Liz Buxbaum has always adored rom-coms, not least for helping her still feel close to her screenwriter mother, who died when she was little. There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.Ī grieving teen’s devotion to romance films might ruin her chances at actual romance. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends.

Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.Īutumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart their mothers are still best friends. As positions harden and blood is shed, their destruction at each other’s hands looms ever more certain but a desperate hope that somehow disaster can be averted propels readers to the final devastating page, leaving only the excruciating wait for the sequel. Her ferocious intelligence and his blazing integrity demand sympathy and allegiance even when the intense yearning, distrust, rejections and betrayals become almost too painful to bear. The diversity both between and within the various cultures suggests a richly detailed world yet as the fate of peoples, kingdoms and empires hangs in the balance, the conflict plays out at the most intimate personal level in the reluctant, dangerous, impossible attraction between Kestrel and Arin. The twisty plot is a cleverly constructed puzzle box of intrigue and deceit, couched in graceful prose that shifts from restrained to voluptuous. Now betrothed to the feckless Imperial heir, she risks even more as a spy, while managing to convince everyone-most particularly Arin, once her slave, then her captor, now governor of Herran-of her ruthless devotion to tyrannical Valorian dominion. Lady Kestrel has successfully bargained for limited independence for the Herrani people, but only at the price of her own freedom. The middle entry in a fantasy trilogy brings new players to the game while exponentially raising the stakes.

The Winner's Crime by Marie Rutkoski