Shamim Sarif’s London love story between a Palestinian bride-to-be and a shy British Indian writer is funny and warm, carried by its families, but head-hopping prose and a thin romance hold it back.
Ann McMan’s sapphic historical novel has a found family readers adore and real emotional weight, but its short rotating chapters ask for patience. Here’s what the evidence shows.
A romance novel makes a promise before the first page: two people will fall in love, overcome what separates them, and reach an emotionally satisfying ending. Because readers already know the destination, the real tension lies somewhere else. Does she love me back? Why does she keep pulling away? Was that glance meaningful? Can I … Read more
Verdict: A likeable butch/femme royal romance with a motorbike-riding undercover reporter and a princess-adjacent idealist who has real chemistry, undercut by a thriller subplot that dilutes the love story and a spin-off structure that leans hard on books you may not have read. Best for: Readers who already know Queen Roza and Lex from Jenny … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A lush, genuinely queer witch novel set among the California redwoods, with a found-family coven readers adore, held back by a fractured, time-hopping structure that loses a real share of them in the early chapters. Best for: Readers who want atmosphere, lyrical prose and a whole cast of unapologetically … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A blood-caste epic fantasy with one of the most original worlds in recent sapphic SFF and a genuinely moving addiction arc, held back by a slow first half, a pushy love triangle and a romance that shares the stage rather than owning it. Best for: Readers who want big-canvas … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A genre-blending story of music, demons, aliens and donuts with one of the most loved trans heroines in modern SFF and a gentle sapphic romance at its centre, held back by point-of-view shifts that jump mid-scene and a science-fiction strand some readers never warm to. Best for: Readers who … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A furious, gorgeous historical fantasy about three witch sisters and the suffrage fight, with a tender sapphic subplot — undercut by a baggy middle and a romance that stays firmly in the background. Best for: Readers who want witches, sisterhood and feminist fury more than a romance arc, and … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A genuinely brave YA Sleeping Beauty reimagining about depression and the pull of escape, with a dreamscape worth visiting, let down by prose so ornate that close to one reader in five gives up before the end. Best for: Readers who want lyrical, emotionally heavy fantasy about mental health, … Read more
Updated on October 9, 2026 Verdict: A cool, cinematic Swedish doppelgänger novel with a genuinely eerie premise and prose the critics adore, undercut by deliberate confusion, blank characters and an ending that leaves most readers holding the question. Best for: Readers who love Lynch, Hitchcock and puzzle-box literary fiction, who want a sapphic relationship turned … Read more