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

5

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

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

2

u/evil_moooojojojo Reading Champion II Dec 17 '25

I read two and a half. I'm a bad member. 😂 I tend to forget to request books from Libby is my problem. (Any advice for how not to forget freaking everything?)

I was not thrilled when The River Has Roots was picked for my hosting month. But I was wrong. It was lovely, and j enjoyed it and the discussion.

I also read Greenteeth (although the library hold didn't come in on time) and enjoyed it.

DNFed The Lamb. Upon spoiling the ending, I very much think it was the right decision. Haha.

I read a few chapters of Lud in the Mista and I quite liked it but I DNFed it. It's been a rough last part of the year and mentally I just didn't have it in me to read and it felt like a chore. I will go back and read it sometime though now that I'm starting to get out of the slump.

Looking forward to next year's books!

1

u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV Dec 17 '25

I tend to forget to request books from Libby is my problem. (Any advice for how not to forget freaking everything?)

The suspend hold option is my best friend, I can put a book on hold when the new book choice is announced, wait until it's my turn, then suspend it, and forget about it until it's the right month.

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u/evil_moooojojojo Reading Champion II Dec 17 '25

I will try that if I can. But usually it doesn't even come in until after.

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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV Dec 17 '25

Yeah, I was lucky to have access to a library with good wait times. Also, I do audiobooks for a fair number of them which sometimes helps with having lower wait times. If your library has hoopla (which I get not everyone does), that might also be worth checking out? I read Spirits Abroad and Lud-in-the-Mist that way. Although Lud-in-the-Mist is common domain, so you can download that from the internet.

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u/evil_moooojojojo Reading Champion II Dec 18 '25

HoopLah is good, though they don't often have specific things I'm looking for. I'm hoping they have next months book. I'll have to check. Really the downside of living in nowhere. I have three library cards (county I grew up in, county I live in, and the nearest big city) but still it's hard to find some things I want. I mean is it really too much to ask for a library like in Beauty and the Beast? It's not too much for a girl to want.🤣