Books Received in November and December 2022

Many thanks to the publishers who sent me books to review the last 2 months. 

Camp Zero by Michelle Min Sterling - Set in Canada, it sounds pretty interesting.

In a near-future northern settlement, a handful of climate change survivors find their fates intertwined in this mesmerizing and transportive novel in the vein of Station Eleven and The Power.

America, 2049: Summer temperatures are intolerably high, the fossil fuel industry has shut down, and humans are implanted with a ‘Flick’ at birth, which allows them to remain perpetually online. The top echelons of society live in Floating Cities off the coast, while people on the mainland struggle to survive. For Rose, working as a hostess in the city’s elite club feels like her best hope for a better future.

When a high-profile client offers Rose a job as an escort at an American building project in northern Canada called Camp Zero, in return for a home for her displaced mother and herself, she accepts it. But her real assignment is to secretly monitor the mercurial architect in charge.

Rose quickly secures the trust of her target; but in the north, she begins to sense a new way forward, and her objective shifts. Through skillfully entwined perspectives including a young professor longing to escape his wealthy family, and the collective voice of an all-female US military brigade at a climate research station, the fate of the Camp and its select inhabitants comes into stunning relief. Atmospheric, original, and utterly gripping, Camp Zero interrogates the seductive and chilling notion of a utopia; asks who and what will survive as global tensions rise; and imagines how love may sustain us.

Culinary Travels by Emily Szajda - This is a fun cookbook with recipes from around Europe. I've reviewed it here. 

A map of flavors, aromas and evocations from across the European continent and beyond, Emily Szajda takes you on a culinary journey traversing borders. In this narrative cookbook, you will encounter healthy adaptations of traditional recipes from her travels and life abroad along with stories and takeaways on how food, the simple act of breaking bread, creates an experience. It has the power to tear down walls and create a space for conversation, understanding, and memory. Awaken your senses and relish the moment. From an afternoon tea with fresh baked scones and clotted cream at the St. James Hotel in London to a plate of delectable truffled risotto with osso bucco in Rome, food is not merely sustenance, a part of the human existence but an act of love and fellowship. Please be my guest. Learn how to have a soulful, interactive relationship with food that not only fills your belly but your heart and mind. Take time. Pull up a seat at my table. Let's eat!

Dragonfall by L. R. Lam - I haven't read a good dragon fantasy novel in ages. Really looking forward to this one. Out in May 2023.

Long-banished dragons, revered as gods, return to the mortal realm in the first in this magical new epic fantasy trilogy from a bestselling author

Long ago, humans betrayed dragons, stealing their magic and banishing them to a dying world. Centuries later, their descendants worship dragons as gods. But the "gods" remember, and they do not forgive.

Thief Arcady scrapes a living on the streets of Vatra. Desperate, Arcady steals a powerful artifact from the bones of the Plaguebringer, the most hated person in Lumet history. Only Arcady knows the artifact's magic holds the key to a new life among the nobles at court and a chance for revenge.

The spell connects to Everen, the last male dragon foretold to save his kind, dragging him through the Veil. Disguised as a human, Everen soon learns that to regain his true power and form and fulfil his destiny, he only needs to convince one little thief to trust him enough to bond completely--body, mind, and soul--and then kill them.

Yet the closer the two become, the greater the risk both their worlds will shatter.