Would it even be a month-long feature on the Fantasy Hive if we didn’t corral the team into creating lists of recommendations?? 

Of course not.

With that in mind, every Friday we’re going to follow along with our Women in SFF photo challenge, and bring you our Top Three of that Friday’s prompt.

For the first week, the team discussed their Top Three favourite (female) reads since last Women in SFF.

Last week, we shared out Top Three favourite female authors discovered either through Women in SFF, or recently.

This week, we’re looking at our Top Three Favourite books that blend genres or top three favourite genre blends

Beth

I’ve been absolutely loving the folklore trend in fantasy lately! I decided to feature books which all have strong ties to British myth and folklore. I included two more in my instagram post for today if you want more folklore fantasy recs!

Drift by Caryl Lewis

Selkie folklore set on the coast of west Wales

Mischief Acts by Zoe Gilbert

A series of short stories moving through the history of London’s Great North Wood. There’s a lot of folklore in this, but most prominent is Herne the Hunter.

The Magician’s Daughter by H. G. Parry 

Features Irish folklore, most notably the mythical island of Hy-Brasil, but also figures such as the Puca.

Nils

I love books which blend genres! So here’s three that I highly recommend:

Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros.

This blends a dystopian world with fantasy.

Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Törzs

which blends dark academia with fantasy and a touch of thriller.

Immortal Longings by Chloe Gong

which blends a dystopian and urban city with fantasy elements. 

Julia

The Ninth Rain by Jen Williams

I did not think blending epic fantasy with scifi could work so well for me, but I devoured this book in no time at all. I loved the main characters, and thought the way old technology and magic were combined was done incredibly smoothly.

Firebreak by Nicole Kornher-Stace

A bit of litRPG mixed with a Dystopian world run by greedy cooperations. Real life is getting ever harder, so you turn into the game world to earn money and find followers. I really liked how the real world and the in game world were linked, and the way the characters grew past what they thought they could be.

Werewolf of Whitechapel by Suzannah Rowntree

Week researched historical fantasy, plenty of banter and action, a tiny dash of cute Victorian romance and then you mix it with a fast paced mystery involving werewolves and vampires! I loved this blend of all sorts of things, and devoted the whole series in no time at all 

Hil

I’m going all in on Urban Fantasy/Romance! So many cinnamon buns, so little time. 

The Ward Witch by Sarah Painter (M/F)

Jack of Thorns by AK Faulkner (M/M)

The Wolf at the Door by Charlie Adhara (M/M)

Theo

A Wind from the Wilderness by Suzannah Rowntree

A brilliant blend of history and fantasy in the charismatic descriptions of the crusades – with real characters and places rendered in wonderful detail and in the violent magic that brings together two protagonists from different times and cultures and entwines their fates. 

Threading the Labyrinth by Tiffani Angus

Another blending of history and fantasy as a new owner comes to an old country house and finds the past bleeding into the present of an overgrown walled garden, with a child’s cry heard through the ages as different eras make their mark on the soil and brick of the garden. 

Temeraire #1 (His Majesty’s Dragon) by Naomi Novik

And finally, blending er… not just history and fantasy, but my first genre love – Hornblower-esque Nelsonic fiction and my first fantasy love – dragons, in a spirited reimagining of the terror of 1805 when England expected Napoleon to invade in just the same way that 1940 Britain feared Hitler’s See-Loewe invasion. Novik combines the two eras bringing furious dragon based aerial defence together with hard fought ship to ship action.