The Daughters' War and The Blacktongue Thief, by Christopher Buehlman

Apart from Stephen King, who is a category unto himself, my favorite horror writer is Christopher Buehlman. I read The Daughters’ War (2024) and immediately chased it with a reread of the sequel, The Blacktongue Thief (2021).

Both are sword-n-sorcery dark fantasy novels. The Daughters’ War follows Galva, a duke’s daughter marching into battle with the goblins. Most of the fighters in this war are women, since the goblins killed or maimed the men in previous wars. Her unit uses war corvids, an untested  new weapon concocted by wizards with a knack for experimental biology. Each woman fights with two of these giant murder birds.

Galva reappears in The Blacktongue Thief, set nine years after the events in The Daughters’ War, though now the point-of-view character is Kinch, a professional thief. They travel together, reluctantly, to find a missing princess. And this time the baddies are giants.

There’s no shortage of books with these familiar elements: goblins and giants, wizards and witches, quests to find missing princesses. But Buehlman’s novels are far better than most of what’s out there. His prose is what I aspire to. His characters become real people to the reader, and the plot takes you places you do not expect, with thoughtful world-building and vivid settings.

Nikki Garcia does a terrific job reading The Daughters’ War, particularly in some of the battle scenes. Her narration stirred my blood and made me want to hit something. And Buehlman narrates The Blacktongue Thief. In his other career, he is a stage performer, and it shows. His reading is incredible.