Spring is finally (blessedly!) upon us, and that means only one thing. A brand new spring TBR! I managed to complete my winter TBR (who’s proud of me?). Last time I went with five books and since that proved achievable, I’ve done the same again here (although there are a few more that are on my radar this season, as you’ll see if you stick around till the end).

• A Forbidden Alchemy by Stacy McEwan

Romantasy / Gritty fantasy

‘She has learned the might of silence. It is the prelude to fear. It is the absence of company. It is the moment before the monster takes you into his claws. She abhors it.’

Synopsis: ‘Nina Harrow and Patrick Colson are only twelve years old when they are whisked from their disenfranchised mining towns to dazzling Belavere City to test for magical abilities. Nina’s lifelong dream is to become an Artisan, a powerful elemental mage who fulfils the city’s grand ambitions, while Patrick wants only to reunite with his family of Craftsmen in the mines. Together they discover a devastating secret: Artisans aren’t born, but chosen.

With this information, they part ways. Patrick returns home while Nina finds her place as one of the rarest, most coveted types of Artisan. When a Craftsmen revolutions ignites years late, Nina is captured by Patrick’s rebel group – and he hasn’t forgotten her. In fact, he needs her help for a mission that could shift the tides against Belavere City. She reluctantly agrees to aid him, battling the sparks between them. But when Nina’s first love reappears, asking her to betray Patrick for the Artisans, she faces an impossible choice that will determine the fate of their world.’

• The Republic of Thieves by Scott Lynch

Epic fantasy / Grimdark

‘“Place ten dozen hungry orphan thieves in a dank burrow of vaults and tunnels beneath what used to be a graveyard, put them under the supervision of one partly crippled old man, and you will soon find that governing them becomes a delicate business.”‘

Synopsis: With what should have been the greatest heist of their career gone spectacularly sour, Locke and his trusted partner, Jean, have barely escaped with their lives. Or at least Jean has. But Locke is slowly succumbing to a deadly poison that no alchemist or physiker can cure. Yet just as the end is near, a mysterious Bondsman offers Locke an opportunity to either save him or finish him off once and for all. Magi political elections are imminent and the factions are in need of a pawn, If Locke agrees to play the role, sorcery will be used to purge the venom from his body – though the process will be so excruciating he may well wish for death. Locke is opposed, but two factors cause his will to crumble: Jean’s imploring – and the Bondsmage’s mention of a woman from Locke’s past, Sabetha. She is the love of his life, his equal in skill and wit, and now, his greatest rival. Locke was smitten with Sabetha from his first glimpse of her as a young fellow orphan and thief-in-training. But after a tumultuous courtship, Sabetha broke away. Now they will reunite in yet another clash of wills. For faced with his one and only match in both love and trickery, Locke must choose whether to fight Sabetha – or to woo her. It is a decision on which both their lives may depend.

• Warrior Princess Assassin by Brigid Kemmerer

Romantasy / Adult fantasy

‘The magic will find you when it’s ready.’

Synopsis: Warrior King Maddox Kyrnon’s fire magic has earned him a ruthless reputation. But now his kingdom is slowly burning, a blaze he cannot control, and his one chance to save it is a marriage alliance with the neighbouring royal family of Astranza and their power to manipulate the weather. As war looms on the horizon, Princess Jory’s home needs this alliance. But her family is hiding a dangerous secret: their magic is fading. When she meets her intended, he sets her heart aflame, but what will he do when he realises she’s deceiving him? Once a young nobleman causing mischief with Jory in Astranza’s palace, Asher is now part of the Hunter’s Guild. When a lucrative job arises, he can’t refuse – until he sees the targets. Someone wants King Maddox and Princess Jory dead. Now Asher must decide what he’s willing to do to protect the woman he loves and the king she’s about to marry.

• The Peepshow by Kate Summerscale

True crime / Non-fiction

‘A gripping account of murder, misogyny and spectatorship that has implications well beyond the tragic orbit of the case itself. A haunting, thought-provoking, deeply unsettling book.’

Synopsis: In 1953, the bodies of three young women are found by a tenant in the walls of a Notting Hill house. He tells the police that he chanced upon them while putting up a shelf for his transistor radio. As a series of further horrors are discovered, the eyes of a nation turn to 10 Rillington Place. In this riveting tale of murder, misogyny and tabloid frenzy, Kate Summerscale lifts the veil on what really happened inside the house – and suggests a new solution to one of the twentieth century’s most notorious crimes.

• Weavingshaw by Heba Al-Wasity

Gothic fantasy / Dark academia

‘Nothing this lovely could be cursed.’

Synopsis: ‘The Saint of Silence trades coins for every sordid divulgence uttered to him. The darker the secret, the higher the price. Leena has a secret, one that has haunted her since she was seventeen – she can see the dead. When her brother falls ill, she knows what she must do: seek the saint. But Leena’s secret is more valuable to the Saint than she could ever have imagined. To save her brother, she must make a deal with him to find the ghost he’s been searching for. All paths lead to Weavingshaw, a cursed estate on the moors. As Leena grows closer to Saint Silas, and she is plunged further into his world of danger, deceit and desire, she learns that he is hiding his own secrets – ones that have the power to destroy them all.’

Also on my radar is Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke, a literary fiction in which a modern-day tradwife wakes up in the era she has so romanticised, Daggermouth, an enemies-to-lovers dystopia (I don’t know what’s in the air but I feel really in the mood for romantasy right now), and In Her Defense, which, full transparency, I saw ONE review for but totally convinced me to add to my immediate TBR. I’m a simple gal – I heard courtroom thriller and I said yes please. Finally, I just got approved for an ARC of Better than Revenge by Bea Fitzgerald (thank the NetGalley gods), which was one of my most anticipated reads of the year. It’s pitched as Thelma and Louise meets the Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, following two actresses embroiled in a Hollywood rivalry.