The Poisons We Drink by Bethany Baptiste

Available May 7, 2024

CW can be found here on The StoryGraph

Look at this gorgeous cover!

From the Publisher:

In a country divided between humans and witchers, Venus Stoneheart hustles as a brewer making illegal love potions to support her family.

Love potions is a dangerous business. Brewing has painful, debilitating side effects, and getting caught means death or a prison sentence. But what Venus is most afraid of is the dark, sentient magic within her.

Then an enemy's iron bullet kills her mother, Venus's life implodes. Keeping her reckless little sister Janus safe is now her responsibility. When the powerful Grand Witcher, the ruthless head of her coven, offers Venus the chance to punish her mother's killer, she has to pay a steep price for revenge. The cost? Brew poisonous potions to enslave D.C.'s most influential politicians.

As Venus crawls deeper into the corrupt underbelly of her city, the line between magic and power blurs, and it's hard to tell who to trust…Herself included.

Reader Friends, this book is incredible. No lie, I started this book months ago and was just a few pages in when I knew I had to put it down because this is such an amazing and special book that I wanted to be sure I was giving it the attention it deserved. I finally had a couple of days to really sit down and immerse myself in this emotional, heartbreaking, and powerful novel. If you are one of those readers who immediately disregards YA, this book will change your mind on the genre.

Baptiste crafted an alternate world that uses magic to explore themes of racism, classism, sexuality and generational trauma. Venus, still so young but straddled with such responsibility, literally puts her body and life in danger to support her family by brewing love potions. Her younger sister, Janus, wants to follow in her father’s footsteps and lead a revolution to guarantee the rights and freedom of witches, but her youthful overconfidence often puts both sisters in danger, adding to Venus’s stress and sense of responsibility. Adding to that tension is the fraught relationship both girls have with their mother. A mother who is more often terse, controlling, and detached when dealing with her two daughters. This complicated relationship drives much of the story and really packs an emotional punch.

The magical system is well developed and very interesting. I really enjoyed the lore of the brewers and their importance in history. There was just information given to keep the reader invested in the story without being too cumbersome with overly detailed rules. The magic was expertly woven into the story and always felt integral, not at all like it was used for convenience or to fill plot holes.

This is definitely a well paced, emotionally charged, and thought provoking book that will stay with you long after the last page. If you’d like to add it to your shelf, you can click on the cover above or here for ordering information.

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post may contain links, including Amazon Associate Links, and I may earn from qualifying purchases.

A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark

Available Now

I love this cover!

Reader Friends, I did it again. I was given the opportunity to read this book ages ago and I waited and waited to finally start it. Why? Because I knew once I read it, no other book would be as good and it would just ruin all books for me.
I was not wrong.

This book is absolutely amazing and I can’t wait for more in the series! This book truly has every bit of my catnip in it. A Master of Djinn is an alternate history, set in 1912 Egypt where the djinn are real and living amongst us. There is a badass female agent with the Egyptian Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments, and Supernatural Entities who looks amazing in tailored suits and refuses to be held back because she’s a woman. There’s a complicated love interest who mysteriously disappears for months at a time only to return when the world goes to hell. There’s a mysterious character who is using magic to inflict horrifying murders and take over the world. There’s a ton of rich-people problems.

It’s so good friends. So, so good.

Here’s the synopsis from the Publisher:

Cairo, 1912: Though Fatma el-Sha’arawi is the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, she’s certainly not a rookie, especially after preventing the destruction of the universe last summer.

So when someone murders a secret brotherhood dedicated to one of the most famous men in history, al-Jahiz, Agent Fatma is called onto the case. Al-Jahiz transformed the world forty years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. This murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions. His dangerous magical abilities instigate unrest in the streets of Cairo that threaten to spill over onto the global stage.

Alongside her Ministry colleagues and a familiar person from her past, Agent Fatma must unravel the mystery behind this imposter to restore peace to the city—or face the possibility he could be exactly who he seems…

A Master of Djinn is a fast-paced adventure full of history and djinn lore. I really appreciate when an author gives the reader just enough information about the history of a region and the lore involved to keep a story flowing, and trusts the reader to look up any information they may need for more context. Several times throughout the book, Fatma or one of her colleagues would refer to a magic-related incident from their past without divulging many details. I hope as the series progresses that there will be some novellas or short stories that flesh out those incidents as they sounded like a lot of fun magical action occurred. The action never stops in this fantastical steampunk adventure through Egypt. From a true djinn in a bottle, magical sandstorms, fights in the streets and at fancy parties, the story moves along quickly .

Fatma is a strong and interesting character who felt really alive and whole. Her complicated relationships with religion, work, and her intimate relationship with Siti were all very relatable. Fatma is a true badass who never backed down from a fight, magical or mortal, but was also very vulnerable in her relationship with Siti. It was interesting how even in a magical world there could still be sensitive conversations about differences of religion as the djinn and magic were everywhere. A Master of Djinn also touches on bigger topics like cultural appropriation, racism, and sexism.

I absolutely loved this book and cannot wait to read more from this author!

If you would like to add this book to your collection, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post also contains affiliate links and I earn from qualifying purchases.

The Conductors by Nicole Glover

This is a phenomenal debut novel full of mystery, magic, and history. Hetty Rhodes, along with her husband Benjy, are conductors on the Underground Railroad. Using their magical gifts to aid in the rescue of many enslaved people, Hetty and Benjy find themselves also serving as the unofficial detectives and investigators for their community. When an old friend of the couple is murdered, the investigation into his death will uncover a tangled web of magic, lies, and devastating secrets. As the couple dive deeper into the mystery of the murder, Hetty continues her years-long search for her missing sister, and discovers that there may be more to her and Benjy’s relationship than she previously believed.

The Conductors is a compelling and engrossing story that effortlessly blends magic and history with the suspense of a mystery. The magic system draws on the powers of the stars and the sigils depicting the constellations. As with our history, white people hold the majority of the magical power and consider their use of it as “good” while they consider the magic held and practiced by Black people to be wrong and dangerous. It’s a gross and unjust system and there’s a very disturbing use of magical collars to control the magic of Black people, but it’s also in line with all the grossness and injustice that white people have inflicted over the centuries. Please don’t think I’m justifying it, I’m not, I just don’t want it to seem that I’m calling the author’s intentions gross. The magical sigils could be embroidered into clothing and handkerchiefs to provide protection, as well as be painted and etched into walls and floors and I love how the beauty of the stars could be translated into magic.

Hetty and Benjy were both great characters and I loved Hetty and Benjy’s unconventional relationship provided a layer of conflict and complexity to the story and to their interactions with friends and the community. They are both driven and steadfast in their mission to protect others, and led to their unconventional marriage. Just like in our own history, Hetty and Benjy couldn’t be seen together, unchaperoned, over and over again without raising eyebrows and creating gossip. To stem some of this, they got married but never had real feelings for each other. As the latest mission brings them closer and closer, forcing out long-held secrets, the two grow into a new relationship that was really lovely to watch develop.

While I would have like a faster pace to the storytelling, I found The Conductors to be an engaging read and look forward to more from this author. 

If you would like to add this book to your shelf, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own. This post contains affiliate links and I earn from qualifying purchases.

The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow

Available Now

This book is so good! I’m pretty sure I read the majority of it aloud to the Hubs and giggled through 90% of it. It’s so, so, so good. So good. It’s so good that I know that anything I have to say about it won’t do it justice so just know, it’s amazing.

Ok, we have the three Eastwood sisters: Beatrice Belladonna, Agnes Amaranth, and James Juniper. It’s 1893 and the three of them grew up with a horribly abusive father who drove them apart, and because of many different events, they haven’t seen each other for over seven years. Agnes has been working her fingers to the bone at the cotton mill, keeping her head down, and trying to stay out of reach of the disgusting and grabby foremen. Beatrice has found a comfortable job as a university librarian and has lived a simple and quiet life on her own. After Juniper finds herself on the run from the law and wandering the city of New Salem, she discovers that her sisters have been in the city all this time, completely unaware of each other. The three of them are drawn together when Beatrice unknowingly recites a spell that creates a mystical connection between them and opens up the gateway to the magical library of Avalon, the center of all magical knowledge. Hurt and betrayed that her sisters left her alone with their abusive father while they began new lives, Agnes sets off to join the newly formed suffragist movement, but not to earn the right to vote. Agnes wants to bring back magic. 

That’s right-witches are real and Agnes and her sisters are all witches. With the help of women from all over New Salem, the three sisters set out to bring back the black tower of Avalon and restore magic to all women. 

I absolutely love alternate history, especially when it’s alternate history with magic. Magic is a known element in this version of New Salem and the men fear nothing more than a female witch. Men are allowed to practice magic but women are threatened with burning if they dare to cast any type of spell, even one as simple as making your hair look good. You can’t have a witch uprising without an evil witch hunter, and that part is played by Gideon Hill, a mysterious man of power that has a cult-like following in New Salem. This book also contains my absolute favorite catnip - books with hidden stories. The stories that were told to the girls by their grandmother held vital information disguised as fairy tales. As the story progresses, these hidden stories become a shared theme amongst many of the women who join forces with the sisters.

Of all the sisters, Juniper is my favorite. She is fearless, driven, and wants nothing more than to tear down the patriarchy. She runs headfirst into every situation and never backs down. Even though she feels her sisters betrayed her, she’s still willing to sacrifice herself to keep them safe. The relationship between the three sisters is very complicated. They all have their own secrets to protect, but they also have some serious misunderstandings about each other’s motivations. The sisters find support for their cause from women all over New Salem. I really enjoyed how it was such a diverse group of women, and a few men, who were so supportive in providing shelter, spells, ingredients, and moral support and there are some interesting ties to the history and lore of the underground railroad. 

This is another chunker of a book, coming in at over 500 pages in the hardcover version. My last few reads were all big books, but all moved very quickly and this one just flew by. In between many of the chapters, there are fairy tales from the sisters’ childhood that provide clues to the source of the witch’s magic and I loved seeing how they fit into the story. While the story itself is pretty grim, the women face torture and death if they are caught practicing magic, the book never feels bleak. If anything, Juniper’s drive to smash the patriarchy and her complete lack of regard for authority help to keep the tone lighter and it’s there are many parts that are downright hilarious. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I can’t wait to hear what others have to say about it. If you would like a copy for your own collection, or as a gift for the witchy book lover in your life, you can find ordering information here:

This post contains affiliate links and I do earn from qualifying purchases. 

The Philosopher’s Flight by Tom Miller

The Philosopher’s Flight by Tom Miller

Available now

Set in an alternate history America, The Philosopher’s Flight is a delightful, and insightful, coming of age story set in the early 20th century.  Empirical philosophy, the ability to control the wind to fly, heal, and move objects is a science dominated by women.  Female Philosophers have long used their abilities to fly great distances while transporting critically injured patients, move large armies across countries to surprise enemies, and are just all-around badasses who are counted on to save the day.  

Raised by one of the greatest fliers of all time, Robert Weekes is determined to become one of the first male members of the US Sigilry Corps’ Rescue and Evacuation Department members.  Considering men have barely enough ability to get their toes off the ground, Robert is soundly laughed off. But when he proves his skills during a daring mission he is given the chance to study at Radcliffe and pursue his dreams.  

Or so he thinks.  

The women at Radcliffe make their disdain and disgust about a male student joining their female dominated studies very well known.  Struggling against deep rooted sexism and constant harassment, Robert is forced to prove himself at every turn. When Robert falls for Danielle Hardin, an outspoken activist, their relationship quickly catches the attention of the Trenchers, a group determined to end the philosophy movement at any cost.

FIghting for his place amongst the elite fliers, against the growing threat of the Trenchers, and for his love of Danielle, Robert will be pushed to his limits.

This was such a great book!  There is so much to unpack with how Robert and the other male students deal with the sexism and disrespect every day at Radcliffe-and just every day in general.  The women truly dominate the field of flying and they have no patience for a man trying to enter their domain. Danielle has to deal with constant anti-semitism and constant attacks from the Trenchers on top of dealing with-what I assume is-some form of PTSD from serving in the Great War.  Robert’s mother has a long history with battling the Trenchers and leaving her behind in Montana is incredibly stressful for him. It’s just an incredibly tense story but there are plenty of times that it becomes quite whimsical and funny.

I found this book absolutely delightful and I couldn’t recommend it enough.  This was a backlist title that I picked up through Book of the Month and I can see why it was selected-it really is that good.

If you would like to grab a copy, and help support the site, you can do so here: