to trust one another when they're pretty
(11:05):
much untrustable or untrusting because of the fact that they
are last thieves, horrible people and they need to get
together and find a way to kill this god the
king that can't die, and only one of them will
like succeed in killing and getting the thing that they need,
and if they kill and are successful, they get like
(11:25):
a big money reward and a lot of the mari
in a situation where it'll either free a sister who's
in slavery or it'll free something like they need the thing.
So it's really cool and it jumps through multiple povs,
but it's not confusing, like you can tell the characters
apart really well.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
And the world is really good.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
I was just about to say it sounds so much
like like a Dungeons and Dragons inspired kind of a yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Could see how that would probably happen, but it's just
it's really cool because you'll be like they're short chapters too,
so you'll kind of like be thrust into this scenario
of this one person and then it's like boom back
to another scenario, and then I get to the point
where it just kind of all joins together and their
world's coming intertwine and more things come to the surface,
and it was just really, really well done. I had
(12:13):
a really fun time with it. It was one of
those things that I just gobbled up. It was like,
from start to finish, I could not stop thinking about
what's going to happen next, And I was not disappointed
by the ending.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
All good to hear, and is it the first of
many or is it?
Speaker 3 (12:28):
I honestly think it is a part of a series.
I don't know if it's going to be more than
a duology, but it's definitely the first in a series,
so we'll see. I don't I wasn't left like on
this huge, huge, huge cliffhanger, but like, I definitely want
to know more in the in this world. Yeah, and
the cover is obviously stunning, so oh.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Yeah, I love it. Actually, the covers of When the
Moon Hatched and Five Broken Blades side by side would
be epic on a bookshelf. Oh yeah, the red and
the blue, like we've got it all covered here.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And the other cover I keep saying is the one
that had what I thought was jellyfish on it, the
jellyfish jellyfish that's actually a flower.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
We have the fantastic North Wind book, which is also
a new romantic book based on the Hades and Persephone
kind of retelling, and that one's I think we do
have limited signed copies of that at the moment too.
Really really love that one as well. Yeah, super different
from When the Moon Hatch Super different from Five Broken Blades,
(13:34):
except that I think all three of them are quite
like what would you say, Like Five Broken Blades has
like a rich fantasy world too, like, yeah, it's so cool.
I think the three of them, I mean, with the
North Wind and When the Moon Hatched one hundred percent
really rich, beautiful worlds, and then the romance is kind
of like against that, so you get a lot more
(13:56):
of this high fantasy kind of storytelling.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
I definitely recall more of like the character building and
the like crazy brutal scenes more than the romance. Out
of five Broken blaits like it's there for those that
need it, but it doesn't like overtake from the cool
plot and like the character driven story.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Is five Broken Blades, I'm guessing there's violence.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Oh yeah, like oh yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
The same for When the Moon Hatched, Like there's a
lot of a lot more darkness to it that I
kind of originally thought, I think.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
When I yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Yeah, but exciting and yeah, so The north Wind Sorry
is Alexandria Warwick's book, another one that was popular online
before it was picked up for publishing. Interesting deal and
this one's beautiful. It's just yeah, beauty and the Beast
vibes like haties and persephone retelling. It's about a girl,
Wren of Edgewood, and her little sister is going to
(14:53):
be taken by this thing called the north Wind and
she's like, don't take my sister, take me instead, and
he does.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
And the cover has little like blue flowers on it, which, yeah,
Ben thought they were jellyfish. If you look at the cover,
I can I can see how Ben thought that, because
they kind of do have jellyfish.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
You know what. I actually think they look like mushrooms
from here, because I'm looking at it from like a
bit of a distance away, I can see him.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Mushrooms got everything. Yeah, mushrooms jellyfish? They are actually flowers.
So you're all wrong.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
But you guess anything else, you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And Ben, you get The north Wind today. You can
also get When the Moon Hatched and then you can
get another book. And it's part of our book Binge promission.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Oh well, well sold, like that was your job. I
love book Binch comes around every year and it's a
it's a buy more, say more extravaganza deal. And yeah,
if you like to read lots, you can save lots.
(16:03):
It's a good it's a good thing. So check out
book bench. If you're in the in the market for
some more books, I always let's move. We are such
good sales. Let's talk about what we're reading next. What
what do you have on the bed side table right
(16:24):
now or or are you aspiring to kind of read
this weekend? Oh?
Speaker 3 (16:29):
I am halfway through Heartless, which is booked two in
the Chestnut Spring series by Elsie Silver. I read Flawless
last month, and by read, I mean literally sat down
and gobbled it up in one day. It was amazing.
It made me cry, which you don't expect from a
romance munty book.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
But Silver, I hear it's hot, hot, hot.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Oh, it is very, very hot and amazing. But it's
also got characters that you just care so much about
and they're emotional, and he did at the end of
book one the most romantic thing I ever read in
a romance book in my life, and he has put
every man that I know to shame, like, Oh, anyways,
you have to read it if you want to find
out what I'm talking about. But I'm currently in Heartless,
(17:11):
which is book two, and obviously the whole test Nut
Spring series follows like a different man for each story,
so you can kind of read them separately, you don't
have to read them one after the other. But this
one follows. Daddy Kid is as well.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
We're talking about this the other day at lunch.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
He is a man who is on a ranch and
he works a lot and requires someone to come and
help look after his small son, and obviously he ends
up hiring a nanny, and then the rest in shoes.
You guys that have read romans know exactly what I'm
talking about.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
But yeah, we know whether this was going when you
said he has a ranch.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
So it is a cowboy romance. But Elsie Silver has
the ability to not just write corny romance, Like there's
depth to her stories. There's always a little bit of
like reperence, representation of something, some issue, something that's going
on with her characters that is really relatable and obviously
you want to be in a relationship with every man.
(18:11):
She writes like she's just really good at writing book boyfriends,
really boyfriends.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
And so she's got a few series, right, So this
is Chestnut Springs, and then there's Wild Love as well.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
Yes, yes, which I will be jumping into next because
I'm doing the Chestnut Springs as like a read along.
So we do like one a month, and because I
finish it too soon, I'm like, I need to jump over.
So I'm going to be jumping over to her other
one when I finish this one, probably tonight, because I'm
already fifty percent through.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Amazing so like easy, like fun to read like but
still kind of meaningful. Okay, I'll have to adding to
TBR right now.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Yeah, So that's what I'm in the middle of. I
obviously I have it like a couple others on the
go because that's just how I roll. But that's the
one that like jumps to mine, that's on my bedside
table at the moment.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I'm excited. What about you, Steph. I'm currently reading
and Patch. It's Tom Lake great, so good, awesome, I'm
loving it, beautiful, just a lot. Yeah, I'm reading a
couple of other books at the moment too. I've just
picked up one called Diary of a Void, which is
a Japanese translated book. Looks awesome, haven't started it yet,
(19:18):
haven't even opened it, but it's about a salary person
working full time, just coming to terms with live, laugh,
loving life. Oh, literary translated fiction. Just yeah, I love.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Her every time we come from this point together. You're
reading like literary, beautiful fiction, and I'm just like, I'm
just reading the romance still.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
I just I just went on a tangent about the
north wind. Come on, Okay, that's.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
That's fair, that's true. I'm so glad you're reading some like.
It's such a special book and patches coming to Australia
for she is, she's well, well loved and right. So
she's one of the best authors at work today. Yes,
I've been on a bit of a thriller vibe.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
Oh my ears are tweaking.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
Yes, I've read some things that I can't really talk
about yet, some things that are coming up in months
to come. But the thing I'm going to read next
is the new Anna Downs book. Anna Downs is an
Aussie author and she writes really sharp thrillers and this
(20:29):
could be her best one yet. It just looks so good.
Is called Red River Road and it happens on the
coast of Western Australia, and it follows a woman who
is in a van in the bloody at back following
the trail of her missing sister and a chain of
(20:53):
social media posts that have gone cold, and trying to
find out where her sister who was doing I think
the whole van life thing what happened to her? And
it looks really dark and really exciting and has the
most beautiful, beautiful setting. And the thing I love about Downs,
(21:15):
apart from being a terrific author, is she does she's
like a method actor, so she doesn't kill people.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
She traveled around w a in the van.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I think she did a bit of that. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
And her first novel is about an a pair in
the South of France, and she was an a pair
in the south of France.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Is that the safe place you're talking about?
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (21:40):
I read that. That was really good.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Did she do that before she wrote the book or
for writing the book? Like during the process.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I think she travel I mean, you know, it's nice
to go into the Western Australian out back copy.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
That is true. I'm like that.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I just want to follow that
van down winding roads with an ominous feeling that someone's
following you. I think that's a scree pitch speak. Thank
you for enlightening me into the world of fantasy, romance
and so much more. We will be back next time
(22:19):
with more brilliant books. If you want to get the
lowdown on any of the books we've discussed today, jump
into the show notes. They'll be links to book Toby
Away can buy them and give the podcast a follow,
or recommend it, or do whatever you need to do.
But until next time, happy reading,
This is tell Me What to Read, a podcast from
the booksellers at book Toopia, where every week I chat
to some enthusiastic readers about the books they love and
why you might love them too. I'm Ben Hunter and
I'm recording this on unseated woe Wood Country. We pay
respects to Elvis past and present, and extend that respect
to any First Nations people listening with us today. On
today's show, we're going to be racing through our new
(00:33):
May book of the Month. It's a terrific, terrific novel,
and we're going to be diving into some new fantasy
slash fantasy romance fiction. And to do all of that,
I have a couple of brilliant people in the room
with me, Stephanie Gregor and Crystal Campbell. How are you
both good? How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Ben?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
I'm feeling excited. I'm feeling good.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Me too, super pumped fresh.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Off watching Eurovision and I'm just jazzed of so much.
So many genres just smashed together in one event of
musical chaos.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
And that's exactly what we're going to do on the
podcast today, but with books.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Well said, eurobook Vision Vision, I did see a TikTok
of someone doing like the filming of the Eurovision and
it was like from the other side, so rather than
like the cool filming you wouldee, is the actual video
of the cameraman. I'm like behind the see this guy talented.
Like the moves he did with that camera.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It was there was a lot of production that goes
into a very short and very frazzling extravagance. Anyway, I
could talk about Eurovision all us, I'm not going to.
I want to talk about may book in the month.
It is Safe Haven by Shanku Chandran and this book
is gorgeous and special and I think you should read it.
(01:53):
Let me take you into why so. Uh. Shanku Chandren
broke out very significantly. She is an author and a
human rights lawy, a very busy woman. But she broke
out with a book called Chai Time at the Simon
Gardens and that was the Miles Franklin winner last year.
(02:14):
And that is a big book that takes a very
It takes a lot of big themes around migration, displacement
and war and crams it into a really beautiful and
human and domestic kind of setting. And Safe Haven comes
(02:37):
kind of Hot Off on the heels of the success
of that book. Safe Haven is a mystery and a
romance and like a bit of a political thriller, and
it is set on a offshore detention centers. That's my
(03:00):
elevator pitch for it. It has two perspectives that are
very This one is like a really rapid fire thrilling read,
whereas Chai Time was more of a slow burn. So
this is a much more accessible novel, which I as
a bookseller, I'm really excited about because I just feel
like I can just get into people's hands. It's got
(03:21):
a gorgeous cover and yes, this book it follows two women,
Fena and Lucky. So Fena is a former asylum seeker
who is helping the asylums community in Australia when she
gets rounded up by the immigration cops and taken to
(03:41):
this place. And Lucky is an investigator who is looking
into a suspicious death of a security guard on this island.
A lot's going to happen and it's really hard to
go even further into it without it. It's an awesome book.
(04:02):
You should read it. Have I sold you?
Speaker 3 (04:05):
I have it on my list already. I literally I
literally was talking to someone the other day about books
that are like jumping up my priority list, and this
one did after you talked about it in office, Ben, Like,
as soon as you sold it the first time to
us at the office, it jumped straight up my list.
And what sold me was the fact that it has
(04:25):
a more thriller element to it than her previous title,
because I feel like, again it is going to be
more palatable for me as a thriller reader. So yeah,
I'm very excited. It's definitely jumped up my list thanks
to Ben selling it to us.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
I've got one Dick, No, I would definitely read it
as well. Yeah, I've wanted to reach High Time at
Cinnamon Gardens for ages as well. Have you read that one, Ben, Yes.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I have. Yeah, she's a really clever writer. And getting
to speak to her when she signed some copies there
are limited signed copies of safe Haven on the book
to w website at the my when she signed, she
was really interesting to speak to. She is a very yeah,
just frank, down to earth, and she comes from a
(05:10):
legal background, so she's she will grill you, I love you.
But she's just so open and conversational and so so smart.
I just yeah, I'm a fan, as you can tell,
which is good. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
You literally haven't stopped smiling since she said, let me
tell you about this book.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
All right, So I'm here to get educated now on
new entrance into the very combative world of fantasy publishing.
There are some new ones that are getting very, very
highly hyped, and they are hitting into this ven diagram
of fannessy and romance, which Iron Flame and Fourth Wing
(05:55):
have sort of drastically exploded in the past twelve months.
Tell me about these new books. What have you guys
been reading.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Hmm, well, okay, I'll go first. I've been reading the
amazing When the Moon Hatched by Sarah A. Parker. So
for a background, Sarah A. Parker is an Ossie romanticy author,
and she's just skyrocketed over the past a couple months
or so with her debut book, When the Moon Hatched,
(06:23):
and it's doing incredibly well and it's beautiful, it's fun.
The world building is fantastic. It's very much in that
like Fourth Wing Iron Flame world of classic romanticy with
like elves and fairies and things like that. I got
so yes, dragons and yeah, really leaning into that Sarah
J Mass stuff too with like there's elves and fairies
in this one and all sorts of magical realms and
(06:46):
basically our main character Rave Rave. I don't know how
to pronounce it because I read it and I read
it as Raeves. I'm just gonna say Reeve. Sorry, Sarah,
it correct me if I'm wrong. She's like, this is
sass for this like rebel group. So she goes around
just like you know, kicking butts and taking names, and
(07:07):
then she gets kidnapped by a different group and she's
being held prisoner and she meets this like fallen dragon
writer guy. So that's the kind of premise of it,
without you know, spoiling anything. But the cool thing about
this one is the world building is just on part
it's beautiful. It's like, I guess a lot of the
(07:30):
time when you do read a romanticy, you kind of
go into it thinking it's just going to be full
on romance with like none of the fantasy, Like maybe
it's like an elf, but yeah, it's like, oh, this
girl has magical powers but we don't know why, or
like just a random magical character. No, this is actually
the opposite. So the whole kind of first part of
the book is really building up this fantasy world, and
(07:52):
it's building up the main character and like magic and
elves and all of the realm staff and beautiful maps
and things and what's really cool. As well as that,
Sarah puts like letters and images and stuff throughout the book,
so you get like a lot of visual representations of
different things. Yeah, so it's got this really rich world.
And then against that backdrop is the actual romance. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
I think it's more fantasy than romance, is what you
would say if you were going to genrealize it.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Definitely a mixture of both, So don't worry, romance fans.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
I'm still love Oh You've like I was already interested
in this, but you guys, every single time we come
on this podcast just make me want to walk straight
out the door and pick up the book. You guys
have been talking about instantly, and this is no different.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yes. Oh, and we do have the deluxe hardcover that
will be coming at the end of this year, so
you can always pre order that if you want a
fancy foiled edge version.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
And I'm excited to see that in person. Me too,
because we had a signing for the paperback edition. Those
signed copies sold that very quickly, so quick. But the
paperback by itself was just really beautiful, like so much
foil and gold and embossed detail and illustration. The book
(09:10):
has illustration at the top of every chapter. It's really
really well done.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah, it's beautiful.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It is.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
The paperback squads and I'm decited.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
The other thing that interests me about this book and
Sarah Parker as a Aussie author, is she was she
was huge as an independent publishing deal. So thousands of
people were just raving about the book on Goodreads, yes,
and then suddenly a million dollar deal with major publisher
and kind of ripped the rug out of it and gone,
(09:42):
don't tell this cheap online anymore. We're going to do
this as our own thing.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Yeah. And it's it's really interesting too with that, right,
because I think a lot of people now are saying
like everything is the next Fourth Wing or everything's the
next Iron Flame, just just gets thrown around so much,
which you can understand why because it's done so well.
But I actually think When the Moon Hatched is a
pretty worthy comparison to those to those kind of blockbuster
(10:07):
romanticies that we had last year, so yeah, really excited.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
The other one that's really taking off at the moment,
Crystal is five Broken Blades. Is that the correct title?
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (10:18):
By my call in, I keep seeing this cover just
popping up on my screen, going bestseller best'll.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Yeah, I ended up picking up this one instead of
When the Moon Hatch because I kind of had both
of them staring me dead in the face. And this
one is very much five people that are all liars, thieves, criminals.
I guess it's probably the gist, and they've all received
a random letter to say, we need you to come
(10:44):
and help us kill the king. The king is one
of those treacherous terrible kings. Under his rule, everything's kind
of gone wrong, but he's a god king and apparently
he's unkillable. But these five people now need to kind
of like learn to trust one another when they're pretty
(11:05):
much untrustable or untrusting because of the fact that they
are last thieves, horrible people and they need to get
together and find a way to kill this god the
king that can't die, and only one of them will
like succeed in killing and getting the thing that they need,
and if they kill and are successful, they get like
(11:25):
a big money reward and a lot of the mari
in a situation where it'll either free a sister who's
in slavery or it'll free something like they need the thing.
So it's really cool and it jumps through multiple povs,
but it's not confusing, like you can tell the characters
apart really well.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
And the world is really good.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
I was just about to say it sounds so much
like like a Dungeons and Dragons inspired kind of a yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Could see how that would probably happen, but it's just
it's really cool because you'll be like they're short chapters too,
so you'll kind of like be thrust into this scenario
of this one person and then it's like boom back
to another scenario, and then I get to the point
where it just kind of all joins together and their
world's coming intertwine and more things come to the surface,
and it was just really, really well done. I had
(12:13):
a really fun time with it. It was one of
those things that I just gobbled up. It was like,
from start to finish, I could not stop thinking about
what's going to happen next, And I was not disappointed
by the ending.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
All good to hear, and is it the first of
many or is it?
Speaker 3 (12:28):
I honestly think it is a part of a series.
I don't know if it's going to be more than
a duology, but it's definitely the first in a series,
so we'll see. I don't I wasn't left like on
this huge, huge, huge cliffhanger, but like, I definitely want
to know more in the in this world. Yeah, and
the cover is obviously stunning, so oh.
Speaker 2 (12:50):
Yeah, I love it. Actually, the covers of When the
Moon Hatched and Five Broken Blades side by side would
be epic on a bookshelf. Oh yeah, the red and
the blue, like we've got it all covered here.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And the other cover I keep saying is the one
that had what I thought was jellyfish on it, the
jellyfish jellyfish that's actually a flower.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
We have the fantastic North Wind book, which is also
a new romantic book based on the Hades and Persephone
kind of retelling, and that one's I think we do
have limited signed copies of that at the moment too.
Really really love that one as well. Yeah, super different
from When the Moon Hatch Super different from Five Broken Blades,
(13:34):
except that I think all three of them are quite
like what would you say, Like Five Broken Blades has
like a rich fantasy world too, like, yeah, it's so cool.
I think the three of them, I mean, with the
North Wind and When the Moon Hatched one hundred percent
really rich, beautiful worlds, and then the romance is kind
of like against that, so you get a lot more
(13:56):
of this high fantasy kind of storytelling.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
I definitely recall more of like the character building and
the like crazy brutal scenes more than the romance. Out
of five Broken blaits like it's there for those that
need it, but it doesn't like overtake from the cool
plot and like the character driven story.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
Is five Broken Blades, I'm guessing there's violence.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Oh yeah, like oh yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
The same for When the Moon Hatched, Like there's a
lot of a lot more darkness to it that I
kind of originally thought, I think.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
When I yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
Yeah, but exciting and yeah, so The north Wind Sorry
is Alexandria Warwick's book, another one that was popular online
before it was picked up for publishing. Interesting deal and
this one's beautiful. It's just yeah, beauty and the Beast
vibes like haties and persephone retelling. It's about a girl,
Wren of Edgewood, and her little sister is going to
(14:53):
be taken by this thing called the north Wind and
she's like, don't take my sister, take me instead, and
he does.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
And the cover has little like blue flowers on it, which, yeah,
Ben thought they were jellyfish. If you look at the cover,
I can I can see how Ben thought that, because
they kind of do have jellyfish.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
You know what. I actually think they look like mushrooms
from here, because I'm looking at it from like a
bit of a distance away, I can see him.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Mushrooms got everything. Yeah, mushrooms jellyfish? They are actually flowers.
So you're all wrong.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
But you guess anything else, you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And Ben, you get The north Wind today. You can
also get When the Moon Hatched and then you can
get another book. And it's part of our book Binge promission.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Oh well, well sold, like that was your job. I
love book Binch comes around every year and it's a
it's a buy more, say more extravaganza deal. And yeah,
if you like to read lots, you can save lots.
(16:03):
It's a good it's a good thing. So check out
book bench. If you're in the in the market for
some more books, I always let's move. We are such
good sales. Let's talk about what we're reading next. What
what do you have on the bed side table right
(16:24):
now or or are you aspiring to kind of read
this weekend? Oh?
Speaker 3 (16:29):
I am halfway through Heartless, which is booked two in
the Chestnut Spring series by Elsie Silver. I read Flawless
last month, and by read, I mean literally sat down
and gobbled it up in one day. It was amazing.
It made me cry, which you don't expect from a
romance munty book.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
But Silver, I hear it's hot, hot, hot.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Oh, it is very, very hot and amazing. But it's
also got characters that you just care so much about
and they're emotional, and he did at the end of
book one the most romantic thing I ever read in
a romance book in my life, and he has put
every man that I know to shame, like, Oh, anyways,
you have to read it if you want to find
out what I'm talking about. But I'm currently in Heartless,
(17:11):
which is book two, and obviously the whole test Nut
Spring series follows like a different man for each story,
so you can kind of read them separately, you don't
have to read them one after the other. But this
one follows. Daddy Kid is as well.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
We're talking about this the other day at lunch.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
He is a man who is on a ranch and
he works a lot and requires someone to come and
help look after his small son, and obviously he ends
up hiring a nanny, and then the rest in shoes.
You guys that have read romans know exactly what I'm
talking about.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
But yeah, we know whether this was going when you
said he has a ranch.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
So it is a cowboy romance. But Elsie Silver has
the ability to not just write corny romance, Like there's
depth to her stories. There's always a little bit of
like reperence, representation of something, some issue, something that's going
on with her characters that is really relatable and obviously
you want to be in a relationship with every man.
(18:11):
She writes like she's just really good at writing book boyfriends,
really boyfriends.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
And so she's got a few series, right, So this
is Chestnut Springs, and then there's Wild Love as well.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
Yes, yes, which I will be jumping into next because
I'm doing the Chestnut Springs as like a read along.
So we do like one a month, and because I
finish it too soon, I'm like, I need to jump over.
So I'm going to be jumping over to her other
one when I finish this one, probably tonight, because I'm
already fifty percent through.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Amazing so like easy, like fun to read like but
still kind of meaningful. Okay, I'll have to adding to
TBR right now.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Yeah, So that's what I'm in the middle of. I
obviously I have it like a couple others on the
go because that's just how I roll. But that's the
one that like jumps to mine, that's on my bedside
table at the moment.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I'm excited. What about you, Steph. I'm currently reading
and Patch. It's Tom Lake great, so good, awesome, I'm
loving it, beautiful, just a lot. Yeah, I'm reading a
couple of other books at the moment too. I've just
picked up one called Diary of a Void, which is
a Japanese translated book. Looks awesome, haven't started it yet,
(19:18):
haven't even opened it, but it's about a salary person
working full time, just coming to terms with live, laugh,
loving life. Oh, literary translated fiction. Just yeah, I love.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Her every time we come from this point together. You're
reading like literary, beautiful fiction, and I'm just like, I'm
just reading the romance still.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
I just I just went on a tangent about the
north wind. Come on, Okay, that's.
Speaker 1 (19:46):
That's fair, that's true. I'm so glad you're reading some like.
It's such a special book and patches coming to Australia
for she is, she's well, well loved and right. So
she's one of the best authors at work today. Yes,
I've been on a bit of a thriller vibe.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
Oh my ears are tweaking.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
Yes, I've read some things that I can't really talk
about yet, some things that are coming up in months
to come. But the thing I'm going to read next
is the new Anna Downs book. Anna Downs is an
Aussie author and she writes really sharp thrillers and this
(20:29):
could be her best one yet. It just looks so good.
Is called Red River Road and it happens on the
coast of Western Australia, and it follows a woman who
is in a van in the bloody at back following
the trail of her missing sister and a chain of
(20:53):
social media posts that have gone cold, and trying to
find out where her sister who was doing I think
the whole van life thing what happened to her? And
it looks really dark and really exciting and has the
most beautiful, beautiful setting. And the thing I love about Downs,
(21:15):
apart from being a terrific author, is she does she's
like a method actor, so she doesn't kill people.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
She traveled around w a in the van.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
I think she did a bit of that. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
And her first novel is about an a pair in
the South of France, and she was an a pair
in the south of France.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Is that the safe place you're talking about?
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yes?
Speaker 3 (21:40):
I read that. That was really good.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Did she do that before she wrote the book or
for writing the book? Like during the process.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
I think she travel I mean, you know, it's nice
to go into the Western Australian out back copy.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
That is true. I'm like that.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I just want to follow that
van down winding roads with an ominous feeling that someone's
following you. I think that's a scree pitch speak. Thank
you for enlightening me into the world of fantasy, romance
and so much more. We will be back next time
(22:19):
with more brilliant books. If you want to get the
lowdown on any of the books we've discussed today, jump
into the show notes. They'll be links to book Toby
Away can buy them and give the podcast a follow,
or recommend it, or do whatever you need to do.
But until next time, happy reading,
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