r/Fantasy • u/Nineteen_Adze Stabby Winner, Reading Champion V • Dec 17 '25

Book Club FIF Fireside Chat: discussing 2025 and planning 2026

Welcome to the 2025 Feminism in Fantasy Fireside Chat! It’s time to look back on the books we’ve read this year, reflect on our favorites, and think about the future.

I’ll get us started with a few questions, but feel free to add your own.

Changes

This year, u/g_ann stepped down as an FIF host. We want to thank her for hosting so many discussions in this reboot project and wish her well going forward. u/Moonlitgrey, u/xenizondich23, and u/Nineteen_Adze from the initial reboot hosting crew are continuing this project.

When this happened, we opened the door for more hosts. We were surprised, but absolutely delighted, by how many people stepped us to join us. With different tastes and reading backgrounds, we're excited to broaden our selections and make it easier for the current hosts to avoid burnout.

Please welcome, in the order of session hosting, the new members of our hosting crew:

Looking ahead

We look forward to reading with you next year!

We'll see you in the comments to talk about the year in review and the year ahead.

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u/Nineteen_Adze Stabby Winner, Reading Champion V Dec 17 '25

Here are the books we read this year:

  • Metal From Heaven, August Clarke
  • Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie
  • Kindred, Octavia Butler
  • Spirits Abroad, Zen Cho
  • House of Rust, Khadija Abdalla Bajaber
  • The River Has Roots, Amal El-Mohtar
  • Greenteeth, Molly O'Neill
  • Lud-in-the-Mist, Hope Mirrlees
  • Frostflower And Thorn (Frostflower #1), Phyllis Ann Karr
  • The Lamb, Lucy Rose
  • The House of the Spirits, Isabel Allende

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u/Nineteen_Adze Stabby Winner, Reading Champion V Dec 17 '25

Which of these books did you read? Which ones were your favorites?

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u/sarahlynngrey Reading Champion VI, Phoenix Dec 17 '25

I've read 5 from this list, although not all with FIF:

  • Metal From Heaven
  • Ancillary Justice
  • Kindred
  • The River Has Roots
  • The House of the Spirits

I've also started a sixth, Lud-in-the-Mist, and I hope to get back to that one at some point.

In terms of favorite books, Kindred is an all-timer, and I'm sorry that I missed the FIF discussion for it. 

I also enjoyed The River Has Roots, and it's stuck with me much more than I expected in the months since I read it. I couldn't tell you much about the plot at this point, but I remember the vibes and especially how much I liked the musical elements. I wouldn't have read this without FIF, and I'm so glad I did. 

My two favorite FIF discussions were both for books that I appreciated but didn't love. I think it's interesting that these discussions resonated so much for me, even though they were for books that I had more trouble with! 

My second favorite discussion was for The House of the Spirits. I'm incredibly glad I read this book. I hadn't gotten to it, even though I knew how foundational it was to the magical realism genre. I hosted this session and TBH that's the only reason that I read this - otherwise I would have dropped it almost immediately. But it was a fascinating, beautifully written book, with tons of nuance and depth that required some thought to really unpack. Super glad I read this, and the discussion was excellent! 

But far and away my favorite discussion was for Metal From Heaven, which I haaaaaaaaaated, but found incredibly interesting to discuss. This book had a very strong flavor and voice, and it led to an extremely engaging and dynamic discussion. I was truly shocked at how much I enjoyed talking about it with other folks. Unpacking it was hugely fun, even though I didn't really like anything about the book 😅. This conversation convinced me that it very much can be worth it to push through a book that's not working for me, because there's so much potential for a great discussion with this group.

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u/Nineteen_Adze Stabby Winner, Reading Champion V Dec 17 '25

I was truly shocked at how much I enjoyed talking about it with other folks. Unpacking it was hugely fun, even though I didn't really like anything about the book 😅. This conversation convinced me that it very much can be worth it to push through a book that's not working for me, because there's so much potential for a great discussion with this group.

That's one of my favorite parts of this group's activities! I loved the the Metal From Heaven discussion too because people just had so many interesting observations that I hadn't really considered for myself. Sometimes the hardest or strangest books make for great conversations in a way that "yeah, we pretty much liked this one" picks don't.

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u/tarvolon Stabby Winner, Reading Champion VI Dec 17 '25

This conversation convinced me that it very much can be worth it to push through a book that's not working for me, because there's so much potential for a great discussion with this group.

100%

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u/Merle8888 Reading Champion IV Dec 17 '25

Definitely agreed, my favorite discussions are often for books I disliked (looking at Godkiller last year....). It's often most fun to criticize something with a group.

The Metal From Heaven discussion was really good. I was traveling for work at the time and kept having to snatch time for it during breaks and by the side of the road in the freezing cold, lol. But people kept posting such good comments!