BotB Staff Blog

Sleep-deprived narrator meets a strange man and creates an underground fight club that quickly evolves into a much more sinister and powerful force.

Dissociated, sleeping pill-addicted narrator falls into a year of sleep with the help of her naive therapist.

I recommend this book to anyone who wants to escape into something soft, magical, and deeply comforting. It’s a cozy fantasy about Viv, an orc mercenary who retires from a life of battle to open a coffee shop in a city that’s never even heard of coffee. What unfolds is a gentle, heartwarming story of friendship, community, and chasing a quieter kind of happiness. I fell in love with the found family, the magical creatures, and the slow, satisfying pace. The audiobook (narrate

Set in the eerie expanses near the Salton Sea, this borderland Gothic novel intertwines a missing girl's mystery, mother/daughter trauma (a Demeter/Persephone retelling), folklore, and environmental injustice in poetic (and at times brutal) fashion.

The story follows Robin Swift, a Chinese orphan taken to study at Babel, Oxford's prestigious translation institute, where students learn to manipulate reality through silver-working. As Robin excels, he discovers the darker side of Babel's work, which is deeply entwined with British colonialism, prompting him to question his loyalty and consider resistance.