Bookshops & Bonedust, by Travice Baldree - Jodie
For fans of Legends & Lattes, fantasy novels, dungeons and dragons, cosy-reads, and queer stories.
If you’ve read Legends & Lattes, then you already know Viv. This book returns to tell more of Viv’s story - this time, from 20 years earlier. For fans of Legends & Lattes, this book is one that will need to go on your reading list
In Bookshops & Bonedust, Viv is a fresh young mercenary pining to prove her strength and value as a swordswoman travelling with Rackams Ravens, a group trying to track down a mysterious necromancer. Only, putting herself in harm's way with her youthful confidence came back to bite her - and she ends up being left in a small coastal town to recoup and heal after an injury. This is where she discovers Thistleburr Booksellers, a run-down bookshop struggling to get by in a sleepy village. Run by a tiny and foulmouthed rattkin and her pet gryphet (think owl meets dog, you will want to cuddle them) we are yet again transported into a story rich with fantasy elements. But rather than the typical fantasy tellings of heroes, politics, and wars, this book captures a snapshot; a zoomed-in look at the town of Murk and its unique inhabitants, and the relationships Viv builds in her weeks there.
Bookshops & Bonedust is of course another cosy-read, but seems to be a touch faster-paced than Legends & Lattes, and I personally find that this book has a better balance of comfort and danger - only helped by already having character investment in Viv from the first book - this is a fantastic follow-up that only improves on the first book.
Thistleburrs is a bookshop we, as readers, have all been to - and as a book lover this made this prequel somewhat even more enjoyable than its predecessor Legends & Lattes. If the smell of a bookshop warms your soul, if piles of books bring you joy, if walls full of unread stories brighten your day - this is a book you need to read.
Baldree has proved yet again with this prequel that he knows exactly how to portray character development, how to make us fall in love with his characters and the small worlds he builds around them.
