Fantasy Fellowship: Battle of the Five Worlds Readathon

This month, I decided to join the Fantasy Fellowship Discord server. I had been on the lookout for a new one to join and it looks like I joined at the right time. Fantasy Fellowship are hosting their Battle of the Five Worlds readathon in October and I thought I would do a post outlining my TBR for it (it’s mostly set in stone…)

For this readathon, there are 5 teams and each team has submitted 2 prompts. There are an additional 2 bonus ones, with 12 prompts in total. Each prompt is worth a number of points and after some mathematical wizardry, the team with the most points wins.

I decided to choose as many books as I could from my 2022 TBR, rather than go for a lot of brand new stuff. Not only did that make the selection process more interesting, it also means I can knock a few more books off my ever growing TBR!

The 12 prompts are as follows:

Read a spicy book (or a book with a unicorn):

The Perfect Crimes of Marion Hayes – Cat Sebastian

This particular author was recommended to me on the Fantasy Fellowship Discord and while the genre may be a little bit out of my comfort zone, I enjoyed The Queer Principles of Kit Webb (the first in this series). I had originally planned on reading the first book for this readathon, but since I managed to finish that this month, I went with this one instead.

Read a book with an animal companion:

The Bone Shard Emperor – Andrea Stewart (aka, more Mephi!)

The Bone Shard Emperor is the first book from my 2022 TBR and as soon as I saw this prompt, I knew that this book would be perfect for it. I really enjoyed The Bone Shard Daughter and I’ve been meaning to read this for a while now. It’s also one of the bigger books on my readathon TBR, so I’m not sure if I will actually get round to this.

Read a book with a female character:

Together We Burn – Isabel Ibañez

I picked up Together We Burn a while ago on a buy one, get one half price offer at my local bookshop. The premise sounds interesting and the cover is really pretty too. Oh, and there’s also dragons 😀

Read a book with fire in the title / on the cover:

The Boy With Fire – Aparna Verma

This has been languishing on my shelf for a while now. It’s due to be re-released next year with Orbit Books, so this readathon is a good opportunity to read the self-published version first.

Read a book chosen at random:

The Atlas Six – Olivie Blake

I picked this up on a Kindle daily deal / sale, as I’d heard a lot about it. The Atlas Six hasn’t really been on my radar at all this year, so I thought it would nicely for this prompt.

Read a book with a bard or jester character:

A River Enchanted – Rebecca Ross

A River Enchanted has been part of my Illumicrate backlog for a while now and, as with a number of books on this list, this readathon is providing the perfect opportunity to actually attempt to read it.

Read a book by a trans or non-binary author:

Hold Fast Through The Fire – K.B. Wagers

I loved A Pale Light in the Black when I read it back in 2020 and I have been waiting for the right time to read Hold Fast Through The Fire. I loved the found family vibes in the first book and I cannot wait to catch up with the Neo-G crew soon.

Read a book by a deceased author:

The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafón

I first read this several years ago and I am very much looking forward to re-reading it. There are a number of sequels too, so I’m hoping to get round to those soon as well.

Read a book written by a woman:

Hall of Smoke – H.M Long

I’ve attempted to read Hall of Smoke a couple of times and haven’t really made much progress. I feel like this one you need to read while curled up under a big blanket with a hot drink, so I might make the most of staying in and doing exactly that.

Read a book in a trilogy:

Torn – Rowenna Miller

Torn has been on my Kindle for ages. It’s also on my 2022 TBR (along with the rest of the trilogy), so I think this will be one that I try and prioritise for this readathon.

Bonus – Read a book released in 2020 or after:

Foxhunt – Rem Wigmore

This is the final book from my birthday book haul that I need to read. I don’t know much about it, but I really liked the cover and the story sounds interesting. It’s one of the shorter books on my list and as a result, it will probably be one of the first I read.

Bonus – Multiple choice author prompt:

Song of the Lioness quartet – Tamora Pierce

At Fantasy Fellowship con a couple of weekends ago, the moderators asked the authors for a prompt that the server members could choose for the final readathon prompt. I decided to go with Robin Hobb’s, which is to read a book you found comforting as a child / teenager.

As soon as I saw that one, I just knew that I was going to pick the Song of the Lioness quartet by Tamora Pierce. I’ve been wanting to re-read it anyway as part of my re-reading series on the blog, but I also just want to read something that I found so comforting as a kid. The last time I read it was when I was 11 years old, so I’m equal parts incredibly excited and terrified to return to a world I loved so much when I was younger!

So, that’s my October TBR! I’m really excited for this readathon and while I know I might not read every single book, I’m still looking forward to reading what I can. Bring on 1st October!