Read in July 2026
July turned out to be a good reading month. Not only did I finish a decent number of books, most of them also managed to impress me quite a bit. And as I become increasingly willing to put books aside when they clearly aren’t working for me, I was also able to DNF two books this month after reading very little of them.
In total, I finished 7 books in July, totalling 2300 pages. That brings the average July book to 329 pages per book.
There were also 2 DNFs. Between them, I read barely 80 pages before deciding they simply weren’t for me. Sometimes, thankfully, you don’t need much more than that to know that continuing would be a waste of time.
The books I did finish were generally quite successful. My ratings ranged from 3 to 5 stars, with no fewer than five books receiving four stars from me. This brings the average rating for July to a lovely 4.0 stars.
There wasn’t much variation in target audience this month either. One of the seven books I finished was aimed at a Young Adult audience, and surprisingly, that one was not one of the books I ended up DNFing.
I varied my reading formats a little more. I read one e-book and two audiobooks, combined listening with physical reading for one book, and also read 5 books from my own shelves.
Genre-wise, I kept things limited, alternating between only 2 genres: mystery (2) and fantasy (7).
Below you’ll find the list of the books I read in July, along with my star ratings.
Click the link to jump to the blurb and my review! As always, please be aware that both blurbs and reviews may contain spoilers, especially when it comes to later books in a series. I sometimes hide spoilers behind expandable or blacked-out text.
- Brennan, Sarah Rees – Long Live Evil (Time of Iron #1) (DNF)
- Blake, Olivie – Gifted & Talented (DNF)
- Barker, R.J. – The Bone Ship’s Wake (The Tide Child #3) ★★★★★
- Barker, R.J. – The Hag’s Call (The Tide Child #0,5) ★★★★
- Chen, Gina – Violet Made of Thorns ★★★
- Horowitz, Anthony – A Line to Kill (Hawthorne & Horowitz #3) 🎧 ★★★★
- Horowitz, Anthony – The Twist of a Knife (Hawthorne & Horowitz #4) 🎧 ★★★★
- Tao, Shen – The Poet Empress ★★★★
- Kingfisher, T. – Paladin’s Hope (The Saint of Steel #3) ★★★★
Brennan, Sarah Rees – Long Live Evil (Time of Iron #1) (DNF)
Genre: Fantasy
She wakes in a castle on the edge of a hellish chasm, in a kingdom on the brink of war. Home to dangerous monsters, scheming courtiers and her favourite fictional character: the Once and Forever Emperor. He’s impossibly alluring, as only fiction can be. And in this fantasy world, she discovers she’s not the heroine, but the villainess in the Emperor’s tale.
So be it. The wicked are better dressed, with better one-liners, even if they’re doomed to bad ends. She assembles the wildly disparate villains of the story under her evil leadership, plotting to change their fate. But as the body count rises and the Emperor’s fury increases, it seems Rae and her allies may not survive to see the final page.
This adult epic fantasy debut from Sarah Rees Brennan puts the reader in the villain’s shoes, for an adventure that is both ‘brilliant’ (Holly Black) and ‘supremely satisfying’ (Leigh Bardugo). Expect a rogue’s gallery of villains including an axe wielding maid, a shining knight with dark moods, a homicidal bodyguard, and a playboy spymaster with a golden heart and a filthy reputation.
I am genuinely disappointed that Long Live Evil did not work for me, because the premise sounded like exactly the kind of chaotic, immersive fantasy I would love. The idea of escaping into your favourite book series and getting to play around with villains and fantasy tropes sounded like so much fun. Unfortunately, I struggled with the execution almost immediately and ultimately decided to DNF around 20%.
My biggest issue was the writing style. Everything felt rushed, chaotic, and confusing, with very little time given to introducing the characters, situations, or world. The story constantly jumped from one thing to another, throwing information, names, and jokes at me before I had any chance to get my bearings or become invested. Once the main character entered the fantasy world, I found myself more confused than immersed, struggling to understand both the story she had entered and the characters within it.
The tone and humour also didn’t work for me. What I think was meant to feel delightfully dramatic, ridiculous, and over-the-top instead came across as messy and frustrating. I never really had the chance to connect with the characters or become invested in what was happening.
And that’s what makes this DNF particularly disappointing. The concept is fantastic and has so much potential, and I really wanted to love this book. Unfortunately, the writing style and execution ultimately prevented me from enjoying the experience.
Blake, Olivie – Gifted & Talented (DNF)
Genre: Fantasy
Where there’s a will, there’s a war.
Thayer Wren, the brilliant CEO of Wrenfare Magitech and so-called father of modern technology, is dead. Any one of his three telepathically and electrokinetically gifted children would be a plausible inheritor to the Wrenfare throne.
Or at least, so they like to think.
Meredith, textbook accomplished eldest daughter and the head of her own groundbreaking biotech company, has recently cured mental illness. You’re welcome! If only her father’s fortune wasn’t her last hope for keeping her journalist ex-boyfriend from exposing what she really is: a total fraud.
Arthur, second-youngest congressman in history, fights the good fight every day of his life. And yet, his wife might be leaving him, and he’s losing his re-election campaign. But his dead father’s approval in the form of a seat on the Wrenfare throne might just turn his sinking ship around.
Eilidh, once the world’s most famous ballerina, has spent the last five years as a run-of-the-mill marketing executive at her father’s company after a life-altering injury put an end to her prodigious career. She might be lacking in accolades compared to her siblings, but if her father left her everything, it would finally validate her worth—by confirming she’d been his favorite all along.
On the pipeline of gifted kid to clinically depressed adult, nobody wins—but which Wren will come out on top?
Unfortunately, I think I have to accept that Olivie Blake’s writing style is simply not for me. I had a similar reaction to The Atlas Six, and from the very first pages of Gifted & Talented, I recognised that same feeling of disconnect.
I only made it 14 pages into this one, so I can’t judge the story itself. However, the writing immediately became a barrier for me. The prose felt overly complicated and almost stream-of-consciousness at times, with lots of tangents, parenthetical asides, and long, winding sentences that didn’t create much engagement or momentum. Even the opening chapters felt like a struggle to get through, and I quickly realised that I simply wasn’t enjoying the reading experience.
I’m sure this style works wonderfully for many readers, but unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to work for me. Despite being interested in the story, I didn’t want to force myself through a book I was already struggling to enjoy. So, rather than continuing and hoping it would eventually click, I decided to move on.
Barker, R.J. – The Bone Ship’s Wake (The Tide Child #3) ★★★★★
Genre: Fantasy
Leading the black fleet from the deck of Tide Child Joron takes every opportunity to strike at his enemies, but he knows his time is limited. His fleet is shrinking and the Keyshan’s Rot is running through his body. He runs from a prophecy that says he and the avian sorcerer, the Windseer, will end the entire world.
But the sea dragons have begun to return, and if you can have one miracle, who is to say that there cannot be another?
What an ending to an amazing story.
After three books, I had become deeply invested in Joron’s journey. Almost the entire trilogy is told through his perspective, and his character development throughout the series was stellar. We get to know him slowly, from the lonely and broken man we meet at the beginning to someone who has found a place among people who respect him, look up to him, and genuinely care about him. The found-family aspect of the trilogy felt particularly effective because we experience it through Joron’s eyes.
The Guillaime was another character I found impossible not to care about. Mysterious, strange, but also incredibly endearing. They remained one of the most intriguing parts of the story for me.
What I particularly loved about this finale was how much of it had actually been set up throughout the trilogy. The final revelations are not random twists pulled out of nowhere. We finally learn what the strange titles of Windseer and Caller really mean and, looking back, there are hints and pieces scattered throughout the books that point towards what is eventually revealed. When I reached the final chapter, my immediate reaction was essentially: Wait. Did I actually understand what just happened here? I had to reread the passage to realise that I was indeed right. Having that realisation slowly sink in, was truly a very strong WOW moment.
At the same time, I do have some reservations about how quickly everything is wrapped up. Compared to the length of the rest of the book, the final revelations and conclusion happen incredibly quickly, almost entirely within a single chapter. After so much careful build-up, it felt a little abrupt. I think this ending would probably have even more impact on a reread, when you know what you are looking for and can recognise all the hints scattered throughout the trilogy. As a first-time reader, however, especially one who doesn’t remember or even recognised the significance of every tiny detail from three books, I found myself wishing for a little more room to process it all.
This is particularly true of the mythology and history behind the world. I absolutely loved the ideas, creatures, and lore introduced here. So part of me desperately wanted Barker to spell it all out and give us a deeper look at the intricate details of how and when everything came to be. Instead, we are left to reconstruct much of it ourselves from fragments scattered throughout the trilogy.
And yet, the more I think about it, the more distance and time are between me and this story, the more I appreciate that choice. It kind of reminded me of how we reconstruct real-world mythologies: a story preserved here, a written fragment there, and centuries later people trying to piece together what it all means. The fact that Barker manages to create that same feeling within a fictional world is impressive.
So yes, I finished this book with about a thousand questions. But I also finished it thinking: Wait, did Barker really just pull that off? Thinking back through everything and rediscovering all those scattered little pieces that eventually fell into place, I can only appreciate how cleverly this story spanning three books was constructed.
A truly fantastic, ambitious, massively underrated, and beautifully constructed trilogy.
Barker, R.J. – The Hag’s Call (The Tide Child #0,5) ★★★★
Genre: Fantasy
A fun little extra that added some additional flavour, but isn’t really essential.
Chen, Gina – Violet Made of Thorns ★★★
Genre: YA Fantasy
Violet is a prophet and a liar, influencing the royal court with her cleverly phrased—and not always true—divinations. Honesty is for suckers, like the oh-so-not charming Prince Cyrus, who plans to strip Violet of her official role once he’s crowned at the end of the summer—unless Violet does something about it.
But when the king asks her to falsely prophesy Cyrus’s love story for an upcoming ball, Violet awakens a dreaded curse, one that will end in either damnation or salvation for the kingdom—all depending on the prince’s choice of future bride. Violet faces her own choice: Seize an opportunity to gain control of her own destiny, no matter the cost, or give in to the ill-fated attraction that’s growing between her and Cyrus.
Violet’s wits may protect her in the cutthroat court, but they can’t change her fate. And as the boundary between hatred and love grows ever thinner with the prince, Violet must untangle a wicked web of deceit in order to save herself and the kingdom—or doom them all.
I went into Violet Made of Thorns without any sort of expectations, which probably worked in its favour. The author weaves together many familiar fairytale motifs into an engaging story that proved to be a remarkably quick read. While the world-building remained rather vague, the dark fairytale atmosphere and steadily unfolding plot kept me turning the pages.
My biggest obstacle was Violet herself. She is intentionally written as a deeply flawed protagonist, but her bitterness, selfishness, and often spiteful inner monologue made it difficult for me to truly connect with her. Likewise, the romance never fully convinced me. Rather than a believable emotional connection, it often came across as more lust than love, leaving much of the relationship feeling underdeveloped.
That lack of development extends to the world as well. The novel introduces intriguing ideas and mysteries but leaves many of them unexplored. I had assumed this was a standalone, only to discover afterwards that it was originally intended to have a sequel that has since been cancelled. In hindsight, that perhaps explains why several important questions surrounding Violet’s origins and the wider background story never receive satisfying answers, although I still wish some of these elements had been developed more fully within the book itself.
Even so, I still enjoyed the overall experience. The emotional impact never quite reached the heights I had hoped for, but the fairy-tale charm, engaging pacing, and ending, which felt wonderfully true to the genre, made this an entertaining read.
🎧 Horowitz, Anthony – A Line to Kill (Hawthorne & Horowitz #3) ★★★★
Genre: Mystery
When Ex-Detective Inspector Daniel Hawthorne and his sidekick, author Anthony Horowitz, are invited to an exclusive literary festival on Alderney, an idyllic island off the south coast of England, they don’t expect to find themselves in the middle of murder investigation—or to be trapped with a cold-blooded killer in a remote place with a murky, haunted past.
Arriving on Alderney, Hawthorne and Horowitz soon meet the festival’s other guests—an eccentric gathering that includes a bestselling children’s author, a French poet, a TV chef turned cookbook author, a blind psychic, and a war historian—along with a group of ornery locals embroiled in an escalating feud over a disruptive power line.
When a local grandee is found dead under mysterious circumstances, Hawthorne and Horowitz become embroiled in the case. The island is locked down, no one is allowed on or off, and it soon becomes horribly clear that a murderer lurks in their midst. But who?
Both a brilliant satire on the world of books and writers and an immensely enjoyable locked-room mystery, A Line to Kill is a triumph—a riddle of a story full of brilliant misdirection, beautifully set-out clues, and diabolically clever denouements.
Continuing my reread of the Hawthorne & Horowitz series.
As with all these rereads, I found myself paying much more attention to the details surrounding Hawthorne than to the actual mystery. There are so many little things that feel slightly off about him and what he tells Anthony, while the increasingly strange situation surrounding Reeth only makes me more curious about what is really going on beneath the surface.
Hawthorne himself remains an absolute pain to work with, especially in the way he constantly keeps Anthony in the dark and seems to have very little regard for ordinary human interaction. I love how Horowitz writes their dynamic: self-deprecating, awkward, and often genuinely funny. Hawthorne’s sense of justice is admirable, but the way he antagonises people and bends the rules to get the result he wants makes him a wonderfully frustrating character.
As always, this is such an engaging and entertaining mystery. And that ending, dangling even more questions about Hawthorne and Reeth in front of me, had me immediately wanting to continue with the next book.
🎧 Horowitz, Anthony – The Twist of a Knife (Hawthorne & Horowitz #4) ★★★★
Genre: Mystery
“I’m sorry but the answer’s no.” Reluctant author, Anthony Horowitz, has had enough. He tells ex-detective Daniel Hawthorne that after three books he’s splitting and their deal is over. The truth is that Anthony has other things on his mind.
His new play, a thriller called Mindgame, is about to open at the Vaudeville Theatre in London’s West End. Not surprisingly, Hawthorne declines a ticket to the opening night. The play is panned by the critics. In particular, Sunday Times critic Margaret Throsby gives it a savage review, focusing particularly on the writing. The next day, Throsby is stabbed in the heart with an ornamental dagger which turns out to belong to Anthony, and has his fingerprints all over it.
Anthony is arrested by an old enemy… Detective Inspector Cara Grunshaw. She still carries a grudge from her failure to solve the case described in the second Hawthorne adventure, The Sentence is Death, and blames Anthony. Now she’s out for revenge. Thrown into prison and fearing for both his personal future and his writing career, Anthony is the prime suspect in Throsby’s murder and when a second theatre critic is found to have died in mysterious circumstances, the net closes in. Ever more desperate, he realizes that only one man can help him. But will Hawthorne take the call?
After finishing the third book, I wasn’t ready to stop rereading, so on to book four!
The premise of The Twist of the Knife is wonderfully ridiculous: somehow, everyone seems perfectly willing to believe that Anthony Horowitz would murder someone over a bad review. It is exactly the kind of absurd setup that works so well for this series, especially because Horowitz is so willing to make himself the butt of the joke.
The meta humour remains one of my favourite things about these books, and the self-deprecating way Horowitz writes himself into the story continues to be hilarious. Hawthorne, meanwhile, is becoming increasingly enigmatic and increasingly manipulative. The way he controls Anthony’s situation and effectively uses a murder accusation to force him into continuing their books together is rather terrible. And yet, it makes their already bizarre relationship even more entertaining.
The mystery itself is once again excellent, with plenty of little clues and a satisfying conclusion. Rory Kinnear also continues to do a fantastic job with the audiobook, bringing all these characters to life.
Another four stars, and once again I just want to keep going. One more reread to go before I finally catch up with the new book. Now I just wish Horowitz would write faster!
Tao, Shen – The Poet Empress ★★★★
Genre: Fantasy
As the emperor lays dying, the once-great Azalea Dynasty plunges towards civil war. While its princes plot for power, a more hidden war – to become the next empress – occupies the imperial court.
Wei Yin – peasant girl turned concubine to the cruel Prince Terren – has already endured unimaginable suffering. Ripped from her family, she has no title, no allies, and no escape. But she does have a secret . . .
In the shadows of the palace, surrounded by enemies, she is learning a skill forbidden to women. Because when words are weapons and poetry holds an ancient magic, the fate of a girl – and a nation – can both be rewritten. All she has to do is compose the perfect poem – a tale so powerful, it can kill any man, even the next emperor.
I genuinely cannot believe that The Poet Empress is a debut novel. Shen Tao’s writing is exquisite, and from the very first pages, it was clear that this was going to be something quite different from what I had expected.
This is where I want to call out the marketing for this book. Calling this romantasy feels like a disservice to both the story and its author. There are relationships and romantic elements within the story, but readers going in expecting an epic love story may find themselves disappointed.
Set in a historical-inspired world with fantastical elements, The Poet Empress tells a devastating story about survival, grief, broken trust, the cost of power, and the complicated, often contradictory nature of humanity. The world-building may have been sparse, but it was enough to do what it needed to do. I particularly loved the imagery of the dragon as the literal seat of power, changing and reflecting the nature of the era and those who rule it.
As for the pacing, I may have found that the middle section felt a little slow at times. However, by the end, I could appreciate how deliberately everything had been placed. Even the quieter moments and slower developments ultimately served a purpose, gradually building towards the choices and revelations that define the story.
The character work is where this book truly shines. There are no simple caricatures here and no easy division between good and bad people. All of them felt utterly real, shaped by their past, their circumstances, their environment, their fears and desires. Shen Tao manages to make you understand people who, at first glance, seem almost irredeemable. Not by excusing what they have done, but by allowing us to understand how they came to make those choices and why those choices made sense to them. She manages to perfectly and believably balance the idea that a person can be both victim and perpetrator, deserving both compassion and condemnation. That complexity is one of the book’s greatest strengths.
I honestly cannot believe how much this book made me sympathise with a tyrant.
Through the eyes of someone who has personally suffered because of him, we slowly unravel his past without ever excusing what he has done. We get to see the child he once was, a child who simply wanted to love and be loved by his brother. Revealing the humanity beneath the monster without asking us to forgive the monster is an incredibly difficult balance to achieve, and Shen Tao does it beautifully. It was genuinely heartbreaking.
The ending was devastating, but in the best possible way. The choices that were made and the decision the main character ultimately reached felt painful, inevitable, and completely right. It is the kind of ending that leaves you staring at the page for a moment, wondering how something can hurt so much while also feeling so perfectly fitting.
My only real disappointment is that I would have loved a little more emotional closure for Wei. After everything she does for her family and her village, I found myself wishing that we could at least have seen her reunited with her little brother. The conclusion also felt slightly abrupt, which made me want just a little more time with the aftermath.
One final thing I really appreciated was the title. I think it is very beautifully done how The Poet Empress only fully reveals its true meaning at the end.
A devastating, beautifully written, and emotionally complex debut that came incredibly close to a five-star-read. Shen Tao has definitely made me want to read whatever she writes next.
Kingfisher, T. – Paladin’s Hope (The Saint of Steel #3) ★★★★
Genre: Fantasy
Galen is a paladin of a dead god, lost to holiness and no longer entirely sane. He has long since given up on any hope of love. But when the two men and a brave gnole constable are drawn into the web of the mysterious killer, it’s Galen’s job to protect Piper from the traps that await them.
He’s just not sure if he can protect Piper from the most dangerous threat of all…
Another wonderfully quirky and lovable installment in T. Kingfisher’s Saint of Steel series.
Paladin’s Hope was once again the epitome of a comfort read for me, which is maybe a bit strange considering this book contains murder, horror, dead bodies, and a deadly puzzle dungeon. Somehow, Kingfisher manages to make all of that feel cosy through a combination of excellent humour, lovable characters, and a genuinely sweet romance.
I particularly enjoyed the progression through the puzzle-dungeon section. There was something incredibly entertaining about watching the characters work their way through increasingly bizarre and dangerous traps, while still finding time for all the wonderfully ridiculous humour that makes these books so much fun.
The romance was also very cute and sweet, and I really enjoyed watching it develop. But honestly, the gnoles stole the show for me. I absolutely adore the way Kingfisher writes them: the way they speak, their behaviour, their values, and the completely different perspective they bring to the world. I would happily read an entire book about gnoles at this point.
I did feel a little like I was reading this series slightly out of order, though. I still haven’t read the Clocktaur books, and this installment contains more connections to the wider world than the previous books did. I could follow the story perfectly well, but I suspect some of the references and world-building would have had more impact if I had read those books first.
And then there is that final sentence. *cries*
I really, really want to know the story behind the Saint of Steel.
Another delightful, funny, slightly horrifying, ridiculously comforting read. I just love this series.
