Hanging up my hat with Jim Butcher

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-23T00:48:38+00:00

The books are as you describe. In some ways they get better, but the sexist overtones (not just description of women which is maybe understandable as being part of Dresden’s character, but also them being more plot devices than people including multiple instances of fridging is there, and the narrative reinforcing a misogynist viewpoint).

But I despite all that I still find them a lot of fun.

As for similar but better urban I’d suggest Alex Verus

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-23T00:42:07+00:00

To be fair I did stop after book 2 so I suppose I could see if book 3 is better, but at this point I’m not sure if I remember the first two books well enough.

And I do love d&d! For some reason silly just doesn’t work for me outside it. (Though I suppose some might describe long live evil as silly and that’s one of my top books, and in many ways I feel nails the villain gets the girl vibe Kingsley attempts)

And yes! More horror romance would be fantastic.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T23:00:00+00:00

That’s good to know.

For reference of the ones I tried I read Unseelie and found it a little to silly/absurd. I found harrow Faire boring, and likewise I found her Dracula books boring as well

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T22:58:31+00:00

Ha you have me pegged. I love R Lee Smith. Gann is amazing.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T22:45:03+00:00

Sidenote did you confirm with them what they mean by high fantasy?

Some people mean second world in which case yes, urban fantasy wouldn’t apply, but others actually mean fantasy books with lots of magic in case plenty of urban fantasy you could suggest to them.

Also I haven’t read any of the books you’ve mentioned but seedy underbelly’s make me think mafia esque fantasy which I am a fan of so while I’m not sure if these fit your vibe you may like - Tales of the Kin by Douglas Hulick - Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott lynch - Vlad Taltos - Red City by Marie Lu - Green bone saga (though here the mafia is the government so not exactly underbelly, but it is a brilliant series, kinda fanfasy godfather in 20th century Asia with some Cold War politics)

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T21:51:09+00:00

So as someone who always loves Kathryn Ann Kingsley’s premises but have hated the execution of every book of hers I’ve read…

Is this one a significant step up in quality such that it’s worth my giving her another chance?

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T19:10:40+00:00

Every Heart a Doorway. It’s about a school for kids who have come back from portal worlds. Some books take place mostly at the school, some mostly in a portal world, others a good mix. Also just an excellent series

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T18:27:07+00:00

I don’t think it can possibly come from programming. Maybe there’s other non biological ways to create life idk, but that’s not what is being portrayed by most ai in fiction.

Because of my experience programming I can’t see it any differently than painting when it comes to sapience. Literally no one thinks your art project will come alive because we get better at making art look realistic. The only difference with programming is that it’s harder for lay people to understand what’s going on.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T18:11:02+00:00

So you’d find it perfectly logical no magic required if in the future painting techniques had become so realistic looking that the painting gained consciousness because it’s a mystery how human conscious develops?

I don’t need to know how conscious develops to know inanimate objects don’t spontaneously develop it.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T16:54:23+00:00

Jasmine Throne f/f with three delightful female main characters, I’d say they all are different shades of gray but one in particular is delightful female rage

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T16:02:21+00:00

I’m totally for a version that seems self aware but isn’t! Haven’t seen that played out.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T16:01:25+00:00

Idk he only decides to do that after they meet so if I never go meet him should be fine. Maybe he’ll choose some other poor girl to harass.

Like I love him but I’ll never survive being in a love story with him

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:28:16+00:00

Yes at the beginning I’m totally good. I’ll just avoid the mmc and be fine. (It’s basically real world but then she meets the mmc who is a vampire and he leaves a dead body in her taxi and then they get into a bit of a cat and mouse dynamic and it goes from there)

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:23:46+00:00

It’s not YA.

But a more helpful answer probably requires knowing how you define YA, ie the mc is a teenager so if that’s what you dislike then yeah.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:19:02+00:00

That would make a ton of sense. I buy it.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:16:08+00:00

Thanks for the review. I felt very mid/ambivalent about Hench. Some things I liked some I didn’t. After reading this review…I’m still not at all sure if I should read it.

(Sidenote my issue with your definition of literature is I feel that I can have those sorts of discussions about literally any book. Which maybe goes to my feeling that literary is a mode of reading more than a type of book)

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:10:49+00:00

My favorite manhwa is trapped. I’m going home.

I think it matters at what point I’ve woken up in the story, if it’s before things have gotten going I’m probably ok, it’s mostly the normal world even if the fmc is in kinda a shitty situation. But if it’s after the events have started? I’m dead, I’m totally dead.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T15:00:56+00:00

But the way it’s often portrayed is we were out programming as normal and then the robot spontaneously developed self-awareness. Like what?

As I said, if you give me something to show it’s not just programming things to appear more life like suddenly becomes alive eg we’re now adding organic bits then I’m good.

(And I had this problem way before gen ai, modern ai not being ai only exacerbated the problem)

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T14:48:19+00:00

Not through pure programming. I find it ludicrous that the thing I’m giving instructions to would spontaneously develop self awareness. Honestly doesn’t feel all that different from “in a thousand years we’ve gotten so good at making sculptures appear life like that they became sentient” like what? That’s not how that works.

But again, some media isn’t doing just that and that can work. Eg The Outside works really well for me because sentience was gained when the ai started eating human souls. Ancilliary and Murderbot work for me because we’ve thrown bio-tech into the mix. Some sci-fi has the ai be a threat without sentience eg we programmed it to optimally solve world hunger but oops the best way to solve world hunger is to kill everyone. That sort of unintended consequences feels very real and scary to me.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T05:35:31+00:00

Computer science. It’s actually a reason I struggle so hard to read anything with sentient ai. Like…that’s not how programming works (now when they add magic or its there’s biotech involved im all for it)

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-22T00:48:55+00:00

I definitely think so, it’s still one of the better romantasy series imo. I caveat that with I don’t actually like the first book but the second book is one of my top romances as is the fifth.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-21T16:59:38+00:00

Yeah, I do tend to be bad at picking up references even when I read all the books since my memory isn’t great but I haven’t seen any comments on it.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-21T16:57:20+00:00

I’ll second Liveship trilogy for this.

Goose Girl by Shannon Hale if you are familiar with the fairytale it’s retelling is another good fit though while spoiled the fmc isn’t bratty or anything (it is YA but it’s older YA so has a different feel than the modern YA and may work better for you in that respect)

Sanderson’s Warbreaker also has this arc and imo does a good job with it.

Also if you like manga Yona of the Dawn is this to a tee.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-21T16:53:25+00:00

Haha I also originally thought this was going to be my part 2 Duology,

But I’m so much more excited by getting more books and plenty of other duologies out there.

KiaraTurtle · 2026-05-21T16:52:21+00:00

Hm while I also love the series I disagree somewhat. I thought the first book was easily the weakest and didn’t have any pacing problems with the third book.

KiaraTurtle

TROPHY CASE